On ships they call it "mutiny". That pirate Irving Gould made a fortune scuttling Commodore and The Amiga, and setting back home computing and multi-media 10 years.
many companies do the same thing as commodore. I think Atari did the same thing at one point (before the infogrames rebrand) where they fired an economically good CEO. the same could be said for politicians where Canadians chose a PM who has since brang economic growth to a standstill and brought loads of rapists from the middle East (Justin truedau) when they could've voted for someone who'd bring more economic growth and better prosperity.
_"For comparison, at the Macintosh launch just a year earlier the crowd went wild for a scrolling screen of monochrome text."_ It probably wouldn't be much different in 2020.
Except of course that synopsis is bullshit. People who bought Macs could buy the computer with a printer, drop it on their office desk, and never regret their purchase. Straight out of the box it had a suite of applications which meant you'd never need to make another purchase. Why would you buy an Amiga? When the A1000 was released it cost over $1000 ($3000+ allowing for inflation) and it had Defender of the Crown and that was about all. You could buy a Commodore 64 for about $150 or a NES for $170. You couldn't do anything with a first generation Amiga because nobody had written any of the applications which came years later yet. People speak of the Amiga as if on the day of its release it came with a video toaster and lightwave and a suite of games and applications and cost the same as the A500 in 1987. The explanation for why the Amiga failed is really basic: The Amiga fan-base have a completely unrealistic image of the Amiga and an equally unrealistic and dishonest opinion of the competition.
The original name was going to be the Amigo... "The name Amiga was chosen because it is the Spanish word for (female) friend, and alphabetically it appears before Apple in lists of computer makers. It originated as a project code-named "Lorraine", therefore the female was used instead of the male and general version Amigo."
Real Talk? Gently chiding maybe? It can be both be a genuine comment, and a friendly dig. I think the OP made it very clear he enjoyed and appreciates the video
Real Talk? I am. I have a youtube Channel under a different name, though its fairly inactive these days and I've worked on and off as a professional musician. I well understand that these labour's of love take a lot of time and energy, I just don't overreact to friendly, joking comments. Where are you from if you don't mind me asking? Maybe this is a cultural difference. In the UK this kind of comment is totally normal and not considered insulting. Friendly banter, maybe
@@Jo-tv6sj For Activision/Blizzard an absolute yes, i think that if Microsoft can raise a little bit the quality of the Ac/Blizzard games, o boi it promise to be good
The main reason, the C64 was build to a price according to Tramiels motto "Computers for the masses, not for the classes", the Amiga on the other hand was pricey hi-tech when it came around.
Much more innovation in that time period. It was a new industry, and all the waters were uncharted. Now that the industry is solidly in the hands of a few massively rich corporations, they don't want new ideas.
@@shaggybreeks You also can't just do new ideas anymore cause most of the ideas have already been had. Well, probably not most but all the low-hanging fruit for hardware and software innovation is already gone and the bar for quality has been raised immensely.
When I was working at a local TV station in 2005, they were still using an Amiga with a Video Toaster for live titles. One of the last bastions of an otherwise sadly forgotten relic.
This is a pretty good summary, but it misses one vital detail: When Tramiel was in charge of Commodore he was so aggressive that he alienated his own supply chain and retail channels. By the time he left Commodore none of the stores in the US that they'd previously sold the C64 through wanted to do business with Commodore anymore, which meant that their new Amiga never even made it into a lot of stores where it might have impressed and made sales.
@@xmlthegreat Threatened to cut off stock supplies at times of high demand, struck deals to supply stock at price X only to demand price Y at the last minute, promised supplies to one store only to sell them to a rival store instead, etc. He basically made it miserable for the stores to deal with Commodore. "Business is war" was Tramiel's life motto, and as far as he was concerned everybody was the enemy, even the businesses that would be selling his products for him.
Tramiel never had much to do with the Amiga. He got fired by the management that drove C= into the ground. The Amiga actually went from the 64's toy departments to real computer stores.
Patience is a virtue. Quality comes from polish and refinement. Ahoy takes their time making videos to assure the absolute highest of quality, and telling him to rush would compromise it
@Global Cringe I know and I wasn't trying to criticize Ahoy. I was just joking about how long these videos take to produce. I don't want to discredit the quality of the video, or the time that was put into creating it. UA-camrs are so focused on quantity over quality, that it is nice to see people like Ahoy that can spend months creating masterpieces, and still succeed.
This really needs a “part 2”, because where you leave it, everything is looking up for Commodore. I can’t help but notice, I didn’t watch this on a Commodoe tablet, and I don’t have a Commodore phone next to me right now.
The Trackers video could also be a semi sorta sequel when it switches from being about trackers on Amiga to being on PC. Also, how do you not have a device capable of amigaOS 28 already??
that wouldn't really be a part 2, that'd be a separate thing on commodore, at least that'd be the most logical way to do it since their stories overlap
I can only think of two companies from that era who are still thriving in Microsoft and Apple, and Apple only survived the 90s thanks to Microsoft trying to avoid having a monopoly. Even IBM is a shell of itself.
It even gives me nostalgia vibes- which is weird cause I didn't even have an Amiga. I had an Atari, and I only knew about Amagi because all good games on PC (and Deluxe Paint II) were ported it. So I'm getting warm feels about games my Atari could never run but IF it could have, it'd surely have looked like this LOL
Turrican soundtrack at the end made me cry... Those pearls, cannon fodder, ruffntumble, it came from the desert... Cytadela, deathmask, superfrog... i could count all games that i have deep in the heart till the morning...
Yes! I just commented about the soundtracks from Shadow of the Beast and Turrican, I got very nostalgic. It was nice to see those Bitmap Brothers graphics again too, they had such a distinct visual style on all their games.
To be alive when all this stuff was happening was pure magic. Bear in mind that before computers went mainstream, they were still considered tools, and you could do anything you wanted with them. It was possible for one person to understand how the whole machine worked, right down to the metal. Every day new and exciting stuff was coming out. Programming in the 90's was the most fun I've had in my life. I feel bad for anyone who missed the dawn of the computer age, before all of this technology became a boring commodity littered with DRM.
@@Waccoon how did you get into programming back then? like how would you learn? the way people talk about early computing makes it sound like everyone was a programmer
Had a thought that one day there will be very few people alive that lived through the 80s/early 90s era of computing so that is interesting that will it remain remembered. Another interesting thing is how older computing comes across to younger people who didn't see it gradually come about.
@@chis5050 I read somewhere that Linus Torvalds got started with programming on a Sinclair QL - with relatively little software available for it, he had to write programs for himself. Also, computers like the QL, C64 and ZX Spectrum booted into a BASIC interpreter (it was in the ROM), so you could literally just flick the power switch and start coding!
@@F0ur_Tw3nty when he show really old software he often shows it widescreen dos internal resolution was wide but you were supposed to stretch it with crt gun for full screen 4//3 the stupidest part even game devs never knew what the hell they are doing. some people used old giant widescreens, some people used aspect correcting software some raw software. the mismatch mismanagemant and miscommunication is present even in the rgeat games like wolf3d or ufo but you always can tell when a 4//3 game is presented in widescreen and you can find raw images or software he shows in widescreen and see for yourself that it's 4//3
I was a musician on the Amiga demo scene for a while! I was Screech/Eltech. I never made a name for myself, but it was cool nonetheless. I did get to be CU Amiga magazine's tune of the month in April 1997 (I know, very late in the Amiga's life), and that was a high point for me. The A1200 was my all-time favourite home computer. Great days. Thanks for the video!
nice :) i always wished i got into the scene at some point.. ive always followed it. it's mad what they can do on an amiga and others now. I recently thought of getting into the scene (never too late) as a musician (i code and do gfx too but im best at music) .. i've left a few posts here and there asking if anyone would need a musician .. who bloody knows :)
When the "Assault on Precinct 13" theme kicked in I got chills. With this level of quality, the fact that these videos are made by one person never fails to blow me away.
Just a note on the attention to detail put into these videos, the background music @2:42 uses the noises of floppy drives as percussion, awesomesauce :)
@@MarkoKraguljac I think there could a part at the end titled "The small rebirth of Commodore" with the whole Demoscene being still active for both 8 bit, and 16 bit machines, new hardware still giving life to the machines, the YT/online community, and commercial products like the C64 Mini, and Full size versions having decent success. so it does not have to be all doom, and gloom.
@@MaxHohenstaufen Stuart has never been the fastest content creator to begin with, but I have heard he's been having more than his share of troubles over on his Reddit. He has a sleep disorder and children, and COVID has complicated his life to prevent him from being able to crank out lots of videos. This is why when an Ahoy video does appear in the wild, it's a treat.
I bought myself a Commodore Amiga 500 back in the late 80's. It had just over 500KB of RAM. Then about a year later, I upgraded it to 1MB of RAM 😮 It was an exciting time.
I think the staggered upload is actually part of ahoys charm.. He's a fleeting view into what's good about UA-cam... He comes back to remind us of the absolute quality that some people can get too... Absolute king... Deserves a TV show
More than any Amiga game and I played most, pixel art, sound and atmosphere of Bitmap brothers' Gods will remain etched in my brain FOREVER. What a time.
