Atari Jaguar


The Atari Jaguar is a home video game console that was developed by Atari Corporation and originally released in North America in November 1993.
A successor to the 7800, the Jaguar came as part of the fifth generation of video game consoles and was, controversially, marketed by Atari as being the world's first "64-bit" video game system, while competing with the existing 16-bit consoles and the 32-bit 3DO Interactive Multiplayer platform. The Jaguar shipped with Cybermorph as the pack-in game.
Development on the Atari Jaguar started in the early 1990s by Flare Technology. The multi-chip architecture, hardware bugs, and lacking developer support tools made game development difficult. Underwhelming sales further contributed to the console's lack of third-party support. This, in addition to the lack of internal development at Atari, led to a games library comprising only 50 licensed titles, plus another 13 games on the Jaguar CD.
Atari attempted to extend the lifespan of the system with the Atari Jaguar CD add-on and marketing the Jaguar as the low-cost next generation console, with a price tag over $100 less than any of its competitors. However, with the release of the Sega Saturn and Sony PlayStation in 1995, sales of the Jaguar continued to fall, ultimately selling no more than 250,000 units before it was discontinued in 1996. The commercial failure of the Jaguar prompted Atari to leave the video game console market.
After Hasbro Interactive acquired all Atari properties in 1998, the rights to the Jaguar were released into the public domain, with the console being declared an open platform. Since its discontinuation, the Jaguar has gained a cult following, with a developer base that produces homebrew games for the console.

History

Development

The Jaguar was developed by the members of Flare Technology, a company formed by Martin Brennan and John Mathieson. The team had claimed that they could not only make a console superior to the Genesis or the Super NES, but they could also be cost-effective. Impressed by their work on the Konix Multisystem, Atari persuaded them to close Flare and form a new company called Flare II, with Atari providing the funding. Flare II initially set to work designing two consoles for Atari. One was a 32-bit architecture, and the other was a 64-bit system ; however, work on the Jaguar design progressed faster than expected, so Atari canceled the Panther project to focus on the more promising Jaguar.
The Jaguar was unveiled in August 1993 at the Chicago Consumer Entertainment Show.

Launch

The Jaguar was launched on November 23, 1993, at a price of $249.99, under a $500 million manufacturing deal with IBM; to prepare for this, all of Atari's other products -- the 2600, 7800, XEGS and the ST Computer line -- would be discontinued by that time. The system was initially available only in the test markets of New York City and San Francisco, under the slogan "Do the Math", claiming superiority over competing 16-bit and 32-bit systems. A U.S.-wide release followed six months later, in early 1994. Computer Gaming World wrote in January 1994 that the Jaguar was "a great machine in search of a developer/customer base", as Atari had to "overcome the stigma of its name ". The company "ventured late into third party software support" while competing console 3DO's "18 month public relations blitz" would result in "an avalanche of software support", the magazine reported.
The Jaguar struggled to attain a substantial user base. Atari reported that it had shipped 17,000 units as part of the system's initial test market in 1993. By the end of 1994, it reported that it had sold approximately 100,000 units.

Arrival of Saturn and PlayStation

In early 1995, Atari announced that they had dropped the price of the Jaguar to $149.99 in order to improve its competitive nature. Atari ran early morning infomercials, with enthusiastic salesmen touting the powerful game system. These infomercials would run for most of 1995, but did not significantly sell the remaining stock of Jaguar systems.
In a 1995 interview with Next Generation, then-CEO Sam Tramiel declared that the Jaguar was as powerful, if not more powerful, than the newly launched Sega Saturn, and slightly weaker than the upcoming PlayStation. Next Generation received a deluge of letters in response to Tramiel's comments, particularly his threat to bring Sony to court for price dumping if the PlayStation entered the U.S. market at a retail price below $300 and his remark that the small number of third party Jaguar games was good for Atari's profitability, which angered Jaguar owners who were already frustrated at how few games were coming out for the system.
In Atari's 1995 annual report, it noted: In addition, Atari had severely limited financial resources, and so could not create the level of marketing which has historically backed successful gaming consoles.

