Launched in the United States almost ten years after the Atari 2600, the Atari 7800 arrived in 1986 in a particular context. Since 1984, it is no longer under the aegis of Warner Communication that Atari has evolved, but under that of Jack Tramiel who bought the Californian company. To reduce engineering costs, Tramiel will make something new out of the old. All you have to do is revamp the previous machines which are starting to sell less well to have new systems at low cost, while benefiting from already existing toy libraries.

But let's go back to 1982: This year, Atari markets the Atari 5200, which is actually an Atari 800 computer without a keyboard and whose architecture has been slightly modified. It is following the same concept that four years later is launched the 2600 jr (an Atari VCS of reduced format). But unlike the Jr and the 5200, the architecture of the 7800 is completely original. We recognize all the same engineering similarities: its "Sally" microprocessor is a variant of those found in the Atari 2600 and 800, and the "TIA" sound chipset comes from the 2600. On the design side, the hull of the two consoles is designed in the same line as the 5200: black body, metal plate and horizontal chromatic gradient. Despite the commonalities these three consoles share, the Atari 7800 is truly...

Of the 58 titles published, half are ports of arcade games, often very well done (Xevious, Galaga, Donkey Kong or Ms Pac-Man). But the 7800 also has adaptations of games from microcomputers (Karateka and Ballblazer, the latter being the most beautiful version ever seen on consoles) as well as some absolutely original titles (Jinks). In addition, the Atari 7800 is historically the first console to natively offer backward compatibility since it can run all 2600 games, thus increasing its toy library by more than five hundred additional titles. And the icing on the cake, the French version of the console plugs into Scart, so that it is easy to access the games of the 2600 without having to worry about connections and tedious settings.

The console was only marketed in Europe in 1991, four years after Nintendo's NES. Despite this delay, she managed to make a small place for herself in the hearts of children and teenagers who keep excellent memories of her today. To commemorate the Atari 7800, in 2009 IGN voted it the 17th best video game console of all time. The Atari 7800 remains a great classic that every video game lover must experience at least once in their life... and why not, to get it to indulge in it and have their loved ones benefit from it.

Discover the list of Atari 7800 Ntsc games compatible with the Sécam console