Audacity Games is a newly-announced game developer with a bold vision: it's going to be making brand-new Atari 2600 games. And yes, there will be actual cartridges produced.
The Atari 2600 was one of the first home video game consoles to get widespread adoption and it has a pretty big library of games. Some of the very people who worked on popular cartridges for that console — including Pitfall and the Atari 2600 port of Donkey Kong — are now banding together to breathe a bit of new life into a very old video game console.
How Audacity Games is Making New Atari 2600 Games
Audacity Games promises to deliver "completely new" games in a retro style from classic designers David Crane, Garry Kitchen, and Dan Kitchen. Those names may not be immediately familiar to you, but you've probably heard of their work.
David Crane, for example, counts Pitfall as one of the over 100 video games he's made in his long career. Oh, and he also happens to be one of the co-founders of a little company you may be familiar with: Activision.
"Our first titles will be Atari 2600, but we will support most retro game platforms, as long as there is reasonable demand for the product." – Industry Veteran Garry Kitchen on Twitter
Of course, the Kitchen brothers have a fair amount of titles to their credit as well. Garry Kitchen worked on games such as the N.E.S. classics The Simpsons: Bart vs. the Space Mutants and The Simpsons: Bart vs. the World. His brother Dan worked on those same titles and has quite a robust profile of releases across every console generation save the newest one. Now, these three industry veterans are teaming up to make new Atari 2600 games.
Audacity Games' projects will be distributed on actual cartridges compatible with the Atari 2600 console. Understandably, not everyone might have one of these gaming titans sitting in a closet somewhere, or they might not have the right cables to play it on a modern television. That won't be a problem — Garry Kitchen says that their first wave of releases will also include a download of a digital version compatible with the Stella emulator.
There's no telling what this new developer's first project might be; all we know for now is that its first release will be on the Atari 2600. Other retro consoles may be supported, too, as long as there is "reasonable demand" for a port according to Garry Kitchen.
For now, fans of retro games have something to look forward to in the coming months and years. You can find out more about Audacity Games on its official website and you can also follow this new game developer on Twitter.
What do you think of this brand-new game developer creating original titles for classic consoles? What consoles would you like to see get new games? Let us know in the comments below!