Decline

By November 1995, mass layoffs and insider statements were fueling journalistic speculation that Atari had ceased both development and manufacturing for the Jaguar and was simply trying to sell off existing stock before exiting the video game industry. Although Atari continued to deny these theories going into 1996, core Jaguar developers such as High Voltage Software and Beyond Games stated that they were no longer receiving communications from Atari regarding future Jaguar projects.
In its 10-K405 SEC Filing, filed April 12, 1996, Atari informed their stockholders that its revenues had declined by more than half, from $38.7 million in 1994 to $14.6 million in 1995, then gave them the news on the truly dire nature of the Jaguar: The filing also essentially confirmed all theories that Atari had given up on the Jaguar beginning in November of 1995, and in the subsequent months were concerned chiefly with liquidating its inventory of Jaguar products. On April 8, 1996, Atari Corporation agreed to merge with JTS, Inc. in a reverse takeover, thus forming JTS Corporation. The merger was finalized on July 30.
After the Atari/JTS merger, the bulk of the remaining Jaguar inventory remained unsold; these would be finally moved out to Tiger Software, a private liquidator, on December 23, 1996. On March 13, 1998, JTS sold the Atari name and all of the Atari properties to Hasbro Interactive.

Technical issues

Hardware Bugs

The Jaguar's underlying hardware was crippled by a flaw in the CPU's memory controller, which prevented code execution out of system RAM. Less severe defects included a buggy UART. The memory controller flaw could have been mitigated by a mature code-development environment, to unburden the programmer from having to micromanage small chunks of code. Jaguar's development tools left much to the programmer's own implementation, as documentation was incomplete.
Design specs for the console allude to the GPU or DSP being capable of acting as a CPU, leaving the Motorola 68000 to read controller inputs. Atari's Leonard Tramiel also specifically suggested that the 68000 not be used by developers. In practice, however, many developers used the Motorola 68000 to drive gameplay logic due to the greater developer familiarity with the 68000, bugs that made using the custom chips difficult, lacking developer support tools, and the adequacy of the 68000 for certain types of games.

Bit count controversy

Atari tried to play down competing consoles by proclaiming the Jaguar was the only "64-bit" system. This claim is questioned by some, because the CPU and the "Tom" GPU executes a 32-bit instruction-set, but sends control signals to the 64-bit graphics co-processors. Atari's reasoning that the 32-bit "Tom" and "Jerry" chips work in tandem to add up to a 64-bit system was ridiculed in a mini-editorial by Electronic Gaming Monthly, which commented that "If Sega did the math for the Sega Saturn the way Atari did the math for their 64-bit Jaguar system, the Sega Saturn would be a 112-bit monster of a machine." Next Generation, while giving a mostly negative review of the Jaguar, maintained that it is a true 64-bit system, since the data path from the DRAM to the CPU and Tom and Jerry chips is 64 bits wide.

Technical specifications

From the Jaguar Software Reference manual, page 1:
Jaguar is a custom chip set primarily intended to be the heart of a very high-performance games/leisure computer. It may also be used as a graphics accelerator in more complex systems, and applied to workstation and business uses. As well as a general purpose CPU, Jaguar contains four processing units. These are the Object Processor, Graphics Processor, Blitter, and Digital Sound Processor. Jaguar provides these blocks with a 64-bit data path to external memory devices, and is capable of a very high data transfer rate into external dynamic RAM.

Processors

  • "Tom" Chip, 26.59 MHz
  • * Graphics processing unit – 32-bit RISC architecture, 4 KB internal RAM, all graphical effects are software-based.
  • ** Core has some additional instructions intended for 3D operations
  • * Object Processor – 64-bit non-programmable; provides all video output from system.
  • * Blitter – 64-bit high speed logic operations, z-buffering and Gouraud shading, with 64-bit internal registers.
  • * DRAM controller, 8, 16, 32 and 64-bit memory management
  • "Jerry" Chip, 26.59 MHz
  • * Digital Signal Processor – 32-bit RISC architecture, 8 KB internal RAM
  • ** Similar RISC core as the GPU, additional instructions intended for audio operations
  • * CD-quality sound
  • ** Number of sound channels limited by software
  • ** Two DACs convert digital data to analog sound signals
  • ** Full stereo capabilities
  • * Wavetable synthesis and AM synthesis
  • * A clock control block, incorporating timers, and a UART
  • * Joystick control
  • Motorola 68000 "used as a manager".
  • * General purpose 16/32-bit control processor, 13.295 MHz

