Infamous E.T. Cartride Burial Being Excavated

[burningdoom]

http://games.yahoo.com/blogs/plugged-in/infamous-video-game-landfill-faces-excavation-165828265.html

Infamous video game landfill faces excavation


E.T. The Extra-Terrestrial (Credit: Atari)

One of gaming’s greatest mysteries might soon be uncovered.

You’ve likely heard the tale before: Millions of unsold copies of the disastrous ET: The Extraterrestrial game for the Atari 2600 lie buried in a New Mexico landfill. Despite a slew of believers and evidence supporting the story, doubters remain. But in the next few months, we'll have the answer once and for all.

The Alamogordo City Commission has approved a deal that will allow for the excavation of the landfill to see what, exactly, is buried there. The big dig will be filmed by Fuel Industries, a Canadian film production company with plans to create a documentary about the gaming legend.

Fuel has access to the landfill for the next six months, which would put it there on the 30th anniversary of the dump. Alamogordo, as you might suspect, is hoping to raise awareness of the town -- and perhaps attract a few tourists to the area.

[turf]

That's kind of cool... I guess. What if it's all just an urban legend?  Then dug up 30 years of dirty diapers.

[thomascozine]

Can wait to see what happens!

[slothingXPIG]

I have been wondering about this since I heard! I cannot wait too see what happens! Keep us updated! Thanks for sharing this!

[scott]

I call Urban Legend. But then again, I've always been a skeptic.

[jobocan]

Logic dictates it's an urban legend. If they got a bunch of returned/unsold cartridges, they wouldn't just throw them away, they'd disassemble them and keep anything that can be re-used. Cartridge shells, probably the circuit boards/chips or at least part of those, and they'd likely either trash or recycle the boxes and manuals and plastic, and keep any useful inserts. I mean, Atari 7800 cartridge shells are just Atari 2600 cartridge shells, I'd wager a large amount of those came from E.T. cartridges.

What the excavators are likely to find is broken console/controller/game parts (since it was obviously very common to throw those away), but a mountain of complete sealed copies of E.T.? Not happening.

[doctorlaudanum]

Logic dictates it's an urban legend. If they got a bunch of returned/unsold cartridges, they wouldn't just throw them away, they'd disassemble them and keep anything that can be re-used. Cartridge shells, probably the circuit boards/chips or at least part of those, and they'd likely either trash or recycle the boxes and manuals and plastic, and keep any useful inserts. I mean, Atari 7800 cartridge shells are just Atari 2600 cartridge shells, I'd wager a large amount of those came from E.T. cartridges.

Pretty much this. I always thought this sounded more than a little ridiculous, and incredibly wasteful. Nonetheless, I am a bit curious to see where this will go. Thanks for sharing!

[htimreimer]

Logic dictates it's an urban legend. If they got a bunch of returned/unsold cartridges, they wouldn't just throw them away, they'd disassemble them and keep anything that can be re-used. Cartridge shells, probably the circuit boards/chips or at least part of those, and they'd likely either trash or recycle the boxes and manuals and plastic, and keep any useful inserts. I mean, Atari 7800 cartridge shells are just Atari 2600 cartridge shells, I'd wager a large amount of those came from E.T. cartridges.

What the excavators are likely to find is broken console/controller/game parts (since it was obviously very common to throw those away), but a mountain of complete sealed copies of E.T.? Not happening.

one thing did heard was that the original atari company had some sketchy business practices and this was one of them