Intellivision Amico - Tommy Tallarico introduction + Q&A

2 hours ago, IMBerzerk said:

Next stop... Daytona 500!!

Formula One sponsorship!!  Imagine seeing the Running Man on a Ferrari or Mercedes!  It's on our corporate vision board.  (On a Ferrari).  

Hey with your obvious relationship with Ferrari, time to think bigger.  Time to think..  Outrun!

On 9/28/2019 at 2:04 PM, Tommy Tallarico said:

2 really big YouTubers both wore Amico shirts in their videos yesterday!  Pretty cool!

 

 

At 0:33, talking about the NES and the Super Nintendo controllers, "...but with Super Nintendo games you're getting a bit more complex."

I find interesting that instead of a neutral, "more input buttons," he chose, "more complex." Maybe I read too much into that choice of words, but I'm tempted to believe he agrees controllers have indeed become "complex."

7 hours ago, Loafer said:

Hey with your obvious relationship with Ferrari, time to think bigger.  Time to think..  Outrun!

Let's just say... see if anyone notices what kind of car I showed in the quick racing game towards the very end of the trailer. 

On 9/28/2019 at 2:04 PM, Tommy Tallarico said:

2 really big YouTubers both wore Amico shirts in their videos yesterday!  Pretty cool!

 

 

OH MY GOD! I CANT BELIEVE RGT85 WORE AN AMICO SHIRT! IT'S AMAZING AND I AM SO EXITED ABOUT THAT THAT I CAN'T STOP HYPER SCREAMING AT MY COMPUTER AT ALL THE EXCITEMENT AND LOUDNESS SURROUNDING THE SHIRT THAT HE'S WEARING ON HIS EXTRA LOUD YOUTUBE VIDEO! OMG OMG OMG! IT'S LIKE AN OXYCLEAN INFOMERCIAL BUT WITH VIDEO GAMES!!!!! 😘

1 hour ago, Blarneo said:

OH MY GOD! I CANT BELIEVE RGT85 WORE AN AMICO SHIRT! IT'S AMAZING AND I AM SO EXITED ABOUT THAT THAT I CAN'T STOP HYPER SCREAMING AT MY COMPUTER AT ALL THE EXCITEMENT AND LOUDNESS SURROUNDING THE SHIRT THAT HE'S WEARING ON HIS EXTRA LOUD YOUTUBE VIDEO! OMG OMG OMG! IT'S LIKE AN OXYCLEAN INFOMERCIAL BUT WITH VIDEO GAMES!!!!! 😘

 

 

You are just lucky he isn’t doing his 30 second long Stevie Richards montage intro anymore. 🤣

Latest AtariVCS interview with Michael Artz (by Dean Takahashi) mentions Intellivision.  He had nice things to say.

https://venturebeat.com/2019/09/29/atari-antstream-arcade-to-bring-thousands-of-retro-games-to-atari-vcs-console/

I'm way behind the curve of modern video game consoles, but I had to share that I played the jackbox party game pack on the XBox that a friend of ours had.  We had 7 people playing at the same time using our smartphones as controllers and it was awesome!  Because of this, I am hoping the Amico will integrate something like this in it's game list for the 2020 launch.  Tommy, have you considered utilizing these kind of word and picture type party games?

3 hours ago, Tommy Tallarico said:

Latest AtariVCS interview with Michael Artz (by Dean Takahashi) mentions Intellivision.  He had nice things to say.

https://venturebeat.com/2019/09/29/atari-antstream-arcade-to-bring-thousands-of-retro-games-to-atari-vcs-console/

It was nice to see a (semi) competitor speak nicely of the Intellivision. AntStream itself would also kinda be an Intellivsion competitor and it totally flew under my radar. I have to say, although I wish them the best, the concept of streaming retro games seems very backwards since the bandwidth to stream is greater than the size of almost all the retro games in their collection (unless you just play for a minute to two). This is pointed out in this rather lukewarm review: https://www.gamesradar.com/antstream-arcade-review/

This might be valid on a very, very low end device but almost any low end phone/tablet makes a pretty good emulation device. Also the Atari VCS has enough grunt to emulate almost any retrogame pretty well and doesn't need streaming to accomplish this task. However as least now we know what the "S" in VCS stands for "Subscriptions" - can't wait to learn what the other two mean.

