A new report has revealed that the system architect for Atari’s retro console, the Atari VCS , has left the project after he claims the company hasn’t paid him in six months.

First Look at the Atari VCS 24 IMAGES

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Atari architect Rob Wyatt, who was previously a founding member of the Xbox team, told The Register that he left the Atari project last week. “As of Friday, October 4th, I have officially resigned as the architect of the Atari VCS ,” Wyatt told the publication.According to Wyatt, his design consultancy Tin Giant has not been paid for invoices dating back over six months. “As a small company, we have been lucky to survive this long,” Wyatt says.The status of the Atari VCS is also murky. Wyatt says his team only received a prototype motherboard last month, and that his team was in the process of debugging it before parting ways with Atari. Surfacelink, another contracted company with Atari, has reportedly taken over the project from Tin Giant.In a statement to IGN, an Atari spokesperson says the Atari VCS is still on track: "The Atari VCS is proceeding according to its previously announced schedule." Atari also says updates on the project can be found on Medium In regards to Wyatt's claims of unpaid invoices, Atari issued the following statement: "It is Atari's policy not to comment on an isolated matter under dispute, only to say that the Atari VCS project has always been a team effort and its success has never been and will never be dependent on any single individual or partner."The Atari VCS was announced in 2017 before going on pre-order sale earlier this year. The Atari VCS wasn’t actually a retro console like the NES or SNES Mini. Instead, the Atari VCS would take inspiration from the Atari 2600, but still, run modern games Atari said the Atari VCS would run a custom AMD processor on Linux and support 4K resolution, HDR and 60fps. The Atari VCS would still play classic games thanks to access to something called the Atari Vault, which comes pre-loaded with 100 games.This isn't the first time the Atari VCS has come under fire. At GDC 2018, the Atari VCS units shown to press came under fire for being largely for show , something Atari said was the purpose of the units all along."We remain confident in the Atari VCS as the entire team works diligently to bring forth its vision according to plan," Atari says. The company also announced plans for more hands-on presentations to media this fall.

Matt Kim is a reporter for IGN. You can reach him on Twitter