Atari 5200 - worth buying?

hey guys I'm going to try a little something new today this is a new series where I'm going to take a look at all of my classic game consoles and computers as well as some that I probably don't own yet and tell you whether or not I think they're still worth owning today not every game console and computer has aged as gracefully as every other some are more worth buying today than others and I'm going to go through and take a look at the pros and cons of each system and tell you whether or not I think it's still worth going out and buying one of these today I couldn't think of a better place to start them with the Atari 5200 a system that's kind of a bastard child of Ataris lineup it was the first system to use their wedge-shaped design something that they basically continued on until the end it's got a lot going for it but also got kind of a few issues with it so I it's a great subject to start this series with I think and let's just take a look at it right now let's take a look at the console itself first it is a big wedge-shaped imposing slab of a console and I think it actually looks great there are some foibles with the system for one thing there's a lot of empty space I'm going to throw up a picture right now so you can see this the back of the system actually is a holder for the controllers I don't have them in there right now but let's just see how that works to kind of go in upside down and as usual with any kind of controller storage they never quite fit the way they originally did so I generally don't keep them in there whatever you get the idea and this entire area back here is just empty space that if there wasn't controller storage could have made the console a lot smaller but again I like it big it has a cool look to it I'm going to do something right now that hopefully will be really satisfying the plastic on my system is still on this system was barely used when I picked it up in the 90s in the box this was before the days of retro gaming as a thing so the previous owner never even took the plastic off now sometimes these can be a little tricky to get off but I'm going to try hopefully it comes off in one nice smooth motion so I always think this is a fun thing to do and watch on old equipment so let's let's see if this actually works look at that coming off like butter I hope this is in focus right now beautiful so that's the system now one thing about this system is that it has a tendency to fall apart it may be a little difficult to see and I'll show another picture to you but much of the system is actually covered in not black but a frosted clear plastic and that in those days had a reputation as being very brittle much more brittle than ABS or other types of plastic that were more pliable now it actually happened to me part of my system just broke on its own while it was sitting on a shelf that can happen with these it's it's really not the most durable system it was forward-looking in a lot of ways it had a lot of features that other systems didn't have but the plastic itself is very brittle and can break this here and this here are made of that clear plastic and those are the trouble spots here's the bottom of the system I do like the fact that it has an RF cable storage that was kind of a new thing at the time Atari did that also both on the Atari 2800 and 7800 later so it does have RF output it can be modified to have both s-video and RCA composite output so if you're interested in that just know that it can be done you can even buy them with that already done for you if you look around one thing to be aware of if you do want to buy these for yourself is that there are both two and four port models there's really not a huge difference between them other than that and not many games supported four ports so Atari just removed them in the later models the four port models would be the very early ones and they're a little rarer than the two port models well actually quite a bit rare so may be worth a little bit of a premium now here's one of the systems controllers and I'm going to give you another little bit of satisfaction here also with the plastic only on this one the other one already has it taken off but look at that beautiful the Atari 5200 controller was both one of the system's greatest innovations and also one of its biggest weaknesses first of all analog control it had the first analog controller on a mass-produced home system but it was non centering see that it only returns to centre by the little rubber boot that's on top this meant that in games that required you to return back to centre you'd have to do it manually you'd constantly have to be adjusting and there was really no way to know what was true center that made a lot of games basically almost impossible to play although it is possible to get used to it after a while so it's really not the end of the world but there is a solution to that and that is the Whittle command control stick this was basically a standard joystick nothing more nothing less made for the Atari 5200 it duplicate both of its buttons and has some features like adjustable X and y-axis but it is a centering joystick so if you do pick up a 5200 I really recommend looking for these these are a bit expensive and make sure that you get the Y cable with it this one is actually connected here but I have another one just to show you so you need this because this allows you to use the keypad on the 5200 the original controller along with the wiko stick now speaking of the keypads on these because that's another point of contention with the 5200 controller unless they've been refurbished they're all going to be broken it just happens whether you use the controller or not it will happen sitting on a shelf sitting in a closet I have almost never used my 5200 and still at least one of my controllers keypads is broken I'm not sure about the other but I'll test that out in just a few minutes there are ways to fix that for not too much money you just need to open up the controller and get in there you can get refurbishment kits from best electronics as well as other sellers so it's not the end of the world again and once you refurbish it it's going to stay that way forever it's not going to break again so it's again not the end of the world but it is just kind of a hassle and something to be aware of with this system just to round out the coverage of the controller here you see start pause and reset buttons that was also an innovation with the 5200 now let's just talk about the game is because that's obviously the most important part of any game console Atari 5200 games came on these great cartridges with their blue and silver labels they look great they feel great and I'm going to be playing through some of these in just a couple of minutes so that you can see some of the gameplay but most of the system's library is made up of Atari