The Atari 2600, released in the US during 1977, was Atari's first home console that could play a number of games via cartridges. While not able to fully replicate arcade games, it still surpassed anything that was previously available. Selling around 30 million units in its lifetime, the Atari 2600 was a huge success for the company, though later consoles could not keep this momentum up.

From 2004, a number of Atari Flashback plug-and-play consoles have been created by AtGames, based on the Atari 2600 and beyond. While some were themed around later Atari consoles, most were designed to look like the original 2600 — the majority of the Atari Flashback game line-up is also taken from the 2600 as well.