I was in University. A friend of mine was one of the first to major in "computer animation". He bought an Amiga in hopes of being a professional graphic artist. The average consumer didn't buy a computer for games. A Commodore 64 for games, yes. Anything over $1000? No way. I had to play games on a green monochrome screen. The frustration was crazy making.
The Amiga was a great machine for the time. Got my start in animation with Deluxe Paint and Sculpt Animate 3D. Its 4096 colors blew away the 16 colors Mac was touting and even the 256 colors of the PC for many years after. Sadly, the last time I saw an Amiga was on clearance for $50 in the mid 90s after PCs took over the high end graphics space.
@@acewolfgang276 And that is pretty crazy in it self that AAA games has such insane marketing budgets. But the market is a lot bigger now to where AAA games alone can bring in billions if you have a real huge hit.
There was something else great about the amiga: Blitz Basic, you could make games that look just as good as commercial games with it, I made a clone of IK+ that run at 50fps just like the original games, 3 characters fighting, etc, also made a bunch of other games with perfect hardware scrolling. AMOS professional was nice as well, but Blitz Basic was on another level.
Apparently it lowers views and doesn't send out notifications to subscribers, therefore lowering potential ad revenue and video's popularity, so I'd disagree. The only good thing about it is the live chat, but then again it's a live chat, so most of the time it will be 99% spam.
@@equalibrium7037 the theory and on the paper? yes. Actual case? no. UA-cam Premier is basically sending your channel to a tiny fraction of audience compared to regular channel.
@Equalibrium I, as a viewer, hate it. It's a "video" that appears that has the description, the thumbnail - everything - just infront of me, like carrot on a stick, and I can't watch it. All I can do is to randomly chat with 1 person who happened to be visiting the page at the same time as me, or look at the "11 hours remaining" timer, where 11 hours later would be 03:00 AM for me so I can't really view it at the time of the premiere. And even if it premieres at the time that I can watch it at, I still watch it later because I can't set it to 2X speed or because my craptop lags out from all the chat messages. Although my time may be not that important, I still prefer watching videos at faster speed than normal so that I'd save some more of it - and I can't do that with videos while they are premiering. I saw many premieres over time, and most of them ended up having a questionable like/dislike ratio, because people disliked the video into oblivion before it even premiered. Also, here's a premiere related funny story: I remember when someone else did a premiere on a giveaway video they did - they put all the information about the giveaway in the description, but not what actually was given away. The instructions pretty much said to write a comment with a specific hashtag - then they choose the first ones as winners. At that moment the video would premiere in 5 hours, and there were like 3 people in the chat talking about stuff and wondering what the giveaway is for. Funnily enough, none of them actually bothered to write a comment, so I had all the chances to be the first before the video even releases! That's how I won... A little card. Eh, still a win! So yeah. Here's my wall of text.
@@equalibrium7037 How? All it is, is holding back a finished video to create artificial hype. We all know it to, so it creates agitation, and on top of that there's apparently release issues, and more to go wrong. Perhaps fittingly, since you're no longer uploading a video, you're leaving it to the whims of an automated scheduling system, bringing in an unnecessary middle man and mechanic to go wrong. In the best case scenario, you have a couple of excited people that needed that routine and hype in their life. In the worst case scenario, its being annoying TV cable when most use UA-cam as an evolution for something far better.
Damn, Deluxe Paint was really powerful and iconic, never would have imagined such art program was there. Figures why the pixelart program, GraFx2 is a tribute for it, and both are powerful in their way.
why is that when the first notes of xenon 2 or turrican start to play in the background i instantly get chills? amiga music was so good, it gets under my skin everytime
When the title includes "Flatline" I expected to see the end of Amiga. Nope all I got is a little languishing. I seriously loved my Amiga 4000. I wanted to see how it all ended. Oh well. great video!
@@CTimmerman That's not what either of us are referring to. The company went under in 1994. Not close to bankruptcy, but completely and utterly bankrupt.
This is a good well produced video indeed, and covers really the beginning of the Amiga story. For the FULL history I highly recommend the videos by Dan Wood and Nostalia Nerd on youtube. Just search either with "amiga history" or "amiga story" in your search.
Yeah the end of the video also caught me a bit by surprise. The story is not completely finished yet. Other than that, great video and nice choice of soundtracks!
My stepfather's brother had an Amiga so I spent a lot of time playing it during the mid-90s despite already having a PC and an 8-bit Nintendo myself. Have many fond memories of games like Turrican, Giana Sisters, Pirates!, Xenon II: Megablast, Operation Wolf and Shadow of the Beast II.
@@FiksIIanzO The moment the market grew to the point that it promised making a lot of money, it attracted people that really only just wanted to make a lot of money.
"dur hur, now x company only believes in money" That isn't really how it works. EA cared about making money as much then as it does now, it's just as the company got bigger it's mentality on how to make that money changed, the problem lies more in the size of the company and the mentality of the people running it than it does in "making money". In these lines no one selling things are doing it purely for the art. That may make you uncomfortable, but it's true.
Mate, I’ve watched your content since 2013 and it always delivers. This is amazing, the research of data, the soundtrack, and of course the animations. It animates It educates It’s history of videogames. It’s Xbox Ahoy.
I can't agree more. The Polybius documentary completely blew me away. So far, I've watched it thrice and I'm absolutely sure I'll watch it another couple of times. This is truly great content.
Rattigan seems like the rare breed that actually goes in and make the cuts, really unpopular but definitely important. In Sweden we had a prime minister named Göran Persson, he is extremely controversial as he went in and cut the spending like crazy, used pension funds to settle the state debt and made the goal budget + 2% = BNP. I think what he did was the right thing for Sweden but holy hell is that both rare and controversial.
As much as we like to lament the loss of the Amiga the PC represents a healthier more pro-consumer product and in some ways I'm glad it won. The PC's architecture is highly modular and no one company truly holds a monopoly on the platform, almost all of the components in the system can be purchased from a different manufacturer if you want and even the OS is a relatively open market.
More or less true, but can't ignore that there was and to an extent still is, a Wintel monopoly. Both companies have engaged in unethical anti-competitive practices.
@@pkaulf Which is fair enough, and I would love it if intel would license X86 again so we could have more choices. But the standards we have in place now make it so a consumer can't get totally fucked over if they choose wrong, imagine being the guy who chose to get a Mindset system rather than an Amiga or an ST.
@@ZILOGz80VIDEOS Not sure licensing is a big deal now. The patents are long dead, and AMD is a viable choice (every comp I ever built was AMD). The real issue is raising awareness of alternatives to Windows.
Cough watch that: ua-cam.com/video/BhTNR6XZJd0/v-deo.html "What Comodore was developing at that moment time was sensational" and paraphrasing:, "would still be sensational even if released in 2017 becasue it was so far ahead of its time and they (Escom) let it (and all the Amiga engineers) go". pro-consumer? What a joke, the decades of the wintel monopoly is healthy compared to the far more varied market of the 1980s and early 1990s??? The IBM Compatible PC is still relying on an ancient legacy hardware design, yeah great. It basically used expensive (also in terms of energy consumption another great thing for the consumer!!!!) brute force to push that out of the way, I wonder how many consumers realised they were continuously boiling a kettle to do word processing. It still cant multi-task like the 1985 Amiga lol. There was advantage in the PC graphics and sound card 3rd party competition but that came at a later time once the game monopoly was sealed as did the appearance of the AMD processor. Your overall premise is also strange, the Amiga also had plenty of 3rd party hardware to make it better in the market where the content needed it, particularly in TV production. The AAA chipset design for the next generation Amiga designed back in the late 1980s was a modular approach to make upgrading easier but Commodore stopped investing in R&D and followed investor gain and went for the easier short term approach of updating the existing chips. There was also plenty of opportunities to license out the Amiga tech, in fact that happened once Commodore disappeared which also saw 3rd party companies creating add on processors, sound cards, graphics cards and eventually motherboards designed around the PowerPC. There was nothing about the Amiga that said it couldnt be outsourced that was just Comodore Management not realising the strengths of the technology they had bought and the US management looking down on the hugely successful Amiga game market in Europe. The form factor of its cheaper home range that borrowed from the 8bit design linerage of the all-in-one keyboard/computer also restricted add ons but it took a long time after the Amiga died before PCs ever reached that same price point. The irony of your statement is that what brought Commodore down and the Amiga with it was the parent company's obsession with becoming IBM and producing PC clones, in fact the Amigas success in Europe was used to subsidise the US managements PC ambitions rather than investing back into the Amiga eco system. The obsession with competing in the then more cut throat PC market was also the downfall of the next two Amiga intellectual property owners, Escom and Gateway 2000! I actually think it would have been very interesting if the UK management were successful in their management buy out bid, the Amiga name was still big at the time and they understood the market and technology and would have had to have licensed it out, but the insolvency company chose the high street PC retailer Escom. The other complete irony of your post is that you write at the time of the great stagnation, a decade of not much performance improvement for multiple costs of the Amiga home computer. Yeah so fuck the PC! Watch and weep: ua-cam.com/video/BhTNR6XZJd0/v-deo.html, especially what Amiga tech Commodore had unreleased at the time of their demise!
