[Header image: FTL's Oids of 1987]
The Atari ST: Overview
For the purposes of my computer game commentary I refer to the Atari ST as a Western computer game machine. The Atari ST is also known as "The ST."
The Atari ST was designed by Shiraz Shivji of Atari Corporation R&D.
Both the Atari 520 ST and 1040 ST are powered by the Motorola MC68000 microprocessor clocked at 8 MHz. The 520 ST has 512K of 150-nanosecond DRAM (16x 32K chips). Many 520 ST owners had upgraded to 1 meg of RAM by late 1987. The 1040 ST of 1986 has 1 meg of RAM out of the box.
The 512K-RAM Atari 520 ST debuted in June of 1985 in the U.S.A. and retailed for $799.99 with a monochrome monitor or $999.99 with a color monitor.
In April of 1985 Atari Corporation of the U.S.A announced that the 128K 130 ST would retail for US$399, the 256K 260 ST would retail for US$499 and the 512K 520 ST would retail for $599. However, only the 520 ST and 1040 ST would see broad trans-Atlantic distribution and have a big impact on computer game history. Indeed, Atari scrapped the 130 ST in June of 1985 and the 260 ST in February of 1986. These two scrappings made room for the U.S. release of the 1 meg 1040 ST in March of 1986, which is covered below. The original 520 ST was discontinued by June of 1986 (replaced by the ST-M). Note that the subsequent ST-M and ST-FM were both referred to as 520 STs.
The 512K-RAM Atari 520 ST-M retailed for £259 in the U.K. in June of 1987. The 520 ST-M did not come with a monitor, but it could be plugged into a conventional analog television set via RF Modulator (the M in ST-M stands for "modulator"). The 520 ST-M also did not come with a mouse or a even a disk drive. However, it could accept 128K ROM cartridges. In addition, the 520 ST-M had an external power supply. In June of 1987 in the U.K. the Atari ST-M also retailed for £449 while including an SM124 monochrome monitor, SF354 external disk drive, and a two-button mouse. The external Atari SF354 MicroFloppy disk drive accepted 3.5" single-sided double-density 360K diskettes but could only store 375,376 bytes or 349K on a diskette and had a data transfer rate of only 31,250 bytes or 250K bits per second; that is, with half the capacity of and at half the rate of a Sony 3.5" drive of 1984 (Sony invented the 3.5" format in 1982). A second external disk drive could be daisy-chained on the ST-M and subsequent ST models.
On the other hand, the 512K-RAM Atari 520 ST-FM of 1987 retailed for £399 in the U.K. in June of 1987. In the sphere of home computing the 520 ST-FM was the most famous ST by far; it was the ST that competed directly with the Amiga 500, which retailed for US$699 and £499 in the U.K. at launch in October of 1987. 520 ST-FM hardware specifications are as per 520 ST-M, but the ST-FM included a built-in disk drive, an internal power supply, and a two-button mouse (the FM in ST-FM stands for "floppy, modulator"). At the same time, the 1024K-RAM 1040 ST-F retailed for £599. Both 520 ST-FM and 1040 ST-F/FM internal disk drives accepted 3.5" double-sided double-density 720K diskettes and could write 726,016 bytes or 709K to one diskette (equivalent to the SF314 external disk drive). Thus, ST disk drive capacities were doubled by 1987 yet still lagged behind the A1000 of 1985, which could write 901,120 bytes to a diskette at 500K bits per second.
Note that Atari Corp. and many of its advertisers marketed 3.5" ST disk drives as being "500K" and "1 meg" (unformatted), but their actual usable capacities were only 349K and 709K.
By October of 1987 in the U.K. 1040 ST-Fs were retailing for £499 whereas 520 ST-FMs were retailing for as little as £260 from January of 1988 to March of 1989. Thus, the 256K DRAM chip shortage of 1988 did not impact U.K. or European consumers but rather slowed down Atari Corp.'s distribution of ST units into the North American market. By July of 1988 Atari Corp. had recommended retail prices of US$599 for the 520 ST-FM and US$799.95 for the 1040 ST-F; and by December of 1988 Atari Corp. had recommended retail prices of £299.99 for the 520 ST-FM and £599.99 for the 1040 ST-F whereas Commodore's recommend retail price for the A500 was £399.
