Atari 50: The Anniversary Celebration Reviews
This is an extraordinary effort to preserve and cherish Atari's legacy and the history of early electronic game development in general. Despite some clunkers and a few omissions, this collection is required playing for any serious student of video games, or anyone ever moved by the magic of Atari.
Like any retro game collection, how much you get out of Atari 50: The Anniversary Celebration is largely limited by your appreciation of its games. There are a lot here, and it’s safe to say that the majority of them didn’t really hold our interest. There are some classics that remain very playable though, and some were worth returning to just for a hit of nostalgia. The real reason to pick this up, though, is its wealth of museum-like content, as well as its new, reimagined takes on some popular titles. They make this a retro collection like no other.
Atari 50 is... an anniversary celebration of the Atari brand and... is a must-own for retro enthusiasts, gaming historians, and anyone interested in learning about the video game industry’s infancy stages!
Your outlook on Atari 50: The Anniversary Celebration is going to depend on your perspective. As a historical document, it chronicles Atari as a company but still seems focused on the 2600 and old arcade stuff above all else. As a game compilation, it still feels lacking in the latter half of the company's game history, as some of the more interesting titles from the 7800 era onward aren't here; one can argue that the company's output at the time doesn't make the job any easier, though. There are certainly enough curios to keep existing owners of Atari Vault interested thanks to the presence of new titles here, but it could've used more curation to make it an item that's worth celebrating.
Atari 50: The Anniversary Celebration is one of the best game compilations of all-time as Digital Eclipse proves they are one of the best at what they do once again. It isn’t just the fact that you get 100+ Atari games but that you get them presented to you in such a well thought out way. You get to hear from the people who worked on these games and get the learn the backstory on them before jumping in and playing a game for yourself. This is a must-own for any Atari fan and anyone who is mildly curious about the company’s heritage.
Atari 50: The Anniversary Celebration sets a new bar of quality for both game collections and documentary series. This is not only the history of Atari, but also of games as media, entertainment and business.
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Not every Atari game stands up today as a playable masterpiece, and that’s just fine. Atari 50: The Anniversary Celebration provides just about the best contextually driven system for playing and appreciating classic retro games that I’ve ever hit, and it’s an absolute must-have for any gamer of any age. I mean, Tempest 2000 is worth the price of admission alone, but along the way, you’ll learn a lot about gaming history, gaming development and even the weird and wonderful deals and dodgy antics that Atari got up to in its golden age.
Can you imagine a company like Nintendo being so open and honest as we see the participants in this project being? I somehow doubt it, as fascinating as a Nintendo equivalent of Atari 50 would surely be. So for now we’ll have to enjoy Atari 50 as a standout, exemplary title that shows everyone else how interactive video game history and preservation should be done. Perhaps one day some other big players in the space will be open to letting us into their archives in the same way.
This is not a collection of fantastic games, but a fantastic history lesson about gaming's most important company. Atari 50: The Anniversary Celebration is a journey that begins from the distant '70s, with Pong and the 2600, goes through the 7800 and Jaguar eras, and actually concludes… today, as besides all the classic titles, small documentary-like videos, and so on, this even includes reimagined titles, plus unreleased prototypes - and more. Digital Eclipse crafted a rightful tribute to a legendary pioneer.
As an interactive timeline and a virtual exhibit, Atari 50 is unparalleled. No other historical collection comes close to how awesome this is as a context-rich story (the only ones that do are also from the same developer). I hope that this style of giving historical context and not just presenting a list of 40-year-old games without any explanation is the trend going forward for packages like this. Even if I'm not chomping at the bit to play some RealSports Football, I'm thrilled that I now know its place in the grand history of Atari.
As a long-time gamer who's stuck in the past, I must say that Atari 50: The Anniversary Celebration is one of the best compilations ever produced. From its expansive museums to its wide variety of classic games and hidden gems, it really is the cat's pajamas.
Atari 50: The Anniversary Celebration. . . shows us what digital archival in gaming could look like. Many of these documents were fished from dumpsters when Atari went bust. These slivers of history could have been lost forever. Instead, Digital Eclipse found them, polished them up, and put them into a museum where they belong.
To say that the Atari 50: The Anniversary Celebration is jam packed with content is an understatement. Atari and Digital Eclipse really did a great job with this release and you can tell a lot of work went into making it. Despite some of the odd game choices and the inclusion of terrible Atari XE games this is a fantastic collection overall and should not be missed by anyone.
Far more than a mere collection of well-known games, Atari 50 sets the standard for chronicling the history of an icon
An outstanding package in its own right and the new standard by which all future retro compilations should be measured, Atari 50: The Anniversary Celebration serves as a love letter to a bygone era, a reminder of the power the name once held and a tantalising glimpse at how some of gaming’s most storied franchises can be revitalised in the right hands. Highly recommended for anyone remotely interested in gaming history. A particular affinity for Atari? Utterly essential.
Depending on if you are new to gaming and want to test the waters with some old-school games, or you’re like me and used to play the Atari consoles back in the day, this title is for you. Revisiting memories from when things were simpler offers endless hours of fun, and this collection is a great way to honour how it all began.
Due to the fact some classic and amazing arcade games are missing from Atari 50 I can only award it the Thumb Culture Gold Award. Hopefully, some future deals can be achieved to help bring them to this title and make it the ultimate Atari compendium!
Atari has just set a new benchmark for retro game compilations with Atari 50: The Anniversary Celebration. There's been a lot of talk recently about how bad the gaming industry is at preserving its history, but this robust package should be the ideal that all game companies strive for.
I know I’ve said time and time again that “game x” is a love letter to “franchise y”, to a nearly exhaustive degree, but Atari 50: The Anniversary Celebration is just something else. It’s a worthy celebration of one of the most important companies not in gaming’s history, but technology history in general. Hell, maybe even the 20th century as a whole. The sheer amount of games included in it, both old and new, would already make this collection worth checking out for a retro enthusiast, but the tons of extras, namely footage from the 70s and modern interviews with Atari alumni and celebrity fans, result in this almost becoming a playable documentary.
Outside of the unavoidable roadblock of no Warner Bros titles, Atari 50 is a godly compilation that couldn’t have been more lovingly curated, and just like how I sung the praises of SNK 40th for years to come, I’ll no doubt be doing this for Atari 50 and hoping this is a template for future compilations, from all over the world.