Hacker News Board Hacker News, browsed like a classic message board
Live data from Hacker News

Atari co-founder: mobile games make me want to throw my phone

theguardian.com

Post reply on HN
Print view View original

141–150 of 221 posts

Re: Atari co-founder: mobile games make me want to throw my phone

#141

Post by joezydeco »

bigtunacan wrote: post #110
joezydeco wrote: post #97

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Yeah, I'm not on the bandwagon either. Bushnell has started more than twenty companies and is one of the founding fathers of the video game industry. Okay, sure. How many are still going, and how many didn't completely sink the money of the respective investors? I get that Bushnell is a smart game guy, but IMO Atari was a lightning strike he's been trying to replicate ever since.

First I think the original parent is spot on about this being an ad spot for Bushnell's newest venture. On the lighting only striking once though you are certainly off base. Chuck E Cheese was big in it's own right and I'm sure you have heard of at least one of the other companies he started; it's called Pixar.

I'll give you half a point on CEC, but the founding of CEC was more about getting more Atari units into communities that wouldn't allow arcades.

And, no, Bushnell had nothing to do with Pixar, which had been around for 4-5 years at LucasFilm before CEC sold off Kadabrascope to Lucas in a fire sale. Pixar started with Ray and Catmull.

Re: Atari co-founder: mobile games make me want to throw my phone

#142

Post by st3v3r »

snarfy wrote: post #95

I love video games and became a developer because of them. I've always wanted to make a game and mobile is supposed to be the renaissance of indy game development. But I just can't do it. I hate the touch screen. It is a horrible input device for gaming. It makes every game as frustrating as typing a sms full of auto-corrects. I can't imagine any game I would make would be fun.

That's probably because you're thinking too much about traditional controls.

Re: Atari co-founder: mobile games make me want to throw my phone

#143

Post by protomikron »

greenspot wrote: post #129

MUST-WATCH in this context: South Park S18 E6, it's about Freemium, Mobile, Addiction, Dopamine in very educative AND funny way Here full episode in HD (you can switch to English): http://www.southpark.de/alle-episoden/s18e06-freemium-gibts-...

Thank you, that was fantastic! :) Classic South Park. Direct but with lots of truth in there.

Re: Atari co-founder: mobile games make me want to throw my phone

#144

Post by st3v3r »

jordache wrote: post #116

Just republish gameboy, game gear, lynx, neogeo titles, and you'll have a great mobile gaming ecosystem.

No. Having a lack of buttons means controls for games designed with buttons in mind would be terrible.

Look to those games for inspiration, but the games made need to first and foremost embrace the touchscreen, rather than attempt to emulate traditional controls.

Re: Atari co-founder: mobile games make me want to throw my phone

#145

Post by hypertexthero »

To me a good game is an experience to immerse myself in, and for some reason I have never managed to do so on portable devices such as mobile phones.

I played my first videogames on an Atari 2600. I remember Defender, Space Invaders, Night Driver, Pac Man, Adventure and River Raid. Then Super Mario Bros, Zelda, Battle City, and a multitude of titles on those '1000 games' Japanese cartridges with physical switches on NES and later SNES, many of these in [black and white][1]!

The SNES was my last console. My parents gave me a 386 PC-XT where I played a [version of Space War][2], Sopwith, Rogue, Falcon 1.0, Double Dragon 2, Sim City 2000 and Doom. On later computers I played Daggerfall, XCOM, TIE Fighter, System Shock, Thief, Subspace, Grand Theft Auto, Jagged Alliance, Far Cry 2.

Presently I'm enjoying Elite: Dangerous and Metal Gear Solid V on a Macbook Pro.

[1]: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/PAL-M

[2]: http://hypertexthero.com/logbook/2006/06/spacewar/

(Edited for formatting.)

Re: Atari co-founder: mobile games make me want to throw my phone

#147

Post by baldfat »

harryaka wrote: post #54
Tenhundfeld wrote: post #48

Earlier quoted context omitted.

If anybody's looking for a side project, I think there's a curation opportunity here. I'd subscribe to a newsletter focused on great, non-IAP-driven iOS games. It could be weekly or monthly, with a mix of new games and classic gems that maybe aren't so well known. I'd tolerate a fair amount of advertising or sponsored content in the newsletter as long as it was clearly labeled. The key thing for me is quality . I thi…

Check out Curated, pretty much does what you're looking for: https://play.google.com/store/apps/details?id=com.curated.an...

Last updated August 2015

Re: Atari co-founder: mobile games make me want to throw my phone

#149

Post by bigtunacan »

AceJohnny2 wrote: post #133
bigtunacan wrote: post #110

Earlier quoted context omitted.

First I think the original parent is spot on about this being an ad spot for Bushnell's newest venture. On the lighting only striking once though you are certainly off base. Chuck E Cheese was big in it's own right and I'm sure you have heard of at least one of the other companies he started; it's called Pixar.

The link between the Bushnell-founded Kadabrascope, sold to Lucas in 1984 in a fire sale to save Chuck E. Cheese, and the founding of Pixar in 1986 as a spin-off of Lucasfilm's Computer Division (which was founded in 1979) is hazy. Yes, Bushnell created what probably became a part of Pixar, but calling him a founder is pushing it.

True enough; founder is stretching, but there is definitely a link there that as an outsider is difficult for us to really measure. If I had called it Kadabrascope though; most people wouldn't know what I'm referring to ;-)

No doubt though he is a smart business man with multiple ventures under his belt. I do believe he really has a passion for what he does as well; the fact that he is still doing this in his 70s when he surely has plenty of F-You money says something about his passion for this industry.

Re: Atari co-founder: mobile games make me want to throw my phone

#150

Post by Declanomous »

rasz_pl wrote: post #64
Declanomous wrote: post #47

Earlier quoted context omitted.

For you and I maybe. Touchscreens are very natural for people who have grown up using them. My 3 year old cousin (once removed) can destroy most people I know at touchscreen games because she has grown up using touchscreens. My cousin's mother gave her a glossy magazine to read a while back, and she tried swiping the pages to turn them.

its like saying your cousin is great at special Olympics, same goes for console FPS/RTS.

First of all, I assume you mean the Paraolympics. The Special Olympics is for people with mental disabilities, the Paraolympics are for individuals with physical disabilities.

Second of all, that metaphor is not true at all. Great works are often improved by working within the limitations of their medium. To claim otherwise is utterly absurd.

Post reply on HN