Intellivision Amico - Tommy Tallarico introduction + Q&A

26 minutes ago, IntelliMission said:

Yeah, I mean after that one (which was released about 10 years ago).

He was working on Fable Legends, an online multiplayer RPG for Xbox One, but MS killed the project and shut Lionhead Studios down in 2016.

3 minutes ago, vongruetz said:

What would be hilarious, and the ultimate mic drop moment, is if it was Nolan Bushnell.  

Wouldn't that be something?

15 hours ago, Tommy Tallarico said:

Here's a good one.  Betcha didn't know that Amico was supposed to come with 17 pack-in games!!!

 

Don't worry... neither did I!  

 

Where do they get this stuff from!??!?

https://www.thegamer.com/intellivision-amico-gamestop-exclusive-purple/

 

 

This was a leak from the atari VCS people.. They Demo'd Tempest 4000 on "actual hardware". Turns out that the linux powered machine did not have a linux binary. That came from a very surprised Jeff Minter... Who wrote the game. That may have been remedied by now. But I haven't been keeping up with the console. Just all the emails I get about all the other stuff the people are doing. Like Hotels. Blockchain. Casinos? 

14 hours ago, Tommy Tallarico said:

Yo!,

 

Just wanted to let everyone know that today we hired an absolute game industry LEGEND as our Managing Director of Intellivision.  The game industry and press are gonna FREAK when they find out who is helping to work on Amico now!  Talk about a mic drop moment!

He's a friend who contacted me a few weeks ago.  He's been retired for over 10 years (yet still a young guy) and didn't think anything would ever get him out of retirement... until he saw what we were doing with Amico.  He was just calling to congratulate me on everything and how passionate he was about the entire concept behind Amico and how he's been banging the same drum since the 90's! (i.e. bringing people together and reaching a wider audience).  Him and his brother grew up playing Intellivision and it's the inspiration behind his gaming career and one of the most famous gaming products on the planet.  I said why don't you come and work with me on it!  He was blown away by the idea.  This is a guy who doesn't do things for money... but out of sheer passion.  By the next morning after speaking with his finance, he was all in and ready for the adventure!

 

The bad news is that I can't tell anyone who it is right now as we're putting together a big press release about it which should be out over the next few weeks.

But WOW! WOW! WOW!  Even hardcore gamers aren't gonna believe this one. 

 

@RxScram & @nurmix know who it is... I'm pretty sure they are over the moon and are both extremely ecstatic and impressed... but I'll let them talk about it in their own words (without giving any hints of who it is!!)

 

Score another BIG point for Intellivision today!!

 

Can't wait to share this info with the rest of the world!

 

I am throwing my SWAG out as John Romero, co-founded of id Software and designer of Wolfenstein 3D, Doom, Quake, etc.

41 minutes ago, vongruetz said:

What would be hilarious, and the ultimate mic drop moment, is if it was Nolan Bushnell.  

That was my first guess but I don't think he has been retired for 10 years. 

I'll guess Will Wright.

20 minutes ago, NTV said:

That was my first guess but I don't think he has been retired for 10 years. 

Also would have been really hard for Nolan, founder of Atari, to have "grew up playing Intellivision".

1 minute ago, GrudgeQ said:

Also would have been really hard for Nolan, founder of Atari, to have "grew up playing Intellivision".

Good point!

Will Wright has been working on a mysterious new game called Proxi since 2016, so it can't be him.

11 hours ago, popsicle said:

Las Vegas - 2-5 player dice roller. Roll all of your dice, and place matching dice in a 'casino' until your dice are gone. Amount of dice at end wins the point value (cards that are dealt at the start of each). Players that tie are cancelled, and can't win. This often leads to strange upsets, and adds strategy to where to place your dice. The thought of 'dice chuckers' with the Amico controller is exciting!

My sister has this game and it is a go-to at many family gatherings.  My 6yo son loves it.  It would be great to see this on the Amico.

8 hours ago, MarioMan88 said:

Yea wonder how the haters will reconcile this? 
 

Can’t wait to see who it is!  

Well if it was someone like Shigeru Miyamoto they couldn't wiggle out of that on. Fyi I'm not saying its him its just a reference.  But there is a host of powerhouses out there. I excited to hear who. But for me I think in the end Tommy have made gaming more fun just having this anticipation of things to come and a bringing up a new level of gaming.  

34 minutes ago, NTV said:

That was my first guess but I don't think he has been retired for 10 years. 

He's also not young.

4 minutes ago, Relicgamer said:

Well if it was someone like Shigeru Miyamoto they couldn't wiggle out of that on. Fyi I'm not saying its him its just a reference.  But there is a host of powerhouses out there. I excited to hear who. But for me I think in the end Tommy have made gaming more fun just having this anticipation of things to come and a bringing up a new level of gaming.  

