The wait is finally over! Atari and the video game developer SneakyBox just launched their latest title Days of Doom today. The game is available on PlayStation 5, PlayStation 4, Xbox Series, Xbox One, Switch, PC, and Atari VCS.

Days of Doom is a turn-based tactical roguelite game that takes place in a post-apocalyptic world. The game follows a group of survivors as they journey to Sanctuary, a place of promise and respite. Along the way, they will encounter a variety of enemies, including zombies, raiders, and mutant creatures.

There are a total of eight playable classes, each with its own unique abilities. Players must carefully assemble their teams and use their skills strategically to defeat their enemies. They can also boost their party by collecting a variety of items and runes.

One of the most unique things about Days of Doom is its roguelite elements. When players start a new game, the game procedurally generates the world, which means that no two playthroughs are the same. They will also lose all of their progress if they die, though permanent upgrades can be unlocked for future playthroughs.

Additionally, the game has a vibrant and colorful art style, which sets it apart from other post-apocalyptic games. Its world is full of life, even in the midst of destruction.

Check out the official gameplay trailer below.

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The classic 1982 survival-horror title Haunted House is making a comeback after more than 40 years. Atari is finally reviving it as a stealth-horror roguelite game with the help of the developer Orbit Studio. Today, they announced that the game will launch on multiple consoles on 12 October. This includes PS5, PS4, Xbox Series X/S, Xbox One, Nintendo Switch, Atari VCS, and PC.

In this new reimagined version, players take control of Lyn Graves, the niece of legendary treasure hunter Zachary Graves. Lyn and her friends visit Zachary’s mansion, only to find it overrun with ghouls and monsters. She must find the shattered pieces of a magical urn and put them back together in order to free her uncle and her friends and capture all the supernatural foes.

The game will feature a number of new gameplay mechanics, including stealth-based gameplay, unlockable characters, and Atari Easter eggs. Players can also use a variety of weapons and items to defeat their enemies and explore the mansion. The roguelite elements of the game also add a new layer of replayability.

The original Haunted House was one of the earliest survival horror video games. It is considered to be a classic by many gamers. Fans of the original game can expect to see familiar enemies and locations in the new game, but they can also expect to be surprised by new challenges and mechanics.

Make sure to watch the official release date trailer below.

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Atari, the video game company just revealed the release date of their upcoming title Days of Doom. They also dropped a new gameplay trailer as well. The game will finally launch on PC and consoles on September 21, 2023. The news came during this week during the Feardemic’s FEAR FEST 2023.

Days of Doom is a post-apocalyptic tactical RPG roguelike developed by SneakyBox. Players take control of a small group of survivors who must journey through a post-apocalyptic wasteland in search of Sanctuary, a rumored safe haven. Along the way, they will face a variety of threats, including zombies, raiders, and other dangerous creatures. They will need to use their strategic skills to survive in this harsh environment and to make the difficult choices that will determine the fate of their group.

The game features a unique art style that combines hand-drawn animation with a colorful and quirky aesthetic. The eight playable character classes each have their own unique abilities, and players can customize their party to suit their playstyle. The game will feature a variety of randomly generated events and encounters, which keeps each playthrough fresh and unpredictable.

Here are some of the key features of the game-

• Beautifully animated hand-drawn art that brings the quirky vision of the post-apocalypse to life
• Eight character classes, each equipped with unique default and special abilities
• A dozen enemies from the archetypal zombie to deadly raiders, to explosive monstrosities, and two surprisingly brutal boss fights
• Over 50 randomly occurring events that present risk-reward scenarios
• Over 70 items and runes to collect to turn the odds in your favor
• Roguelite progression means no two runs will be the same, but you permanently upgrade stats like party size and speed of resource accumulation, which means each run will get you closer to reaching your goal
• Original orchestral soundtrack by Jelle Dittmar

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Caverns of Mars: Recharged is the latest classic Atari game to get a visual and gameplay face-lift. You can find the original in the recently reviewed – Atari 50: The Anniversary Collection.
The concept of the original game was a scrolling shooter that went from top to bottom instead of left to right. You descended through the various stages of the destructible Martian subterranean landscape with the goal of surviving and doing as much damage as in little time as possible.

