Atari 2600 Xante Kiosk Cartridge
Potted History and Description of Famously Rare A2600 Carts
Introduction to Atari 2600 Kiosk Cartridges
At the time of the A2600, several publishers made use of the arrival of commercially viable cartridge writing equipment. Companies such as Romox used the fact that their, initially blank cartridges, could be rewritten with other games on demand as a marketing tool, while the brains behind Xante had a somewhat more advanced idea.
They set up kiosks in well known stores, such as McCartneys and Kmart, with the idea that games could be selected from a catalogue, downloaded via telephone from a central server, and copied onto a cartridge upon demand.
The package was completed with a generic sticker, printed up at the booth, and a similarly generic box, also prepared by the staff responsible for the outlet. Publishers were approached to provide the games, and Xante had a catalog of games licensed from the likes of Imagic and Fox Video Games.
Xante was operational for a year or so, in the Tulsa, Oklahoma area. Their cartridges were a reasonably unique blue color, and they had distinctive 'rainbow' stickers.
Rarity Ratings of Atari 2600 Xante Cartridges
Due to the fact that the company was so short lived, and operating in a restricted geographic area, there are relatively few Xante cartridges on the market. According to a source on the AtariAge.com website forum, if two or three were to hit the market in the same year, questions as to their origin would be raised.
There is also a question mark over exactly how many games were produced on the Xante label. AtariAge.com has polled its forum regulars, and managed to list precisely 7 games that were released, and now in the hands of collectors:
Alien (Dallas North, Fox Video Games)
Beany Bopper (Grady Ward, Fox Video Games)
Crypts of Chaos (J. Marvin, Fox Video Games)
Demon Attack (Rob Fulop, Imagic, Inc.)
No Escape! (Michael Greene, Imagic, Inc.)
Solar Storm (Dennis Koble, Imagic, Inc.)
Trick Shot (?, Imagic Inc.)
All of these were also released on other labels, either simultaneously with the Xante variations, or after the company's demise in 1984. As such, many collectors take the view that Xante is a label variation, and not a publisher in its' own right, having a direct effect on the market value, and attractiveness to collectors as a whole. Niche collectors (Atari 2600 and/or label variation collectors) will attach a higher value to the cartridges than those collecting video games in general.
AtariAge.com currently places Xante cartridges on their NTSC Rarity Guide with R10 ratings; the highest possible.
