Intellivision Amico - Tommy Tallarico introduction + Q&A

20 hours ago, Tommy Tallarico said:

But enhancing the UX and adding different layers or options down the road (year 1, year 2, year 3, etc.) is a smart move to ensure the success of the launch.  The other thing to keep in mind is that we won't be hitting the top of our "sales bell curve" til year 3 of the console!  That's when we have the potential to sell tens of millions of units at $199 MSRP.  So as long as we have the amazing (and simple) things in by then... it won't really matter for the overwhelming future success.  But having too many options, too many things to do, too many ways to do things... could cause some confusion to the general public.

I am absolutely in the KISS camp, even if it means skipping popular features for a while or maybe even forever (and I am in the pro online multiplayer camp - so it pains me personally to say that). Until the product launches and you get real customers with real needs (and you know the proportion of those needs across your customer base) adding features just adds complexity & design cost and could even make the product less appealing to the core base.

Notice the interface design differences between NASA, who is all about technical exploration, vs SpaceX's Crew Dragon, who's mission is for the human race to become routine space dwellers. As much as I respect the "Right Stuff" astronauts, to accomplish SpaceX's goal we need to switch that to "Competent Stuff" levels for future space craft pilots. Notice the SpaceX UI is all about monitoring and just a few manual controls for emergencies. Everything is just automatic since the Dragon capsule is perfectly capable of flying itself to the International Space Station (as demonstrated in the earlier unmanned test flight). Even though this example is a several orders of magnitude more complex than the Amico, you can still see the difference. If you want more people doing something, keep it simple. If you want lots of people doing it - keep it extremely simple.

55 minutes ago, Tommy Tallarico said:

1 hour ago, LePionnier said:

I wonder in how many directions we will be able to move on Amico !? 🙄

 

4 is good enough.  We even got rid of the diagonals.  I hated those in the original.

I agree with you. Almost Never played this mode.

(Edit : Maybe I disliked this mode because instead of hitting the opponent, we managed to get through!

The graphics also seemed less beautiful with the line cut diagonally.)

But I am curious to know if you have tried to move with the touch screen and go anywhere you want !?

4 minutes ago, LePionnier said:

And what's interesting from your point of view ?

That’s what I was wondering. It’s not interesting in any way to me. 

8 minutes ago, Tommy Tallarico said:

 

4 is good enough.  We even got rid of the diagonals.  I hated those in the original.

 

 

We almost never played with diagonals turned on.

4 minutes ago, LePionnier said:

I agree with you. Almost Never played this mode. But I am curious to know if you have tried to move with the touch screen and go anywhere you want !?

I'm not sure I understand the question. 

There are only 4 ways to move so putting it on the touch screen wouldn't give you more movement... it would act just like the disc (UP, DOWN, LEFT, RIGHT).

Do you mean putting the 4 ways on the touchscreen as well as the disc? 

13 minutes ago, Cranker said:

That’s what I was wondering. It’s not interesting in any way to me. 

Yeah ! I subscribed to Lukas channel because I am curious to see the evolution of his thoughs in a couple of months or years.

But one thing is sure, looking at all the views from his videos, ( near 20 views except of course for Amico already near 200 views ) I know he will talk about Amico again !

11 minutes ago, LePionnier said:

And what's interesting from your point of view ?

Well this is the first video I have seen from someone in his age group. He had pretty good knowledge of retro gaming I think he did do his homework and I even learned something. I like hearing from people around his age because even I a lot of times think that younger generations just play games themselves and don't really play with others but he said he plays games with family and friends. It's interesting to hear from their perspective.

40 minutes ago, Tommy Tallarico said:

Do you mean putting the 4 ways on the touchscreen as well as the disc? 

I was curious to know if for fun you had coded the game to go in all directions possible to see what it looks like for gameplay.

So instead of 4 directions, let say 16 directions. (I talked about the touchscreen because for me it's like endless possibility, going around in circle, etc. )
A bit like when you had to try Pong with pads at the top and bottom of the screen. Often interesting ideas on paper, but not during tests.

23 minutes ago, Cranker said:

Nothing new here. He is just picking the video apart in a very mechanical way rather that actually learning about the console and talking about it in an intelligent way. In most commentaries , there are usually both positives and negatives discussed . No surprise here ! He comes off as a smart ass kid that had no interest in the console and had taken no time to learn about it. It’s just the usual negative rant comparing it to a cell phone ......blah blah blah ......You don’t like it ? Don’t buy it ! Simple as that 😜

well we were all smart ass kids around his age, doesn't make his opinions any less valid. I could argue that your last couple sentences were kind of smart-ass.

5 minutes ago, Juice said:

well we were all smart ass kids around his age, doesn't make his opinions any less valid. I could argue that your last couple sentences were kind of smart-ass.

Fair enough. 

22 minutes ago, Juice said:

Well this is the first video I have seen from someone in his age group. He had pretty good knowledge of retro gaming I think he did do his homework and I even learned something. I like hearing from people around his age because even I a lot of times think that younger generations just play games themselves and don't really play with others but he said he plays games with family and friends. It's interesting to hear from their perspective.

I agree with your first sentence. But not sure he did his homework.

I think kids of his age can be considered Hardcore Gamer but he seems to like retro games. So probably he his not the target audience. But maybe his dad or his mom will buy Amico !

