Atari Jaguar
Encyclopedia
The Atari Jaguar is a video game console
that was released by Atari Corporation in 1993. It was the last to be marketed under the Atari brand until the release of the Atari Flashback
in 2004. It was designed to surpass the Mega Drive/Genesis
, Super Nintendo Entertainment System
, and the Panasonic 3DO in processing power. Although launched one year earlier, it was eventually in competition with the Sega Saturn
, the Sony PlayStation, and other consoles that made up the fifth generation
of video game consoles. The console was first released in New York City
and San Francisco on November 23, 1993, and the rest of the country in early 1994. Although it was promoted as the first 64-bit gaming system, the Jaguar proved to be a commercial failure and prompted Atari
to leave the home video game console market. Despite its commercial failure, the Jaguar has a dedicated fan base that produces homebrew games
for it.
, a company formed by Martin Brennan
and John Mathieson
. The team had claimed that they could not only make a console superior to the Sega Mega Drive
(also called the Sega Genesis) or the SNES, 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 Corp. One was a 32-bit architecture (codenamed "Panther
"), and the other was a 64-bit system (codenamed "Jaguar"); however, work on the Jaguar design progressed faster than expected, so Atari Corp. canceled the Panther project to focus on the more promising Jaguar.
The Jaguar was introduced in November 1993 at a price of $249.99, under a $500 million manufacturing deal with IBM. The system was initially marketed only in the New York City
and the San Francisco Bay
areas, under the slogan "Do the Math", claiming superiority over competing 16-bit and 32-bit systems. A nationwide release followed in early 1994.
The Atari Jaguar struggled to attain a substantial user base. In 1993, Atari reported that they had shipped 17,000 units as part of the system's initial test market. By the end of 1994, Atari reported that they had sold approximately 100,000 systems and had reduced the price to improve the competitive nature of the console. By the end of 1995, Sony and Sega had entered the marketplace with competing consoles and Atari's sales declined rapidly. In their 1995 annual report, they noted:
"Jaguar sales were substantially below Atari's expectations, and Atari's business and financial results were materially adversely affected in 1995 as Atari continued to invest heavily in Jaguar game development, entered into arrangements to publish certain licensed titles and reduced the retail price for its Jaguar console unit. Atari attributes the poor performance of Jaguar to a number of factors including (i) extensive delays in development of software for the Jaguar which resulted in reduced orders due to consumer concern as to when titles for the platform would be released and how many titles would ultimately be available, and (ii) the introduction of competing products by Sega and Sony in May 1995 and September 1995, respectively."
Jaguar did 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 it and Tempest 2000 were named among the system's defining titles by GamePro in 2007. 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.
In 2006 IGN
editor Craig Harris rated the Jaguar controller as the worst ever, criticizing the complexity of the "phone keypad" and the VGA-style
connector.
Lack of titles was attributable to two main factors: the Jaguar's questionable long-term prospects among third-party game-publishers and the problematic nature of developing games for the Jaguar. Atari had one opportunity to convince third-party developers, vital for the diversity of Jaguar's game library, with a solid retail-performance, but as things played out, post-holiday sales figures questioned the viability of Atari's business; Atari failed to attract many third-party developers already committed to other game platforms. In addition, 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, but still annoying 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. Writing game-code was often an endurance exercise in the tedious assembler
.
In a July 1995 interview with Next Generation Magazine, then-CEO Sam Tramiel declared that the Jaguar was as powerful, if not more powerful, than the Sega Saturn
, and slightly weaker than the Sony PlayStation.
By the end of 1995
, Atari's revenues declined by more than half, from US$38.7 million in 1994 to $14.6 million in 1995. In late 1995, Atari Corp. ran early-morning infomercial
advertisements with enthusiastic salesmen touting the powerful game system. The infomercials ran most of the year, but did not significantly sell the remaining stock of Jaguar systems. In its 10-K405 SEC Filing, filed April 12, 1996, Atari informed their stockholders of the truly dire nature of the Jaguar business: Atari had already suffered an ill-fated crash in the mid 1980s as a result of the oversaturation of the video game market by third-party developers.
