Last month video game company Atari and their CEO Fred Chesnais teased that the company was releasing a new console. Now, the company has officially unveiled the Ataribox, revealing details of the system and showing off what the console will look like.

All the announced details on the Ataribox

Let's start off by discussing the look of the unveiled Ataribox. There are two different versions of the console, which both feature ribbed black plastic as a throwback to older Atari consoles. One console comes with a wood front and back -- an homage to the original 1977 Atari console -- with white lighting on the front.

The other comes with a black glass front with a red Atari symbol in the front and a red back. For the announced technical aspects of the console, it was revealed that the Atari box will have four USB ports, an HDMI port, an SD card slot, and a place to plug in a network cable.

A twist on the NES Classic by Atari?

According to the email that went out to Atari mailing list subscribers, it was stated that “we will be delivering classic gaming content, we will also be delivering current gaming content.” They also stated they want to share the Ataribox step by step and that most details on the specs, games, pricing, and release date would be given out later.

Since the picture of the console suggests that there is no cartridge port, this is leading many to believe that it will run classic games via emulation, like Nintendo has with the NES and will do with the SNES Classic. Atari has a backlog of classic games for this purpose, but it is not clear what exactly they mean by “current gaming content.” No one knows if this could be more current Atari games, mobile games, or maybe higher-end console and PC games.

What games could be on the Ataribox?

With the Ataribox being able to play retro games, what are some that Atari has in their library that could be featured on the console? There are a number of old-school classics they developed and/or published to choose from. This includes games like "Asteroids," "Battlezone," "Centipede," "Gauntlet," "Gauntlet II," "Marble Madness," "Millipede," "Missile Command," "Paperboy," "Pong," and "Primal Rage." The company also has its lineup of sports titles it could use, as well as the popular 1983 "Star Wars" and 1990 "Batman" games.

There is also Atari's "Rollercoaster Tycoon" series, with the most recent game having come out last December, "Rollercoaster Tycoon Touch."
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