h. So far, it’s gotten one DLC: The Wider World of Atari, that added even more titles. Now, it’s about to get its second, thanks to an acquisition it made earlier this year.
Atari announced The First Console War on Friday, and it’s about, as you can guess, the company’s first console war with the Intellivision, although it’ll touch on a specific element of it. In the 1980s, Mattel was publishing games on the Intellivision. At some point, it decided to release versions of these console exclusives for its main competitor, the Atari 2600, under the M Network label.
Recommended Videos You might not recognize some of the names. For example, what is Astroblast? Is that like Astrosmash? Well, a lot of games got different names when Mattel ported them over. Thankfully, the Atari M Network names are similar to the originals. Atari acquired its rival Intellivision in May, therefore ending the video game industry’s oldest console war and acquiring over 200 games, including more than a dozen M Network games. Atari CEO Wade Rosen said following the announcement that the company wanted to distribute the games, and was looking into possible ways to create new games based off those IPs.
Related Digital Eclipse, which Atari also owns, makes games that are both retro remasters and interactive museum exhibits, and The First Console War is no different. The DLC will feature interviews with M Network programmer Jane Terjung, game historians Leonard Herman and Mike Mika, and former Atari developers David Crane and Garry Kitchen, along with a new timeline breaking down this era in video game history.