Production of the Jaguar ceased after Atari Corp. merged with JT Storage
in a reverse takeover
. In a last ditch effort to revive the Jaguar, Atari Corp. tried to play down the other two consoles by proclaiming the Jaguar was the only "64-bit" system. This claim is questioned by some, because the CPU
(68000
) and GPU
executed a 32-bit instruction-set, but sent control signals to the 64-bit graphics co-processors (or "graphics accelerators"). Atari Corp.'s position was that the mere presence of 64-bit ALUs for graphics was sufficient to validate the claim. 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. In practice, however, many developers used the Motorola 68000 to drive gameplay logic.
Over the short life of the console, several add-on peripherals were announced. However, only the ProController, the Atari Jaguar CD
drive, and the JagLink (a simple two-console networking device) reached retail shelves. A voice modem and VR
headset (with infrared head-tracking) existed in prototype form, but were never commercialized (see Loki
and Konix Multisystem
for early development).
After the Atari Corporation properties were bought out by Hasbro Interactive
in the late 1990s, Hasbro released the rights to the Jaguar, declaring the console an open platform and opening the doors for homebrew
development. A few developers, including Telegames
and Songbird Productions, have not only released previously unfinished materials from the Jaguar's past, but also several brand new titles to satisfy the system's cult following.
In the United Kingdom
in 2001, a deal was struck between Telegames
and retailer Game
to bring the Jaguar to Game's retail outlets. The machine was initially sold for £29.99 brand new and the software was ranged between £9.99 for more common games such as Doom and Ruiner Pinball
, and up to £39.99 for more sought-after 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.
This deal was seen as a move to remain competitive with Game's rival at the time, Gamestation
who were well known for stocking retro formats.
Imagin Systems, a manufacturer of dental imaging equipment, has since purchased the molding plates for the Jaguar's casing as with minor modification they were found to be the right size for housing their HotRod camera. The game cartridge molds were reused to create an optional memory expansion card.
licensed the Atari Jaguar's chipset for use in its arcade games. The system, named COJAG (for "Coin-Op Jaguar"), replaced the 68000 with a 68020 or MIPS
R3000-based CPU (depending on the board version), and added a hard drive and more RAM. It ran the lightgun games Area 51
and Maximum Force
. Other games (3 On 3 Basketball; Fishin' Frenzy; Freeze; Vicious Circle) were developed but never released.
"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." (page 1)
, allowing Atari Jaguar CD games to save persistent data such as preferences and savegames.
(5th), the Sony PlayStation (7th), the Sega Saturn
(18th), and the 3DO
(22nd).
Video game console
A video game console is an interactive entertainment computer or customized computer system that produces a video display signal which can be used with a display device to display a video game...
that was released by Atari Corporation in 1993. It was the last to be marketed under the Atari brand until the release of the Atari Flashback
Atari Flashback
The Atari Flashback, Atari Flashback 2, Atari Flashback2+ and Atari Flashback 3 are dedicated video game consoles marketed by Atari Inc. in 2004, 2005 and 2010, then AtGames in 2011...
in 2004. It was designed to surpass the Mega Drive/Genesis
Sega Mega Drive
The Sega Genesis is a fourth-generation video game console developed and produced by Sega. It was originally released in Japan in 1988 as , then in North America in 1989 as Sega Genesis, and in Europe, Australia and other PAL regions in 1990 as Mega Drive. The reason for the two names is that...
, Super Nintendo Entertainment System
Super Nintendo Entertainment System
The Super Nintendo Entertainment System is a 16-bit video game console that was released by Nintendo in North America, Europe, Australasia , and South America between 1990 and 1993. In Japan and Southeast Asia, the system is called the , or SFC for short...
, and the Panasonic 3DO in processing power. Although launched one year earlier, it was eventually in competition with the Sega Saturn
Sega Saturn
The is a 32-bit fifth-generation video game console that was first released by Sega on November 22, 1994 in Japan, May 11, 1995 in North America, and July 8, 1995 in Europe...
, the Sony PlayStation, and other consoles that made up the fifth generation
History of video game consoles (fifth generation)
The fifth-generation era refers to the computer and video games, video game consoles, and video game handhelds available at stores...
of video game consoles. The console was first released in New York City
New York City
New York is the most populous city in the United States and the center of the New York Metropolitan Area, one of the most populous metropolitan areas in the world. New York exerts a significant impact upon global commerce, finance, media, art, fashion, research, technology, education, and...
and San Francisco on November 23, 1993, and the rest of the country in early 1994. Although it was promoted as the first 64-bit gaming system, the Jaguar proved to be a commercial failure and prompted Atari
Atari
Atari is a corporate and brand name owned by several entities since its inception in 1972. It is currently owned by Atari Interactive, a wholly owned subsidiary of the French publisher Atari, SA . The original Atari, Inc. was founded in 1972 by Nolan Bushnell and Ted Dabney. It was a pioneer in...
to leave the home video game console market. Despite its commercial failure, the Jaguar has a dedicated fan base that produces homebrew games
Homebrew (video games)
Homebrew is a term frequently applied to video games or other software produced by consumers to target proprietary hardware platforms not typically user-programmable or that use proprietary storage methods...
for it.