    Other Jaguar features

  • RAM: 2 MB on a 64-bit bus using 4 16-bit fast page mode DRAMs
  • Storage: ROM cartridges – up to 6 MB
  • DSP-port
  • Monitor-port
  • Antenna-port Fixed at 591 MHz in Europe
  • * Not present on French model
  • Support for ComLynx I/O
  • NTSC/PAL machines can be identified by their power LED colour, Red = NTSC, Green = PAL

    COJAG arcade games

licensed the Atari Jaguar's chipset for use in its arcade games. The system, named COJAG, replaced the 68000 with a 68020 or MIPS R3000-based CPU, added more RAM, a full 64-bit wide ROM bus, and optionally a hard drive. It ran the lightgun games Area 51 and Maximum Force, which were released by Atari as dedicated cabinets or as the Area 51/Maximum Force combo machine. Other games were developed but never released.

Atari Jaguar Duo

The Atari Jaguar Duo was a proposed console similar to the TurboDuo and Genesis CDX. It was an attempt by Atari to combine the Atari Jaguar and Atari Jaguar CD to make a new console. A prototype model, described by journalists as resembling a bathroom scale, was unveiled at the 1995 Winter Consumer Electronics Show, but the console was cancelled before production could begin.

Peripherals

Prior to the launch of the console in November 1993, Atari had announced a variety of peripherals and add-ons for the Jaguar to be released over the console's lifespan. This included a CD-ROM-based add-on console, a dial-up internet link with support for online gaming, a virtual reality headset, and an MPEG-2 video card. However, due to the poor sales and eventual commercial failure of the Jaguar, most of the peripherals in development were scrapped. The only peripherals and add-ons released by Atari for the Jaguar were a redesigned controller, an adapter for four players, a CD console add-on, and a link cable for local area network gaming.
The redesigned second controller for the Jaguar, the ProController by Atari, added three more face buttons and two triggers. The controller was created in response to the criticism of the original controller that the console came with, which was said to not possess enough buttons for fighting games in particular. Sold independently, however, it was never bundled with the system after its release. A peripheral that allowed 4 controllers to be plugged into the console was also released. Dubbed the "Team Tap", it was released independently and as a bundle with White Men Can't Jump. However, the Team Tap was compatible with White Men Can't Jump and NBA Jam Tournament Edition only. Eight player gameplay with the Team Tap peripheral is also possible if a second Team Tap is plugged into the second controller port on the console, but neither of the compatible games supports eight players. Local area network multiplayer gameplay was achieved through the use of the Jaglink Interface, which allowed two Jaguar consoles to be linked together through a modular extension and a UTP phone cable. The Jaglink was compatible with three games: AirCars, BattleSphere and Doom.
In 1994 at the CES, Atari announced that it had partnered with Phylon, Inc. to create the Jaguar Voice/Data Communicator. The unit was delayed and eventually in 1995 mass production was canceled, but not before an estimated 100 units were produced. The Jaguar Voice Modem or JVM, as it became known, utilized a 19.9kbit/s dial up modem and had the ability to answer incoming phone calls and store up to 18 phone numbers. Players were required to directly dial each other for online game play. The only Jaguar game that supports the JVM is Ultra Vortek; the modem is initialized in the Ultra Vortek start up screen by entering 911 on the key pad.

