Game Stooge

Atari Going Low Budget?

• Scribbled on May 23rd, 2008 by Derrick Schommer
• Filed in Casual Gaming, Industry News, Rumor Mill

Phil Harrison took control of Infogrames and is charged with turning around the company and its little Atari branding into something less…suck?

It’s not that Atari has bad titles, it’s really that they’ve sold most of their franchises off to stop bleeding money. Much like a boat that has taken on water, sometimes you have to toss some prized possessions overboard to keep it floating, those are the breaks.

Well, this new captain has a new focus and wants to taste success like he did with SCEE (Sony), being a core member of the team which has launched a little console known as PlayStation. Granted, he’s taken on a sinking ship, but when the chips are down there is only one direction to go, right?

No. He could drive the ship into the rocks resulting in a bloody mess of body parts and feces. But, the other perspective is a growing company with a sustainable income and a chance at success. The question is, how can it be done?

Perhaps by focusing Atari and its parent company in a new direction, less emphasis on large budget “block buster” game titles and more focus on online gaming with a social community aspect. Valve’s Steam online store has proven their is a market for digital downloads at a reasonable price. Other companies like GarageGames have opened up Flash game ports of their titles to increase sales on their new beta site Instant Action.

The digital download community is large, perhaps much larger than the “hardcore console gamers,” and it remains widely untapped by huge companies. While EA, Activision, Ubisoft and others go after the console market smaller companies like PopCap, Valve, MyTopia, GarageGames and other developers/publishers steal the online limelight.

We’re not saying you have to go out and create an Massively Multiplayer Online Game (MMOG), but perhaps target a more general audience with a social networking style game. A light weight title that doesn’t have to hit epic proportions in terms of sales and cost.

Let’s face it, if you don’t have a Halo or Grand Theft Auto franchise you’re probably going to take a risk in spending 100-million dollars on a game title. There are a few select franchises that will break entertainment records in the future, but they are far and few compared to the less risky lower budget titles.

Infogrames and Atari really cannot afford too many risks with their current financial status, so Alone in the Dark might be their last mega-blockbuster epically expensive game for years to come. That doesn’t, however, mean the company is at an end road, consumers want cheaper titles with creative designs and innovative direction. The Wii isn’t a success by sheer luck; take a page from Nintendo’s book and sell a less expensive alternative.

(Thanks, CasualGamerChick)