Wouldn't that be something ! 😀

Lukas : " Dad, mom ! What have you done ! What my friends and subscribers will think of me now ! "  lol 😆

1 hour ago, Juice said:

 

 

Interesting insights from this young man

Definitely a bit bias without facts. His position would hold more weight if he did research but like most youth they dont have the patience they rather do opinion videos.  Kinda sad could have been alot better video

I was just counting up the days since the last Intellivision press release and was wondering if we would have another one pretty soon?

44 minutes ago, Juice said:

well we were all smart ass kids around his age, doesn't make his opinions any less valid. I could argue that your last couple sentences were kind of smart-ass.

It does make it less valid when you dont have facts. Amico is not from mattle it is a 16bit cpu. Having an opinion is fine but doesn't mean a lick of anything if you are off on the facts. Then you are just a misguided person just ranting and l you dont even know why. It just makes him look ignorant. 

https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/General_Instrument_CP1600

14 minutes ago, GrudgeQ said:

I was just counting up the days since the last Intellivision press release and was wondering if we would have another one pretty soon?

 

@Tommy Tallarico mentioned big news this week, so yeah that will be fun!

5 minutes ago, OEB_Pete said:

@Tommy Tallarico mentioned big news this week, so yeah that will be fun!

Yeah looking forward to the next announcement for sure. The news cycle is pretty packed right now though (), so may be a while before the next one.

7 minutes ago, GrudgeQ said:

Yeah looking forward to the next announcement for sure. The news cycle is pretty packed right now though (), so may be a while before the next one.

I thought I heard Tommy mention that the next news item was coming this Tuesday or Wednesday.  I could be wrong.  Time will tell.  

2 minutes ago, Intellivision Master said:

I thought heard Tommy mention that the next news item was coming this Tuesday or Wednesday.  I could be wrong.  Time will tell.

Hopefully over the next few days.  The bigger the company is... the longer it takes for approvals.

1 minute ago, Intellivision Master said:

I thought heard Tommy mention that the next news item was coming this Tuesday or Wednesday.  I could be wrong.  Time will tell.

Yeah, but everybody is talking about Sony and Sega now. I don't know when they will decide (IE) to let go the press release.

On 5/26/2020 at 12:27 PM, Tommy Tallarico said:

Coming next Monday!
 

Get your "cookies" ready.

 

🍪🍪🍪🍪🍪

 

nom nom nom nom nom

 

 

Is this still happening today or did it get changed?

6 minutes ago, Tommy Tallarico said:

Hopefully over the next few days.  The bigger the company is... the longer it takes for approvals.

 

It is going to be freaking amazing! 

1 hour ago, Relicgamer said:

It does make it less valid when you dont have facts. Amico is not from mattle it is a 16bit cpu. Having an opinion is fine but doesn't mean a lick of anything if you are off on the facts. Then you are just a misguided person just ranting and l you dont even know why. It just makes him look ignorant. 

https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/General_Instrument_CP1600

We don't expect the majority of folks in his age group to be asking for or buying Amico.  So it's not surprising that he makes fun of it the entire time.

We speak to a lot of kids his age and it's not really our initial target market.  So I understand where his opinion is coming from. And it's fine.  He didn't get a lot of the details correct, but again... he's just a kid making a video so it would be hard to complain or hold him to any kind of journalistic standard.  Although saying I'm lying about having one of the former presidents of Nintendo was probably going a little too far... but it's fine.  He doesn't know what he doesn't know.  It's okay.  More acceptable for a teenager to do it.  Not so much for people who purport to be "experts" and try to make a living off it in their 40's.

It's interesting to to see the same handful of hate-filled fake account banned dingbats swarming around the poor kid in hopes to egg him on. 

LUKAS!!  STAY AWAY FROM THE WINDOWLESS WHITE VAN!  THEY DON'T REALLY HAVE CANDY AND FORTNITE!!

Those folks continue to read every post in here and scour the internet every day to leave disparaging remarks.  People that clearly have nothing better to do with their lives.  Sad if you really think about it.  Starting to actually feel sorry for these folks at this point.

1 hour ago, Juice said:

well we were all smart ass kids around his age, doesn't make his opinions any less valid. I could argue that your last couple sentences were kind of smart-ass.

Having opinion based on misinformation does in fact make it less valid.

And it goes both ways.

If someone loved Amico because they thought it had 128GB of internal memory, came with 4 controllers and cost $149... then their "opinion" that it is AMAZING was based on misinformation and therefore less valid than someone who knew the facts.
 

1 hour ago, LePionnier said:

I was curious to know if for fun you had coded the game to go in all directions possible to see what it looks like for gameplay.

So instead of 4 directions, let say 16 directions. (I talked about the touchscreen because for me it's like endless possibility, going around in circle, etc. )
A bit like when you had to try Pong with pads at the top and bottom of the screen. Often interesting ideas on paper, but not during tests.

 

No, we haven't tried that.  16 directions would be a nightmare.  8 directions (the diagonals in the original game) were a bit of a nightmare that no one liked.  16 would make it even worse.  

I think the best part of the game is the simplicity of it.  Just like Pac-Man & Frogger... UP, DOWN, LEFT & RIGHT is all it needs.