A "standard" was certain to emerge in the computer world, and was necessary, but I liked it better when there were no standards, and everybody ran a different operating system, and there were palpable differences between computer brands/models. It was a much more exciting time to be a computer user. Now, computers are about as exciting as a microwave oven.
@@ChristianIce the amiga wasnt dead in 92. Whilst pc users had early 3d games, amiga users still enjoyed a host of superior games up until at least 97 when things started to die off.
I was in the Atari ST camp, but the 486 with VLB VGA was just crushing it and I finally realized that as messy as the PC was, it was now able to brute-force its way past everyone else. I don't think there was any one computer company that was really aware of or looking to the future. Even Apple was making those late 68K Macs so unaffordable that no one gave them a second glance.
The graphic design in this, as with all Ahoy videos I've seen, is amazing. I love the level of thought and detail, including littles like the triangles around news clippings, the newspaper clipping colours, and the graph design (something many people stuff up).
@@CattoRayTube wow nice argument mate, like totally addresses the issue you should be next pendostan president with such skills, would ideally complement the current one
@@tsartomato well you cant blame him for 'shite' gameplay. Its a computer from the mid 80s. Did you expect deep gameplay and decent graphics? This sorta stuff was cutting edge for its day
It's all the little touches in this video that make it so good. Take for example the like "but the Amiga would not be a success", such a chilling thing to say that still leaves something to the imagination, it sounds so much better than to simply say "but the Amiga would end up a failure".
This video was quite hard to watch as I have been an Amiga fan since childhood! Painful truths with regards to Commodore's lousy management meant they went bankrupt in 1994, but I stayed loyal after my family and friends migrated to the PC! I eventually accepted I'd have to have a Windows PC as my main computer, but I still have a souped-up Amiga 1200 which I have made many cartoons with, and some digitised animations. The Amiga never truly died, there is still new hardware being made (or converted) for it.
I know what you mean, I kept using my Amiga for *everything* until the year 2000. It sat idle after I had to go the PC route for 5 years, but I pulled it back out and fired it back up in 2005. Now it sits there for the occasional burst of nostalgic fun 👍
I used my Amiga 500 with an upgraded CPU and daughterboard until The Apple G4 came out. I saw a G3 running OS9 shortly before that and said, "The other companies have finally caught up."
I also play old games occasionally and do animation with Deluxe Paint 5 and AnimatED, a while ago I turned on too many appliances at once, and the A1200's power unit was shorted out! There is a UK company, Amigakit, that sells Amiga stuff and fixes Amigas, but they always have a work backlog! :-( Since my A1200's PSU was that of a standard PC, I was able to get it fixed in a normal computer shop, they were quite fascinated by it!
Sounds familiar, I was also sad over two recent episodes of the AVGN, where he reviews the CD32 and bad games, slamming all its faults (and the CDTV!) While most of his "criticisms" are accurate, I loved our CD32, I had some GOOD games and was wowed by 24-bit artwork on magazine cover CDs! At the end, the nerd destroys his CD32 with fire, painful to watch!
I almost didn't watch this as it is just too depressing. the Amiga was my favourite computer of all time. I still prefer it over modern systems. The multitasking is still better in many respects. It saddens me to think of how great a system it could have become today if not for the stupidity of Commodore. I once asked a Commodore rep at a World of Commodore show in Toronto, "Why aren't you advertising this machine?!" and his reply... "advertising costs money"... it was a sign of things to come. Beautifully done video anyhow. So many good memories come flooding back. Good times, I miss those days. I ran a BBS on my Amiga 2000 for a while as well using the wonderful TransAmiga BBS software. Amiga's scripting language, AREXX was very nice to use, easy to program BBS doors with it. I think AmigaBASIC was one of the first BASIC's that didn't use line numbers, but used labels instead. I was surprised that you missed one Amiga Magazine, my favourite... Amiga AHOY :)
The C64/C128 days were the glory days of Commodore. They dominated the home computer market in the US. The IBM PC supposedly was the most popular personal computer when you read texts nowadays, but that's not the same thing as the home market since most IBM PCs were bought for purposes related to business, and by the businesses that could afford to do so.
F/A18 Interceptor was what made me buy an Amiga 500! I played it on a mate's black and white telly and was totally blown away! I spent many hours trying to land on the Golden Gate bridge! :D
Who else would rather watch this than UA-cam rewind? Stupid question, ignore it. We all know actual talent and purpose when we see it, it's why we're subbed to the legend. Loved it Ahoy, hows the son?
This is amazing content. Amiga was before my time but Ahoy could do a video about *ANYTHING* and I'd happily watch it. The voice, the graphic design, the pacing, the music, it's all superb and world class.
I've never even heard of this machine before and I'm glad I've been enlightened. It's interesting to compare the home computer market of today to the one of the past, and I wonder if we can see parallels in industries such as 3D Printing.
Thank you for finding footage filmed on a CRT for the games instead of just capturing the video off an emulator. The effect of the phosphor raster on a CRT really is significant for these older game titles which were designed expressly to take advantage of this anti-aliasing and color smearing in order to add detail to what would otherwise be a rudimentary sprite.
I loved my Amiga. It was the best thing out there at the time, I lusted after the 4000 but never managed to get one. It was ahead of its time, with separate graphics chips, polyphonic sound, multitasking. I first saw one live with the game Barbarian, and I was hooked. I played Defender of the Crown to death, learned chess with Battlechess. You mention some greats in the video, good watch. Brings back memories. Eventually though, when it was plain there would not be a follow-up machine, I got my first PC, and I've been just upgrading my PC since then.
I had a roommate during college who owned an Amiga 2000, it was an amazing computer. I dearly wished Amiga back then experienced a greater success. I would like to see what a World would be like if their computers had really taken off.
@@berkan5578 Much earlier than that. There was no stopping the PC clone market with its open platform. Commodore didn't have the fat margins that Apple did to rely on niche sales of the Amiga and instead kept a crutch onto the 8 bit market for sustained cashflow.
I would say the Amiga experienced huge success, particularly in Europe where the Amiga 500 was king for bedroom gaming for years. In the US the Amiga took over the TV production industry for years even in 3D which is ironic as it was 3D gaming that destroyed the success in gaming. The fact it all went wrong shows just how bad the management at Commodore was at that time. Watch this and weep ua-cam.com/video/BhTNR6XZJd0/v-deo.html
UA-cam crashes as literally anyone with a internet connection leaves to watch ahoy, society crumbles as no one can do much work, and restarts in 50 minutes
Every shop, storefront, public transport, service all stops. Even the police and emergency services stop to watch the video ~ but that's okay, everyone is too distracted by the video to do any crime or have any accident
My only gripe with them was that me and my brothers couldn’t beat the first boss in Shadow of the Beast. Turns out it’s: down, punch. 10 yr old me would’ve loved that little tip.
"First there was Menace. Now, Psygnosis presents. A DMA Design game. Blood Money." Still love that intro. I think I prefer Doesn't Mean Anything Design games back then to what they are now; Rockstar North.
Not sure if I've posted this comment already, (and I'm just too lazy to check) - The story of the Amiga is the textbook example of how to mismanage the development and marketing of what was the most advanced computer in existence at the time, right into the ground. Commodore could have taken over the world with the Amiga, if they only hadn't made just about every mistake a company can make. But mistakes they made, one after another, and instead, the computing world languished for nearly a decade, as IBM/Windows PCs and Apple played catch-up with the Amiga's capabilities. What could have been, if only...
The Amiga will always hold a special place in my heart, a sentiment that almost all Amiga owners will agree with and most non-Amiga users simply can't understand. It's a feeling of genuine love that no other piece of hardware has ever garnered from its users. Some of the software managed to coax incredible things from the hardware; Hired Guns with its 4 characters, first person, and fairly advanced AI and inventory systems. Uridium 2's intro music that makes Paula make sounds you never knew were possible. And the exemplary helicopter flight sim, KOALA that managed huge theatres of war and 3D graphics. And of course, the cracktros and demoscene that wowed us all with their artistic and programming talent.
My dad used to use an Amiga back in the day, and he has fond memories of me being barely a baby just hitting and bashing the keys of the keyboard while on his lap. It'll always have a special place in his heart
Very true, those innumerous hours on A500 (to the detriment of my parents mental health) are the most memorable computer memories i have. Just thinking about those times is making me feel someone is peeling onions somewhere in the house. i had no harddrive on it so i had to swap disks. A lot of them. If i remember correctly "Indiana Jones and the Fate of Atlantis" required 13 disks! And at times i had to swap the disk two times to load the next room or cutscene. For a hyperactive young boy that was a perfect way to learn patience. And i never felt angry about it, i felt it can take twice the time because the awesomeness of the adventure is worth the wait :)
You’re seriously in the top 5 best voice over voices I’ve ever heard. Morgan Freeman & David Tennent are 2 others. (David, 10th Doctor, did a BBC nature doc that was phenomenal).