As you descend deeper, the challenges increase. The enemies become harder and the environment more challenging to navigate. Fortunately, power and weapon upgrades are also plentiful. Yet you cannot simply blast your way through everything. Energy and ammunition levels must be monitored and maintained. This brings a strategic element to the game, that has to be managed on the fly, or on the drop.
The original game debuted on the Atari 800 8-bit PC and has the blocky graphics of the era. Caverns of Mars: Recharged gets a digital face-lift, but a restrained one. The blockiness is being smoothed out, yet very much reflects the aesthetics of the original. Weapons fire and explosions receive substantial upgrades with particle effects, yet do not overpower the player’s view.

Simple Yet Deep

The big gameplay difference between the two is with the controls. In the original, you could slow the ship’s descent with the directional pad by pushing up. In this version, directional controls only affect lateral movement. To slow down, you either use weapons fire or as a last resort, bulldoze through rock. The second method is a desperate move because you will rapidly deplete your health.
As you fall, ammo and weapons upgrades are available by navigating over them. Sometimes, they are out in the open and easy to get. Other times they are strategically located and offer a risk/reward proposition where picking one up will have you either crashing into a rock or having to blast your way through. It requires split-second decisions and precision handling, which makes the game challenging.

The same challenge extends to the enemies. Some enemies are ships, some are mines, and others are weapon beams. The mixing and matching of enemy types also make for greater challenges. Beam weapons cut a horizontal swath across the screen. You must either navigate around them or destroy the weapon emitting the beam. Mines have a blast radius, so shooting one within the area means you will suffer some collateral health damage.
Caverns of Mars: Recharged offers up several gameplay modes. The first is an Arcade Mode where the goal is to reach a reactor and set it off. The next mode is a Missions Mode where 30 specially crafted missions to test your skills are available. There is also a unique co-op mode where one player navigates the sinking ship while the other handles the weapons. Also present are the requisite leaderboards for both friends and worldwide.

Two Button Strategy

This is a simple game. There are only two controls – navigation and weapons fire. Yet it is fun to play and surprisingly challenging. The pace of this version of the game is much faster than the original. So you’ll have to make a lot of decisions quickly. There is very much a flying-by-the-seat-of-your-pants feel that is thrilling and engaging.

Weapon pickups also provide on-the-fly strategy changes. You can hew an alternative path with the focused railgun shots or leverage the spread of rapid shotgun blasts to destroy multiple enemies.

The sound of the game is worthy of note too. The soundtrack and sound effects work together to heighten the intensity. Weapon’s fire and explosions add an excellent oomph factor to the visceral thrill. Especially satisfying is the crunchiness of the sound effect for destroying the landscape.

You will die a lot. That is part of the gameplay cycle for these types of shooter games. Beating a mission may take you many runs to master. The frustration level is what it is, but at least you can step back and do another run instantaneously. The downtime between runs is nearly minimal.

Atari has done an excellent job with this upgrade of a classic game. If you like the original game and would like to play it with modern gameplay sensibilities, this is right up, or down, your alley.

*** PS5 code provided by the publisher ***

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Fifty years is a long time. When a huge part of gaming’s history successfully celebrates fifty years it’s a big deal. Today Atari, one of gaming’s most iconic brands, is celebrating its fiftieth anniversary. Founded on July 27th, 1972, Atari has been a historically significant company in the sphere of gaming for a long time now. So, today they are celebrating with an exclusive interview, from IGN, with Atari Founder Nolan Bushnell and CEO Wade Rosen. In the video interview, available on Atari’s website, the two discuss the company’s legacy within the gaming world, as well as, its role as a forefather of game development. 

Of course the five-minute interview offers a great deal of insight. Bushnell and Rosen discuss the legacy and past of Atari. However, they also discuss the future of the company as well. Specifically, the interview discusses Atari’s return to its roots as a game developer and publisher. For instance, Rosen discusses today’s announcement of Atari games coming to Google Stadia. Atari has announced five games coming to Stadia that will be a part of the Atari Recharged series. 

Additionally, on top of the interview, Atari is also celebrating their fiftieth anniversary with the fans through a sale. The Golden Anniversary sale to be exact. Of course this sale includes many limited time deals. However, the sale also features exclusive 50th Anniversary t-shirts. 