Jaguar CD

The Atari Jaguar CD is an add-on to the Jaguar that made use of CD-ROMs to distribute games. It was released in September 1995, two years after the Jaguar's launch. Twelve games were released for the system during its manufacturing lifetime, with more being made later by homebrew developers. Each Jaguar CD unit came with a Virtual Light Machine, which displayed light patterns corresponding to music, if the user inserts an audio CD into the console. It was developed by Jeff Minter, who had created the program after experimenting with graphics during the development of Tempest 2000. The program was deemed a spiritual successor to the Atari Video Music, a system which served a similar purpose, released in 1976.
An additional accessory for the Jaguar CD, which allowed Jaguar CD games to save persistent data such as preferences and saved games, was also released. Known as the Memory Track, it was a cartridge that contained a 128 K EEPROM, and was to be inserted into the cartridge slot on the Jaguar CD while the user played a Jaguar CD game. The program manager for the Memory Track is accessed by pushing the option button while the system is starting, and exited by pushing the * and # keys simultaneously. There were plans to make a second model of the Jaguar console that combined both the Jaguar and the Jaguar CD into one unit, a la the TurboDuo. Originally codenamed the Jaguar III, and later the Jaguar Duo, the proposed model was scrapped after the discontinuation of the Jaguar.

Jaguar VR

A virtual reality headset compatible with the console, tentatively titled the Jaguar VR, was unveiled by Atari at the 1995 Winter Consumer Electronics Show. The development of the peripheral was a response to Nintendo's virtual reality console, the Virtual Boy, which had been announced the previous year. The headset was developed in cooperation with Virtuality, who had previously created many virtual reality arcade systems, and was already developing a similar headset for practical purposes, named Project Elysium, for IBM. The peripheral was targeted for a commercial release before Christmas 1995. However, the deal with Virtuality was abandoned in October 1995. After Atari's merger with JTS in 1996, all prototypes of the headset were allegedly destroyed. However, two working units, one low-resolution prototype with red and grey-colored graphics and one high-resolution prototype with blue and grey-colored graphics, have since been recovered, and are regularly showcased at retrogaming-themed conventions and festivals. Only one game was developed for the Jaguar VR prototype: a 3D-rendered version of the 1980 arcade game Missile Command, entitled Missile Command 3D, though a demo of Virtuality's Zone Hunter was also created for Jaguar VR demonstrations.

Unlicensed peripherals

An unofficial expansion peripheral for the Atari Jaguar dubbed the "Catbox" was released by the Rockford, Illinois company ICD. It was originally slated to be released early in the Jaguar's life, in the second quarter of 1994, but was not actually released until mid-1995. The ICD CatBox plugs directly into the AV/DSP connectors located in the rear of the Jaguar console and provides three main functions. These are audio, video, and communications. It features six output formats, three for audio and three for video making the Jaguar compatible with multiple high quality monitor systems and multiple monitors at the same time. It is capable of communications methods known as CatNet and RS-232 as well as DSP pass through, allowing the user to connect two or more Jaguars together for multiplayer games either directly or with modems. The ICD CatBox features a polished stainless steel casing and red LEDs in the jaguar's eyes on the logo that indicate communications activity. An IBM AT-type null modem cable may be used to connect two Jaguars together. The CatBox is also compatible with Atari's Jaglink Interface peripheral.
An adaptor for the Jaguar that allows for WebTV access was revealed in 1998; one prototype is known to exist.

