The year is 1994 and it's a typically bright morning in Sunnyvale, California. Chris Hudak is riding the Caltrain to work, powerbook in his lap, dozing in and out of consciousness. Arriving into the office sometime around noon, he rocks up at his cubicle and is approached by team leader and head designer BJ West. BJ has decided, in his capacity as captain, that his motley crew really need a staff meeting. Furthermore, he determines it would greatly improve morale if that meeting were to be held at the Brass Rail, a nearby strip joint. In the words of Hudak, they "all nod and gravely agree".
Dave, the DJ at the Brass Rail, is no stranger to these 'meetings' and celebrates their entrance by playing a load of industrial metal, much to the dismay of the girl dancing on the stage. The team share a pitcher of beer and muse on how this beats the hell out of spending the day at Atari's offices. Everyone agrees and the meeting is concluded. Begrudgingly returning to work, the team cap off the working day with a plastic dart gun fight, conducted with weapons procured from the local Toys 'R' Us. Another typical day in the life of the Black ICE\White Noise team, a group of rookie designers charged with the near-impossible task of saving the Atari Jaguar from destroying America's most legendary video game developer.
The mid-90s were perhaps the most transformative period in video game history. The leap from 2D to 3D and the amount of experimentation that took place at the time still staggers me. It's not just the power of those once-new machines I find incredible, but the sheer amount of choice we had back then. Today, we have the PlayStation 4 and Xbox One, two (relatively) similar systems, then there's Nintendo with its quirky little handheld, and the goliath that is the PC. But between 1993 and 1996, there were more failed major console releases than there were consoles released in the last decade. Nevermind the fact there were still multiple PC alternatives for the mouse and keyboard community, such as the Mac or the Amiga, or indeed Atari's own line of computers.
from Eurogamer.net
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