Intellivision Amico - Tommy Tallarico introduction + Q&A

17 minutes ago, Intellivision Master said:

Thank you !

This Christmas, instead of having Amico under the tree, because of covid we received a PS5 from Santa Claus !
If we are lucky, we will have Amico in April just in time for my son's birthday ! 😀

4 minutes ago, LePionnier said:

Thank you !

This Christmas, instead of having Amico under the tree, because of covid we received a PS5 from Santa Claus !
If we are lucky, we will have Amico in April just in time for my son's birthday ! 😀

You're welcome.  That's great you were able to get a PS5.  I know they're hard to come by right now.  I'm hoping the Amico releases in April.  That would be a nice birthday present for your son.  

Just a quick note to say Merry Christmas to all my friends here at Atari Age!  So many great discussions, ideas and thoughts from everyone.  Thank you all for your continued support and interest in what we're doing.

2021 is gonna be a GREAT year.

Appreciate you!

From my family, to everyone in the Intellivision Family, have a very Merry Christmas and a Happy New Year!

Tommy,

I know Pinball has been talked about before on Amico.  I came across this cute pinball game on Apple Arcade.  It's called The Pinball Wizard.  I played a few minutes of it and it's actually pretty fun.  The game play & art style seem like a perfect match for Amico.  It even has a story too which I thought was interesting.  If this came to Amico, you could change the story & have different enemies/characters.  Add in couch co op as well.  The game could also make good use of the Amico controller's touch screen/motion controls.  Anyway, it would be neat to see this on Amico or something similar.

One of my Christmas gifts was some photo art by one my daughters. Of course still shill’n for Intellivision even in family photos. Have a Happy Holiday and an Amico New Year everyone!

On 12/23/2020 at 2:58 PM, ASalvaro said:

has Jumpman on the Amico been talked about yet?

i played it last night on the C64 emu for the 1st time in 30 years and man what a great game that is 

and i read someplace that the author Randy Glover has the rights to it so it would be pretty easy to get it on the Amico 

Hey, that reminds me of Jumpman Forever, a licensed sequel that came out a few years ago for PC and OUYA:

https://www.midnightryder.com/jumpman-forever/

Contractual issues prevented a release on the mainstream consoles (or at least, according to the developer), but perhaps an Amico version would skirt around that?

Has IE talked with WayForward about possibly working together? They've got a huge amount of experience in the family and "retro" spheres.

No Amico’s under the tree this year, so we fell back to plan B. 
 

Merry Christmas to all!  ... a day late.. I forgot to post yesterday. 🤭

Here is this year's "Retro Christmas Tree".  This is something fun I like to do every year for Xmas.  I started it about 5 years ago when I saw an old picture of this very tree in the mid-80's and I thought.. well, I have the tree and lights, just need the other stuff.

So... here it is in short.   The tree was my family tree and purchased somewhere back in '84 or '85.  Many of the ornaments on it are my family's dating back to the 60's!  I remember putting some of them on the tree as a little kid.

The fun stuff... under the tree.  Some originals, some remakes.  But look around under there, you'll see The Red Rider (A Christmas Story),  a highly modified version of Schwinn's Mike's Bike (Stranger Things), Rock'em Sock'em Robots, Sears Super Video Arcade, A "Red Rocket" Flexible Flyer, NY Jets 80's style Helmet, and a bunch of other fun stuff we remember from being kids.  Missing is Simon... it's there now, but was not in the pics.

Anyhow.. a little taste of Christmas in the 80's for the house.  I just thought what better way to display all this retro stuff than putting it under a Retro X-Mass Treee?  LOL!

Wish list for the tree...

a few Matchbox cars and a playset

Marx Navarrone Hill or Battleground playsets

A few more MB Games like "Which Witch" or "Emergency!"

An original "Game of Life"

Some old Revell or Monogram Plastic Airplane model kits (I know Hobby Lobby still sells them).

Merry Christmas to all!

2 hours ago, IMBerzerk said:

The fun stuff... under the tree.  Some originals, some remakes.  But look around under there, you'll see The Red Rider (A Christmas Story),  a highly modified version of Schwinn's Mike's Bike (Stranger Things), Rock'em Sock'em Robots, Sears Super Video Arcade, A "Red Rocket" Flexible Flyer, NY Jets 80's style Helmet, and a bunch of other fun stuff we remember from being kids.  Missing is Simon... it's there now, but was not in the pics.

I see Mastermind in there... that's a fun game!

15 minutes ago, Zoyous said:

I see Mastermind in there... that's a fun game!

What if we got that on Amico?  Wouldn't that be something?

10 minutes ago, Intellivision Master said:

What if we got that on Amico?  Wouldn't that be something?

I was just going to suggest working with Pressman Toy 

Funny how that works!

5 hours ago, IMBerzerk said:

So... here it is in short.   The tree was my family tree and purchased somewhere back in '84 or '85.  Many of the ornaments on it are my family's dating back to the 60's!  I remember putting some of them on the tree as a little kid.

great stuff, I wish we still had all the tree ornaments from the 70s, there is/was something magical about them, Anyway, love that idea of a retro tree. 

Good article, but think they forgot one; 2 actually

https://apple.news/AoQvEi5j0QY2_tjLPKtXHng

2 hours ago, Starpaddler said:

Good article, but think they forgot one; 2 actually

 

https://apple.news/AoQvEi5j0QY2_tjLPKtXHng

Intellivision and Arcadia 2001.... they also forgot the Fairchild Channel F system which had it's own unique controller as well.