1 hour ago, GrudgeQ said:

It was nice to see a (semi) competitor speak nicely of the Intellivision. AntStream itself would also kinda be an Intellivsion competitor and it totally flew under my radar. I have to say, although I wish them the best, the concept of streaming retro games seems very backwards since the bandwidth to stream is greater than the size of almost all the retro games in their collection (unless you just play for a minute to two). This is pointed out in this rather lukewarm review: https://www.gamesradar.com/antstream-arcade-review/

 

This might be valid on a very, very low end device but almost any low end phone/tablet makes a pretty good emulation device. Also the Atari VCS has enough grunt to emulate almost any retrogame pretty well and doesn't need streaming to accomplish this task. However as least now we know what the "S" in VCS stands for "Subscriptions" - can't wait to learn what the other two mean.

Thanks for the read.  The VCS definitely has issues I see in the system plan one of the biggest for me being having to install a second OS to get full use but when your hard drive is only 32 gig 2 operating systems are going to chew up a very large segment of your memory I’d guess for 2 OS you would be looking at 20-25 gigs being the platform itself so you’d only have 12 or less gigs to work with for programs which to me says you’ll need a hard drive upgrade right out of the box depending on your plans for the system and that’s a really bad look 

This may be a bit out of topic, but I had this video in my recommended list :

I think his wife was really good, when I did the same thing with my mother it was much, much worse (and not only I was actively trying to help her, but apart from Portal, I tried simpler and easier games), but to me it still shows that games are now only for children or hardcore gamers.

Some interesting quotes :

3:58 : "Part of this stems for her not being all that comfortable with a controller. Anytime a game asked for her to press a certain button, she'd look down the controller and search for it."

7:22 : "Video games are best when they are a communal experience"

8:02 : "When it came to the 2D platformers, navigating wasn't especially difficult for her [...] However for all the 3D games, navigating proved far more difficult"

1 hour ago, GrudgeQ said:

However as least now we know what the "S" in VCS stands for "Subscriptions" - can't wait to learn what the other two mean

Vapor Console?

2 minutes ago, Alpha82 said:

Thanks for the read.  The VCS definitely has issues I see in the system plan one of the biggest for me being having to install a second OS to get full use but when your hard drive is only 32 gig 2 operating systems are going to chew up a very large segment of your memory I’d guess for 2 OS you would be looking at 20-25 gigs being the platform itself so you’d only have 12 or less gigs to work with for programs which to me says you’ll need a hard drive upgrade right out of the box depending on your plans for the system and that’s a really bad look 

It is sad to say but my first thought about the Atari VCS is 'wipe the hard drive' or maybe swap it out with a bigger one and just make it into a Linux/Windows TV box. Of course I am a hardware guy and know that the VCS is basically a Athlon 200GE (they are using the new low power mobile version of that chipset but the horsepower is about the same) x86 box. I mean it is nice that Atari is building in a sandbox mode and they have said it is their job to make the walled garden potion worth it to consumers, but for me so far the value is as a chunk of hardware. Maybe they can come up with something more than a subscription streaming service and a few games for it, but I would rather just have Steam and although it can't play my AAA library it would make a decent little indie gamer/Hulu/Netflix box with a cute retro case and low power draw - especially if I can get one in a bargain bin (assuming they make it to retail). Maybe the typical consumer will love it but so far they just haven't announced anything in the walled garden part that I can remotely see as attractive (I mean spend $250/$350 and THEN subscribe to retro classics?).

The idea of the video is great, but the execution is terrible. The game selection is masochistic.

Dark Souls? Super Mario Bros, which is ultra hard for any non gamer? The new Doom instead of the old one, better and with much simpler controls?

He should have had some empathy and try with some classic graphic adventure, some forgiving platform game... I don't know. He seems too surprised of the results. For me, the actual experiment was about him: It appears most modern gamers live in their own bubble.