“I’m excited to share this very special conversation with founder Nolan Bushnell as we celebrate the tremendous impact of Atari on popular culture and the video game industry over the past fifty years.” Says Wade Rosen, Atari CEO in the interview. 

The interview is available on Atari’s website, YouTube, and IGN. 

SOURCE

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Since the very beginning, video games have been a major social force, as well as a form of entertainment. They’ve made us question reality, challenged us to be better people, and even learn more about ourselves. But sometimes, there are games that push the boundaries so much, they cross the line of what is acceptable. In an effort to get noticed, or sell units, they push the bounds of decency so much, that in some cases they even get banned altogether. Let’s take a look at five games that went too far.

Call of Duty: Modern Warfare 2 “No Russian” Mission

In 2009, Call of Duty: Modern Warfare 2 sparked a lot of outrage among players and game developers alike. In it, you play as a CIA operative who takes part in a terrorist massacre at a Russian airport to gain the trust of a terrorist leader named Vladimir Makarov. It’s a graphic scene depicting the mass murder of innocent civilians, and as the player, you’re the one helping to carry it out. To be fair, you were given the option to skip the scene, and you could technically play the scene without actually shooting anyone if you wanted to. But still, the “No Russian” scene (so named because this order is spoken just before the shooting starts) will go down as a prime example of a game taking shock value a little too far for some.

Carmageddon

In 1997, developers at Stainless Software had an idea for a way to get more publicity for the racing game they were working on: add running over pedestrians. For points. It was a strategy specifically designed to attract controversy, and it worked. The game sold well, moving close to 2 million units all told. And it wasn’t actually a horrible game, getting positive ratings from a number of gaming reviewers. But still, some just couldn’t get past its mean, morally questionable vehicular-homicide gameplay, and the game was censored in some countries and even banned in others. Despite all the controversy, Carmageddon went on to be a long-running series, with the latest reboot, Carmageddon: Reincarnation dropping as recently as 2015.

Custer’s Revenge

Speaking of a game purposely seeking out controversy, Custer’s Revenge just might be the most tasteless and shameless of them all. Released in 1982 for the Atari 2600 console, this ugly little game placed you in the boots (and only the boots) of a naked General George Custer, as he walks across the screen, dodging arrows so he can sexually assault a tied-up indigenous woman. And that’s it. That’s the game. It was an idea meant to get attention, and it did unfortunately result in big sales for the game. That is, until it was pulled from shelves after a firestorm of protest from, well basically everyone. Combining awful racism, sexism and just plain poor game design all in one offensive little package, Custer’s Revenge was an early stain on the gaming industry that is still remembered with shudders from gamers to this day.

Grand Theft Auto V “By the Book” Mission

One of the all-time great games, GTA V was a brilliant spoof of modern excess and that of course included the over-the-top violence. But one mission, “By the Book,” stood out as maybe taking things too far. In it, Trevor brutally tortures a man to get information for the mission. He electrocutes him, hits him with a wrench, waterboards him, and even pulls out the poor man’s teeth with pliers. Even by GTA standards, this mission was a brutal, and maybe even nauseating exercise in sadism. Some outlets felt it “push[ed] the boundaries of taste” and cynically presented the horrific scene as if it were meant to be funny. To top it off, much like the “No Russian” mission mentioned above, the player was put in the role of actively carrying out Trevor’s actions during the torture sequence. “By the Book” stands as one time GTA perhaps took its signature nihilistic violence a step too far for some.

Postal 3

A game series that has, inexplicably, spawned numerous sequels, Postal is an isometric shooter in which you (as “Postal Dude”) have to kill as many civilians as possible. In 2012, Postal 3 brought a fresh round of mindless violence combined with poor level design, terrible dialogue, and regular crashing. Our own Paul Sullivan, who came to the game with an open mind, found Postal 3 to be “distasteful” and “a game you should avoid.” Other critics agreed. But let’s fact it: this was never meant to be a good game. It was meant to get lots of attention and sell units. However, this is one time where it didn’t work — within just a few months, the developers pulled the game from their store and admitted Postal 3 was not a good game. There hasn’t been a new Postal instalment in a while, but Postal Redux remastered the original “classic” in 2016. Who knows, maybe we’ll see Postal Dude again in the future.

Well, that’s it for this round of video games that pushed things a bit too far. What do you think? Is there a game we missed? Were we unfair to one of the games on our list?

