Bankrupt Atari is taking steps to auction off its storied brand after failing to find a buyer for all of its assets, according to The Wall Street Journal.

The company on Wednesday filed preliminary papers with the U.S. Bankruptcy Court in Manhattan seeking approval for an auction of properties that include the Atari brand itself and individual video game franchises like RollerCoaster Tycoon, Test Drive, and Humongous, the newspaper reported this week.

Atari's U.S. arm filed for bankruptcy on Jan. 21 as a way to extricate itself from its French parent, Atari S.A., and began a search for a buyer of its assets. In the ensuing several months, Atari received 15 preliminary bids for its catalog but found "none of the initial offers acceptable," according to gaming site Polygon.

Breaking up its assets into blocks that would be auctioned off beginning in July offers the best course of action for the failed gaming company, Atari told the bankruptcy court.

"The Debtors believe that this type of a targeted bidding process affords the Debtors the best opportunity to market the Assets and maximize the value thereof for the benefit of all stakeholders," Atari said in court papers, according to the Journal.

Atari is seeking minimum bids totaling nearly $22.2 million for the combined parts of the company it seeks to put on the auction block.

Among the minimum bids Atari is seeking for various video game franchises, the Journal cited $3.5 million for Roller Coaster Tycoon; $1.5 million for Test Drive; $500,000 apiece for Humongous, Fatty Bear's Birthday Surprise, and Math Gran Prix; and $250,000 for Total Annihilation.

Atari, founded by Nolan Bushnell and Ted Dabney in 1972, ushered in the age of arcade and home console gaming with titles like Computer Space, Pong, Asteroids, and Missile Command, and dominated the home console market in the late 1970s through the early 1980s with the Atari 2600.

Atari was split into two companies following the "video game crash" of 1983, but neither was able to recapture the impact the original company had during computer gaming's early years. Over the past three decades, Atari's brand and the bits and pieces of its former empire were bought up and repackaged by the likes of Hasbro and JT Storage.

Atari's winding road culminated in the completion of Infogrames' (now Atari SA) acquisition of the brand and remaining catalog in 2008 after several years in which the French holding company licensed the Atari name and logo.

For more, check out Atari: A Damaged Yet Vital Brand and New Book Tells Inside Story of Atari.

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