why are Atari gatefold boxes (and carts) numbered that way

[Kid Ice]

Atari's first nine VCS releases were numbered as follows:

Combat 01
Air Sea Battle 02
Starship 03
Indy 500 11
Street Racer 12
Video Olympics 21
Surround 41
Blackjack 51
Basic Math 61

My questions are the following:

-Why the numbering?

-Why aren't the numbers sequential?

-Why did they drop the numbering?

-Why did they drop the gatefold boxes? (I get the feeling I know the answer to this one)

[Blitzwing256]

those are the production numbers for them

and they wanted to cut corners after the first year or so.

[Keir]

The first digit denotes the genre and the second is sequential. My best guess as to the genres is as follows:

0= war/action
1 = racing
2 = sports
4 = strategy
5 = gambling
6 = educational

It appears that they continued these genres for a little while even after they stopped putting numbers on carts and using the gatefold boxes. CX2604 is Space War (and a numbered cart of this has been found, possibly a prototype), CX2652 is Casino, etc. The first 3 series game is Superman (CX2631) so that series might have been intended for licensed games, or maybe adventure games.

[diskoboy]

Hmmm.... that's a good question.

My guess is they were trying to get the numbers into catagories. The 1st digit representing the catagory, 2nd digit representing the number it was released.

If you look at it - the (first digit) zero's are all shooting games. One's are racers. Two for sports, etc..

(Edit - Keir beat me, by a fraction of a second!)

[Kid Ice]

The first digit denotes the genre and the second is sequential. My best guess as to the genres is as follows:

0= war/action
1 = racing
2 = sports
4 = strategy
5 = gambling
6 = educational

It appears that they continued these genres for a little while even after they stopped putting numbers on carts and using the gatefold boxes. CX2604 is Space War (and a numbered cart of this has been found, possibly a prototype), CX2652 is Casino, etc. The first 3 series game is Superman (CX2631) so that series might have been intended for licensed games, or maybe adventure games.

Ahhhhh so that explains the CX numbers too. For some reason I always assumed the CX numbers were non sequential because games were assigned a CX number before release (therefore the "missing" CX numbers were used by unreleased titles). Thanks.

[Arcade Antics]

Yep indeed. And FWIW, I always presumed C=Category and X=Number.

[rolenta]

Yep indeed. And FWIW, I always presumed C=Category and X=Number.

That sounds plausible except that the VCS itself had the model number CX-2600 so the individual carts for that system were also in the CX series.

[Phosphor Dot Fossils]

What an awesome topic - seriously. I'd never even given this a moment's thought, and now looking at it this way is kinda like the realization hitting me that the same gravity that keeps me from floating off the planet also keeps the planet from floating away from the sun. Eye-opening!

[DefaultGen]

.....

[Keir]

Nope, these are the gatefold boxes:
http://img252.imageshack.us/img252/5584/gatefoldnk5.th.jpg (http://img252.imageshack.us/my.php?image=gatefoldnk5.jpg)
/brag

[Blitzwing256]

ha!

that explains ALOT, when I was a kid I noticed the numbers and I thought there was enough games to fit 1-99, I tried to "Catch them all" and was never able to come close.

now I feel pretty silly ;-)