Let us know in the comments below!

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Atari can be attested to be one of the grandfathers of gaming, that’s for sure. It is, after all, going to be celebrating 50 years in the gaming industry on June 27th, 2022. However, some of the things that Atari has done have been a little strange as of late. For example, there has been the Atari hotel and the rumor of being acquired by Soulja Boy.

And now it appears that Atari will be acquiring MobyGames, at the price of 1.5 million. The funny part is, MobyGames isn’t a developer, nor is it a publisher or studio. Instead, MobyGames is a resource for finding out various facts in gaming history. Users can upload anything video game related to the site, including screenshots, new upcoming releases, to older games. It can also give credit to those who have worked on games in the past, and what role they played.

MobyGames, while it has been moderated by volunteers, isn’t a nonprofit database like Wikipedia. It is for profit, which has left all sorts of conflict of interest between users and owners. Because, well, owners of this platform could easily attempt to promote their own games and other materials. Then again, this is not the first, nor the last time that things have gotten hot or heavy for MobyGames. Gamefly Media, when owners of the videogame database in 2013, redesigned the site so that the basic functions were impacted. Thankfully, when BlueFlame Labs bought MobyGames, they brought back the old functionary, and let the resource be what it was supposed to be.

But with Atari planning on taking the database, who knows what may happen. As said before, Atari has made some strange choices as of late, and this may not go so well for people who are simply trying to find or verify certain information about the video game industry.

At least there’s still Wikipedia.

SOURCE

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The Creators of Pong and RollerCoaster Tycoon, Atari, celebrated their fifty years as part of the gaming industry and as one of its founders. As part of this celebration, Atari has revealed a new logo, one that they called the “GoldSchool Sunnyvale”. This is in tribute to their original design studio all those years ago in Sunnyvale, California, as well as commemorating the grand half-century that it has been at the forefront of interactive entertainment.

Technically, the anniversary isn’t quite here yet, being that it will be on June 27, 2022. But that hasn’t stopped them from unveiling the logo they plan on using. They will be using the golden logo on marketing communications, on games, and on first-party and licensed products- but only until the end of that year. So it’s little wonder that they’re making the most of it now, instead of later. Then again, Atari has been using this opportunity since June of 2021, with their launch of the Atari VCS, a gaming console that players can use to enjoy some of their classics. Atari is also using this as an opportunity to do some major licensing collaborations, though, with who, they haven’t said. It may be a fair guess that they may work with Microsoft and Google, as it is currently possible to use both the Xbox Ultimate Gaming Pass and the Google Stadia to play some of the classics. There may be other collaborations with big names in the gaming industry, depending on whether it may be for consoles, or for games themselves, depending on the direction that Atari wants to go. As it is, they are currently very pleased to still be part of the gaming industry and have a lot of big plans for the upcoming year.

Atari CEO, Wade Rosen, spoke of the Atari logo unveiling and on its plans for the future.“On behalf of the entire Atari team, I’m proud to unveil this commemorative logo and launch the celebration of our 50th anniversary. Atari has an exciting year ahead, filled with new and commemorative products that will delight our fans; including the launch of new premium game titles, new business initiatives, and several really exciting lifestyle product collaborations.”

If fans want to celebrate the Atari anniversary with a limited edition shirt, it’s possible to buy yourself one on their website. But it’s best to act fast, as many of them have already sold out.

Did you know that Atari came out in 1972? Have you ever played an Atari game? Let us know in the comments below, or let us know on Facebook!

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Hey, we all love video games. They’ve been a part of our lives — bringing us joy, making us think, and continually impressing us with their creative genius. But let’s face it: not all games are great. Over the years, we’ve all played those duds, those stinkers, those lazy and unimaginative titles that make us curse them for wasting our time with them. Come along with COGconnected as we look at but a few of these infamous games. Here are 5 of the absolute most terrible video games ever made.

ET the Extra-Terrestrial (Atari 2600, 1982)

Attempting to cash-in on the massively successful movie of the same name, ET the Extra-Terrestrial on the Atari 2600 was a truly awful mess of a game. That’s in large part due to it being rushed out in just over a month to make the 1982 Christmas shopping season. What resulted was a woefully bare-bones affair in which you guide the titular ET, searching for pieces of a phone to “call home.” This game was so bad it caused the entire gaming industry to crash for years afterwards, and legends say there’s still a big pit somewhere in New Mexico full of thousands of buried, unsold Atari ET cartridges.