History
The Jaguar was developed by the members of Flare TechnologyFlare Technology
Flare Technology was a computer hardware company based in Cambridge, United Kingdom. It was founded in 1986 by Martin Brennan, Ben Cheese, and John Mathieson, former engineers at Sinclair Research....
, a company formed by Martin Brennan
Martin Brennan (engineer)
Martin Brennan is a computer engineer who developed pioneering personal computers such as the Loki and the Atari Jaguar video game console....
and John Mathieson
John Mathieson (computer scientist)
John Mathieson is a Computer Science graduate who initially worked for Sinclair Research before going on to found Flare with fellow ex-Sinclair colleagues Martin Brennan and Ben Cheese....
. The team had claimed that they could not only make a console superior to the Sega Mega Drive
Sega Mega Drive
The Sega Genesis is a fourth-generation video game console developed and produced by Sega. It was originally released in Japan in 1988 as , then in North America in 1989 as Sega Genesis, and in Europe, Australia and other PAL regions in 1990 as Mega Drive. The reason for the two names is that...
(also called the Sega Genesis) or the SNES, but they could also be cost-effective.
Impressed by their work on the Konix Multisystem
Konix Multisystem
Konix was a British computer peripheral company primarily known for making joysticks such as the distinctive Speed King during the 1980s. Although this was its primary business for years, its place in videogame folklore was cemented by its ambitious and ultimately ill-fated plans to release its own...
, 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 Corp. One was a 32-bit architecture (codenamed "Panther
Atari Panther
The Atari Panther was the 32-bit predecessor to the Atari Jaguar video game console. It was developed by the same ex-Sinclair team Flare Technology who were previously responsible for the Flare One and the Konix Multisystem. It was scheduled to be released in 1991, but Atari Corp...
"), and the other was a 64-bit system (codenamed "Jaguar"); however, work on the Jaguar design progressed faster than expected, so Atari Corp. canceled the Panther project to focus on the more promising Jaguar.
The Jaguar was introduced in November 1993 at a price of $249.99, under a $500 million manufacturing deal with IBM. The system was initially marketed only in the New York City
New York City
New York is the most populous city in the United States and the center of the New York Metropolitan Area, one of the most populous metropolitan areas in the world. New York exerts a significant impact upon global commerce, finance, media, art, fashion, research, technology, education, and...
and the San Francisco Bay
San Francisco Bay
San Francisco Bay is a shallow, productive estuary through which water draining from approximately forty percent of California, flowing in the Sacramento and San Joaquin rivers from the Sierra Nevada mountains, enters the Pacific Ocean...
areas, under the slogan "Do the Math", claiming superiority over competing 16-bit and 32-bit systems. A nationwide release followed in early 1994.
The Atari Jaguar struggled to attain a substantial user base. In 1993, Atari reported that they had shipped 17,000 units as part of the system's initial test market. By the end of 1994, Atari reported that they had sold approximately 100,000 systems and had reduced the price to improve the competitive nature of the console. By the end of 1995, Sony and Sega had entered the marketplace with competing consoles and Atari's sales declined rapidly. In their 1995 annual report, they noted:
"Jaguar sales were substantially below Atari's expectations, and Atari's business and financial results were materially adversely affected in 1995 as Atari continued to invest heavily in Jaguar game development, entered into arrangements to publish certain licensed titles and reduced the retail price for its Jaguar console unit. Atari attributes the poor performance of Jaguar to a number of factors including (i) extensive delays in development of software for the Jaguar which resulted in reduced orders due to consumer concern as to when titles for the platform would be released and how many titles would ultimately be available, and (ii) the introduction of competing products by Sega and Sony in May 1995 and September 1995, respectively."
Jaguar did earn praise with titles such as Tempest 2000
Tempest 2000
Tempest 2000 is a 1994 remake by Jeff Minter of the Dave Theurer 1981 arcade game classic, Tempest. Originally an exclusive to the Atari Jaguar, the game received critical praise for its 3D graphics, soundtrack, and gameplay.-Gameplay:...
