RealSports

RealSports is a series of sports video games originally developed and published Atari, Inc. The first games were released in 1982 for the Atari 2600, then the series expanded to the Atari 5200, Atari 7800, and Atari 8-bit family. By the early 1980s, Atari's initial sports releases for the VCS—Home Run and Football—were dated in terms of visuals and gameplay, and targeted by an Intellivision ad campaign from Mattel. The RealSports series was an attempt by Atari to revitalize the sports game lineup for their consoles.[1]

For the sports news magazine, see Real Sports with Bryant Gumbel.
RealSports
Genre(s)Sports
Developer(s)Atari, Inc.
Publisher(s)Atari, Inc.
Platform(s)Atari 2600, Atari 5200, Atari 7800, Atari 8-bit
First releaseRealSports Baseball (2600)
October 1982
Latest releaseRealSports Baseball (7800)
March 1989

Development

Atari's development of the RealSports series was prompted by an aggressive Intellivision 1980 advertising campaign fronted by George Plimpton criticising the graphics and gameplay of Atari's sports games for the Atari 2600.[2][3] The advertisements negatively compared Atari's sports games to Mattel's Sports Network series of games, the world's first sports video games franchise.[1]

The first three games in the series were RealSports Baseball (October 1982), RealSports Football (December 1982), and RealSports Volleyball (November 1982). The baseball and football offerings were essentially upgrades on existing games for the 2600, whilst the volleyball game was to be the first volleyball-theme game released for an Atari platform. RealSports Soccer and RealSports Tennis followed before the 1983 video game crash halted development of further RealSports games whilst Atari remained under the management of Warner Brothers.[1]

Following Atari's sale to Jack Tramiel in 1984, two further RealSports games were released. RealSports Boxing was released in 1987, whilst a further update of RealSports Baseball for the Atari 7800 platform was released in 1988 as the final RealSports game. A basketball game, RealSports Basketball, was announced but never officially released for the original Atari platforms,[1] though it was later included on AtGames Flashback consoles.[4]

List of games
RealSports games
YearTitlePlatforms
1982RealSports Baseball2600, 5200, 7800, 8-bit (unreleased)
1982RealSports Football2600, 5200, 8-bit
1982RealSports Volleyball2600
1983RealSports Soccer2600, 5200, 8-bit (unreleased)
1983RealSports Tennis2600, 5200, 8-bit
1987RealSports Boxing2600
UnreleasedRealSports Basketball2600, 5200, 8-bit

Reception

The 1984 Software Encyclopedia called the RealSports series an effective update to Atari's sports game offerings.[5] In 2018, the British magazine Retro Gamer assessed the RealSports franchise positively compared to Mattel's Sports Network series for the Intellivision in a head-to-head comparison.[1]

Legacy

The intellectual property rights for the game series passed to Hasbro Interactive and were subsequently bought by Infogrames in 2001, which was subsequently re-named Atari SA. Games from the series were re-released by Infogrames on the 2005 Atari Anthology.[6] Games from the series were then subsequently re-released for the Atari Flashback 3 in 2011, which was the first console of the Flashback series made by the AtGames company.[4] As of 2021, games from the series have been included on all subsequent Flashback consoles, including the Flashback 4,[7] 5,[8] 6,[9] 7,[10] 8,[11] 9,[12] and X.[13]

References
  1. Jainschigg, John (August 2018). "The History of RealSports". Retro Gamer. No. 183. Future plc. pp. 44–49.
  2. Lapetino, Tim (26 October 2016). Art of Atari. Dynamite Entertainment. pp. 180–181, 325. ISBN 9781524101060. Retrieved 20 February 2021.
  3. "Console Portraits: A 40-Year Pictorial History of Gaming". Wired. Condé Nast. 15 June 2007. Archived from the original on 14 August 2020. Retrieved 2 March 2021.
  4. Purchese, Robert (September 7, 2011). "Atari Flashback 3 console: 60 games, £50 - Two pads, looks like Atari 2600". Eurogamer. Gamer Network Limited. Retrieved February 28, 2021.
  5. Kunkel, Bill, ed. (1984). 1984 Software Encyclopedia. Reese Communications Inc. p. 98. Retrieved 24 February 2021.
  6. Reed, Kristian (May 9, 2005). "Atari Anthology Let's do the timewarp. Again". Eurogamer. Gamer Network Limited. Retrieved February 28, 2021.
  7. Pescovitz, David (December 3, 2012). "Atari Flashback 4 console". Boing Boing. Retrieved March 2, 2021.
  8. Atgames Atari Flashback 5 User Guide. AtGames Digital Media Inc. 2014. Retrieved March 2, 2021.
  9. Atgames Atari Flashback 6 User Guide. AtGames Digital Media Inc. 2015. Retrieved March 2, 2021.
  10. Fenech, Steven (February 15, 2017). "Play classic games like Space Invaders, Frogger and Pong on your TV with Atari Flashback 7". Tech Guide. Retrieved March 1, 2021.
  11. Falcone, John (July 17, 2017). "Flashback 8 Gold is Atari fans' SNES Classic alternative". CNET. Retrieved March 1, 2021.
  12. "Atari Flashback 9 User Guide". ATGames. 2019. Retrieved March 2, 2021.
  13. Adcock, Dan (2020). "Atari Flashback X Review". Pixelated Gamer. Retrieved March 2, 2021.
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