Superman 64 (Nintendo 64, 1999)

With the full (and awkward) name of Superman: The New Superman Adventures, this title had poor visuals, boring gameplay and an inexplicable fondness for foggy environments. Although it did sell well, critics have panned Superman 64’s simplistic “fly through rings” objectives, unpolished controls and unimaginative environments — which many suspect were the reason for all that fog. It’s no surprise that the planned PlayStation version was cancelled. This is one disaster that’s consistently mentioned as one of gaming’s worst-ever titles.

Postal III (PC, 2011)

This first-person shooter was a (second) sequel nobody asked for, taking all the mean-spirited humor, sadistic violence and dumb stereotyped attitudes of its predecessors and adding lots of bad design, and lots of bugs. Like many games that purposely court controversy to get attention, Postal III just wasn’t a good game — in fact it was terrible. Even our own Paul Sullivan, a man who admits he enjoys edgy humor in a game, found Postal III to be “distasteful” and “a game you should avoid.” Ouch.

Goat Simulator (All Platforms, 2014)

Sometimes, games are “so bad they’re good.” But sometimes, they’re just bad. And 2014’s Goat Simulator wasn’t just bad, it was baaaaaad (get it?). It started out as a joke, a small, harmless PC game with ridiculous gameplay and quirky glitches. But by the time our man Trevor reviewed it on console, he wasn’t laughing anymore. As he observed, Goat Simulator was, after the initial laughter died down, just a “crappy game” with “no substance.” It looked like ass, was boring to play, and was overall just a big hot mess.

Vroom in the Night Sky (Switch, 2017)

If you haven’t heard of this god-awful little title on the Switch, consider yourself lucky. In it, you’re a witch, flying a bicycle through a series of rings for some reason, and… that’s pretty much it. There’s really nothing else to do, and no goals to accomplish. Even this thin premise might have had some charm if the flying didn’t feel, in the words of our reviewer, like traveling “through sludge at a snail’s pace.” Throw in some horribly localized dialogue, and you’ve got a game that is not just one of the worst Switch games ever, but a contender for worst game on any platform, ever.

That’s it for our list of some of history’s worst video games. Stay tuned to COGconnected for a look at more truly terrible titles. As long as they keep makin’ em, we’ll keep listing ‘em!

Thank you for keeping it locked on COGconnected.

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Video games have a long history over many generations now, and while they’ve steadily gained mainstream popularity there has always been a segment of society that has criticized gaming’s influence, especially on younger consumers. But there have been some games that pushed the envelope so much, were so utterly offensive, or stoked so much outrage, that the backlash they garnered was particularly intense. In many cases, people even tried to ban them. Come along with COGconnected as we take a look at some of the most controversial video games ever to strut their pixelated stuff on gamers screens over the years.

Custer’s Revenge (1982) – Atari 2600

Custer’s Revenge is a game that’s legendary for all the wrong reasons. In the early 1980s, porn purveyors working under the name “Mystique” attempted to cash in on the popular Atari 2600 console by releasing what is often cited as one of the worst games in history. In it, you play as General Custer, the real-life loser at the Battle of Little Bighorn, as he walks, naked, across the screen towards a Native American female who is tied-up and also nude. The “game” has you sexually assault the woman after dodging arrows…and that’s pretty much it. Combining the most ugly misogyny and racism in a way few games ever have, Custer’s Revenge did (sadly) sell well for a while before being pulled from the shelves due to the public’s understandable outrage.

Hatred (2015) – PC

It’s not hard to see why Hatred, from developers Destructive Creations, has been so controversial. You play as a mass murderer out on a maniacal mission to kill as many innocent civilians as possible. From the first news of its development, Hatred was attacked by critics on all fronts, who questioned why a game with such a vile premise was even being made in the first place. Upon release on PC, the game was at first pulled from Steam but then reinstated with an “Adults Only” tag, virtually guaranteeing that it would always remain an obscure title. Maybe worst of all, Hatred was just a really bad game; our reviewer Paul at the time dismissed it as “boring, repetitive, and simply not fun.” Well, if nothing else, it was certainly a game with an apt title.

