Suvudu Universe

As I’ve said before, I really liked Atari Force. Yes, it was originally a home-video-game tie-in, but the 20-issue series by (as Mike Sterling reminds us), Gerry Conway and Jose Luis Garcia-Lopez was good science fiction with a motley crew of characters beautifully drawn. Dart, the tough, tattooed bounty hunter, was my favorite.

Now comes word that Dynamite and Atari will be working together on several projects:

• “a retrospective hardcover book comprised of photos and concept artwork, as well as behind-the-scenes information and interviews with those involved in Atari’s history” — neat! I would love to know what eventually took the company down, since it seemed everyone I knew had one of their cartridge gaming consoles.
• “original graphic novels and comics based on popular Atari properties such as Asteroids, Centipede, Missile Command, Crystal Castles, and Tempest” — not so sure about this, since most of those games are simple shooters. I’m not sure what you’d take from the properties — other than the very well-known names.
• Atari Force reprints — yay! I can see if the material still stands up. It’s not always worthwhile to go back to your childhood favorites. But in this case, I have faith.

Heidi’s coverage begins with a photo of the Atari 2600, their best-known game system, and I’m having flashbacks to the days when you actually had to screw things to your TV. Plug-and-play HDMI, scoff.