We all know that Atari has licensed its name for multiple brand partnerships in the gaming industry, but the company’s latest deal is to make its way into hospitality with Atari Gamehouse!
The company announced its partnership with US real estate developer True North Studio and GSD group. They plan to start construction in Phoenix in mid 2020. With the rest to come up in Austin, Chicago, Denver, Las Vegas, San Francisco, San Jose, and Seattle.
The Atari’s ‘video game-themed destination’ will have gaming playgrounds offering VR and AR games.
Some of the locations will also have venues and studios to accommodate Esport events. The hotels are said to have meeting rooms, co-working spaces, restaurants, bars, a bakery, a movie theater, and a gym to say the least.
The company said that it will be a destination for families as well as business meetings. Imagine a business meeting being conducted in a room while an Esport event being conducted in other!
“Our hope is that you come in and never want to leave! Because there’s a lot of interaction,” said an executive behind the project.
Atari is set to receive 5 percent of total revenue in addition to $600,000 it received as a part of agreeing the new deal. The first hotel will be located near Steve Wozniak’s Woz U university campus in Arizona. It also happens to be associated with the Phoenix-based GSD Group.
The investment comes in at a time where Esport is the new trend. According to the 2019 Global Games Market Report, by the Esport analytics firm Newzoo, there are, broadly, about 2.5 billion gamers! Meaning anyone who plays on a PC, console or mobile device — across the world. The firm estimated that they would spend $152.1 billion on games in 2019. It’s a 9.6 percent increase from the previous year. The report projected that the global games market would grow by billions of dollars over the next few years, rising to nearly $200 billion by 2022.
The news comes as somewhat of a relief for the group as it had been earlier reported that the development of Atari VCS retro console was undergoing significant difficulties. The console’s lead architect claimed that he hadn’t been paid in over six months.
It is ironical that Atari has been having problems over building a gaming console. And giving their employees salaries, imagining them running the hotels and Atari Gamehouse!
