The rise of Atari and LucasArts

by Ross Miller { Dec 9th 2005 at 5:45PM }

Can you remember a time when George Lucas did not have a hand or two in the games industry? There was a time, long ago, when LucasArts did not exist, and Lucas was on top the world preparing to release Return of the Jedi in theaters. It was a time, also, when Atari would soon dominate the market.

Michael Rubin is currently on tour promoting Droidmaker, a book he wrote about George Lucas and Lucasfilms. Mr. Rubin has graciously posted a chapter of his book online for free (in pdf format), detailing the creation of the Lucasfilms Games Group (later LucasArts). It is a fascinating read, covering topics such as the game Ballblazer and Warner Communications executive Manny Gerard, and very well researched - a must for any fan of gaming history.

Do you think Peter Jackon's WETA might one day follow a similar path, creating a games division using their graphics skills for the console and PC market?

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Reader Comments (Page 1 of 1)

The ZeroCorpse @ Dec 18th 2005 10:09PM

Ballblazer Rocked!

EOM

Jay @ Dec 18th 2005 10:09PM

I had Ballblazer on the Atari 7800...it was probably the best game I played on that system...

Krupo @ Dec 18th 2005 10:09PM

The book reminds me of "Game Over", a book that's about a decade old, but tells a really good story about the history of Nintendo, and incidentally touches on the other big companies. It was interesting to read about how Atari ran pretty well under it's original founder, only to be driven into the ground after it was bought out by what we now call Time-Warner.

After reading the book partway through I ended up finding myself fixing the Wiki entries about the history of Mario - you would think that something so basic wouldn't have blatant errors written about itself. I was wrong. Full story at http://krupo.blogspot.com/2005/12/wiki-surgery-deleting-errors-from.html

boom @ Dec 18th 2005 10:09PM

The people that did the Virtual Cinematography for the matrix trilogy have gotten into hybrid entertainment...

virtualcinematography.org

the guys that designed that punch that neo launces into smith's face at the end of revolutions, are behind fight night: round 3.

SurfMurph @ Dec 18th 2005 10:09PM

Yeah, Ballblazer was great. So was Rescue on Fractalus for the Atari 8-bit computers. (It was later ported to the Commodore 64.) Featured planet landscapes that were generated by fractal surfaces.
Man, time to fire up an emulator and play some of these early LucasArts titles.

MarkTAW @ Dec 18th 2005 10:09PM

Ballblazer & Rescue on Fractalus/Behind Jaggi Lines were two of the best games of all time.

Another important innovation was the use of sound as cue. Previously sound was just an effect and never used to give you information. When you rescued a fellow pilot in Fractalus, they knocked on the door. You couldn't see them, but you could hear them.

The alien freaked me out a few times, and I believe was part of the influence on the sound of a guard spotting you in Metal Gear.