In my case, my dad was in game/simulation development in the 80s and 90s, so there was always commodore gear in our house. I recall watching him while he worked. It was a really snazzy computer; and did way more than the ones at our elementary school could. Amiga computers are really nostalgic for me.
Out of all the computers and consoles I've had over the years, I've always had fond memories of the Amiga the most, more so the A1200 and even to this day I feel that way. Maybe it was that the Amiga was the first real computer that allowed me to more or less do anything I want, I don't know but something about the Amiga still sticks with me and I know it does for many others that had the Amiga.
I remember seeing the Amiga 500 and 2000 demo units at the computer/video game store at the mall when I was a young girl and being completely blown away by the graphics. All my school had was a couple Apple IIe with monochrome monitors. The Amiga made the IIe look like a primitive relic.That moment definitely sparked my passion for computers and video games. Decades later I love it just as much as I did then. Thanks for a fond trip down memory lane!
- Saves company from dying and made the foundations for a big profit
- Gets fired
On ships they call it "mutiny". That pirate Irving Gould made a fortune scuttling Commodore and The Amiga, and setting back home computing and multi-media 10 years.
Sounds like... Something familiar... **COUGH** **COUGH** KOJIMA **COUGH** KONAMI
Iam i a joke to you
many companies do the same thing as commodore. I think Atari did the same thing at one point (before the infogrames rebrand) where they fired an economically good CEO. the same could be said for politicians where Canadians chose a PM who has since brang economic growth to a standstill and brought loads of rapists from the middle East (Justin truedau) when they could've voted for someone who'd bring more economic growth and better prosperity.
DO YOU KNOW HOW MUCH I SACRIFICED?
Gee wilikers! This "EA" company really seems like a wholesome organization that will be loved by all for years to come!
You would bet so! ;)
So it seemed
Hah *Sobs*
They really want their customers to have pride and accomplishment.
Were it so easy...
_"For comparison, at the Macintosh launch just a year earlier the crowd went wild for a scrolling screen of monochrome text."_
It probably wouldn't be much different in 2020.
Except of course that synopsis is bullshit.
People who bought Macs could buy the computer with a printer, drop it on their office desk, and never regret their purchase. Straight out of the box it had a suite of applications which meant you'd never need to make another purchase.
Why would you buy an Amiga? When the A1000 was released it cost over $1000 ($3000+ allowing for inflation) and it had Defender of the Crown and that was about all. You could buy a Commodore 64 for about $150 or a NES for $170. You couldn't do anything with a first generation Amiga because nobody had written any of the applications which came years later yet.
People speak of the Amiga as if on the day of its release it came with a video toaster and lightwave and a suite of games and applications and cost the same as the A500 in 1987.
The explanation for why the Amiga failed is really basic: The Amiga fan-base have a completely unrealistic image of the Amiga and an equally unrealistic and dishonest opinion of the competition.
@@vapourmile lol found the triggered appel fanboi
@@Onion825 LOLNO. You found the person who hates Amiga fan-fiction.
@@Onion825 Most like the apple hater is you, i mean you are not even trying to argue against what he said, just claiming he is an "apple fanboi".
I’m not the one feeling the need to defend the honour of a trillion dollar company against some dipshit on the internet. Moron
1985: "Why Electronic Arts is Committed to the Amiga."
2019: "SuRpRiSe mEcHaNiCs"
2020: "I dOnT sPeAk BrOkE"
@submalevolent grace as in you and your feedback doesnt matter if you arent a whale, yeah i could've said 2017 but whatevs
Why do companies keep getting worse?
Because of Capitalism, companies have always been like this, it's just that with the internet, it's become harder to hide.
EA were a lot better when they weren't only a games company.
Missed a perfect opportunity to say "farewell Amigas"
Farewell Amiga, Amigos.
You can say "Farewell Amigas". It's just the female for Friends in spanish.
@@ghld4er503 Si como no Se habla Espanol.
Not Adios, Amigas?
The original name was going to be the Amigo... "The name Amiga was chosen because it is the Spanish word for (female) friend, and alphabetically it appears before Apple in lists of computer makers. It originated as a project code-named "Lorraine", therefore the female was used instead of the male and general version Amigo."
Thank you, it was outstanding! See you 6 months later!
Szoszaty honestly, I wouldn’t mind as long as it’s the same high quality stuff like this
@@cooper419 Agreed.
@@DjSeptimus Nothing about his message implied he was being ungrateful. Infact, it was quite the opposite. Stop overreacting.
Real Talk? Gently chiding maybe? It can be both be a genuine comment, and a friendly dig. I think the OP made it very clear he enjoyed and appreciates the video
Real Talk? I am. I have a youtube Channel under a different name, though its fairly inactive these days and I've worked on and off as a professional musician. I well understand that these labour's of love take a lot of time and energy, I just don't overreact to friendly, joking comments. Where are you from if you don't mind me asking? Maybe this is a cultural difference. In the UK this kind of comment is totally normal and not considered insulting. Friendly banter, maybe
"Activision followed EA's lead" is a quote that aged really well tbh lol
Then, Microsoft buy Activision/Blizzard, a good thing i think ?
@@azrael-labs Ah yes, the monopolization of a free market. A "good thing".
@@Jo-tv6sj For Activision/Blizzard an absolute yes, i think that if Microsoft can raise a little bit the quality of the Ac/Blizzard games, o boi it promise to be good
@@azrael-labs Godspeed to your optimism and believing in company promises
microsoft acquiring anything should normally send shivers down your spine
Amazing that the Amiga only came three years after the release of the C64. The feel like a decade apart in terms of technological capability.
The main reason, the C64 was build to a price according to Tramiels motto "Computers for the masses, not for the classes", the Amiga on the other hand was pricey hi-tech when it came around.
Much more innovation in that time period. It was a new industry, and all the waters were uncharted. Now that the industry is solidly in the hands of a few massively rich corporations, they don't want new ideas.
@@shaggybreeks You also can't just do new ideas anymore cause most of the ideas have already been had.
Well, probably not most but all the low-hanging fruit for hardware and software innovation is already gone and the bar for quality has been raised immensely.
@@shaggybreeks I agree, they don't. And the technological gap Amiga created was never seen again.
"I m afraid its been 9 years"
Big Boss, best snake
Age hasn't slowed you down one bit.
You feel it, too, don't you?...
"Ive waited here for so long" "I thought you are dead !!!"
"Kaz, I am already a demon."
"A rubber fetus appears in soft focus." Did not expect to hear that sentence in a computer retrospective.
rubba feetos.
the fetus was Kojima
Soothing
Your profile pic: [Absence of God]
Quite a William Burroughs sentence.
When I was working at a local TV station in 2005, they were still using an Amiga with a Video Toaster for live titles. One of the last bastions of an otherwise sadly forgotten relic.
This is a pretty good summary, but it misses one vital detail: When Tramiel was in charge of Commodore he was so aggressive that he alienated his own supply chain and retail channels. By the time he left Commodore none of the stores in the US that they'd previously sold the C64 through wanted to do business with Commodore anymore, which meant that their new Amiga never even made it into a lot of stores where it might have impressed and made sales.
What dies aggressive mean in this context? I genuinely don't know. Did he demand high guaranteed sales targets or something?
@@xmlthegreat Threatened to cut off stock supplies at times of high demand, struck deals to supply stock at price X only to demand price Y at the last minute, promised supplies to one store only to sell them to a rival store instead, etc. He basically made it miserable for the stores to deal with Commodore. "Business is war" was Tramiel's life motto, and as far as he was concerned everybody was the enemy, even the businesses that would be selling his products for him.
He should have known that even in war, there are allies. And that without allies, you are defeated by your enemy.
@@xmlthegreat not paying for chips, and then buying the bankrupt semiconductor company, for example.
Tramiel never had much to do with the Amiga. He got fired by the management that drove C= into the ground. The Amiga actually went from the 64's toy departments to real computer stores.
Amazing video! Well, see you in a year or two...
Maybe three if we are lucky
@@GrievousReborn Hyperbole, look it up!
@@Varangian_af_Scaniae i dont always get jokes or exaggerations
Patience is a virtue. Quality comes from polish and refinement.
Ahoy takes their time making videos to assure the absolute highest of quality, and telling him to rush would compromise it
@Global Cringe I know and I wasn't trying to criticize Ahoy. I was just joking about how long these videos take to produce. I don't want to discredit the quality of the video, or the time that was put into creating it.
UA-camrs are so focused on quantity over quality, that it is nice to see people like Ahoy that can spend months creating masterpieces, and still succeed.
*next up iconic arms MP40*
HOLY SHIT YES!!
I wonder how the flag design on the gun will work
Modern German flag
Nazi battle flag
Or German empire flag.
I would like to see a glock after that, great news still that iconic arms continues
@@eobardthawne3333 It definitely won't be a flag with a swastika on it, not great for monetization that.
Let's see here
Mp40, Glock, shnellfeuer (it's a cool story), kar98, mp44, g3 rifle the list goes on!