Game library

Reception

Reviewing the Jaguar just a few weeks prior to its launch, GamePro gave it a "thumbs sideways". They praised the power of the hardware but criticized the controller, and were dubious of how the software lineup would turn out, commenting that Atari's failure to secure support from key third party publishers such as Capcom was a bad sign. They concluded that "Like the 3DO, the Jaguar is a risky investment – just not quite as expensive."
The Jaguar won GameFans "Best New System" award for 1993.
The small size and poor quality of the Jaguar's game library became the most commonly cited reason for its failure in the marketplace. The pack-in game Cybermorph was one of the first polygon-based games for consoles, but was criticized for design flaws and a weak color palette, and compared unfavorably with the SNES's Star Fox. Other early releases like Trevor McFur in the Crescent Galaxy, Raiden, and ' also received poor reviews, the latter two for failing to take full advantage of the Jaguar's hardware. Jaguar did eventually earn praise with titles such as Tempest 2000, Doom, and Wolfenstein 3D. The most successful title during the Jaguar's first year was Alien vs. Predator. Both Alien vs. Predator and Tempest 2000 were named among the system's defining titles by GamePro in 2007. However, these occasional successes were seen as insufficient while the Jaguar's competitors were receiving a continual stream of critically acclaimed software; GamePro concluded their rave review of Alien vs. Predator by remarking "If Atari can turn out a dozen more games like AvP, Jaguar owners could truly rest easy and enjoy their purchase." In late 1995 reviews of the Jaguar, Game Players remarked, "The Jaguar suffers from several problems, most importantly the lack of good software." and Next Generation likewise commented that "thus far, Atari has spectacularly failed to deliver on the software side, leaving many to question the actual quality and capability of the hardware. With only one or two exceptions – Tempest 2000 is cited most frequently – there have just been no truly great games for the Jaguar up to now." They further noted that while Atari is well known by older gamers, the company had much less overall brand recognition than Sega, Sony, Nintendo, or even The 3DO Company. However, they argued that with its low price point, the Jaguar might still compete if Atari could improve the software situation. They gave the system two out of five stars. Game Players also stated the despite being 64-bit, the Jaguar is much less powerful than the 3DO, Saturn, and PlayStation, even when supplemented with the Jaguar CD. With such a small library of games to challenge the incumbent 16-bit game consoles, Jaguar's appeal never grew beyond a small gaming audience. Digital Spy commented: "Like many failed hardware ventures, it still maintains something of a cult following but can only be considered a misstep for Atari."
In 2006 IGN editor Craig Harris rated the standard Jaguar controller as the worst game controller ever, criticizing the unwarranted recycling of the 1980s "phone keypad" format and the small number of action buttons, which he found particularly unwise given that Atari was actively trying to court fighting game fans to the system. Ed Semrad of Electronic Gaming Monthly commented that many Jaguar games gratuitously used all of the controller's phone keypad buttons, making the controls much more difficult than they needed to be. GamePro''s The Watch Dog remarked, "The controller usually doesn't use the keypad, and for games that use the keypad extensively, a keypad overlay is used to minimize confusion. But yes, it is a lot of buttons for nuttin'." Atari added more action buttons for its Pro Controller, to improve performance in fighting games in particular.

Legacy

Telegames continued to publish games for the Jaguar after it was discontinued, and for a time was the only company to do so. On May 14, 1999, Hasbro Interactive announced that it had released all rights to the Jaguar, declaring it an open platform; this opened the doors for extensive homebrew development. Following the announcement, Songbird Productions joined Telegames in releasing unfinished Jaguar games alongside new games to satisfy the cult following. Hasbro Interactive, along with all the Atari properties, was sold to Infogrames on January 29, 2001.
In the United Kingdom in 2001, Telegames and retailer Game made a deal to bring the Jaguar to Game's retail outlets. It was initially sold for £29.99 new and software ranged between £9.99 for more common games such as Doom and Ruiner Pinball and £39.99 for rarer releases such as Defender 2000 and Checkered Flag. The machine had a presence in the stores until 2007, when remaining consoles were sold off for £9.99 and games were sold for as low as 97p.
In 1997, Imagin Systems, a manufacturer of dental imaging equipment, purchased the Jaguar cartridge and console molds from JTS. The console molds could, with minor modification, fit their HotRod camera, and the cartridge molds were reused to create an optional memory expansion card. In December 2014, the molds were purchased from Imagin Systems by Mike Kennedy, owner of the Kickstarter funded Retro Videogame Magazine, to propose a new crowdfunded video game console, the Retro VGS, later rebranded the Coleco Chameleon after entering a licensing agreement with Coleco. The purchase of the molds was far cheaper than designing and manufacturing entirely new molds, and Kennedy described their acquisition as "the entire reason is possible". However, the project was terminated in March 2016 following criticism of Kennedy and doubts regarding demand for the proposed console. Two "prototypes" were discovered to be fakes and Coleco withdrew from the project. After the project's termination, the molds were sold to Albert Yarusso, the founder of the AtariAge website.