-
Ever wanted an RSS feed of all your favorite gaming news sites? Go check out our new Gaming Headlines feed! Read more about it here.
GamesIndustry.Biz: Intellivision layoffs have resulted in a "significant reduction in staff", is licensing its IP to raise further funds for Amico
- Thread starter IDontBeatGames
- Start date
Nah, twas a real thing that a musician CEO ran into the ground with some bad decisions. Only them did it turn into a cult and ponzi scheme to raise enough funds to survive his bad choices and ideas.
Well, a dozen or so devices will probably make it into people's hands, which will mean they'll get to covet their devices and consider them iconic. I think their fervor will increase, greatly.
Yup, I just felt so bad for those kids. With those parents promising them something awesome will come later. Some of the kids just didn't know how to react. Some were too young probably. I think there was even a tree decorated with amico game boxes.
Hopefully "license the IP" means they license a few of the games for someone to release on Steam. It's what I've been rooting for all along.
Yeah, I was interested in some InTV revivals like Night Stalker but I wasn't going to buy Amico hardware for them.
He bought the Intellivision name a few years back. He seemingly got forced out at the end of last year and is back to doing VG Live again.
He was "friends" (unclear what their actual relationship was, Tommy has a history of referring to basically everyone he's ever come in contact with as a friend) with the previous owner of the Intellivision property. They were apparently talking about releasing a new console (as relayed by Tommy, but, again, he has a history of embellishment and self-aggrandizing), but the guy passed away and then Tommy bought up all the rights and everything and installed himself as CEO.
It turns out that manchild 90's composers don't make good CEOs and he spent most of the time arguing online and augering the company into the dirt. He's since "stepped down" to a Creative Officer position and disappeared entirely from any Amico communication and the internet in general.
VGL did suffer and stop doing shows due to Covid, but have done a show or two in the last few months, and he seems to be entirely focused on that now.
I hate the way the Intellivision name has been dragged because of this fiasco. I don't know what they were thinking. Their entire premise was identical to the Wii's 15 years ago, and that ship has sailed.
They should've just made a mini INTV console that played all those old games on an HDTV. I'm always down for some Astrosmash or Night Stalker, but the originals, not new versions.
Keith Robinson is surely rolling over in his grave.
They should've just made a mini INTV console that played all those old games on an HDTV. I'm always down for some Astrosmash or Night Stalker, but the originals, not new versions.
Keith Robinson is surely rolling over in his grave.
First Elon Musk finds every excuse imaginable to back out of his impulsive buying of Twitter, and now this!
legit don't know what happened to tommy talarico
games live concerned years back were a blast, his music in the game industry was solid for its time too
this has just been such a mess, with nothing to show for it
games live concerned years back were a blast, his music in the game industry was solid for its time too
this has just been such a mess, with nothing to show for it
You don't start a production line for "a dozen or so devices".
Scammy console-ish android based whatevers come out all the time. Makes it pretty clear that the whole business model here was to pay a bunch of execs, rather than to quickly deliver the inevitably crap product at a profit.
Now, imagine this: they license some of their IPs to a developer who publishes a nice game on other platforms.
Now... with a good version of that game on a machine I already own why would I want to buy a console for a version of the same game developed with ideally a WAY lower budget?
It makes no sense at all.
Also, in 2022 on a home console how long would you play something like this?
Nope, Interplay still has it, Intellivision was just licensing it.
Well, ostensibly licensing it. It's pretty clear no actual work was done on the game and it mostly "existed" to add a "big name" to entice potential investors and fans.
What I really despise about this situation is that people lost their jobs and I still see comments like "Great news!".
Pathetic.
Pathetic.
Last paragraph here is the entirety of the scam, I think. This is what they're hoping to get away with. I really don't think it's much more complex than that.
In fact, I'm pretty sure a lot of Tallarico's "delusional" habits were always part of the scam. Courting desperate 50 year old gaming youtubers with 3 views per video stinks to me like he was trying to leave a trail that the whole endeavor was actually for real. Leaving a mess for the inevitable lawsuits to be forced to untangle.
I don't think this was ever much more than some moderately wealthy people deciding on gaming crowdfunding as a novel sector to bilk out of some cash in a very simple way.
Even if they do get successfully sued, how do you possibly figure out who I responsible? There are dozens of people who were pretty much being paid to do nothing, on top of paying company funds to themselves via renting corporate space they owned, etc.
They already got away with it, pretty much.
I doubt many people worked for this company in good faith outside of maybe some random contractors who did the small amount of actual game development.