@@eobardthawne3333 the g43 as well
This really needs a “part 2”, because where you leave it, everything is looking up for Commodore. I can’t help but notice, I didn’t watch this on a Commodoe tablet, and I don’t have a Commodore phone next to me right now.
In an alternate reality you do.
I'm from an alternate universe, we have Commphone 14 Ultra Elite and the master race Comm-puter capable of running Crysis. Trust me it's real.
The Trackers video could also be a semi sorta sequel when it switches from being about trackers on Amiga to being on PC. Also, how do you not have a device capable of amigaOS 28 already??
that wouldn't really be a part 2, that'd be a separate thing on commodore, at least that'd be the most logical way to do it since their stories overlap
@@craigh5236 In an alternate reality, your comment didn't sound moronic.
I see the 80s computer history like a giant cagefight with only one rule: SURVIVE
Am i wrong?
TWO COMPANIES ENTER
ONE COMPANY LEAVES
WELCOME TO THE THUNDER DOME!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!
you aren't entirely wrong, no
I can only think of two companies from that era who are still thriving in Microsoft and Apple, and Apple only survived the 90s thanks to Microsoft trying to avoid having a monopoly. Even IBM is a shell of itself.
@@gamemeister27 You forgot(or may not have considered) intel and their x86 architecture, still in use today.
Development from scratch is hard and expensive.
Wow, those 7 days went by pretty quickly!
What are you talking about
It felt like an eternity without his amazing content
Accidental early publish?
@@mr.montazer5835 woosh
maybe the 7 days is an intentional troll.
WHO CARES IT'S A NEW AHOY VIDEO WOHOO
Production quality is just insane here. Unbelievable.
Ahoy is number 1 is this category.
Indeed, he puts many a documentary you see on mainstream tv to shame such is his talent.
Crazier when you realize he's also a music producer, and makes the background tracks for these documentaries.
It's not only about video quality, but music KICKS ASS. Every fking time.
//Don't know other youtuber, making own standalone OSTs for their videos...
Him and lemmino are in a league of their own.
Is it just me or is Ahoy's soundtrack for this video as well as others are kickass? Like, It has no reason to be this good.
Very true. This video especially has such good music and audio compositing behind it!
Ahoy's rendition of 'The Final Fight' has been the mainstay opener to my Turrican playlist.
It's as close to perfect as can be.
2 & 1/2 years later, I'm still waiting for part 2.
Yup, what happened to amiga.
We're left languishing.
Man I'm so bummed there's no part two 😟
@@Lilacs4 I think this video he made works perfectly as a part 2. It even kinda starts where this video ends: ua-cam.com/video/Tv6aJRGpz_A/v-deo.html
@@2DarkDreams You literally posted the same comment multiple times...
Christmas come early boys!
no
So sorry, but please correct this it's, “it's Christmas cAme...”
@expics on yt wooosh/r
I see you everywhere
what the fuck is your profile picture
He could narrate me taking a dump and it'd still sound so sophisticated
lol im on the toilet right now
[Ahoy's voice] "...but... if you punish hard the toilet... the water strikes back." X)
@@Jolgeable Screen turns black.
The Amiga is the only system that gives me "nostalgia" vibes. It really was unique in all respects.
It even gives me nostalgia vibes- which is weird cause I didn't even have an Amiga. I had an Atari, and I only knew about Amagi because all good games on PC (and Deluxe Paint II) were ported it. So I'm getting warm feels about games my Atari could never run but IF it could have, it'd surely have looked like this LOL
Turrican soundtrack at the end made me cry... Those pearls, cannon fodder, ruffntumble, it came from the desert... Cytadela, deathmask, superfrog... i could count all games that i have deep in the heart till the morning...
Yes! I just commented about the soundtracks from Shadow of the Beast and Turrican, I got very nostalgic. It was nice to see those Bitmap Brothers graphics again too, they had such a distinct visual style on all their games.
Ahoy delivers most satisfying and aesthetic videos out there
A E S T H E T I C ???
Check out Strafefox
The word aesthetic, on its own, doesn't mean bad or good aesthetics. You'd have to say aesthetically pleasing, or something like that.
@@bobbym3155 it's used as a synthwave/retro 80s artform term
this is true
I hope Ahoy does a Part 2 for the fall of Commodore, right after the MP40 video.
He made an amiga video 4 years ago you should check that one out too
I hope Ahoy does a part 2 for the fall of Constantinople, right after the fall of Rome video.
This computer came out 18 years before I was even born but I’m still interested by 80s hardware
Same here, except it was 11 for me
To be alive when all this stuff was happening was pure magic. Bear in mind that before computers went mainstream, they were still considered tools, and you could do anything you wanted with them. It was possible for one person to understand how the whole machine worked, right down to the metal. Every day new and exciting stuff was coming out. Programming in the 90's was the most fun I've had in my life.
I feel bad for anyone who missed the dawn of the computer age, before all of this technology became a boring commodity littered with DRM.
@@Waccoon how did you get into programming back then? like how would you learn? the way people talk about early computing makes it sound like everyone was a programmer
Had a thought that one day there will be very few people alive that lived through the 80s/early 90s era of computing so that is interesting that will it remain remembered. Another interesting thing is how older computing comes across to younger people who didn't see it gradually come about.
@@chis5050 I read somewhere that Linus Torvalds got started with programming on a Sinclair QL - with relatively little software available for it, he had to write programs for himself.
Also, computers like the QL, C64 and ZX Spectrum booted into a BASIC interpreter (it was in the ROM), so you could literally just flick the power switch and start coding!
This channel is one of the few on UA-cam that put maximum effort into their incredible videos.
hello Mrs Ahoy
by not even showing the correct aspect ratio and putting stupid instagram filtres everywhere?
@@incaseofimportantnegotiations Can you elaborate more on the aspect ratio part?
@@F0ur_Tw3nty when he show really old software he often shows it widescreen
dos internal resolution was wide but you were supposed to stretch it with crt gun for full screen 4//3
the stupidest part even game devs never knew what the hell they are doing. some people used old giant widescreens, some people used aspect correcting software some raw software. the mismatch mismanagemant and miscommunication is present even in the rgeat games like wolf3d or ufo
but you always can tell when a 4//3 game is presented in widescreen and you can find raw images or software he shows in widescreen and see for yourself that it's 4//3
@@F0ur_Tw3nty 15:31
I was a musician on the Amiga demo scene for a while! I was Screech/Eltech. I never made a name for myself, but it was cool nonetheless. I did get to be CU Amiga magazine's tune of the month in April 1997 (I know, very late in the Amiga's life), and that was a high point for me.
The A1200 was my all-time favourite home computer. Great days. Thanks for the video!
nice :) i always wished i got into the scene at some point.. ive always followed it. it's mad what they can do on an amiga and others now. I recently thought of getting into the scene (never too late) as a musician (i code and do gfx too but im best at music) .. i've left a few posts here and there asking if anyone would need a musician .. who bloody knows :)
And i am a fucking pope
@@TheKid_88 Fuck you...
@@TheKid_88 Well, molesting young boys and controlling people through lies and manipulation is hardly an accomplishment worth touting....
I nominate this for the "Best soundtrack on a youtube video" award
0:48 and very little has changed
When the "Assault on Precinct 13" theme kicked in I got chills. With this level of quality, the fact that these videos are made by one person never fails to blow me away.
Just a note on the attention to detail put into these videos, the background music @2:42 uses the noises of floppy drives as percussion, awesomesauce :)
I’ve watched this video several times and still thoroughly enjoy it.
A Part II to finish the story would be fantastic.
.. and gut wrenching with its fading away
@@MarkoKraguljac I think there could a part at the end titled "The small rebirth of Commodore" with the whole Demoscene being still active for both 8 bit, and 16 bit machines, new hardware still giving life to the machines, the YT/online community, and commercial products like the C64 Mini, and Full size versions having decent success. so it does not have to be all doom, and gloom.
Indeed. It perfectly explains the struggles in middle side of the history in the 80s, but not how this ended in the 90s
This channel has withered for some reason, sadly.
@@MaxHohenstaufen Stuart has never been the fastest content creator to begin with, but I have heard he's been having more than his share of troubles over on his Reddit. He has a sleep disorder and children, and COVID has complicated his life to prevent him from being able to crank out lots of videos. This is why when an Ahoy video does appear in the wild, it's a treat.
It’s been along time, old friend
old amiga
I'm a simple man. I see an Ahoy video I hit the like button.
I, too, am a simple man.
I see a video with a title like "FLATLINE: How The Amiga Languished," I expect to hear what went wrong, not how it succeeded.
I had upgraded from my rubber keys speccy to an Amiga A500 in 1989 and I honestly thought the future had arrived.
I bought myself a Commodore Amiga 500 back in the late 80's. It had just over 500KB of RAM. Then about a year later, I upgraded it to 1MB of RAM 😮 It was an exciting time.
Who will ever need more than 64KB RAM lol
@@crhu319 I had to think for a moment what 64KB would power. Then I remembered the Commodore 64.
