10 Video Game Facts That Aren’t True
7. The Video Game Crash Nearly Destroyed The Industry
In 1982, it seemed as though the once booming video game industry had made it to the top and was now rapidly descending. The market was flooded with titles of often underwhelming quality and, to make matters worse, there were also way too many different consoles to choose from. Each had their own games and none could sustain a sizable chunk of audience, some of whom had moved onto home computers instead.
Reasonably sized companies filed for bankruptcy and giants like Atari were making losses upwards of $300 million.
However, the video game industry as a whole was never in that much danger. Video games were not going to suddenly cease to be. It was just the western world that had experienced the rather sudden downturn.
Japan, however, was coincidentally finally moving from the arcade to the home console for the first time during this same year. The Famicom, Nintendo’s first home console, released around the time that the US market was imploding.
It wasn’t alone either - Sega and Microsoft Japan were also trending upwards. Eventually, with the gap made by the loss of Atari and co, Nintendo and Sega could move their successes across the sea.
It's telling that we here in the west call it the Video Game Crash of 1983 but Japan simply refer to it as “Atari Shock”. Sort of cute really.