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Anthony
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Atari's Financial Troubles
« on: December 24, 2007, 06:25:45 pm »

I was reading up on the horrible game Jenga World Tour for the Wii and DS, and some people speculated that this game reflected Atari's Financial losses:  http://www.gamespot.com/news/6182469.html

According to Gamespot, they've lost $12 Million.

Quote
revenues shrink to $10M as losses rise to $12M.

If Atari filed for bankruptcy, what would happen to the to their possession of the Star Control name?  Would it be open up for grabs, or would Atari end up giving it to some predecessor?

http://uqm.stack.nl/wiki/Star_Control_Trademark
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countchocula86
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Re: Atari's Financial Troubles
« Reply #1 on: December 24, 2007, 07:10:36 pm »

Oh wow, thats pretty interesting. Maybe TfB should make an offer? I mean if Atari is goin down the crapper, they will likely be very interested in selling old titles off?
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Re: Atari's Financial Troubles
« Reply #2 on: December 26, 2007, 12:31:23 am »

But at what price? They're sitting on a lot of licenses I'd love to get my hands on, but I hear these things are like... ... a lot. Really a lot.
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taltamir
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Re: Atari's Financial Troubles
« Reply #3 on: January 03, 2008, 06:35:03 am »

I had a hunch so I looked up atari on wikipedia real quick.
Every single game on the list which I have liked and, as a result, played. Was released as an early beta and usually never completed.

The worst offender of them all is temple of elemental evil. Which is completely unplayable without the company of 8 fix mod (www.co9.org) the game really kicks ass with it though.

Neverwinter nights 1 and 2 come in second: neverwinter nights 1 was finally made complete... thanks to two expansion packs and continuing support from bioware... NWN2 was recenlty made PLAYABLE with the release of the first expansion a year after the game's original release, but there is still much work to do there. I get the feeling that they could have made nwn2 complete in a few months instead NOT being there a year later if they concentrated on fixing it rather then creating an entire expansion. (which, btw, was a REALLY good expansion). and oodles of new content

Maybe if atari would start allowing (or maybe insisting?) that games be released when they are ready instead of releasing an early beta they would be getting better reviews, selling more copies, etc...

I know that some of these games I have not bought on principle because they were so buggy and incomplete. NONE of these was playable from beginning to end at release (they had show stopper bugs that would ALWAYS show up and prevent progression, although those were quickly fixed)
« Last Edit: January 03, 2008, 06:38:38 am by taltamir » Logged
Anthony
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Re: Atari's Financial Troubles
« Reply #4 on: January 07, 2008, 05:22:10 pm »

They also published The Witcher, which is wicked; too bad I can't run it on any of my computers... Also, Atari won't do anything with it anyways.  I don't think that Atari should go into a bidding war; I think it's going to a point where Atari will have no choice but to sell it at a more than fair price.
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Re: Atari's Financial Troubles
« Reply #5 on: January 07, 2008, 06:38:40 pm »

AFAIK, to keep the trademark protection, a trademark holder needs to use its trademark, something which Atari has not done for a long time, to my knowledge. TFB may not need to pay anything.

But it doesn't really matter; TFB have the rights to all the SC1/SC2 characters and storylines. They do not need the name "Star Control".
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Re: Atari's Financial Troubles
« Reply #6 on: January 07, 2008, 09:07:51 pm »

Essentially it might actually benefit Toys for Bob to use a new name for a sequel, so that although people associate the characters with Star Control 1 and 2, they don't assume that it will be as disapointing as Not-Star Control 3.
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