I love how even the graphics are in an 80s style, in color, font, and feel. Ahoy is a TALENT.
even the music is sometimes done with a floppy drive
2:40
@@proxy1035 yeah that's the noise you hear, just before you start to chant "oh please load, pplease load"
I think the staggered upload is actually part of ahoys charm.. He's a fleeting view into what's good about UA-cam... He comes back to remind us of the absolute quality that some people can get too... Absolute king... Deserves a TV show
well said
The effort put into one of his videos is no joke. Even full time this is many weeks for 1 person to pull off.
The killer app for me on the Amiga was 'Shadow Of The Beast', the graphics just blew me away in 1989, well I was 10 at the time.
hahaha, im actually playing Shadow Of The Beast on an Amiga 500 while reading this comment. lol never have beaten it, been trying since about 1998
More than any Amiga game and I played most, pixel art, sound and atmosphere of Bitmap brothers' Gods will remain etched in my brain FOREVER. What a time.
I was in University. A friend of mine was one of the first to major in "computer animation". He bought an Amiga in hopes of being a professional graphic artist. The average consumer didn't buy a computer for games. A Commodore 64 for games, yes. Anything over $1000? No way. I had to play games on a green monochrome screen. The frustration was crazy making.
@@MarkoKraguljac Into the wudderful......
@@dcikaruga Into the wonderful?
The Amiga was a great machine for the time. Got my start in animation with Deluxe Paint and Sculpt Animate 3D. Its 4096 colors blew away the 16 colors Mac was touting and even the 256 colors of the PC for many years after. Sadly, the last time I saw an Amiga was on clearance for $50 in the mid 90s after PCs took over the high end graphics space.
I used mine until 2000 as a terminal.
NEXT UP: ICONIC ARMS MP40
He's back!
Yeah baby!
12:15 1985 Marketing budget of $40,000,000 with cumulative inflation in 2018 would be around $94,000,000. No wonder the cash was getting scarce.
That it was... crazy amounts.
Imagine blowing $94,000,000 on ads that made no sense today. Someone would have your head
$40,000,000 Must've bought a crap ton of blow for whoever directed that crazy TV spot.
Destiny 1's marketing was about $250,000,000
@@acewolfgang276 And that is pretty crazy in it self that AAA games has such insane marketing budgets. But the market is a lot bigger now to where AAA games alone can bring in billions if you have a real huge hit.
There was something else great about the amiga: Blitz Basic, you could make games that look just as good as commercial games with it, I made a clone of IK+ that run at 50fps just like the original games, 3 characters fighting, etc, also made a bunch of other games with perfect hardware scrolling.
AMOS professional was nice as well, but Blitz Basic was on another level.
100% agree, it was awesome, there were a few commercial releases using it.
I learned a lot about 3D programming with Blitz BASIC.
25:30 I immediately got gosebumps when I realized the music is the soundtrack of Xenon 2.
Thank you so much for ditching UA-cam Premiere and uploading it normally, just as it should be on UA-cam. :)
personally i believe premiere is better for the community and creators alike.
Apparently it lowers views and doesn't send out notifications to subscribers, therefore lowering potential ad revenue and video's popularity, so I'd disagree. The only good thing about it is the live chat, but then again it's a live chat, so most of the time it will be 99% spam.
@@equalibrium7037 the theory and on the paper? yes. Actual case? no. UA-cam Premier is basically sending your channel to a tiny fraction of audience compared to regular channel.
@Equalibrium
I, as a viewer, hate it.
It's a "video" that appears that has the description, the thumbnail - everything - just infront of me, like carrot on a stick, and I can't watch it. All I can do is to randomly chat with 1 person who happened to be visiting the page at the same time as me, or look at the "11 hours remaining" timer, where 11 hours later would be 03:00 AM for me so I can't really view it at the time of the premiere.
And even if it premieres at the time that I can watch it at, I still watch it later because I can't set it to 2X speed or because my craptop lags out from all the chat messages. Although my time may be not that important, I still prefer watching videos at faster speed than normal so that I'd save some more of it - and I can't do that with videos while they are premiering.
I saw many premieres over time, and most of them ended up having a questionable like/dislike ratio, because people disliked the video into oblivion before it even premiered.
Also, here's a premiere related funny story: I remember when someone else did a premiere on a giveaway video they did - they put all the information about the giveaway in the description, but not what actually was given away. The instructions pretty much said to write a comment with a specific hashtag - then they choose the first ones as winners.
At that moment the video would premiere in 5 hours, and there were like 3 people in the chat talking about stuff and wondering what the giveaway is for. Funnily enough, none of them actually bothered to write a comment, so I had all the chances to be the first before the video even releases! That's how I won... A little card. Eh, still a win!
So yeah. Here's my wall of text.
@@equalibrium7037 How? All it is, is holding back a finished video to create artificial hype. We all know it to, so it creates agitation, and on top of that there's apparently release issues, and more to go wrong. Perhaps fittingly, since you're no longer uploading a video, you're leaving it to the whims of an automated scheduling system, bringing in an unnecessary middle man and mechanic to go wrong. In the best case scenario, you have a couple of excited people that needed that routine and hype in their life. In the worst case scenario, its being annoying TV cable when most use UA-cam as an evolution for something far better.
Amiga - an American computer that mostly Europeans enjoyed.
More like appreciated. :)
Damn, Deluxe Paint was really powerful and iconic, never would have imagined such art program was there. Figures why the pixelart program, GraFx2 is a tribute for it, and both are powerful in their way.
Stu, this might be the single most vaporwave video you have ever put up.
I love it.
huh?
@@Goobyster he was talking about the video's aesthetic
What does Stu mean
@@jennifertottenham2995 That's from the presenter's name, Stuart.
@@jennifertottenham2995 ahoys irl name, Stu or Stuart.
This channel is a great example of quality over quantity.
AND AHOY IS BACK WITH ANOTHER BANGER LADIES AND GENTLEMEN
why is that when the first notes of xenon 2 or turrican start to play in the background i instantly get chills? amiga music was so good, it gets under my skin everytime
The story of how Jack Tramiel created the Atari ST is one worth telling as well.
This video is so goddamn ＡＥＳＴＨＥＴＩＣ
So A E S T H E T I C in fact that it's actually A E S T H E T I C
Aste thicc
The total vaporwave
*E X P E R I E N C E*
Amiga games were.
A E S T H E T H I C C
When the title includes "Flatline" I expected to see the end of Amiga. Nope all I got is a little languishing. I seriously loved my Amiga 4000. I wanted to see how it all ended. Oh well. great video!
Same. I was a little sad that it wasn't taken all the way up to the end of Commodore. But oh well. Still a good watch.
10:00 shows the near bankruptcy of Commodore due to mismanagement.
@@CTimmerman That's not what either of us are referring to. The company went under in 1994. Not close to bankruptcy, but completely and utterly bankrupt.
This is a good well produced video indeed, and covers really the beginning of the Amiga story. For the FULL history I highly recommend the videos by Dan Wood and Nostalia Nerd on youtube. Just search either with "amiga history" or "amiga story" in your search.
Yeah the end of the video also caught me a bit by surprise. The story is not completely finished yet. Other than that, great video and nice choice of soundtracks!
My stepfather's brother had an Amiga so I spent a lot of time playing it during the mid-90s despite already having a PC and an 8-bit Nintendo myself. Have many fond memories of games like Turrican, Giana Sisters, Pirates!, Xenon II: Megablast, Operation Wolf and Shadow of the Beast II.
I loved my amiga. Ahhhh nostalgia. I had 4 huge boxes full of games. Paved the way for my PC gaming.
Remember the time EA actually believed in something except money?
Partridge Farms remembers
I have a collection of games and stuff from back when I actually admired ECA.
@@Artsificial Yeah, there's plenty bitter reminders of past glory in my library, too. Bethesda, Activision, Ubisoft, Valve... what happened?
@@FiksIIanzO The moment the market grew to the point that it promised making a lot of money, it attracted people that really only just wanted to make a lot of money.
"dur hur, now x company only believes in money" That isn't really how it works. EA cared about making money as much then as it does now, it's just as the company got bigger it's mentality on how to make that money changed, the problem lies more in the size of the company and the mentality of the people running it than it does in "making money". In these lines no one selling things are doing it purely for the art. That may make you uncomfortable, but it's true.
Mate, I’ve watched your content since 2013 and it always delivers.
This is amazing, the research of data, the soundtrack, and of course the animations.
It animates
It educates
It’s history of videogames.
It’s Xbox Ahoy.
I can't agree more. The Polybius documentary completely blew me away. So far, I've watched it thrice and I'm absolutely sure I'll watch it another couple of times. This is truly great content.
Thiesi also the Nuclear Fruit one is top notch
I wish I could see a documentary about Commodore from a alternate timeline where Rattigan stayed CEO and wasn't replaced with a incompetent asshole.
In that alternate timeline, we may be posting to UA-cam on our brand-new Amigas.
@@sandakureva So true 😓😭😭
Rattigan seems like the rare breed that actually goes in and make the cuts, really unpopular but definitely important.