The Atari ST was about hitting attractive price-points and advertising cost-breakthroughs in order to outprice and undermine the far superior Amiga hardware as well as set the ST up as a contender to PC/Mac in business productivity software. For example, a big deal was made of the 1040 ST-F having 1 meg of RAM and retailing for US$999 in 1986, but what is 1 meg of RAM -- in gaming -- when set against the Amiga's color palette, bit blitter, copper coprocessor and Paula audio? In ST/Amiga gaming 1 meg of RAM was only needed for a handful of games, even by 1990. By late 1987 many 520 ST and Amiga 500 owners had upgraded their machines to 1 meg of RAM, anyway -- but not for games -- for productivity software. In late 1987 upgrading to 1 meg of RAM only cost 520 ST and A500 owners £100. 1 meg of RAM was just a run-of-the-mill DIY off-the-shelf upgrade by 1987, but Atari cleverly leveraged 1 meg of RAM against the Amiga via the 1040 ST in 1986; a kind of preemptive strike that would at least delay the inevitable fact that the Amiga would, by virtue of its custom chips, eventually shine much more brightly than the ST. Nothing about the ST suggests a dedicated computer game machine -- it has no coinop-style custom chips.
Many people get confused: the ST is not the successor to the Atari 8-bits (400/800), the Commodore Amiga is. The Atari 8-bits and Amiga have custom chips that were designed by the same engineer, Jay Miner. No line can be drawn from the ST back to the Atari 8-bits. In hardware design the Atari ST is more correctly the opposite to the Atari 8-bits and the Amiga. Hardware-wise, Atari in 1985 was nothing like Atari in 1979 -- Atari changed dramatically under Jack Tramiel: Atari Corp.'s main focus was on getting the ST to undermine the Mac as a productivity software platform; the ST was the Jackintosh that was out to whack the Mac.
If a ton of ST/Amiga owners had 1 meg of RAM by 1987 (and many did), why didn't practically all ST/Amiga games require or at least utilize 1 meg of RAM by 1990? The simple fact is that most ST/Amiga gamers owned unexpanded 520 STs and A500s with only 512K of RAM. Up until 1990 the base-line for 16-bit computer-gaming was the 520 ST-FM and the Amiga 500 with half a meg of RAM, period.
1 meg of RAM for under $1,000. Atari were clever to market a compact computer with 1 meg of RAM in 1986. The 1040 ST-F is little more than a 520 ST-FM with double the RAM. Initially, the 1040 ST-F did not even come with a TV modulator because it was targeting productivity software users that wanted hires monochrome monitors for column/row character displays. 1 meg of RAM was all-but-necessary to run mid-80s productivity software efficiently; even in 1986 productivity software was RAM-hungry; you weren't doing much in 512K. But my commentary is about games. And games did not need 1 meg of RAM in 1986; 16-bit games were in their infancy.
1 meg of RAM as standard made the Amiga 1000's 256K of RAM look like a joke, but the Amiga 1000 of 1985 could be upgraded to 512K Chip RAM as well as auto-address a whopping 8½ megs of Fast RAM. Also, the PAL Amiga 1000 had 512K RAM as standard for its U.K. launch in May of 1986. By 1987 the 520 ST could be upgraded to 2 megs of RAM and the 1040 ST could be upgraded to 4 megs of RAM.
The 1040 ST-F/FM could have come with an Amiga-like bit blitter that sped-up certain screen-draws by 20x. But no, we'll skip that. The 1040 ST could have come with a Paula-like audio chip that was far superior to the Yamaha YM2149. But no, we'll skip that. The 1040 ST could have come with a higher capacity disk drive. But no, we'll skip that. As a result, ST games of the next six or seven years were somewhat cut down, suffered from weak audio and displayed in small drawspaces that did not update smoothly -- even with 1 meg of RAM.
From 1985-88 many Commodore 64 games played better than ST/Amiga games, yet the C64 only had 64K of RAM.
By mid-1986 in the U.S.A the 1040 ST with SM124/SC1224 monitor retailed for US$1000/1200. The SF314 disk drive retailed for US$300 and the SH204 20 meg Winchester hard disk drive retailed for US$800. Otherwise, for the price of one Macintosh Plus (US$2600) one could purchase four 520 STs and just hook them up to TVs.
