Uploaded August 2026 | Updated September 2026, 1 day ago
Gamescom 2026 Day 1 gave us three announcements that all say the same thing if you squint: Atari and Activision are putting 39 Atari 2600 games back on real cartridges, Xbox is calling its new disc-to-digital service "game preservation," and IKEA built a stool shaped like a thumbstick. Somebody explain.
Let's start with the Atari x Activision Collection, because it's the one I actually care about. Real 2600 carts — Pitfall!, River Raid, Kaboom!, H.E.R.O., Keystone Kapers, Enduro, Chopper Command, that work in the Atari 2600+, the 7800+, and original 1977 hardware. Not a compilation cart. Not a ROM bundle. Actual manufactured cartridges, which is genuinely the biggest new-manufacture 2600 run in about thirty years. Then I looked at the pricing. Standard editions are $34.99 each starting in November. The four Deluxe box sets, Treasure, Speed, Secrets, Victory — are $249.99 apiece, and the last one doesn't ship until Fall 2027. Do the math on all 39 games and you're at roughly a thousand dollars for a library most collectors already own loose for a few bucks a cart.
Then Microsoft announced its disc-to-digital feature and used the word "preservation" while doing it. Here's what it actually is: you put an Xbox One or Xbox Series X disc in, you claim a digital entitlement tied to your Microsoft account, and your disc keeps working. Fine. Useful, even. But an account entitlement is a license, not a copy, and "preservation" means a game survives without the company that sold it. This is the opposite of that. It's a bridge to a console that probably doesn't have a disc drive, and it currently covers "most" Xbox One and Series X titles — no original Xbox, no 360, no promise the whole library ever gets there.
And then IKEA showed up with YXSTABY, a nine-piece Xbox collection landing in October. A thumbstick stool. A mint green D-pad cushion. A metal dish based on the Elite controller's D-pad. I'm not even mad about this one. I'm just tired.
Here's the part nobody's saying out loud: Microsoft owns Activision. Microsoft licensed physical cartridges to Atari on the exact same day it pitched you on going discless. Both things are true at once, and that tells you everything about how these companies actually think about physical media — it's a product category when it sells, and a legacy burden when it doesn't.
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All music and video used are the property of their respective owners.
Copyright Disclaimer Under Section 107 of the Copyright Act 1976: allowance is made for “fair use” for purposes such as criticism, comment, news reporting, teaching, scholarship, and research. Fair use is a use permitted by copyright statute that might otherwise be infringing. Non-profit, educational, or personal use tips the balance in favor of fair use."
Gamescom 2026 Day 1 gave us three announcements that all say the same thing if you squint: Atari and Activision are putting 39 Atari 2600 games back on real cartridges, Xbox is calling its new disc-to-digital service "game preservation," and IKEA built a stool shaped like a thumbstick. Somebody explain.
Let's start with the Atari x Activision Collection, because it's the one I actually care about. Real 2600 carts — Pitfall!, River Raid, Kaboom!, H.E.R.O., Keystone Kapers, Enduro, Chopper Command, that work in the Atari 2600+, the 7800+, and original 1977 hardware. Not a compilation cart. Not a ROM bundle. Actual manufactured cartridges, which is genuinely the biggest new-manufacture 2600 run in about thirty years. Then I looked at the pricing. Standard editions are $34.99 each starting in November. The four Deluxe box sets, Treasure, Speed, Secrets, Victory — are $249.99 apiece, and the last one doesn't ship until Fall 2027. Do the math on all 39 games and you're at roughly a thousand dollars for a library most collectors already own loose for a few bucks a cart.
Then Microsoft announced its disc-to-digital feature and used the word "preservation" while doing it. Here's what it actually is: you put an Xbox One or Xbox Series X disc in, you claim a digital entitlement tied to your Microsoft account, and your disc keeps working. Fine. Useful, even. But an account entitlement is a license, not a copy, and "preservation" means a game survives without the company that sold it. This is the opposite of that. It's a bridge to a console that probably doesn't have a disc drive, and it currently covers "most" Xbox One and Series X titles — no original Xbox, no 360, no promise the whole library ever gets there.
And then IKEA showed up with YXSTABY, a nine-piece Xbox collection landing in October. A thumbstick stool. A mint green D-pad cushion. A metal dish based on the Elite controller's D-pad. I'm not even mad about this one. I'm just tired.
Here's the part nobody's saying out loud: Microsoft owns Activision. Microsoft licensed physical cartridges to Atari on the exact same day it pitched you on going discless. Both things are true at once, and that tells you everything about how these companies actually think about physical media — it's a product category when it sells, and a legacy burden when it doesn't.
━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━
✅ Support the channel / become a member
Become a member to get access to exclusive perks: members-only livestreams, early videos, and behind-the-scenes updates:
youtube.com/channel/UC7E0dGyMoi1K2dutiifLo5Q/join
━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━
💼 Business / product reviews
If you’d like me to review your product(s) or for any business inquiry, email:
jameshateseverything2020@gmail.com
━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━
🔗 Follow me / more content
Instagram: instagram.com/jameshateseverything
X (Twitter): https://x.com/HatesJames32769
Facebook: facebook.com/JamesHatesEverything
Threads: threads.com/@jameshateseverything
Live & VOD Gameplay Channel: youtube.com/@JHE_Plays
Everything AI related: youtube.com/@James-On-AI
━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━━
📌 Disclaimers
All music and video used are the property of their respective owners.
Copyright Disclaimer Under Section 107 of the Copyright Act 1976: allowance is made for “fair use” for purposes such as criticism, comment, news reporting, teaching, scholarship, and research. Fair use is a use permitted by copyright statute that might otherwise be infringing. Non-profit, educational, or personal use tips the balance in favor of fair use."