Last edited:
I meant the dozen or so they have finished already. Because I don't think they'll secure enough money for refunds + manufacturing.
"If you think about it, there's 200 million hardcore gamers in the world. We're going to let Microsoft and Sony and Nintendo, and now Google, fight for those 200 million gamers. For us, there's three billion gamers. They just don't call themselves gamers, they play their phone every day. The reality is, they're 55 percent of the entire $140 billion dollar industry."
"How can we sell these people a worse phone than they already have, but in a shitty box they have to hook up to their TV, and charge them more for worse games than the ones they can play for free on the phones they already have?
I give you...The Amico."
Yeah I always amazed by this, even when Tommy and crew say the right buzzwords for the chud crew, shit still struggles for triple digit. Funny thing is Pat and Ian of CUPodcast biggest numbers come from Amico news and they do 20k regularly on it
It's funny that Intellivision has just basically abandoned their official Twitter, too. Truly the sign of a thriving company.
It really hammers home that Tommy was just handling the official Twitter, too.
At the very least they could do the standard "What's your favorite Intellivision game?" engagement bait, or just queue up a bunch of Intellivision trivia or screenshots or whatever, but they can't even be bothered to do that.
They couldn't even do the Ouya thing in making their console a hell of a lot cheaper. This thing was the same price as a Switch or a Series S... They want $339 for this fucking thing, it was a hard pass at $250.
It's kind of funny, Tommy shit on literally everyone else, from accusing Nintendo of selling child sex games to dunking on the other little upstart console failures like the Ouya. He couldn't even reach the lofty heights of the Ouya, which shipped a couple hundred thousand units. The Amico is a little more legitimate than the Coleco Chameleon in that there are hand built Amicos that play games made for them.
The investors and people who preordered are cooked, they aren't getting their money back now..."oh gee we sacked most of our staff and now have no-one to process all the refund requests lol!"
How fucking convenient...
It's almost like the entire thing's been one huge scam from the beginning! 😲
How fucking convenient...
It's almost like the entire thing's been one huge scam from the beginning! 😲
There is a guy they took a loan from, in return they promised him the first 100 dollars from every amico sold.
What I find fascinating is that even if we go with the assumption they're telling the truth, that the hardware is delayed, that shouldn't affect the software.
The games ideally should be done and finished, at least the initial batch. The fact that not one single component of this is complete and done is the biggest red flag to me.
Not that they don't have legitimate devs, but because there's no pressure on them to finish. The executives need to have employees working constantly to justify their positions.
I still remember one place I was at, a startup from an ex-designer at a studio that made a high profile PSP title in a certain Sony series about a god.
He secured funding initially from a mom and son in Atlanta and it was to design an AI-driven football game, but with betting. Whatever, it was interesting AI work for me and I got to learn Unity on the job. But I remember he hired his father-in-law to play World of Warcraft all day. Literally paid his father-in-law to play WoW. The idea was that he'd be in a clan of the company's name, so when the company went public with the name there would automatically be a bunch of fans. It was the dumbest, most corrupt idea I've ever heard someone seriously explain to me. Needless to say, the VC pulled their funding when they found out they only owned the game they were funding, and not the entire studio, and the company quickly collapsed after that.
The games ideally should be done and finished, at least the initial batch. The fact that not one single component of this is complete and done is the biggest red flag to me.
Not that they don't have legitimate devs, but because there's no pressure on them to finish. The executives need to have employees working constantly to justify their positions.
I still remember one place I was at, a startup from an ex-designer at a studio that made a high profile PSP title in a certain Sony series about a god.
He secured funding initially from a mom and son in Atlanta and it was to design an AI-driven football game, but with betting. Whatever, it was interesting AI work for me and I got to learn Unity on the job. But I remember he hired his father-in-law to play World of Warcraft all day. Literally paid his father-in-law to play WoW. The idea was that he'd be in a clan of the company's name, so when the company went public with the name there would automatically be a bunch of fans. It was the dumbest, most corrupt idea I've ever heard someone seriously explain to me. Needless to say, the VC pulled their funding when they found out they only owned the game they were funding, and not the entire studio, and the company quickly collapsed after that.
That video compilation of Tallarico using this manipulative, hideous, nostalgia-wringing play, time and time again, was probably the thing I'll remember the longest from this whole sorry saga, yes even more so than "gaming racists".
He's not just a narcassist, he showed he's pretty fucking devious with it. What a combo.
Holy shit, I just read about that. The loan arrangement stipulates the entire $810k was to be paid back by December 31st 2021, bet that dude isn't happy...
Well, he could invest in the Amico so that they'll launch it and... OH, wait.