Welcome, Guest. Please login or register.

Author Topic: Great Games Company (aka GameTek) article from 1983  (Read 2805 times)

DoorNumberFour

  • Member
  • Posts: 1921
  • ChristianCarrion.com
Great Games Company (aka GameTek) article from 1983
« on: March 09, 2020, 08:02:18 AM »
Video Games magazine, volume 1 number 9. Featuring the only screen grab (clearly a mock-up) and gameplay description I’ve seen/read thus far for the cancelled line of game show games due out for the Atari 2600 later that year.

BCD74-CA3-4741-4-B96-97-C1-EA612-FDA1-AF2" border="0
Podcaster, National Archives of Game Show History
"Tell Us About Yourself: Conversations with Game Show Contestants" available on all streaming services
christian@christiancarrion.com

JakeT

  • Member
  • Posts: 834
Re: Great Games Company (aka GameTek) article from 1983
« Reply #1 on: March 10, 2020, 07:41:09 PM »
As much as many of us were dying for these games to be released back in the day, can you begin to imagine just how awful they would have been?

May well have made "E.T." for the 2600 look like the Mona Lisa...

JakeT

clemon79

  • Member
  • Posts: 27543
  • Director of Suck Consolidation
Re: Great Games Company (aka GameTek) article from 1983
« Reply #2 on: March 12, 2020, 01:15:39 PM »
can you begin to imagine just how awful they would have been?

Since I would only have history to that point in the industry as a frame of reference and it's only fair to compare it with products of its time, no, I couldn't.
Chris Lemon, King Fool, Director of Suck Consolidation
http://fredsmythe.com
Email: clemon79@outlook.com  |  Skype: FredSmythe

Jeremy Nelson

  • Member
  • Posts: 2792
Re: Great Games Company (aka GameTek) article from 1983
« Reply #3 on: March 15, 2020, 01:55:52 AM »
As much as many of us were dying for these games to be released back in the day, can you begin to imagine just how awful they would have been?

May well have made "E.T." for the 2600 look like the Mona Lisa...

JakeT
Primitive? Yes. Awful? Not really. I'm envisioning the Tiger handheld game shows with slightly better graphics.

Also, considering the company's eventual track record with game shows, I don't really sense that these would be bad. Just because a game was released in '83 doesn't mean it was bad. The kinds of games that crashed the industry were shoddily programmed with no intent but to profit off a licensed brand. It sounds like GameTek put some thought into these.

Fact To Make You Feel Old: Just about every contestant who appears in a Price is Right Teen Week episode from here on out has only known a world where Drew Carey has been the host.

Adam Nedeff

  • Member
  • Posts: 1741
Re: Great Games Company (aka GameTek) article from 1983
« Reply #4 on: March 15, 2020, 02:53:03 AM »
Primitive? Yes. Awful? Not really. I'm envisioning the Tiger handheld game shows with slightly better graphics.

Also, considering the company's eventual track record with game shows, I don't really sense that these would be bad. Just because a game was released in '83 doesn't mean it was bad. The kinds of games that crashed the industry were shoddily programmed with no intent but to profit off a licensed brand. It sounds like GameTek put some thought into these.

I'm curious about the data capacity on those Atari cartridges. For a game like "Joker's Wild," of course you can easily program the spinning wheel graphics, but how many questions could a game like that hold? Or perhaps, would they have had to do like some of the Tiger handheld games of the 90s did and packaged a question book with the games?

Joe Mello

  • Member
  • Posts: 3420
  • has hit the time release button
Re: Great Games Company (aka GameTek) article from 1983
« Reply #5 on: March 15, 2020, 09:35:07 AM »
I'm curious about the data capacity on those Atari cartridges.
Cursory research says that the biggest cartridges were up to 16KB, but a lot were 4KB
This signature is currently under construction.

JasonA1

  • Executive Producer
  • Posts: 3001
Re: Great Games Company (aka GameTek) article from 1983
« Reply #6 on: March 15, 2020, 03:49:34 PM »
I only recently learned about this, Atari's take on a Concentration/Memory style game, c. 1978. Even with the 5-year difference, the limitations on display gave me loads of pause on whether or not they were ready to do game shows on the home consoles of the time.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=6u2kXfrWFbE

-Jason
Game Show Forum Muckety-Muck

clemon79

  • Member
  • Posts: 27543
  • Director of Suck Consolidation
Re: Great Games Company (aka GameTek) article from 1983
« Reply #7 on: March 16, 2020, 01:28:37 PM »
I'm curious about the data capacity on those Atari cartridges. For a game like "Joker's Wild," of course you can easily program the spinning wheel graphics, but how many questions could a game like that hold? Or perhaps, would they have had to do like some of the Tiger handheld games of the 90s did and packaged a question book with the games?

16K on the absolute high end. I'd think they would need to include a question book and all questions would need to be multiple choice.
Chris Lemon, King Fool, Director of Suck Consolidation
http://fredsmythe.com
Email: clemon79@outlook.com  |  Skype: FredSmythe

jcs290

  • Member
  • Posts: 32
Re: Great Games Company (aka GameTek) article from 1983
« Reply #8 on: March 16, 2020, 02:57:05 PM »
According the article, the cartridge had enough memory for 60 modified Family Feud games. The modified rules being 1) show a category like “Dangerous Fish” 2) show seven answers of just the first letter shown 3) pick the top 3 answers in under 3 seconds.

First, that doesn’t sound like Family Fued. Second, if that’s one game, then one question per game is the order of business here. Third, three seconds?!?!

Allstar87

  • Member
  • Posts: 927
Re: Great Games Company (aka GameTek) article from 1983
« Reply #9 on: March 16, 2020, 03:14:15 PM »
According the article, the cartridge had enough memory for 60 modified Family Feud games. The modified rules being 1) show a category like “Dangerous Fish” 2) show seven answers of just the first letter shown 3) pick the top 3 answers in under 3 seconds.

Drop the third rule, and you basically have America Says.

Jeremy Nelson

  • Member
  • Posts: 2792
Re: Great Games Company (aka GameTek) article from 1983
« Reply #10 on: March 16, 2020, 06:02:20 PM »
I only recently learned about this, Atari's take on a Concentration/Memory style game, c. 1978. Even with the 5-year difference, the limitations on display gave me loads of pause on whether or not they were ready to do game shows on the home consoles of the time.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=6u2kXfrWFbE

-Jason
Seeing this makes me wonder how they would have even programmed a cartoon host to kiss the screen/contestants. Then again, my first console was an NES, so I didn't grow up in a time when 2600 developers were the ones doing"cutting edge" things.
« Last Edit: March 16, 2020, 06:14:42 PM by Jeremy Nelson »
Fact To Make You Feel Old: Just about every contestant who appears in a Price is Right Teen Week episode from here on out has only known a world where Drew Carey has been the host.