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August 28th, 2024

The Atari 7800

The Atari 7800, launched in 1986, sold over three million units but struggled against the NES. Atari recently announced the Atari 7800+, a retro console supporting 2600 and 7800 games.

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The Atari 7800

The Atari 7800, launched in 1986, was Atari's second most popular console after the 2600, but it faced significant challenges throughout its history. Initially announced in 1984, the 7800 was shelved due to Atari's financial struggles and a lack of new games. It was reintroduced in response to the impending release of the Nintendo Entertainment System (NES). Despite its launch with several classic arcade ports, the 7800 struggled to compete with the NES, which boasted a larger library of games and superior marketing. By the time it was discontinued in 1992, the 7800 had sold over three million units, a stark contrast to the NES's 60 million. The 7800 featured improved graphics and backward compatibility with 2600 games, but its sound capabilities were limited, often resembling those of the older system. Recently, Atari announced the Atari 7800+, a retro console that plays both 2600 and 7800 cartridges through emulation, highlighting the enduring legacy of the original 7800. The new console aims to attract nostalgic gamers with modern features like HDMI output and a wireless controller, although it lacks the ability to load games from USB or SD cards.

- The Atari 7800 was launched in 1986 as a competitor to the NES.

- It sold over three million units but was overshadowed by the NES's success.

- The console featured improved graphics but had limited sound capabilities.

- Atari recently announced the Atari 7800+, which plays both 2600 and 7800 games.

- The 7800's backward compatibility was not a significant selling point due to the dated nature of 2600 games.

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Link Icon 10 comments
By @blahedo - 8 months
Man oh man, I remember wanting an Atari so bad in the mid-80s—my friends, at least the ones with older siblings, had 2600s—and my parents managed to get me a 5200 right in the window where that was the thing they were selling. And nothing ran on it. I think the 7800 may have even been out by then, which just added to the disappointment. (Fast forward a couple years and we got a Nintendo and have been a Nintendo household ever since ;)
By @sehugg - 8 months
The 7800's video architecture is almost/maybe more difficult to program than the 2600. The MARIA chip reads Display Lists from RAM, which tell it what to draw on each scanline. These can contain a combination of bitmaps and indirect bitmaps (i.e. tiles). You only get so many DMA cycles per scanline, so you have to track cycles yourself -- and these cycles eat into your CPU time too.

But wait, there's more. Display Lists are grouped into Display List Lists which are <= 16 lines high, so any moving object higher than 1 pixel is going to need multiple copies.

And if you don't want garbage above and below your sprite, you're going to have to learn about "DMA holes" and arrange your bitmaps carefully in memory space. I didn't mention that some of these structures need to live in 7800's static RAM area, did I?

It's kind of amazing that programmers of the era hacked out a dozen high-quality arcade games. Today things like 7800basic exist to ease the pain. And it's a shame the sound quality wasn't upgraded, C64's SID had set the bar higher by then.

By @RattlesnakeJake - 8 months
I was given a 7800 out of my wife's grandfather's estate last year, along with an assortment of around thirty 2600 and 7800 games.

As a 32-year-old who cut my teeth on a hand-me-down NES, it's been interesting to look back and see just how much more primitive its competition was. Even the games that were released on both platforms (Xevious comes to mind) were much better-looking and easier to play on the NES.

By @TMWNN - 8 months
As the author wrote in another article, in retrospect it is almost inexplicable that Atari didn't simply release the 5200 as a keyboardless 8-bit computer, as opposed to using the same hardware but making the two platforms incompatible. There is absolutely no reason why it could not have released the equivalent of the XEGS in 1982, instead of five years later; doing so would have given the 5200 a large library immediately, especially given that it came out in the brief window the Atari 8-bits were the clear choice for computer games (after the Apple II and before the C64). It would have also protected the company from the "Why not buy a computer instead?" argument that contributed to the crash a year later. The only explanation I can come up with for this not happening was the incredibly bad internal war at Atari between the coin-op, computer, and console divisions. InfoWorld in 1984 covered the chaos in detail <http://books.google.com/books?id=gy4EAAAAMBAJ&lpg=PA15&pg=PA...>.

The 7800 was another mistake along these lines, with better graphics but worse sounds than the 5200 or 8-bit.

By @dvh - 8 months
I had 800XL but with the joystick from the picture. It didn't had micro switches so it was very quiet. I could play while father was sleeping on the couch.
By @guidedlight - 8 months
Atari (more accurately, what’s left of Atari), has just announced the Atari 7800+ console and a bunch of new and rerelease cartridges, releasing later this year.

https://youtu.be/vsArjSWdNV8

By @jccalhoun - 8 months
I remember my parents convinced me to buy the 7800 over the NES because it was backwards compatible with the 2600. Of course a couple years later we got an NES since the 7800 was a failure.
By @michele_f - 8 months
I had it!!!
By @wazoox - 8 months
Still have a 2600, works fine :)