Could have Atari prevented the crash of 1983?

[S.Peelman]

Atari is not Atari anymore though, the company is Atari in name only. They own the rights to some of those old titles still though I think, for whatever good that'll do. What use does one still have for a name like Missile Command? They're way, way further gone than SEGA.

Anyway I think what you said is right, they should've put the leash on third parties. They should have made rules, and they should have monitored, overlooked and organised what was released on the system. Basically, they should have done what Nintendo after the crash (as one of the handful of survivors) realized they should be doing even if in hindsight that's ironically what's biting Nintendo in the behind these past few generations.

There's no way Atari could have known though, and in an industry that young it was bound to be just one big experiment. Of course it also wasn't completely their fault. I agree it was a very good system and I can have great fun with some of the games on my Atari.