Me too, I’m all in and have been from day 1. Glad to hear other industry vets are coming on board! 

I can't think of who meets the criteria of being famous, relatively young, and retired for 10 years so I won't try guessing. Of course, when it gets announced I'll probably still not know who it is without researching and then everyone's going to laugh at me for being young. Oh well.

29 minutes ago, GrudgeQ said:

Also would have been really hard for Nolan, founder of Atari, to have "grew up playing Intellivision".

That was my thought too.  A lot of the people I initially thought of were too old.  So we're looking for a man, mid-50's probably, probably from the US, has a fiancee(?) and a brother, and he was involved in one of the biggest video gaming products in the world. He also retired around 10 years ago, but does that mean he couldn't be an advisor or something on a project?  Someone here should be able to put it all together...

25 minutes ago, vongruetz said:

So we're looking for a man, mid-50's probably, probably from the US, has a fiancee(?) and a brother, and he was involved in one of the biggest video gaming products in the world. He also retired around 10 years ago, but does that mean he couldn't be an advisor or something on a project?

You have your orders...

And this might be a good place to start looking: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_video_game_industry_people

6 minutes ago, vongruetz said:

That was my thought too.  A lot of the people I initially thought of were too old.  So we're looking for a man, mid-50's probably, probably from the US, has a fiancee(?) and a brother, and he was involved in one of the biggest video gaming products in the world. He also retired around 10 years ago, but does that mean he couldn't be an advisor or something on a project?  Someone here should be able to put it all together...

Also most likely an American. Intellivision didn't have much success in Europe or Japan, so growing up playing it would be unlikely.

Ouch! Yeah, that kind of leaves Peter Molyneux and any other European developers out.

I think the key is that the original Intellivision inspired him to create "one of the most famous gaming products on the planet".

5 hours ago, IntelliMission said:

It looks like we will have several weeks to take guesses on who the new guy is.

 

So please, try to think about some famous dude who used to do cool video games until 2010. NOW! We need to solve this riddle. 🧐

Maybe Tommy meant he was in a video game? 

My guess is Mr Bean!

He will also be used for all the new commercials and marketing.

TJ

9 minutes ago, IntelliMission said:

Ouch! Yeah, that kind of leaves Peter Molyneux and any other European developers out.

 

I think the key is that the original Intellivision inspired him to create "one of the most famous gaming products on the planet".

If I’m a betting man(which i don’t) Ed Fries is right age, 50ish, has older brother and helped create original Xbox. Just a guess...I’m bored during quarantine 😂

4 minutes ago, Tommy Tallarico said:

With all this talk of Murder Hornets going around, I think it might be a good time to consider re-imagining this original Intellivision classic. Buzz Bombers!!

 

 

 

 

I love Buzz Bombers,another great idea!😃👍

3 minutes ago, MarioMan88 said:

If I’m a betting man(which i don’t) Ed Fries is right age, 50ish, has older brother and helped create original Xbox. Just a guess...I’m bored during quarantine 😂

I was thinking Seamus Blackley, but he isn't retired.  I do think it's one of the original Xbox guys though.

4 minutes ago, Tommy Tallarico said:

With all this talk of Murder Hornets going around, I think it might be a good time to consider re-imagining this original Intellivision classic. Buzz Bombers!!

 

 

 

 

Tommy, does it get overwhelming with the sheer number of games that people ask for re-imaginings?  How do you balance the resources for all these projects of nostalgic games vs new ones people don't know yet?

I just watched the first Xbox Series X gameplay reveal.

I honestly didn't see much difference with the current generation. These companies have clearly lost the wow factor that was such a big thing in the 80s, 90s and early 2010s. And this will be more of an issue with each new generation.

Also, remember when video game news used to talk about the way a game plays instead of a sub-par The Walking Dead-ish story or how you can personalize your genitals?

And yeah, I was a huge Sony fan from 1997 to 2007 but I don't get all the fuzz with The Last of Us. It looks like a decent movie, but... as a game? Do you really want to force yourself through another 3rd person shooter? I was tired of this genre after playing 10 minutes of Hitman in 2001.

So yeah, back to the guessing game! Uh... Andy Gavin?

1 minute ago, IntelliMission said:

I just watched the first Xbox Series X gameplay reveal.

 

I honestly didn't see much difference with the current generation. These companies have clearly lost the wow factor that was such a big thing in the 80s, 90s and early 2010s. And this will be more of an issue with each new generation.

But there's dust, rust and skin poors in the new one! 😁🤪