On 12/26/2020 at 3:08 AM, Battlefish said:

Has IE talked with WayForward about possibly working together? They've got a huge amount of experience in the family and "retro" spheres.

I was just thinking that WayForward could be a good fit for the Amico, a new Mighty Switch Force would be great!

On 12/18/2020 at 3:52 PM, Tommy Tallarico said:

A very dear and old friend of mine was the guy who created GEX.  We worked together in the early 90's at Virgin (he was a producer and a designer).  He now owns and runs Heavy Iron Studios and we've been talking for over a year about doing something on Amico.  He doesn't own the rights or name for GEX... but it's something we could potential do a deal for with the folks who own it.  But the project he wants to do on Amico is actually even cooler (in my opinion).

 

 

Hmmm, the plot thickens! When I think about Virgin Games the first game that comes to mind is Robocop Vs Terminator, though that might be a bit too violent for the Amico I guess...

With you mentioning the Amico's styling being inspired Ferrari and Lamborghini cars it makes me wonder about a Ferrari or Lamborghini licensed game, or maybe even Ferrari V Lamborghini!

Also, I came across this little gem on Youtube earlier, it'd definitely be cool to see a sequel to this, maybe call it Lomax the Lemming since Lemmings has more brand recognition than Lomax. It has really nice graphics, I must say.

Longplay of The Adventures of Lomax/Lomax - YouTube

8 hours ago, IMBerzerk said:

Intellivision and Arcadia 2001.... they also forgot the Fairchild Channel F system which had it's own unique controller as well.

 

 

And the Bally Astrocade, and ColecoVision, and the 5200 had THEIR unique controls, all ambidextrous.

  At around 1983, there were at least 10 consoles considered "current": 2600, Intellivision, ColecoVision, 5200, Odyssey 2, Astrocade, Arcadia 2001, Vectrex, (in the budget bin) Fairchild Channel F, and Starpath Supercharger.  That doesn't count at least 5 main computer lines: Apple IIe, Commodore 64, Commodore Vic 20, Atari 400/800, TRS 80, and "IBM compatibles".

And of those 15 ecosystems, all 5 computers had software-based Ambidexterity, 5 of them had built in Ambidexterity, 2 of them shared in de facto third party Ambi models, one was righty only (Odyssey 2) one was lefty only (Vectrex) and the Fairchild I have never seen in the wild.  I "heard" those joysticks were ambi.

I got a very different reaction from Japanese companies.  Nintendo basically told me in the SNES days "get good" with the Authorized sticks.  Sega, with arguably more than 50% American roots, actually hooked me up with KY Enterprises, a precursor to Able Gamers.

BTW Hori USA loved my design on sinistersticks.com predicted it would sell in America, and yet  said the Japanese main HQ won't allow them to do it.  Is there something in Japanese Culture that hates right-handed joysticks?  Is that an equivalent to a middle finger to a Japanese person?

On 12/24/2020 at 12:50 PM, Relicgamer said:

Ok haven't been on on a while so sorry if this has been asked. 

With the recent buzz of you showing some Youtubers the physical media can we get a confirmed date when you will show the rest of us commoners?  

Not exactly sure just yet.  We're working on some pretty cool things with some big YouTubers (10M - 15M+ subscribers) so we may give the exclusive to one of them... however it would probably be a few months before we launch, so it will depend on whether we hit our April date.  If we are unable to hit April, we are looking at June or July.

On 12/24/2020 at 3:56 PM, IMBerzerk said:

My friend, you have found a gold mine of fun with a game that never gets old.  My daughter is now 20, 3rd year away at college and to this day still challenges me to a "Frog Bog Championship of the World" everytime she's home for the holidays.  We've been at this over 15 years, started at about age 4 for her.  Best of three, and she almost ALWAYS wins!! 

 

This year she drew me my Birthday card for my 51st (yesterday)... Here it is ... Lol.  Frog Bog.  Hahahaha.

 

Enjoy the fun of playing with her...it's years of laughter.  

 

Same for Shark Shark...and don't forget Snafu.  Play the "nibble the tail game".  I think it's game 8 or 9 or something like that.  Triple Action Battle Tanks is a blast with little kids too..with all the bouncing balls flying all over the place. 

 

Merry Christmas!

 

 

 

 

This is a great story as well!!  With your permission I'd love to share this next week also.

On 12/25/2020 at 8:45 AM, vongruetz said:

From my family, to everyone in the Intellivision Family, have a very Merry Christmas and a Happy New Year!

LOVE the Running Man hat!!  Hahahahhaa!!!

On 12/25/2020 at 11:59 AM, Intellivision Master said:

Tommy,

I know Pinball has been talked about before on Amico.  I came across this cute pinball game on Apple Arcade.  It's called The Pinball Wizard.  I played a few minutes of it and it's actually pretty fun.  The game play & art style seem like a perfect match for Amico.  It even has a story too which I thought was interesting.  If this came to Amico, you could change the story & have different enemies/characters.  Add in couch co op as well.  The game could also make good use of the Amico controller's touch screen/motion controls.  Anyway, it would be neat to see this on Amico or something similar.

 

Nice find.

Looks interesting.   I'll check it out.

On 12/25/2020 at 4:36 PM, GrudgeQ said:

One of my Christmas gifts was some photo art by one my daughters. Of course still shill’n for Intellivision even in family photos. Have a Happy Holiday and an Amico New Year everyone!

Hahahha!  Love this!!