24 minutes ago, GrudgeQ said:

It is sad to say but my first thought about the Atari VCS is 'wipe the hard drive' or maybe swap it out with a bigger one and just make it into a Linux/Windows TV box. Of course I am a hardware guy and know that the VCS is basically a Athlon 200GE (they are using the new low power mobile version of that chipset but the horsepower is about the same) x86 box. I mean it is nice that Atari is building in a sandbox mode and they have said it is their job to make the walled garden potion worth it to consumers, but for me so far the value is as a chunk of hardware. Maybe they can come up with something more than a subscription streaming service and a few games for it, but I would rather just have Steam and although it can't play my AAA library it would make a decent little indie gamer/Hulu/Netflix box with a cute retro case and low power draw - especially if I can get one in a bargain bin (assuming they make it to retail). Maybe the typical consumer will love it but so far they just haven't announced anything in the walled garden part that I can remotely see as attractive (I mean spend $250/$350 and THEN subscribe to retro classics?).

At this point in what they're talking about, it seems Apple Arcade already has them beat. $5 a month and AppleTV is $150 & use any old PS or XB controller you have lying around. It's not as if Centipede can't be played anywhere else... including Amico. 

30 minutes ago, IntelliMission said:

He seems too surprised of the results. For me, the actual experiment was about him: It appears most modern gamers live in their own bubble.

I believe that was his point. This video is about all the things gamers like him take for granted. I'm guessing Dark Souls was more for the "lulz" than anything else, but his other choice of games are valid considering what he was trying to show.

5 hours ago, atarifan88 said:

I'm way behind the curve of modern video game consoles, but I had to share that I played the jackbox party game pack on the XBox that a friend of ours had.  We had 7 people playing at the same time using our smartphones as controllers and it was awesome!  Because of this, I am hoping the Amico will integrate something like this in it's game list for the 2020 launch.  Tommy, have you considered utilizing these kind of word and picture type party games?

Hmm... 😉

1 hour ago, IntelliMission said:

The idea of the video is great, but the execution is terrible. The game selection is masochistic.

 

Dark Souls? Super Mario Bros, which is ultra hard for any non gamer? The new Doom instead of the old one, better and with much simpler controls?

 

He should have had some empathy and try with some classic graphic adventure, some forgiving platform game... I don't know. He seems too surprised of the results. For me, the actual experiment was about him: It appears most modern gamers live in their own bubble.

I've mentioned this before (probably here?), but I did a similar gaming 'experiment' with my wife.  Those who listen to The Intellivisionaries Podcast and have heard her little sound drops that I sprinkle in each episode, know that she is NOT a gamer at all!  She will play a round or two of Pac-Man / Ms. Pac-Man in the garage arcade if we have guests over (and she's had a glass of wine), but that's about the extent of it.  But during E3, when I was taking the two Amico prototype consoles home each night, I got her to play some of the games, and she was actually laughing and enjoying them.  And believe me, that says A LOT!

 

On 9/23/2019 at 11:00 AM, Tommy Tallarico said:

Now people know why I had to hire Paul!!!!!! 

I thought it was my sparkling wit and cutting sarcasm?

29 minutes ago, nurmix said:

I thought it was my sparkling wit and cutting sarcasm?

 

And your ability to fill out a mascot outfit. 

Hot off the press!

Lots of controversial questions.... and answers!

 

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Mtrf_Xbx5WM

47 minutes ago, Tommy Tallarico said:

Hot off the press!

Lots of controversial questions.... and answers!

 

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Mtrf_Xbx5WM

Implies the term "Willy Wonka" written on a planning board hints at possible prize drawing. Actual refers to plan for certain select YouTube personalities: 🤣

52 minutes ago, GrudgeQ said:

Implies the term "Willy Wonka" written on a planning board hints at possible prize drawing. Actual refers to plan for certain select YouTube personalities: 🤣

 

 

Or feeding their bodies into the factory.

7 minutes ago, Blarneo said:

Or feeding their bodies into the factory.

Correct - I may have been referring to certain YouTube punks. But Tommy is too nice for that, I am sure he meant a prize drawing - yeah that's right - only a prize drawing

awesome! Tommy thanks for making work go faster today with this interview in the backround lol