arcade hits of the time obviously with any system there are going to be some original games thrown in there as well but a lot of the games are going to be familiar if you visited an arcade in those days and of course there was some third-party support as well not as much as some other systems but we'll leave that one for a second but we have Activision we have various others these are both Parker Brothers games and even today there's still a homebrew scene I only have one because I'm not generally big into home brews myself but mule has always been one of my favorite games on any system I played it first on the Atari 8-bit computers if you've ever looked for it on the 8-bit computer line it's extremely expensive if you want to get an original copy but I have it here on the 5200 and it's basically a perfect port the 5200 shares most of its hardware with the Atari 8-bit line I'm going to try and play that for you a little bit later also I'm not sure if I'm going to be able to at this point because my controllers may both be broken but we'll see if I can get the keypad to work on one of them I will fire that up now before I actually get into showing you some gameplay I do want to talk just a little bit about the history of the system I always think context is important or at least interesting the 5200 came out in 1982 which was just about a year or so before the North American video game crash so it was a very short-lived system that's kind of why I called it the bastard child of the Ataris lineup it's also why it's got such a relatively small library it was released shortly after the in television and ColecoVision both of which also featured keypad based controllers all three of these manufacturers were trying to move on from the simple joystick of previous generations now in addition to the widow command control stick there are a couple of other accessories you might want to look into if you're considering getting a 5200 the first is the trackball controller which makes games like Missile Command and centipede just that much more realistic and closer to the arcade experience the second is the Atari VCS adapter when the 5200 was released it was not backward compatible with the Atari 2600 which was a problem because the ColecoVision and intellivision both had adapters available for not too much money that made them compatible with Ataris earlier system the 5200 was not compatible with atari zone system so the quickly rushed out a 2600 adapter it's kind of an awkward t-shaped thing but it is available if you want to have a 5200 to just take care of all your Atari needs the most extreme detail the most realistic jump hold position only the Atari 5200 super system placement rooms of cold arctic real sports baseball your are only on super system 2600 games we adapt replace them all the Atari 5200 super system it's only competition so let's just take a look at some gameplay now Missile Command is one of those games that actually works better with the 5200 controller than with the standard joystick or even say a centering analog stick if you watch what I'm doing here you can use this almost like a mouse pointer you just put it where you want and there's not really much resistance trying to bring you back to the center which in most games is a bad thing but in this game kind of works out well countermeasure is an incredibly difficult game for me at least I don't know if other people out there have a better time with it than I do but I did want to just show that it's one of the few it sorry 5200 games to feature overlay so that was a feature copied from the Intellivision and the ColecoVision to some extent but it does use overlays it doesn't use them for much but it does use them I'll show you a little bit of the gameplay but I'm not going to be very good I'm just warning you now defender I think is one of the best games on the system and one of the best versions of defender at that time I actually like it better than the ColecoVision version [Music] [Music] [Music] [Music] [Music] [Music] [Music] [Applause] [Music] [Music] [Laughter] super breakout was originally the packing game for the system and that was probably a mistake on Ataris part by 1982 games that looked like pong were not really in fashion anymore and at the same time the ColecoVision was coming with Donkey Kong as a packin it's also a game that actually makes use of the non centering controller break out in the arcade used a roller as far as I remember and on the 2600 it used the paddle controller this was kind of a compromise you could use it again similar to Missile Command almost like a mouse you could just kind of put the paddle wherever you wanted it to be but it was still very imprecise [Music] you [Music] [Music] [Music] [Music] and unfortunately I've tested this and I'm not going to be able to play mule for you I neither one of my controller keypads is working so I will have to fix that before I can actually play this game but I just wanted to show you a little bit of the intro screen and this infectious music that you may or may not know from this game but you will never get it out of your head now [Music] so do I feel like the Atari 5200 is worth buying and owning today as either a gamer or collector or hopefully both well yes I actually do despite its issues with the controllers with the durability of this system these things can be either overcome or even just ignored the system itself is just I mean look at it it's big black and silver it's just a cool system the games that it plays it's got most of Ataris greatest hits and from the arcades at that time they're heavily upgraded over the 2600 the 5200 was much more of an upgrade over the 2600 then the later 7800 was over the 5200 it just feels like a quantum leap over the 2600 it is very similar to the Atari 8-bit line of computers and if you do have an 8-bit Atari computer you don't necessarily need a 5200 but I do think that it's a unique enough system to buy on its own I mean look at these cartridges these are just big imposing cartridges obviously the controllers are different and certain games actually played pretty well with them Missile Command for example so it's not exactly the same as having an Atari 8-bit computer so let's say you do want to pick one of these up for yourself I will put a link in the description to an eBay search I would appreciate it if you would use that if you want to take a look at one of these yourself and if you do like this video be sure to click the like button if you're not a subscriber be sure to subscribe and that's about it for now but I will hopefully see you next time bye bye [Music] [Applause] [Music]

Channel: Modern Classic

Views: 78,622

Keywords: atari 5200, atari, classic gaming, retro gaming, vintage gaming, video games, game consoles, video gaming, reviews, 8 bit

Id: dFUc8hEENZ8

Length: 24min 18sec (1458 seconds)

Published: Fri Apr 28 2017