The Atari Jaguar & Collecting For It

I always considered going for a complete sealed Jaguar collection (Much like Adol's collection), but one thing that always bothered me was whether or not games were factory sealed or resealed, and how to tell? Another thing that I was always confused about was the difference between the UK releases and the American carts. It seemed to me that there were a lot of American carts flooding the UK, similar to how a lot of GBA carts from the US have contaminated our own market. The Jaguar also had a troubled start as well, with many modded US consoles sold here to meet demand.

It's a shame, because I really liked some games on the Jaguar. The controller wasn't perfect - Far from it - But there are a number of games that truly stand out ~ My favourite being Brutal Sports Football! The few sealed games I do have seem to be slightly crushed. The cardboard boxes aren't as well constructed as N64 or SNES games for example, and tend to "Implode" under pressure for use of a better word.

I think the Jaguar could've been a serious contender to the SNES and Mega Drive if it were released a few years earlier. It wasn't even really true 64bit, so I don't know what Atari were thinking for the future of the Jaguar - If things had turned out different (Ie, no Saturn or PlayStation), then would the Jaguar have gone head to head with the Nintendo 64? Both being cart based systems - Would we have ever seen anything as impressive as Mario 64 or Ocarina Of Time on the Jaguar for instance? In my opinion, the Jaguar was only a glorified 16bit machine like the 32X - Trying to live up to the hype

It's also a shame that it was so poorly designed and constructed. The controller was certainly not "Revolutionary" as they said it was, and the graphics weren't really much better than the SNES could handle with a Super FX card. The aesthetical design of the Jaguar was bordering on the unsightly, but it was clear that Atari had plans for the console from the start (With the eventual release of the CD Rom add-on, which connected nicely). As for the physical construction of the console, carts, and peripherals... They all felt far too cheap and fragile. Certainly not cutting edge technology, and of very poor quality! The carts felt brittle; The controllers felt hollow and didn't connect into the ports very well; And the carts didn't really connect to the console very securely either, often resulting in game freezing or glitches. It's a wonder Atari managed to sell any consoles at all!

The whole concept of the Jaguar seemed "Rushed", as if Atari felt that they had to make an appearance in the "Next gen". With many other companies at the time jumping on the bandwagon, Atari "Rushed" out the Jaguar promising the public 64bit graphics and even Virtual Reality (In the form of a VR helmet that never actually made it to retail). There were a few stand-out titles, but nothing that could compete with the PlayStation and Saturn