, Doom, and Wolfenstein 3D
Wolfenstein 3D
Wolfenstein 3D is a video game that is generally regarded by critics and gaming journalists as having both popularized the first-person shooter genre on the PC and created the basic archetype upon which all subsequent games of the same genre would be built. It was created by id Software and...
. The most successful title during the Jaguar's first year was Alien vs. Predator. Both it and Tempest 2000 were named among the system's defining titles by GamePro in 2007. 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.
In 2006 IGN
IGN
IGN is an entertainment website that focuses on video games, films, music and other media. IGN's main website comprises several specialty sites or "channels", each occupying a subdomain and covering a specific area of entertainment...
editor Craig Harris rated the Jaguar controller as the worst ever, criticizing the complexity of the "phone keypad" and the VGA-style
D-subminiature
The D-subminiature or D-sub is a common type of electrical connector. They are named for their characteristic D-shaped metal shield. When they were introduced, D-subs were among the smaller connectors used on computer systems....
connector.
Lack of titles was attributable to two main factors: the Jaguar's questionable long-term prospects among third-party game-publishers and the problematic nature of developing games for the Jaguar. Atari had one opportunity to convince third-party developers, vital for the diversity of Jaguar's game library, with a solid retail-performance, but as things played out, post-holiday sales figures questioned the viability of Atari's business; Atari failed to attract many third-party developers already committed to other game platforms. In addition, the Jaguar's underlying hardware was crippled by a flaw in the CPU's memory controller
Memory controller
The memory controller is a digital circuit which manages the flow of data going to and from the main memory. It can be a separate chip or integrated into another chip, such as on the die of a microprocessor...
, which prevented code execution out of system RAM
Ram
-Animals:*Ram, an uncastrated male sheep*Ram cichlid, a species of freshwater fish endemic to Colombia and Venezuela-Military:*Battering ram*Ramming, a military tactic in which one vehicle runs into another...
. Less severe, but still annoying 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. Writing game-code was often an endurance exercise in the tedious assembler
Assembly language
An assembly language is a low-level programming language for computers, microprocessors, microcontrollers, and other programmable devices. It implements a symbolic representation of the machine codes and other constants needed to program a given CPU architecture...
.
In a July 1995 interview with Next Generation Magazine, then-CEO Sam Tramiel declared that the Jaguar was as powerful, if not more powerful, than the Sega Saturn
Sega Saturn
The is a 32-bit fifth-generation video game console that was first released by Sega on November 22, 1994 in Japan, May 11, 1995 in North America, and July 8, 1995 in Europe...
, and slightly weaker than the Sony PlayStation.
By the end of 1995
1995 in video gaming
-Events:*May 11 – Introduction of trade magazine GameWeek *May 11-16 — The 1st annual Electronic Entertainment Expo is held in Los Angeles, California...
, Atari's revenues declined by more than half, from US$38.7 million in 1994 to $14.6 million in 1995. In late 1995, Atari Corp. ran early-morning infomercial
Infomercial
Infomercials are direct response television commercials which generally include a phone number or website. There are long-form infomercials, which are typically between 15 and 30 minutes in length, and short-form infomercials, which are typically 30 seconds to 120 seconds in length. Infomercials...
advertisements with enthusiastic salesmen touting the powerful game system. The infomercials ran most of the year, but did not significantly sell the remaining stock of Jaguar systems. In its 10-K405 SEC Filing, filed April 12, 1996, Atari informed their stockholders of the truly dire nature of the Jaguar business: Atari had already suffered an ill-fated crash in the mid 1980s as a result of the oversaturation of the video game market by third-party developers.
Production of the Jaguar ceased after Atari Corp. merged with JT Storage
JT Storage
JT Storage was a maker of inexpensive IDE hard drives for personal computers based in San Jose, California...
in a reverse takeover
Reverse takeover
A reverse takeover or reverse merger is the acquisition of a public company by a private company so that the private company can bypass the lengthy and complex process of going public...
. In a last ditch effort to revive the Jaguar, Atari Corp. tried to play down the other two consoles by proclaiming the Jaguar was the only "64-bit" system. This claim is questioned by some, because the CPU
Central processing unit
The central processing unit is the portion of a computer system that carries out the instructions of a computer program, to perform the basic arithmetical, logical, and input/output operations of the system. The CPU plays a role somewhat analogous to the brain in the computer. The term has been in...
