Strange things have been happening at Atari over the past few years: under Wade Rosen, who took over as CEO in April 2021, Atari has overseen an excellent reworking of old titles, and the 50th anniversary game, a mishmash of elements from the company's history, looks pretty great.

Atari announced via a press release that it has now acquired "over 100 PC and console titles from the 1980s and 1990s. The games appear to be primarily from the back catalogs of three publishers: Accolade, Infogrames, and Microprose. These include the Bubsy the Bobcat series, Hardball, Demolition Racer, and 1942 games: the Pacific Air War series, the F-117A series, and the F-14 series. After the acquisition, Atari is looking to re-release these titles, sell merchandise, and most importantly, "create new games based on the IP." [Atari CEO Wade Rosen said, "This is a deep catalog of groundbreaking, award-winning titles from Accolade, Infogrames and Micro Press. Many of these titles are part of Atari's history, and fans look forward to seeing many of these games re-released in physical and digital formats and, in some cases, ported to modern game consoles."

As part of the deal, Atari also acquired Accolade and the GTI brand: Accolade was a big player in game publishing until it went bankrupt in 2000. This follows last month's announcement of the acquisition of the (so far excellent) Night Dive Studios, which can rightly be called a retro-specialist studio, and the acquisition of the classic game Berzerk.

"There has been a lot of disappointment in Atari over the years, and even if I say things will change, it won't," Rosen said in a recent interview with Axios (opens in new tab).

"I just hope that people will continue to watch what we do and that the company's actions over the next few years will speak for themselves.

For the first time in decades, the company's modern form (the original Atari had long since disappeared) is actually producing some decent products. The reborn VCS hardware looks respectable, but quite underpowered for the price; interest in NFT and blockchain remains high, and the company has divisions dedicated to these technologies. But as someone who has seen Atari stumble through various zombie phases that make it look more like a T-shirt company than the giant gaming company it once was, I feel like Atari has something to offer for the first time in a long time, especially in retro gaming.

I don't know if re-releasing "Bubsy 3D" is what the world needs right now, but Atari's recent focus on re-releasing classic titles in proper condition is likely to continue, and that can only be a good thing. (Far beyond its heyday in the 1970s.) Great legacy, and while the company won't be in contention for the top spot again anytime soon, the gaming industry with a strong Atari will be the richer for it.