LAS VEGAS—It looks like 2020 is shaping up to be a big year for game consoles. Sony is launching the PlayStation 5. Microsoft is launching the Xbox Series X. And Atari Interactive is launching the Atari VCS. Yes, Atari is launching a new game system in 2020, and we spent some time with it at CES.

The Atari VCS is a relatively small box for a game console, perhaps a little bigger than a Nintendo Switch with Joy-Cons attached, laying flat. Its design combines modern, sleek sensibilities with the stark and wood-paneled look of the Atari 2600 (the original Atari Video Computer System, or VCS). It features a low profile with curved edges, and a top marked with flat black plastic strips reminiscent of the top of the Atari 2600. The front panel is replaceable, with wood, color, and flat black options. You can make it look like the streamlined child of the Atari 2600 with a wood face, or like a modern streaming box or microconsole with a black, red, or yellow face.

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Under the nostalgically informed plastic is modest but functional computer hardware. The $249.99 Atari VCS Onyx 400 features an AMD Ryzen R1606G CPU with Radeon Vega 3 graphics, 4GB of RAM, and 32GB of internal storage, enough power to play (some) games at 1080p60 and stream 1080p video content. The step-up $279.99 Atari VCS Onyx 800 features 8GB of storage, and can stream 4K video content as well as play games at 1080p. So it's closer to a Nintendo Wii U than an Xbox One X in power, but it's still enough to run Unity games, and it's wildly more than enough to run classic Atari games. Which is good, because that's going to make up the bulk of the available software.

The Atari VCS runs a Debian Linux distribution with an Atari-built user interface designed for easily accessing games on the couch. At launch, the system will come with 100 Atari Vault games preinstalled, covering Atari's arcade, 2600, and 5200 releases. It also comes with a specialized, Atari-centric subscription to the Antstream retro game streaming service, adding another approximately 1,000 Atari games to the mix.

If you buy the core Atari VCS systems, you'll have to bring your own wired or Bluetooth controller to the mix to play. If you're an Atari enthusiast, though, you'll probably want to spring for the $389.99 Atari VCS Onyx 800 All-In-One system, which adds both a modern dual analog wireless gamepad (the Atari Game Controller) and a much more classic-style joystick modeled after the Atari 2600 controller (the Atari Classic Joystick).

If these prices seem steep for a game console primarily designed to play Atari games, that's because they are. The Atari VCS is pretty hefty on cost considering how light on software it is. It's likely most major AAA game releases for the PC, PlayStation 4, and Xbox One will pass the Linux-based Atari VCS over due to its lack of power. The Nintendo Switch has similar processing power to the Atari VCS, so the potential is there for ports, but developers have generally been much more eager to develop and port to Nintendo's own platform than Linux in the past.

Fortunately, Atari was eager to demo another important feature of the VCS: PC Sandbox Mode. Since the Atari VCS is basically just an AMD Ryzen-based PC, it can be treated as such, and that includes ignoring the Linux partition of the system and installing Windows 10 instead. Microsoft's operating system runs just fine on the Atari VCS, which opens up the console for modest PC gaming, including both Fortnite and Borderlands 3. It isn't exactly a Threadripper-toting beast of a gaming PC, but for $250 to $390, you aren't going to get that kind of performance in a PC.

Primarily for Enthusiasts

It looks to me that the Atari VCS is almost purely an enthusiast system. This is for classic Atari fans and PC tinkerers looking for a slick platform they can play with. I like the design and the flexibility, but it's hard to get past the price when Sony, Microsoft, and Nintendo all offer much more mature game ecosystems and either more processing power or mobility for around the same price. It feels like the Atari VCS is gearing up to take on the same oddball niche as the Nvidia Shield TV, the PlayStation TV, or the Wii U. It seems almost destined to be the game system your weird techhead friend eagerly preorderes and either swears by as a very specific platform for exactly the types of games they like, or modifies it into a home theater PC/Plex server/bitcoin miner purely because they can.

To Atari Interactive's credit, the Atari VCS looks like a functional console. Out of the box it's a premium-feeling nostalgic ride through Atari's classic games, with a stylish retro design and an interface that can access hundreds of titles from decades ago. And if you decide to install Windows 10 on it, it's capable at that as well, with full support for both USB and Bluetooth peripherals.

The two controllers also show excellent build quality. The Atari Game Controller feels like a sturdy, if conventional, gamepad. The Atari Classic Joystick, on the other hand, feels almost like alternate history retro-tech. It looks like an Atari 2600 joystick, with a single big red button and a big black joystick. It's completely wireless, though, and a secondary shoulder button adds some more control options, along with joystick rotation on top of tilt. The base of the joystick even lights up with amber LEDs to indicate which way you're tilting it. It's like, well, a 2020 version of the 2600 joystick, as if computers and games moved forward over the last four decades in every way, except the number and type of physical inputs controllers use. They both feel great in the hand.

The Atari VCS is planned to be released later this spring, and is available for preorder at Atari's site, GameStop, and Walmart. I'm looking forward to really digging into the final version of the system, but right now it seems like it'll be a goofy enthusiast box designed for tinkering more than a particularly popular or widely embraced game console.

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