(68000
Motorola 68000
The Motorola 68000 is a 16/32-bit CISC microprocessor core designed and marketed by Freescale Semiconductor...
) and GPU
Graphics processing unit
A graphics processing unit or GPU is a specialized circuit designed to rapidly manipulate and alter memory in such a way so as to accelerate the building of images in a frame buffer intended for output to a display...
executed a 32-bit instruction-set, but sent control signals to the 64-bit graphics co-processors (or "graphics accelerators"). Atari Corp.'s position was that the mere presence of 64-bit ALUs for graphics was sufficient to validate the claim. 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. In practice, however, many developers used the Motorola 68000 to drive gameplay logic.
Over the short life of the console, several add-on peripherals were announced. However, only the ProController, the Atari Jaguar CD
Atari Jaguar CD
The Atari Jaguar CD or Jag CD is a CD-ROM peripheral for the Atari Jaguar video game console.Late in the life span of the company, Atari released this long-promised CD-ROM unit. The unit hit shelves on September 11, 1995 and retailed for $149.95. The device sat atop the Jaguar console, snapping...
drive, and the JagLink (a simple two-console networking device) reached retail shelves. A voice modem and VR
Virtual reality
Virtual reality , also known as virtuality, is a term that applies to computer-simulated environments that can simulate physical presence in places in the real world, as well as in imaginary worlds...
headset (with infrared head-tracking) existed in prototype form, but were never commercialized (see Loki
Loki (computer)
Loki was the codename for a home computer under development at Sinclair Research during the mid-1980s. The name came from the Norse god Loki, god of mischief and thieves. Loki was based on the ZX Spectrum, but intended to rival the Commodore Amiga as a games platform. When Amstrad bought out...
and Konix Multisystem
Konix Multisystem
Konix was a British computer peripheral company primarily known for making joysticks such as the distinctive Speed King during the 1980s. Although this was its primary business for years, its place in videogame folklore was cemented by its ambitious and ultimately ill-fated plans to release its own...
for early development).
After the Atari Corporation properties were bought out by Hasbro Interactive
Hasbro Interactive
Hasbro Interactive was an American video game production and publishing subsidiary of Hasbro, the large game and toy company.Hasbro Interactive was formed late in 1995 in order to compete in the computer and video game arena. Several Hasbro properties, such as Monopoly and Scrabble, had already...
in the late 1990s, Hasbro released the rights to the Jaguar, declaring the console an open platform and opening the doors for homebrew
Homebrew (video games)
Homebrew is a term frequently applied to video games or other software produced by consumers to target proprietary hardware platforms not typically user-programmable or that use proprietary storage methods...
development. A few developers, including Telegames
Telegames
Telegames, Inc. is a North American video game company based in Gun Barrel City, Texas, with a sister operation based in England.Telegames was well known for supporting not just modern game systems but also classic game systems, after they've been abandoned by its manufacturer. Effective September...
and Songbird Productions, have not only released previously unfinished materials from the Jaguar's past, but also several brand new titles to satisfy the system's cult following.
In the United Kingdom
United Kingdom
The United Kingdom of Great Britain and Northern IrelandIn the United Kingdom and Dependencies, other languages have been officially recognised as legitimate autochthonous languages under the European Charter for Regional or Minority Languages...
in 2001, a deal was struck between Telegames
Telegames
Telegames, Inc. is a North American video game company based in Gun Barrel City, Texas, with a sister operation based in England.Telegames was well known for supporting not just modern game systems but also classic game systems, after they've been abandoned by its manufacturer. Effective September...
and retailer Game
GAME (retailer)
The Game Group plc is a British video games retail company. It is listed on the London Stock Exchange and is a constituent of the FTSE SmallCap Index....
to bring the Jaguar to Game's retail outlets. The machine was initially sold for £29.99 brand new and the software was ranged between £9.99 for more common games such as Doom and Ruiner Pinball
Ruiner Pinball
Ruiner Pinball is a 3D pinball video game developed by High Voltage Software and published by Atari for Atari Jaguar in 1995.-Plot:Ruiner table setting: Set in 1962, during the Cold War, as nuclear war is imminent...
