05/01/2018 (Day 572: Atari 2600 Game By Game Podcast: An Education In Retro Atari Games)

Today I would like to speak about a podcast that I heard about a couple of years ago, but for some odd reason I never got around to listening to until about two months ago, when I was having some iTunes issues with podcasts and the fact that it kept forgetting what podcasts I had listened to. I am still catching up on podcasts now and if I had not have had any issues with iTunes, then I would be a lot more caught up on podcasts than I am now because I still have about 800 hours of podcasts to listen to, including 2 new podcasts, this one being one of them. I am not sure what drove me to checking out these podcasts because I listen to so many different retro gaming podcasts nowadays, that sometimes listening to them in terms of not falling further behind can be a challenge. However, taking journeys from inception to modern podcasts is quite interesting because as I catch up, I am able to hear the podcasts evolve over time and intriguing to compare this two. Today I will be talking about the Atari 2600 Game By Game Podcast, which is hosted by Ferg and is one of my favourite podcasts to listen to.

I had heard of Ferg and his podcast through other podcasts where he has been a featured guest, which is has been part of quite a few different episodes across a wide spectrum of different consoles. I initially didn’t check out the podcast I think because I felt that being born long after the high point of the console’s life that perhaps I would be too young to listen to the podcast. However, through people recommending me Atari 2600 games to review, my interest in the breadth of the Atari 2600 library, as well as garnering more knowledge about the console was peaked. I then decided to check out the podcast and I was surprised to realise that I was not too young at all to listen because even though I am only 25 and I don’t have any real memories of playing Atari growing up, Ferg did a really job introducing the show’s concept and the console in the first episode.

Once I had listened to episode 1, I ended up marathoning about the first 8 episodes pretty much in a row because I was really interested to see how the next games that he would speak about would function and play. I feel that Ferg does a fantastic job of not just researching the games that he is playing, but also goes the extra mile to research and document the people who developed the game. This I feel is an extra step which I definitely appreciate because back when Atari games were being developed, normally they were made by one or two people rather than the 2000 people that make AAA games nowadays.

I think the thing that I like the most about this podcast is the fact that Ferg does an amazing job of informing the listener about everything from the controls, through to the different box designs that were used for each release of the game. These are small details that I feel that if I were doing the podcast I would potentially miss, but I feel it gives the podcast a real feeling of educating the listener, which is something I strive for when I listen to a podcast. I want to learn something as I am listening and the Atari 2600 Game By Game Podcast does this perfectly without overloading the listener to overwhelming amounts of information to take in.

Ferg doesn’t like the term “Back in the day”, which as I have listened to the podcast I can understand why because it is such a vague and meaningless term to use as it don’t refer to any specific time at all. Even I have stopped using the term recently because I would rather use a different term now, rather than a term that really in theory doesn’t make sense as it is does not clarify what time period is being spoken about. Even as I wrote this blog, I really wrote that term a couple of times, but I realised that Ferg might not like it if I wrote the term many times throughout the blog about his podcast.

Overall, definitely check out the Atari 2600 Game By Game Podcast on all the places where you can find podcasts because even if you like me and were not around when the Atari 2600 was at it’s prime, you will still find a lot to like about this podcast. Ferg is an amazing and informative host and does an amazing job of really educating the listener about the console, the games and even the look of the original boxes that the games came in.

Have an awesome day everyone and I will see you all tomorrow.

Liam