Ah yes, Atari VCS, the delayed Linux-powered gaming box that was crowdfunded on IndieGoGo. It's still a thing and the team seem to think it's all going well.
In a new development update on the Atari VCS Medium account, the team posted a set of questions and answers from the COO Michael Arzt as to what's been happening recently. This follows on from the news back in October, where their system architect Rob Wyatt quit citing non-payment.
From the post they said they're currently going over the hardware to test "for functionality and reliability" and doing tweaks as needed, as then design and engineering teams recently went over to visit their partners in China who are building the actual Atari VCS units along with some photos:
Also detailed in the Q&A post is that they're developing the UI and store in the Unity game engine and they say it's "almost complete". Unity are apparently working closely with them on this, and they have "several studios" lined up ready for the Atari VCS launch. They're not saying who or what games though.
For streaming services like Amazon, Netflix and so on, it does sound like they will not have dedicated applications for them. Not yet anyway, they said for such service there will be the choice of viewing them through a web browser and that "the first big wave of apps isn’t likely to come before Q1".
When talking about the Atari OS, they confirmed yet again it's based on a "Linux foundation" with their integrated Atari VCS store and the Sandbox Mode will be available for installing and booting more traditional operating systems, like a standard Linux distribution (or Windows) so you could boot up Steam on it if you wanted.
IndieGoGo backers were supposed to be getting their units before the public release in December this year. That is now being delayed, although they claim "we are talking weeks here, not months, and the Indiegogo backers remain our top priority".
According to the post, they are on schedule for a full release in March 2020. Let's see what happens.
Article taken from GamingOnLinux.com.
Quoting: Luke_NukemHDMI cartel....
Appropriate name, for those who slow down progress for profit.
slaapliedje Nov 29, 2019
Quoting: tuubiYeah, unless you want to use this as a cheap computer, why would you need DisplayPort? Not a single game console out there has it. Now on the other hand, hopefully they actually do a newer HDMI standard, so it actually will work in 4k. Granted, something tells me not many games will actually take advantage of it. It's not like you need 4k for Combat. :PQuoting: ShmerlOnly HDMI output? That's a huge no go. At least they should use both DisplayPort and HDMI, if they think HDMI is so necessary.Plenty of TV sets with no DP inputs, but all of them have HDMI. I doubt this is such a no-go for most of their target audience.
Guess we'll see what the library for it looks like, but at least if it sucks, this is the new Steam Machine.
Quoting: 0aTTQuoting: subI thought they targeted a high quality finish...?
If this thing gets done at all, it's a lot more than you could have expected.
I never considered buying one. :D
Quoting: GuestQuoting: subThe case looks rather cheap.
I thought they targeted a high quality finish...?
Can you really judge the case quality from those two grainy jpgs?
I dare to, yes.
You can see the uneven glossy plastic finish quite clear.
And that's usually not intended.
You typically see this on very, very low cost parts.
Mohandevir Nov 29, 2019
Quoting: dubigrasuIt does look a bit cheap. Looks like a crappy router or something, not a console.
So true! :D
Last edited by emphy on 29 November 2019 at 11:32 pm UTC
TheRiddick Nov 30, 2019
This thing still going for $199USD? not a terrible price I guess. I only hope it does reasonably well (if nothing more then a streaming box) so Atari can perhaps sometime in future release a REAL gaming console contender, which seems to be very easy to do these days given everyone is using AMD GPU CPU combo's and not custom designs.
ElectricPrism Nov 30, 2019
The Engineer/Designer "hat" inside me is really bothered by this picture.
The black label strip is out of alignment too far to the left.
Text alignment of each label looks like it was spaced out in Microsoft Word using spaces between labels instead of measured and aligned to the center of each port in Photoshop like any sane designer would do.
The USB ports are blue completely ruining the aesthetic.
The mesh material behind the grille just looks like regular grid mesh you would find at your local hardware store.
The USB ports are vertically aligned slightly above the HDMI port which is above the Ethernet port.
I'm not as much informed about the AC ports but I am beginning to wonder if it's wonky too
I mod my own 5 volt power switches and do other mods so these little oddities just stand out and confound me.
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