, and up to £39.99 for more sought-after releases such as Defender 2000
Defender 2000
Defender 2000 was a game developed for the Atari Jaguar in 1995 by Jeff Minter. Considered by many to be the true successor to the original, it sold fairly well—but not as well as his prior creation for the console, Tempest 2000....
and Checkered Flag
Checkered Flag (video game)
Checkered Flag is a 1991 Racing Game, for the Atari Lynx handheld game console which was developed and published by the Atari Corporation. This version of the game can support up to six players....
. 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.
This deal was seen as a move to remain competitive with Game's rival at the time, Gamestation
Gamestation
Gamestation is a chain of UK retail shops selling used and new video games, and was the second-largest specialist video game retailer in the UK until it was bought out by Game in 2007...
who were well known for stocking retro formats.
Imagin Systems, a manufacturer of dental imaging equipment, has since purchased the molding plates for the Jaguar's casing as with minor modification they were found to be the right size for housing their HotRod camera. The game cartridge molds were reused to create an optional memory expansion card.
Arcade games
Atari GamesAtari Games
Atari Games Corporation was an American producer of arcade games, and originally part of Atari, Inc..-History:When, in 1984, Warner Communications sold the Atari Consumer division of Atari Inc...
licensed the Atari Jaguar's chipset for use in its arcade games. The system, named COJAG (for "Coin-Op Jaguar"), replaced the 68000 with a 68020 or MIPS
MIPS architecture
MIPS is a reduced instruction set computer instruction set architecture developed by MIPS Technologies . The early MIPS architectures were 32-bit, and later versions were 64-bit...
R3000-based CPU (depending on the board version), and added a hard drive and more RAM. It ran the lightgun games Area 51
Area 51 (arcade game)
Area 51 is a light gun arcade game released by Atari Games in 1995. It takes its name from the Area 51 military facility.-Overview:The plot of the game involves the player taking part in a STAAR military incursion to prevent aliens, known as the Kronn, and alien-created zombies from taking over...
and Maximum Force
Maximum Force
Maximum Force is an on-rails light gun first-person arcade game developed by Mesa Logic for Atari Games in 1997. In 1998, Atari Games re-released the game as part of one machine called Area 51/Maximum Force Duo that also included Area 51, and later ported the game to both the PlayStation and Sega...
. Other games (3 On 3 Basketball; Fishin' Frenzy; Freeze; Vicious Circle) were developed but never released.
Technical specifications
From the Jaguar Software Reference manual:"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." (page 1)
Processors
- "Tom" Chip, 26.59 MHz
- Graphics processing unitGraphics processing unitA graphics processing unit or GPU is a specialized circuit designed to rapidly manipulate and alter memory in such a way so as to accelerate the building of images in a frame buffer intended for output to a display...
(GPU) – 32-bitBitA bit is the basic unit of information in computing and telecommunications; it is the amount of information stored by a digital device or other physical system that exists in one of two possible distinct states...
RISC architecture, 4 KBKilobyteThe kilobyte is a multiple of the unit byte for digital information. Although the prefix kilo- means 1000, the term kilobyte and symbol KB have historically been used to refer to either 1024 bytes or 1000 bytes, dependent upon context, in the fields of computer science and information...
internal cache, provides wide array of graphic effects - Object Processor – 64-bit RISC architecture; programmable; can behave as a variety of graphic architectures
- BlitterBlitterIn a computer system, a blitter is a circuit, sometimes as a coprocessor or a logic block on a microprocessor, that is dedicated to the rapid movement and modification of data within that computer's memory...
– 64-bit RISC architecture; high speed logic operations, z-bufferingZ-bufferingIn computer graphics, z-buffering is the management of image depth coordinates in three-dimensional graphics, usually done in hardware, sometimes in software. It is one solution to the visibility problem, which is the problem of deciding which elements of a rendered scene are visible, and which...
and Gouraud shadingGouraud shadingGouraud shading, named after Henri Gouraud, is an interpolation method used in computer graphics to produce continuous shading of surfaces represented by polygon meshes...
, with 64-bit internal registers. - DRAMDynamic random access memoryDynamic random-access memory is a type of random-access memory that stores each bit of data in a separate capacitor within an integrated circuit. The capacitor can be either charged or discharged; these two states are taken to represent the two values of a bit, conventionally called 0 and 1...
controller, 8, 16, 32 and 64-bit memory management
- Graphics processing unit
- "Jerry" Chip, 26.59 MHz
- Digital Signal Processor – 32-bitBitA bit is the basic unit of information in computing and telecommunications; it is the amount of information stored by a digital device or other physical system that exists in one of two possible distinct states...
