Project: Home Arcade v3 – Retro Gaming with the Atari VCS 800

Over the years, I’ve written a few articles on different solutions to bring retro gaming into my living room.  Starting with an mini-PC, and then transitioning to Raspberry Pi’s for the job, I have really enjoyed having these systems ready for some classic gaming on the biggest and best TV, and with the best sound system, in the my home.  For the last few years, I have been running the same RetroPie installation, only upgrading from a 1GB Raspberry Pi 3 system to a 4GB Raspberry Pi 4, as well as upgrading to RetroFlag’s outstanding NESPi 4 case¹.

Unfortunately, RetroPie hasn’t seen a new release in nearly 3 years, so it continues to lack support for Raspberry Pi 5 systems.  While the RPi4 has been a great solution for retro gaming, in general, it was never a strong performer when emulating 3D games or systems.  With RetroPie development seemingly stalled, I decided to pick up an Atari VCS 800² system during the recent clearance sales, to see it it might be a worthy replacement for my RPi4 in the living room.

Although Atari has marketed the VCS 800 is a jack-of-all-trades box that can even be a mini-PC, the company has also made some decisions that make using the system outside of Atari OS challenging for everyday consumers.  From a business perspective, I can understand Atari wanting to emphasize their own proprietary game store.  But the likelihood of that being successful was always incredibly small, and entirely dependent on third-party developers and the quality of their games.

Atari OS starts off with a great boot screen, throwing back to Asteroids, and even the controller select screens and user account creation screens are sharp and look, if not “A” grade, then at least a solid “B”.  After that, things quickly fall off into “C” territory, with a Home Screen that looks like a cubby-hole shelving unit and some menu designs that are not all that intuitive.  Atari OS begins with promise, but ends up feeling between unfinished and only partly polished.

For any gaming console, success depends on the quality of the games available for your system.  To Atari’s credit, the Atari 50th Anniversary collection and their Recharged series of games are well done.  But they are not proprietary to the VCS 800; you can find them for PC, PlayStation, Xbox, Switch, etc.  What is available on the VCS 800 game store is generally low quality, which means that there isn’t a compelling reason to boot into Atari OS.

In many ways, the Atari VCS 800 reminds me of the Atari 1200XL computer; a machine with some really clever design ideas but that ended up being a bundle of compromises and a missed opportunity.  Ultimately, in trying to do so many things, the Atari VCS 800 ends up being mediocre as a console, steaming box, and mini-PC.  That said, focusing on just the mini-PC capabilities, and all of the steps needed to maximize those capabilities, allows the Atari to become a fantastic retro gaming system.

The VCS 800 itself is really quite nice, with a good weight to it so that it feels like a console.  The case features two front USB ports for quick charging of the included controllers (more on those below), or using other controllers such as trackballs, spinners, steering wheels, etc.  Packing a dual-core (4 thread) AMD Zen CPU running at 2.6GHz, a Radeon Vega 3 APU, and with expandable RAM and SATA SSD, the VCS 800 is more than capable of outpacing a Raspberry Pi 4 or 5.  Unfortunately, getting inside the system to the upgrade RAM and/or add an SSD are multi-step processes, some of which are not simple.  Even then, installing new operating systems and taking advantage of the expanded SSD storage outside of Atari OS presents its own challenges.

Just the same, the Atari has serious potential for anyone that enjoys tinkering with computer systems.  And, after all of the steps and hoops-to-jump-through and questionable design decisions, the Atari VCS 800 can be turned into an incredible retro gaming system that is suited extremely well for the living room, family room or den.  In my testing, the Zen 2/Vega 3 combo, with 4GB of an expanded 32GB system RAM dedicated to the Vega 3, the VCS 800 is easily able to emulate 3D arcade games, as well consoles as through – at least – the sixth generation.

Atari also includes two controllers with the system, and they are a bit of a mixed-bag.  The Wireless Classic Controller³ is a new take on Atari’s classic CX40 joystick, mashed together with the original Atari Paddle Controller.  As a wireless CX40, the Wireless Classic Controller works well enough to use with classic VCS/2600 games using Atari OS.  As a Paddle Controller it is an interesting idea that doesn’t work very well.  The radius of the dial is quite small, of course, and the dial is too sensitive.  Worse, using it as a joystick there is some natural torque to the movement of your hands which cause the stick to turn as you move it up/down or left-right, so that the experience using the Classic Controller just feels slippery and weird.

Outside of Atari OS, the Wireless Classic Controller is, unfortunately, a bit of a mess.  Batocera, for example, wants to see the digital stick movement as if it was a HAT from a flight-stick, not as a d-pad or joystick.  And the spin for the paddle functionality, which cannot be physically turned off, is seen as a mouse and wants to turn things left or right randomly.  I was hoping to use the Wireless Classic Controller outside of Atari OS, since I’ll be nearly exclusively booting into Batocera, and these limitations mean I’m better off using the old Hyperkin USB Trooper or similar whenever I want an authentic VCS/2600 controller experience.

Using the new Wireless Modern Controller⁴ that Atari bundles with the VCS 800 is an entirely different experience than using the Classic Controller.  While the Modern Controller is not an A+ controller, it has a nice feel and weight to it, and I’ve found the buttons and both analog sticks and d-pad to be quite responsive and accurate.  I would say that it seems very similar to something you might buy from 8bitdo, or other higher-quality third-party controller maker.

When it comes to USB charging cables for their controllers, Atari was generous on the one hand, and not so much on the other.  Including USB cables for both the Classic and Modern controllers that are about 10ft long was a bit unexpected and quite welcome.  Having the controllers using micro-USB feels cheap, but somewhat understandable.  Atari adding a notch to key those micro-USB plugs, to try to force their customers into using only their cables, is one of those aforementioned design decisions that hamper the entire experience with the controllers.

As luck would have it, as development on RetroPie slowed down, another Linux-based emulation distribution became more active.  Batocera Linux, or just Batocera, uses Emulation Station as the UI, so moving from RetroPie feels very natural and easy.  And it is a much more polished experience than RetroPie.  For example, adding the Atari Wireless Modern Controller,  and other controllers, via Bluetooth is entirely handled through the Batocera GUI and with the controller.  The system does not exit out to a Linux text-based Bluetooth manager.  A theme manager is included with Batocera, and there are quite a few themes that you can download to customize the UI.

Hard work can make for a sweet reward.  After the time and effort upgrading and expanding the Atari VCS 800, it is a real treat to use it for some quality retro gaming.  Although I might quibble with some of Atari’s design decisions, I’m quite happy with the latest results in my Project Home Arcade, and look forward to continuing to enjoy my living room home arcade system for some time to come.