In Sweden we had a prime minister named Göran Persson, he is extremely controversial as he went in and cut the spending like crazy, used pension funds to settle the state debt and made the goal budget + 2% = BNP. I think what he did was the right thing for Sweden but holy hell is that both rare and controversial.
As much as we like to lament the loss of the Amiga the PC represents a healthier more pro-consumer product and in some ways I'm glad it won. The PC's architecture is highly modular and no one company truly holds a monopoly on the platform, almost all of the components in the system can be purchased from a different manufacturer if you want and even the OS is a relatively open market.
More or less true, but can't ignore that there was and to an extent still is, a Wintel monopoly. Both companies have engaged in unethical anti-competitive practices.
@@pkaulf Which is fair enough, and I would love it if intel would license X86 again so we could have more choices. But the standards we have in place now make it so a consumer can't get totally fucked over if they choose wrong, imagine being the guy who chose to get a Mindset system rather than an Amiga or an ST.
@@ZILOGz80VIDEOS Not sure licensing is a big deal now. The patents are long dead, and AMD is a viable choice (every comp I ever built was AMD). The real issue is raising awareness of alternatives to Windows.
Cough watch that: ua-cam.com/video/BhTNR6XZJd0/v-deo.html "What Comodore was developing at that moment time was sensational" and paraphrasing:, "would still be sensational even if released in 2017 becasue it was so far ahead of its time and they (Escom) let it (and all the Amiga engineers) go".
pro-consumer? What a joke, the decades of the wintel monopoly is healthy compared to the far more varied market of the 1980s and early 1990s??? The IBM Compatible PC is still relying on an ancient legacy hardware design, yeah great. It basically used expensive (also in terms of energy consumption another great thing for the consumer!!!!) brute force to push that out of the way, I wonder how many consumers realised they were continuously boiling a kettle to do word processing. It still cant multi-task like the 1985 Amiga lol. There was advantage in the PC graphics and sound card 3rd party competition but that came at a later time once the game monopoly was sealed as did the appearance of the AMD processor. Your overall premise is also strange, the Amiga also had plenty of 3rd party hardware to make it better in the market where the content needed it, particularly in TV production. The AAA chipset design for the next generation Amiga designed back in the late 1980s was a modular approach to make upgrading easier but Commodore stopped investing in R&D and followed investor gain and went for the easier short term approach of updating the existing chips. There was also plenty of opportunities to license out the Amiga tech, in fact that happened once Commodore disappeared which also saw 3rd party companies creating add on processors, sound cards, graphics cards and eventually motherboards designed around the PowerPC. There was nothing about the Amiga that said it couldnt be outsourced that was just Comodore Management not realising the strengths of the technology they had bought and the US management looking down on the hugely successful Amiga game market in Europe. The form factor of its cheaper home range that borrowed from the 8bit design linerage of the all-in-one keyboard/computer also restricted add ons but it took a long time after the Amiga died before PCs ever reached that same price point. The irony of your statement is that what brought Commodore down and the Amiga with it was the parent company's obsession with becoming IBM and producing PC clones, in fact the Amigas success in Europe was used to subsidise the US managements PC ambitions rather than investing back into the Amiga eco system. The obsession with competing in the then more cut throat PC market was also the downfall of the next two Amiga intellectual property owners, Escom and Gateway 2000! I actually think it would have been very interesting if the UK management were successful in their management buy out bid, the Amiga name was still big at the time and they understood the market and technology and would have had to have licensed it out, but the insolvency company chose the high street PC retailer Escom. The other complete irony of your post is that you write at the time of the great stagnation, a decade of not much performance improvement for multiple costs of the Amiga home computer. Yeah so fuck the PC!
Watch and weep: ua-cam.com/video/BhTNR6XZJd0/v-deo.html, especially what Amiga tech Commodore had unreleased at the time of their demise!
A "standard" was certain to emerge in the computer world, and was necessary, but I liked it better when there were no standards, and everybody ran a different operating system, and there were palpable differences between computer brands/models. It was a much more exciting time to be a computer user. Now, computers are about as exciting as a microwave oven.
I was an Amiga user until the Pentium One was out.
I remember I found it superior to whatever was available for 486 PCs, then, Quake came out...
then everything changed when quake attacked
@Kurt Pedersen
My Amiga 500 is still working, perhaps I missed your note in 1992.
@@ChristianIce the amiga wasnt dead in 92. Whilst pc users had early 3d games, amiga users still enjoyed a host of superior games up until at least 97 when things started to die off.
I was in the Atari ST camp, but the 486 with VLB VGA was just crushing it and I finally realized that as messy as the PC was, it was now able to brute-force its way past everyone else. I don't think there was any one computer company that was really aware of or looking to the future. Even Apple was making those late 68K Macs so unaffordable that no one gave them a second glance.
Ma stai dappertutto?
The graphic design in this, as with all Ahoy videos I've seen, is amazing. I love the level of thought and detail, including littles like the triangles around news clippings, the newspaper clipping colours, and the graph design (something many people stuff up).
Don't forget the magnificent sound editing of different versions and different games seamlessly blended with eachother. This is art.
you mean the parts where the aspect ratio is all screwed up and all gameplay looks like shite?
@@CattoRayTube
wow nice argument mate, like totally addresses the issue
you should be next pendostan president with such skills, would ideally complement the current one
@@tsartomato well you cant blame him for 'shite' gameplay. Its a computer from the mid 80s. Did you expect deep gameplay and decent graphics? This sorta stuff was cutting edge for its day
If you have nothing nice to say...
It's all the little touches in this video that make it so good. Take for example the like "but the Amiga would not be a success", such a chilling thing to say that still leaves something to the imagination, it sounds so much better than to simply say "but the Amiga would end up a failure".
Wtf I've never heard of the Amiga before and now I love it.
This video was quite hard to watch as I have been an Amiga fan since childhood! Painful truths with regards to Commodore's lousy management meant they went bankrupt in 1994, but I stayed loyal after my family and friends migrated to the PC!
I eventually accepted I'd have to have a Windows PC as my main computer, but I still have a souped-up Amiga 1200 which I have made many cartoons with, and some digitised animations.
The Amiga never truly died, there is still new hardware being made (or converted) for it.
I know what you mean, I kept using my Amiga for *everything* until the year 2000.
It sat idle after I had to go the PC route for 5 years, but I pulled it back out and fired it back up in 2005.
Now it sits there for the occasional burst of nostalgic fun 👍
I used my Amiga 500 with an upgraded CPU and daughterboard until The Apple G4 came out. I saw a G3 running OS9 shortly before that and said, "The other companies have finally caught up."
I also play old games occasionally and do animation with Deluxe Paint 5 and AnimatED, a while ago I turned on too many appliances at once, and the A1200's power unit was shorted out!
There is a UK company, Amigakit, that sells Amiga stuff and fixes Amigas, but they always have a work backlog! :-( Since my A1200's PSU was that of a standard PC, I was able to get it fixed in a normal computer shop, they were quite fascinated by it!
Sounds familiar, I was also sad over two recent episodes of the AVGN, where he reviews the CD32 and bad games, slamming all its faults (and the CDTV!) While most of his "criticisms" are accurate, I loved our CD32, I had some GOOD games and was wowed by 24-bit artwork on magazine cover CDs!
At the end, the nerd destroys his CD32 with fire, painful to watch!
Same story with Sega. Technologically brilliant & innovative but made too many woeful business mistakes
I almost didn't watch this as it is just too depressing. the Amiga was my favourite computer of all time. I still prefer it over modern systems. The multitasking is still better in many respects. It saddens me to think of how great a system it could have become today if not for the stupidity of Commodore. I once asked a Commodore rep at a World of Commodore show in Toronto, "Why aren't you advertising this machine?!" and his reply... "advertising costs money"... it was a sign of things to come.
Beautifully done video anyhow. So many good memories come flooding back. Good times, I miss those days. I ran a BBS on my Amiga 2000 for a while as well using the wonderful TransAmiga BBS software. Amiga's scripting language, AREXX was very nice to use, easy to program BBS doors with it. I think AmigaBASIC was one of the first BASIC's that didn't use line numbers, but used labels instead. I was surprised that you missed one Amiga Magazine, my favourite... Amiga AHOY :)
The C64/C128 days were the glory days of Commodore. They dominated the home computer market in the US. The IBM PC supposedly was the most popular personal computer when you read texts nowadays, but that's not the same thing as the home market since most IBM PCs were bought for purposes related to business, and by the businesses that could afford to do so.
Commodore management was clueless. Real Shane. The Amiga was far beyond all other computers.
Still, have my c64. play it from time to time, just watching this and some of the games just gave me the fuzz.
Yeah, too soon Ahoy... Too soon!!
What was the name of your BBS? I used to frequent several in the U.S. in the early 90s. Just curious if I logged onto yours.
F/A18 Interceptor was what made me buy an Amiga 500! I played it on a mate's black and white telly and was totally blown away! I spent many hours trying to land on the Golden Gate bridge! :D
Holly hell, this is one of the best made and perfectly executed videos I've ever seen, seriously well done Stuart
I second that - exactly same thoughts.