From 1985-88 the ST had more and better games than the Amiga did. In addition, 1040 ST productivity software was comparable to Mac productivity software from 1985-88. Also, two 1040 STs with monochrome monitors is a much better deal than one Mac Plus with monochrome monitor.
As for Atari ST hard disk drives, in 1986 the SupraDrive 10 meg external hard disk drive by Supra Corp. of the U.S.A. retailed for $549. 20, 30 and 60 meg capacity SupraDrives were also available in 1986, retailing for $799, $999 and $1999 respectively. By 1990 Supra Corp. offered 30 meg capacity for $549, 40 meg for $749 and 80 meg for $1199. By as early as 1987 120 and 250 meg SupraDrives were available.
Atari Corp.'s SH204 20 meg external hard disk drive retailed for US$799 in 1986 and US$699 by late 1987. By July of 1988 the SH204 had been discontinued but was superceded by Atari U.K.'s MEGAFILE 20 and 30 meg hard disk drives. In January of 1989 the MEGAFILE 30 hard disk drive retailed for £599 whereas Third Coast Technologies' Third Coast 30 meg hard disk drive retailed for £465.
The SupraDrive 40 had 64K of cache, an 11ms seek time and 11M bits per second data transfer rate whereas the MegaFile 30 had no cache, a 28ms seek time and 7.5M bits per second data transfer rate.
Atari manufactured high-quality monitors. ST gamers typically used Atari SC1224 RGB analog color or SM124 hires digital monochrome 12" CRT monitors. Both the SM124 and SC1224 were released in 1985. Later, the 14" SC1424 RGB analog color monitor and the 14" SM144 hires digital monochrome monitor were also used. The horizontal scanning frequency of the SC1224 is 15.75 kHz whereas the vertical scanning frequency is 50-60 Hz. The horizontal scanning frequency of the SC1424 is 15,625 Hz whereas the vertical scanning frequency is 50-60 Hz. The horizontal scanning frequency of the SM124 and SM144 is 35.7 kHz whereas the vertical scanning frequency is 71.2 Hz.
In 1987 the Atari SC1224 320x200 color monitor retailed for US$300 and £400 in the U.K. whereas the Atari SM124 640x400 monochrome monitor retailed for US$140 and £150 in the U.K.
Both the 520 ST and 1040 ST could display in monochrome 640x400, 4-color 640x200 and 16-color 320x200. The 16 simultaneously on-screen colors are drawn from a palette range of 512 colors.
The ST typically displayed games in 16 colors from a palette range of 512 at a resolution of 320x200. The ST color palette was superior to IBM EGA 16-from-64 but inferior to Amiga 32-from-4096.
The Atari ST went head to head with the Commodore Amiga during the ST-Amiga Wars of the late 80s and early 90s. In terms of computer games the ST was winning the war from 1985-87, but the Amiga started flexing in 1988 and would become dominant from 1989 onwards.
Famous Jack Tramiel quotes that every Atari and Commodore computer owner knew back in the day:
Business is war.
Power without the price.
Computers for the masses, not the classes.
Best Atari ST Games
Relative to their release dates the best Atari ST games are Xanth F/X's MIDI Maze and FTL's Oids and Dungeon Master of 1987. Oids and MIDI Maze were not only masterpieces, they were ST-exclusives.
Best Atari ST Port
The best Atari ST port is Activision Software Studios' 1988 conversion of SegaAM2's Super Hang-On coinop of 1987. The Atari ST and Amiga ports are notable for their accurate controls, speed-conveyance via sprite-scaling and challenging gameplay. Super Hang-On was one of the first great 16-bit ports of a graphically-demanding coinop.
Early Atari ST Flight Sims
Atari ST Criticism
One of the stupidest things about the Atari 520 ST-FM and 1040 ST-F/FM was how their mouse/joystick ports were located under the machine. This meant you had to lift the ST up just to access its right-underside ports. It was not a good idea to lift and move STs all the time because they were heavy and their wedge-shaped plastic enclosures creaked with weakness. As well, you could easily bend the mouse/joystick port pins or even the port itself. On top of that, some of the thicker joystick plugs needed to be jammed hard into ports, yet there was barely any leverage space.