RISC architecture, 8 KB internal cache- Same RISC core as the GPU, but not limited to graphic production
- CD-quality sound (16-bit stereo)
- Number of sound channels limited by software
- Two DACs (stereo) convert digital data to analog sound signals
- Full stereoStereophonic soundThe term Stereophonic, commonly called stereo, sound refers to any method of sound reproduction in which an attempt is made to create an illusion of directionality and audible perspective...
capabilities
- Wavetable synthesisSample-based synthesisSample-based synthesis is a form of audio synthesis that can be contrasted to either subtractive synthesis or additive synthesis. The principal difference with sample-based synthesis is that the seed waveforms are sampled sounds or instruments instead of fundamental waveforms such as the saw waves...
, FM synthesis, FM Sample synthesis, and AM synthesis - A clock control block, incorporating timers, and a UART
- Joystick control
- Digital Signal Processor – 32-bit
- MotorolaMotorolaMotorola, Inc. was an American multinational telecommunications company based in Schaumburg, Illinois, which was eventually divided into two independent public companies, Motorola Mobility and Motorola Solutions on January 4, 2011, after losing $4.3 billion from 2007 to 2009...
68000Motorola 68000The Motorola 68000 is a 16/32-bit CISC microprocessor core designed and marketed by Freescale Semiconductor...
"used as a manager."- General purpose 16/32-bit control processor, 13.295 MHz
Other Jaguar features
- RAM: 2 MBMegabyteThe megabyte is a multiple of the unit byte for digital information storage or transmission with two different values depending on context: bytes generally for computer memory; and one million bytes generally for computer storage. The IEEE Standards Board has decided that "Mega will mean 1 000...
on a 64-bit bus using 4 16-bit fast page mode DRAMs - Storage: Cartridge – up to 6 MB
- Support for ComLynx I/OInput/outputIn computing, input/output, or I/O, refers to the communication between an information processing system , and the outside world, possibly a human, or another information processing system. Inputs are the signals or data received by the system, and outputs are the signals or data sent from it...
Memory Track
Released in 1995, the Memory Track is a cartridge that contains a 128 K EEPROMEEPROM
EEPROM stands for Electrically Erasable Programmable Read-Only Memory and is a type of non-volatile memory used in computers and other electronic devices to store small amounts of data that must be saved when power is removed, e.g., calibration...
, allowing Atari Jaguar CD games to save persistent data such as preferences and savegames.
Reception
The Jaguar was a commercial failure due to its shortage of third party support and several poorly received first party titles. In September 2009, IGN ranked the Atari Jaguar as the 24th best console of all time, lower than all five of its major competitors: the SNES (4th best), the Sega Mega DriveSega Mega Drive
The Sega Genesis is a fourth-generation video game console developed and produced by Sega. It was originally released in Japan in 1988 as , then in North America in 1989 as Sega Genesis, and in Europe, Australia and other PAL regions in 1990 as Mega Drive. The reason for the two names is that...
(5th), the Sony PlayStation (7th), the Sega Saturn
Sega Saturn
The is a 32-bit fifth-generation video game console that was first released by Sega on November 22, 1994 in Japan, May 11, 1995 in North America, and July 8, 1995 in Europe...
(18th), and the 3DO
3DO Interactive Multiplayer
The 3DO Interactive Multiplayer is a video game console originally produced by Panasonic in 1993. Further renditions of the hardware were released in 1994 by Sanyo and Goldstar. The consoles were manufactured according to specifications created by The 3DO Company, and were originally designed by...
(22nd).
See also
- List of Atari Jaguar games
- ContikiContikiContiki is a small, open source, highly portable multitasking computer operating system developed for use on a number of memory-constrained networked systems ranging from 8-bit computers to embedded systems on microcontrollers, including sensor network motes...
, portable operating system - there's a port for the Jaguar with GUI, TCP/IP and web browser support. - Atari Jaguar CDAtari Jaguar CDThe Atari Jaguar CD or Jag CD is a CD-ROM peripheral for the Atari Jaguar video game console.Late in the life span of the company, Atari released this long-promised CD-ROM unit. The unit hit shelves on September 11, 1995 and retailed for $149.95. The device sat atop the Jaguar console, snapping...
, a CD add-on device for the Atari Jaguar.