Dead or Alive Xtreme 3 VR Mode (2016) – PS4/PSVR, PSVita, Switch, PC

While the Dead or Alive game series has always purposely pushed the boundaries with its “fan service” featuring scantily-clad, buxom babes, that isn’t the issue that got it on this list. It was the VR Mode for 2016’s Dead or Alive Xtreme 3 that really took things to a shocking new level, and frankly, crossed the line. It put players in the role of “virtually” touching the girls against their will, accompanied by the sounds of their clear protests and discomfort. Our own writer Shawn Petraschuk, never one to shy away from calling out sexism in the industry, unloaded on what he called the VR version’s “sexual assault mode,” which went beyond the usual voyeuristic eye-candy and amounted to a “violent and aggressive promotion of sexual assault.” Apparently he wasn’t the only one to feel this way, as Koei Tecmo decided not to release the game in the West due to tons of criticism.

Super Seducer Series (2018 to Present) – PC

The Super Seducer series, by Richard La Ruina, was another title accused of promoting rape-culture by critics. Putting you in the shoes of a man trying to pick up various women under the tutelage of an expert “pickup artist”, the FMV PC game was at one point called “the world’s sleaziest game.” The questionable premise, combined with lots of what many called pornographic scenes, raised the ire of both players and gaming platforms. Released on Steam in 2018, the original game had its PS4 release cancelled by Sony due to controversy, and Steam famously rejected Super Seducer 3. Later, Nintendo decided against bringing the series to the Switch, possibly fearing that the series didn’t fit with its family-friendly image.

Agony (2018) – All Platforms

Originally titled Sacred Agony, this indie game actually started out with some promise, having you play as a soul travelling through Hell and featuring some impressive, imaginative art design. But upon its eventual release as simply Agony, it seemed to have been rushed and void of most of the early creativity players had hoped for. In place of imaginative depictions of Hell and an interesting story, Agony merely poured on gratuitous sex, nudity and the old ultra-violence, making for a nauseating, ugly and actually pretty boring final product. On top of that, the sometimes disturbing visuals got Agony a rare “Adults Only” rating by the ESRB, forcing the developers to tone it down in order to get approved for consoles. This is one example of a game that took the lazy route of relying on shock value to cover up its poor execution.

There you have it; five games whose content brought outrage and criticism, in some cases enough to get them banned or censored. These are by no means the only controversial game titles that have come along over the years; stay tuned right here for more features on some of the most offensive, most outrageous games in history!

Thank you for keeping it locked on COGconnected.

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We’ve known for a while that Soulja Boy is a gamer at heart – back in the day he took to his YouTube channel to promote then then-recently-released Braid (including the iconic observation “there ain’t no point to the game”), and more recently he took it upon himself to launch his own consoles, the SouljaGame Console, the SouljaGame Fuze and the SouljaGame Handheld. Now, however, it seems that the rapper has taken a huge step up in the gaming industry, as he claims to have bought the classic gaming company Atari.

Taking to Instagram Live in an Atari hoodie and hat a few days ago, Soulja Boy announced that he now owns Atari, having received an offer from them after his own game console venture impressed them. he also revealed that he was planning on selling the SouljaGame company for $140 million. Soulja Boy has apparently signed two contracts with Atari, leaving him as the owner of the company.

Soulja Boy has had a somewhat troubled past in the video game development scene – despite his attestations, the SouljaGame console family came under massive criticism when they launched back in 2018, which (along with legal threats from a number of studios) lead to the consoles being briefly made unavailable for purchase. However, Soulja Boy bounced back in 2019, with the launch of the SouljaHandheld (definitely not a PS Vita. Nope. Not at all.)

Probably the most defining feature of the SouljaGame consoles is their, uh, uncanny resemblance to other consoles, with the SouljaGame Console and the SouljaGame Fuze resembling the Xbox One, and the SouljaGame Handheld looking a whole lot like the PS Vita. When it comes to the actual games available on the consoles, well, they’re no Playdate. The consoles are essentially emulators, running ROMs that were quite often pirated. This was the catalyst for Nintendo getting in contact with SouljaBoy, and while we don’t know exactly what was said between the two, the SouljaGame consoles were taken down from the SouljaWatch store soon after.

Whether or not SouljaBoy has actually taken control of Atari has yet to be seen – but if he has, things are certainly set to change at the legendary company.