In addition, you would need to be careful when accessing the ports because if you only lifted up the front of the machine you ran the risk of putting stress on the cables and ports at the back of the machine. Thus, most people bought cable extenders that stuck out from the front, which was better but still clumsy. And ugly. And annoying. But at least you would not damage the ST.
The ST had a few other problems as well; namely, lack of hardware scrolling, no bit blitter and only 3-channel Yamaha YM-2149 Sound Generator audio that was inferior to C64 SID and Amiga Paula [1].
As it pertains to gaming, the ST of 1985 also only ever had 360-720K 3.5" disk drives whereas the Amiga had 880K 3.5" disk drives upon its release in 1985. Early STs only had 360K single-sided disk drives, which was absolutely pathetic and adversely impacted many games even after the advent of 720K double-sided disk drives. The IBM PC had 1.44 meg 3.5" high-density disk drives in 1987 and 2.88 meg extended-density disk drives in 1988, but PC games were mainly distributed on 720K-1.44 meg diskettes before CD-ROM took over in the early 90s.
The Atari TOS operating system and Graphics Environment Manager aka GEM GUI is also a joke compared to AmigaOS, Intuition & Workbench. It did run a lot of good software, though. And some games needed to be run from the GEM desktop.
One could be forgiven for referring to the ST as a "16-bit ZX Spectrum with MIDI"; it was only its CPU, RAM, disk-space and color that separated it from the 8-bits; it did not have any coinop-style custom chips like the C64 or the Amiga did; its parts were off-the-shelf with the exception of GLUE, DMA, MMU and SHIFTER. That said, the ST was cheap, reliable, well-designed and had tons of top-notch productivity software, so it sold well.
There were many good Atari ST games that were released from 1985-1995, but the Amiga versions were almost always superior if the coders tapped the Amiga's chipset. And since they often did not do so, the ST versions were often just as good as the Amiga ones, which were just ST ports. So yes, the ST version of a game was often as good as the Amiga version only because the Amiga version was a straight port of the ST version. Conversely, ST ports of Amiga-native games were often mere caricatures.
In addition, the ST version of a game was often cheaper than the Amiga version, yet just as good. The ST also had clearer stock color monitors than the Amiga did.
People often say that ST audiovisuals are good enough -- until they see a native Amiga game. Suddenly, ST audiovisuals are not good enough. Suddenly, those bleeps and blurps sound annoying. Suddenly, that jerky scrolling induces nausea. And oddly, that 16-color palette doesn't contend with 32-color PAL overscan or 64-color extra half-brite modes.
Before the Amiga and IBM PC took over the Atari ST was also used as a low-cost game development system. For example, Xenon 2 graphics were drawn in Degas Elite of 1986 on the ST, IK+ graphics were drawn in NeoChrome of 1985 on ST, and Graftgold used 1040 STs to program Rainbow Islands in assembly.
ST programmers often coded games in HiSoft's DevpacST Editor/Assembler on Mega STs in hi-res, flicker-free monochrome 640x400.
Unless you were into DTP, CAD or MIDI from 1985-90 (and ST MIDI was in 99.9% of cases NOT for games) there was little reason to choose an ST over an Amiga. ST MIDI was mostly for non-gaming: C-Lab's Notator of 1988 and Steinberg's Cubase of 1989.
The ST had some of the best productivity software in the world in the mid-to-late 80s and (very) early 90s. In addition, that productivity software could be displayed in hires on cheap SM124/144 monitors that featured high vertical and horizontal scanning frequencies.
Note that I am only concerned with stock ST-M, ST-F and ST-FM models, not the ST-E, Mega ST, TT or Falcon. Reason: this is computer game commentary, and the stock STs were the only STs that took off as a computer game machines. The Amiga-like STE of 1989 and the A1200-like Falcon of 1992 never took off as computer game machines, even though they were great micros.
Best Atari ST Developer
The best Atari ST developer is FTL aka Faster Than Light. You cannot beat SunDog, Oids and Dungeon Master by 1987 followed up by Chaos Strikes Back in 1989. Those are four of the best games on the Atari ST!
SunDog, Oids and Dungeon Master were three of the first professional games to clearly distinguish 16-bit micros from 8-bit ones.
Other Notable Atari ST Games
[1]
Doesn't mean ST games could not have good sound and music (the ST could play sampled sounds and sampled music, for example).
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