Atari Urban Legend comes true.

soran · 27/04/14 - 00:01

If anyone who has been around gaming long enough to remember the urban legend about Atari burying loads of game cartridges of "E.T The Game"(worst game ever made) then take a look at this:
http://www.torontosun.com/2014/04/26/et-atari-cartridges-exhumed-in-new-mexico-confirming-legend

mred2000 · 27/04/14 - 00:38

Was it ever really an urban legend? I thought there was always enough evidence that the event happened and where stuff was buried...

Dan27 · 27/04/14 - 00:40

I bet MS try and dump all the unsold XB1s there to replace what they found

[Deleted User] · 27/04/14 - 00:45

mred2000 wrote: »

Was it ever really an urban legend? I thought there was always enough evidence that the event happened and where stuff was buried...

I always thought it was an urban legend myself, someone saying yeah we buried it in the desert always seemed a little far fetched, why go through the effort when a local dump would of been a quicker and easier why to illegal dump trash

Rich_L · 27/04/14 - 07:23

I thought there were 'hundreds of thousands' of copies buried together. They've found one?

Dave3622 · 27/04/14 - 08:44

Rich_L wrote: »

I thought there were 'hundreds of thousands' of copies buried together. They've found one?

It's a lot more than one:

http://kotaku.com/e-t-found-in-new-mexico-landfill-1568100161?utm_campaign=Socialflow_Kotaku_Facebook&utm_source=Kotaku_Facebook&utm_medium=Socialflow

gdjman68wasdigi · 27/04/14 - 08:50

the AVGN is making a film about this

gds1972 · 27/04/14 - 09:24

I guess I should have expected this

http://www.ebay.co.uk/itm/E-T-the-Extra-Terrestrial-for-the-Atari-2600-job-lot-10-000-cartridges-/191151052629?pt=UK_PC_Video_Games_Video_Games_JS&hash=item2c817d9755

Tassium · 27/04/14 - 09:58

Remember the line in Raiders of the Lost Ark? Bury a watch for 1000 years and it becomes priceless...

I think the ET Carts if left for 1000years would actually end up still being considered worthless.

mred2000 · 27/04/14 - 10:37

thomas2400 wrote: »

I always thought it was an urban legend myself, someone saying yeah we buried it in the desert always seemed a little far fetched, why go through the effort when a local dump would of been a quicker and easier why to illegal dump trash

But that's not the full story, which isn't hard to 'dig up' as it fairly well documented and wasn't illegal. The burial site was already a landfill, so it wasn't just some random spot in the desert. It was picked as stuff would be buried and harder for folk to dig up. Also, it wasn't just ET cartridge's but copies of other games plus consoles as well from the Atari El Paso warehouse and everything was crushed before burial.

gillyallan · 27/04/14 - 10:47

Weirdly my pal bought that game when it came out

Dave3622 · 27/04/14 - 10:52

gdjman68wasdigi wrote: »

the AVGN is making a film about this

Excellent! That guy makes me laugh

mred2000 · 27/04/14 - 10:54

gillyallan wrote: »

Weirdly my pal bought that game when it came out

I'm surprised my brother didn't buy it considering I was nuts on ET at the time. One of my mates had it, though, and all I can remember of it is it just didn't make any sense...

RotLA on the 2600 was brilliant, though, but I still haven't completed the bloody thing!

gdjman68wasdigi · 27/04/14 - 11:01

Dave3622 wrote: »

Excellent! That guy makes me laugh

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=eiz95K1ngiI

[Deleted User] · 27/04/14 - 13:33

Amazing story appartently a documentary is getting released on this.

MsLurker · 27/04/14 - 16:38

They have unearthed an evil that should have been left well alone. Prepare for water turning into blood, a plague of locusts...

soran · 27/04/14 - 17:02

MsLurker wrote: »

They have unearthed an evil that should have been left well alone. Prepare for water turning into blood, a plague of locusts...

And here it is in all it's glory:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ZPnmewxetNA - WARNING contains video that some hardcore gamers may find disturbing ;-)

Pink Knight · 27/04/14 - 20:09

Never had an Atari 2600, but a mate of mine did and the ET game.
I was more impressed by the machine's wood finish and bought some Atari Joysticks for my Commodore 64 when I got one. Those and Powerplay ones were my favourites.

scorpionatthepc · 27/04/14 - 20:38

I wouldn't say et was the worst game for the system you just have to learn how to play it. Players got frustrated because they didn't know how to get out of the holes and when they did they fell back down them.

Atari made too many copies though.

scorpionatthepc · 01/05/14 - 21:45

Here's the worst game for the atari 2600.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=h3V5FEHWOIc&feature=youtube_gdata_player

mred2000 · 06/05/14 - 15:59

A local news network has found the man supposedly responsible for the dumping:
http://www.mcvuk.com/news/read/i-did-that-james-heller-said-he-was-the-man-who-buried-all-those-et-cartridges/0131993

"[There was] no mystery whatsoever. People made it a mystery."

Again, it baffles me that, even though there has always been LOADS of evidence that this incident occurred, it has easily developed into something that most folk believed to be a myth. Kassar was always vocal about it and a report was even in the Alamogordo Daily News, Sept. 27th 1983 ("City to Atari: 'E.T.' trash go home") as well as national and international press. The Atari owned warehouse that was emptied became a recycling plant when Atari went bump.

Still, don't let the truth get in the way of a good story, as they say, eh?

Hey there!

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Atari Urban Legend comes true.

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