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The Darkside Detective series of retro-style point-and-click adventure games just launched for the all-new Atari VCS videogame computer system, which is itself a very deliberate attempt to recapture the retro feel of the original Atari 2600. Now fans of old-fashioned games can play these multi-award-winning retro games on an equally retro microconsole.

The Darkside Detective and The Darkside Detective: A Fumble in the Dark focus on the bizarre and often macabre adventures of Detective Francis McQueen and his partner, the notoriously spacy Officer Patrick Dooley. Across two games, the pair go through a variety of creepy, spooky, and downright weird cases in the community of Twin Lakes, America’s 34th most haunted city.

These games have already made their way to many different platforms and been very well-received, so it’s not exactly a surprise to see them sneaking onto Atari VCS. Now, even more players can investigate a parade of demented cases, monstrous culprits, and paradoxical solutions. Just keep an eye out when venturing into the parallel dimension known as the Darkside–that’s where things get especially out of control.

Key features include:

• 15 unique standalone cases between both games 
• Pointing AND clicking technology 
• Music from Thomas O’Boyle, a totally-living composer, definitely not undead, and Ben Prunty, the audiomancer behind gems such as Into the Breach, Subnautica, and FTL
• Photo-Realistic* Pixel Rendering (*Depends on your definition of photo-realism)
• At least six jokes 

If you’ve just gotten your hands on the Atari VCS and desperately need some games for it–ideally good games that have already passed inspection on other consoles–you could definitely do worse than The Darkside Detective games. These titles are off-beat and funny in the best way, as you can see in the accolades trailer above.

Between the retro-pixel graphics, spooky sensibilities, and a lot of intricate point-and-click adventure puzzles to solve, you’re sure to have a good time. Just be careful after dark. It would be a shame if something happened to you.

The Darkside Detective and The Darkside Detective: A Fumble in the Dark are now available on Atari VCS, Nintendo Switch, PlayStation 4, PlayStation 5, Google Stadia, Xbox One, and Xbox Series X/S.

What are you looking forward to playing on the Atari VCS? Let us know down in the comments, or hit us up on Twitter or Facebook.

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Legendary games industry company Atari has a storied place in video game history, however it has not been a big competitor in the market for some time, focusing instead on hotels and cryptocurrency. These days the former console manufacturing powerhouse is better known for its iconic logo than as a serious competitor in the gaming space. That may all be about to change, with the surprise announcement of the Atari VCS.

With pre-orders now live, and shipping this year, the Atari VCS marks a return to the living room for the first time since the Atari Jaguar back in 1993 (not counting the Atari Flashback). The VCS was first hinted at back in September of 2017, then codenamed the Ataribox, with rumours suggesting it was going to be a hybrid Console and Home Computer. Those rumours were confirmed today, with the Atari VCS featuring the ability to “reboot into PC mode” and the capability to run Windows, Linux, and Chrome OS.

The Atari VCS is being sold as something of a jack-of-all-trades. Running on an AMD Ryzen processor, the VCS will be a home for over 100 classics from the Atari vault, but also capable of running new games – whether this means there will be 3rd party titles available remains to be seen. The website details specs for an Atari VCS 800 and 400, with the latter having half the RAM. Everything about the presentation of the VCS, from its logo to the black and walnut colour scheme, harken back to the classic Atari systems. The VCS even comes with an updated version of the Atari joystick (featuring a new secondary fire button), for that added nostalgia kick.

The Atari VCS will retail for $389.99 and be available from Walmart and Gamestop, and enters the market at a fascinating time for consoles. As Sony and Microsoft compete to be the face of modern gaming, Atari seems to be focusing on the goodwill that older gamers have thanks to growing up with the brand. The heavy focus on the VCS being a home computer (mouse and keyboard compatible) is an interesting direction for the company to take, but this functionality combined with a more modest price point than its competitors, may make it attractive to consumers this holiday season. The thing that really sells systems, however, is games; and at this point it is hard to tell whether the VCS will have much to offer anyone who doesn’t have an in-built love of its classic games library.

What does Atari mean to you? An old favourite, or a dinosaur? Sound off in the comments.

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The post Atari Are Getting Back in the Game with New Console: The Atari VCS appeared first on COGconnected.