Megabucks Presents : Atari tries to bring the fun back in the Nintendo Age (1987-1990)

Everyone knows what a staunch follower of the OVP Podcast I am, and in many of their recent episodes revisiting 1988 WWF, they’ve watched episodes of Superstars that keep the original commercials (thanks, Richard Land!) Amongst these have been several spots from a struggling Atari, trying to stay relevant in the era of the Nintendo Entertainment System. This caused me to take a deeper look into this time period. I do admit, 10-year-old me was eating what the Big A was serving. I had to, because my parents were in firm skepticism mode about buying an entirely new game system and abandoning the old. This was why I got the Atari 7800 as a Consolation Prize Christmas gift*. It looked nicer like that NES thing, plus it could play all the 2600 games we collected over the years.

* – CPCG…the kids would now refer to them with the “We have [X] At Home” meme. Including but not limited to : the miniature diecast Voltrons that don’t separate/combine, or any bootleg Transformers…but enough about Gobots (rimshot).

So what exactly did Atari do in the late ‘80s to try and survive the changes in the video game scene? Let’s take a look…

THE FUN IS BACK…yes, if you grew up around this time, you probably remember this jingle, actually a rap, because boy does this commercial bleed ‘80s. Despite advertising the smaller version of the 2600, they sneak in footage of what appears to be the *7800* version of Joust. They also feature the 2600 Jr. Pac-Man, which may have been the only official port of that game and may have gotten even more right than 2600 Ms. Pac-Man! They showcase other “red box” entries like Solaris and David’s Midnight Magic, and “a real hip joystick,” because why bother with that newfangled control pad? It’ll never last! The final hook is that the system is now under $50.

Another version of the same rap, except this one is more about the games. RealSports Boxing reminds me of the third party game, Title Match Pro Wrestling. Has the world forgotten Mr. Mean and Skin Head?

Genesis Does What Nintendon’t it ain’t. I’d probably get marked down by like 40 percentage points for that sentence alone if this article was an English class essay. Anyhow, the selling point of the system is, according to the dopey narrator, that at least it doesn’t just play cartridges like the NES does. Well, its Japanese counterpart did have the Famicom Disc System. Meanwhile, the kid in the ad is trying to look non-plussed when he looks at I believe Kung Fu, but his expressions make him appear more curious than bored. As well he should be, Kung Fu is one of my NES jams. So he turns up the enthusiastic face to really sell the moment when he crosses over to the XE side. Why play Duck Hunt when you can play the monochromatic Bug Hunt? The commercial insulting Nintendo’s “toy robot” comes off like the NWA’s “we wrestle!”/”there’s no bodybuilders or rock stars here!” rhetoric. Not that they were wrong to pick on R.O.B., though. And again with the joystick. I mean, yeah, the D-pad made certain games that once relied on 360 stick control a bit of a pain, but besides that?

So what do you do when promising to shoot insects on an all-green screen isn’t enough? More appealing to the wallets! Here, two teens explain how you can buy the Atari 2600, which again is now UNDER $50 and plays HUNDREDS OF GAMES (which was kinda how they got in trouble 5 years prior…) or the Atari 7800 “with arcade like graphics.” I mean, by 1988, we had, let’s see…the Double Dragon series, Operation Wolf, the original Street Fighter, Altered Beast…so not even that claim really holds up. But get this, if you buy either system, you get your first two games FREE! And here is a certain stealth tactic Atari was practicing around now: you’ll notice the screen shots include 7800 Donkey Kong Junior, while the boxes the kids display include the 2600 Donkey Kong and 7800 Mario Bros. And what do all these games have in common? Why, they involve the same Italian plumber who was named for Nintendo’s office landlord! Yes, Atari was practically begging, “We have Mario too! Love us!” That said, I had 7800 Donkey Kong and Mario Bros., and both were serviceable versions of the NES ports, wonky sound effects aside. I don’t know why this ad settled for the bare bones 2600 DK but then again people used its sound effects for generic video game/computer noises in the movies, maybe even to this day. So what do I know?

[Sidenote: listen to the intro to Diana Ross and the Supremes’ “Reflections.” Doesn’t that sound like 2600 Mario walking??]

Oh yeah, the background music to this commercial? 80s kids will recognize it as the intro theme to DTV, the Disney Channel’s music video segment.

I always had the music to this one somewhere in the back of my head. It sounded like an Atari game-type jingle, without the borderline ear S.A. Basically, this is a roll call of 7800 games at the time, because “the more game cartridges a system plays, the more fun it is!” Again, Math 101 time: OVERSATURATION = VIDEO GAME CRASH. Standout moments in the narration include pronouncing it “Cara-teeka” (of course those who were 7800 families called Karateka many expletives instead, until you figured out you had to get in a fighting position first or get knocked out in one blow). That and insisting Xevious and Choplifter were arcade hits compared to the Pacs, Centipedes, and Jousts of the world. I will say Choplifter on 7800 was a game myself, my father, and siblings bonded over. My dad created an urban legend when he claimed to have made a giant mountain or base pop out of the ground after a certain period of playing. I never did figure that one out.

https://youtu.be/-RpWbGP02D8?si=P6i7knehTgDf3ext

Now, we get members of the National Video Game Team plugging the 7800 in numerous spots. They hype up, you guessed it, Mario Bros. and Donkey Kong Jr. Now why didn’t they just feature the original DK in these ads? It was the one with Mario, after all. There’s also Desert Falcon, a Zaxxon-style shooter set in ancient Egypt, and it was one of the 7800’s genuine strong originals. Another guy plays Impossible Mission, which turned out to have a shoot name not meant to be a shoot name…because game bugs in the NTSC version LITERALLY MADE IT IMPOSSIBLE TO FINISH. RealSports Baseball is also mentioned, complete with the ocean waves-type whoosh sounds that were supposed to be crowd cheers. I never got into Atari sports titles, the CPU always overpowered you, no matter what. Except for 2600 Bowling. Anyway, everyone agrees that the best thing about the 7800 is that most games cost under $20.

WHAT?!? They were still doing this in *1990*? The year of Super Mario Bros. 3 arriving and all of us not looking back? The year Sega Genesis had been around for awhile now? It starts like it’s going to be a knockoff of Michael Jackson’s “Bad” video, then…we meet these kids who look like they rummaged through their parents’ costume party stashes. You can barely see any game footage because they keep dancing in front of it, so let’s talk about these kids. One randomly has a beret, two of them are dressed like hair metal stars, one has a Cruella de Vil white streak dye job (and kinda had me wonder for a split second if it was a young Carla Hall…), there’s a typical 90s girl, and…a flapper? I can’t finish any other way but point out the comments on YouTube for this video how after the commercial, these kids probably used their paychecks to buy an NES or Genesis instead.

I made an NWA analogy before, maybe it is more accurate to say that Atari at this point was like Verne Gagne and the AWA, relying on things that worked in the early ’80s going into the ’90s and expecting to compete. Well, since then, we did get the homebrewing scene which created improved versions of certain games, strong ports of classic arcade games, and even a few originals. And while we got one NES Classic, Atari seems to give us plug-in retro systems every other year now. So perhaps they just had to wait for the power of nostalgia to hang in there.