"AFTER 10,000 YEARS OF SLUMBER I HAVE RETURNED" - Ahoy 2018
Who else would rather watch this than UA-cam rewind? Stupid question, ignore it. We all know actual talent and purpose when we see it, it's why we're subbed to the legend. Loved it Ahoy, hows the son?
UA-cam rewind is dogshit, Ahoy is *eternal.*
Still makes my heart weep whenever i think about Amiga dying :(
i still own Amigas ill be holding onto them for as long as i can lol
My dad still has his old Amiga a4000 somewhere. The main-board failed back in the late 90s though, so I'm not sure we could get it working again.
@@sandakureva i think you can buy replacement amiga motherboards and solder the chips back if you’re interested
The effort and editing you put into your videos is just out of this world! I love it. Amazing how you’ve come from making Call Of Duty videos to this!
What's wrong with his cod videos? There was a lot of effort in those, especially for their time.
@@matefugedi7779 i dont think he meant it in offense lmao
This is amazing content. Amiga was before my time but Ahoy could do a video about *ANYTHING* and I'd happily watch it. The voice, the graphic design, the pacing, the music, it's all superb and world class.
British narrators are always tops.
I've never even heard of this machine before and I'm glad I've been enlightened. It's interesting to compare the home computer market of today to the one of the past, and I wonder if we can see parallels in industries such as 3D Printing.
Thank you for finding footage filmed on a CRT for the games instead of just capturing the video off an emulator. The effect of the phosphor raster on a CRT really is significant for these older game titles which were designed expressly to take advantage of this anti-aliasing and color smearing in order to add detail to what would otherwise be a rudimentary sprite.
I loved my Amiga. It was the best thing out there at the time, I lusted after the 4000 but never managed to get one.
It was ahead of its time, with separate graphics chips, polyphonic sound, multitasking.
I first saw one live with the game Barbarian, and I was hooked. I played Defender of the Crown to death, learned chess with Battlechess. You mention some greats in the video, good watch. Brings back memories.
Eventually though, when it was plain there would not be a follow-up machine, I got my first PC, and I've been just upgrading my PC since then.
i know time flies fast but holy shit 7 days go by like lightspeed.
Lightyear is a measure of distance not time tho.
lasarousi its a joke tho
whats the joke tho
there was no joke though
BeefStew only those who were on the premiere know.
I had an Amiga 500 in 1989. Absolutely loved it. Seven Cities of Gold - probably my all time fave game.
I tell you, if Commodore had you as their marketing director, I'd buy and Amiga in a heartbeat.
The A2000, my favorite computer at the time! Great memories, thank you Ahoy!
I had a roommate during college who owned an Amiga 2000, it was an amazing computer. I dearly wished Amiga back then experienced a greater success. I would like to see what a World would be like if their computers had really taken off.
To be honest, they would have probably dies around 2007 like so many others
@@berkan5578 Much earlier than that. There was no stopping the PC clone market with its open platform. Commodore didn't have the fat margins that Apple did to rely on niche sales of the Amiga and instead kept a crutch onto the 8 bit market for sustained cashflow.
I would say the Amiga experienced huge success, particularly in Europe where the Amiga 500 was king for bedroom gaming for years. In the US the Amiga took over the TV production industry for years even in 3D which is ironic as it was 3D gaming that destroyed the success in gaming. The fact it all went wrong shows just how bad the management at Commodore was at that time. Watch this and weep ua-cam.com/video/BhTNR6XZJd0/v-deo.html
If only I could upvote this more than once.
Even the audio seguing seamlessly between tracks (e.g. Bomb the Bass) is beautiful. This chap deserves to go places.
Wow. Awesome to learn things about my favorite machine of that time.
*"Ahoy uploads"*
*Closes out of PornHub in a split second.*
Noob. That's why we use second screen for the porn exclusively, no need to pause at anytime! :D
@@alaric_ Hmm... I'll problably try that when ahoy comes back with Iconic Arms.
>Ahoy uploads<
All of pornhub web service shuts down as all actors and people who run it need to watch the video
UA-cam crashes as literally anyone with a internet connection leaves to watch ahoy, society crumbles as no one can do much work, and restarts in 50 minutes
Every shop, storefront, public transport, service all stops.
Even the police and emergency services stop to watch the video ~ but that's okay, everyone is too distracted by the video to do any crime or have any accident
Psygnosis deserve their own video.
My only gripe with them was that me and my brothers couldn’t beat the first boss in Shadow of the Beast. Turns out it’s: down, punch. 10 yr old me would’ve loved that little tip.
"First there was Menace. Now, Psygnosis presents. A DMA Design game. Blood Money."
Still love that intro. I think I prefer Doesn't Mean Anything Design games back then to what they are now; Rockstar North.
@@TheKidDoc81 oh lord, THE MEMORIES!!!!
Kim Justice has a decent in depth look at Psygnosis here ua-cam.com/video/tvYlxnHOY-Q/v-deo.html
This seriously needs a follow-up video, because we didn't really get to the part of how the Amiga died.
I wanted an Amiga so much when I was 15 and they first appeared at Federated. I’m almost 50 and still want one.
Ah my poor amiga, commodore had amazing engineers and the goddam worst marketing people.
I really like the idea of you doing more general tech history videos! Can't wait to see whats next.
Stephen Acomb tbh he could make a video about paint drying and I’d still finish it
Not sure if I've posted this comment already, (and I'm just too lazy to check) - The story of the Amiga is the textbook example of how to mismanage the development and marketing of what was the most advanced computer in existence at the time, right into the ground.
Commodore could have taken over the world with the Amiga, if they only hadn't made just about every mistake a company can make. But mistakes they made, one after another, and instead, the computing world languished for nearly a decade, as IBM/Windows PCs and Apple played catch-up with the Amiga's capabilities.
What could have been, if only...
My cousin had an Amiga 500, I inherited it! :D
Superfrog, Chuck Rock, Xenon, Ruff'n'Tumble, Et Cetera..
It was basically just a console to me.
The Amiga will always hold a special place in my heart, a sentiment that almost all Amiga owners will agree with and most non-Amiga users simply can't understand. It's a feeling of genuine love that no other piece of hardware has ever garnered from its users.
Some of the software managed to coax incredible things from the hardware; Hired Guns with its 4 characters, first person, and fairly advanced AI and inventory systems. Uridium 2's intro music that makes Paula make sounds you never knew were possible. And the exemplary helicopter flight sim, KOALA that managed huge theatres of war and 3D graphics. And of course, the cracktros and demoscene that wowed us all with their artistic and programming talent.
My dad used to use an Amiga back in the day, and he has fond memories of me being barely a baby just hitting and bashing the keys of the keyboard while on his lap.
It'll always have a special place in his heart
Very true, those innumerous hours on A500 (to the detriment of my parents mental health) are the most memorable computer memories i have. Just thinking about those times is making me feel someone is peeling onions somewhere in the house.
i had no harddrive on it so i had to swap disks. A lot of them. If i remember correctly "Indiana Jones and the Fate of Atlantis" required 13 disks! And at times i had to swap the disk two times to load the next room or cutscene. For a hyperactive young boy that was a perfect way to learn patience. And i never felt angry about it, i felt it can take twice the time because the awesomeness of the adventure is worth the wait :)
Sure we understand
Jacob Shaw Absolutely, I was going to say something similar
I understand that feeling. It's called nostalgia.
God has uploaded.
You’re seriously in the top 5 best voice over voices I’ve ever heard.
Morgan Freeman & David Tennent are 2 others.
(David, 10th Doctor, did a BBC nature doc that was phenomenal).
Ever heard of Wayne June?
Christian Nugraha nope.
No love for Keith David?
Sir David Atenboro comes to mind.
The guy who narrates the "GVMERS" videos is also good.
I can't pinpoint exactly why, but this is one of my comfort videos. I've seen it at least a dozen times, and I'm sure I'll watch it dozens more 💙
Same for me
Me too. One of my most favourite videos on all of UA-cam!
In my case, my dad was in game/simulation development in the 80s and 90s, so there was always commodore gear in our house. I recall watching him while he worked. It was a really snazzy computer; and did way more than the ones at our elementary school could. Amiga computers are really nostalgic for me.
It’s been gone so long, and I’m glad that it’s returned
Indeed bob... indeed
Get your popcorn and spare time ready boys, smash can wait
Out of all the computers and consoles I've had over the years, I've always had fond memories of the Amiga the most, more so the A1200 and even to this day I feel that way. Maybe it was that the Amiga was the first real computer that allowed me to more or less do anything I want, I don't know but something about the Amiga still sticks with me and I know it does for many others that had the Amiga.
I remember seeing the Amiga 500 and 2000 demo units at the computer/video game store at the mall when I was a young girl and being completely blown away by the graphics. All my school had was a couple Apple IIe with monochrome monitors. The Amiga made the IIe look like a primitive relic.That moment definitely sparked my passion for computers and video games. Decades later I love it just as much as I did then. Thanks for a fond trip down memory lane!