You had to be born in the 60's/early 70's to appreciate this list. Atari was first-competitors were intellivision and colecovision-the competitors seem to have better graphics but had way less game inventory. Nintendo wasn't available for a long time later 
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Well I think if it wasn't for Pong, and his inventor, none of it would be available!! But besides that, if it wasn't for Nintendo in 1985, only two years, not your supposed
"long time later", Atari crashed the home video game market, we wouldn't have the home market the way it is today!!
Sure Atari was first, I had one, it was one of my favorite things at the time. However, it was Atari who helped bring about the demise of the home gaming market in 1983. They were the ones who allowed any lil ol company to design games for their system. It was their lack of standards that ended up flooding the market with schlock games that gave both its systems.
Now had Nintendo, and in small part Sega, not come in in 1985 with their systems, then we woudn't have what we have today! It was Nintendo and their NES that set the standards that we still see to this day!
First off, not anyone could make games for their system! I don't know what exactly the standards they set entailed for third party companies to make games for their system, but it allowed for greater control of the home gaming market! Sure companies like Tengen would make games, but not until the very end of the NES' lifespan did they ever get one of their games to receive the Nintendo Seal of Approval.
The Seal of Approval also allowed for a uniformity among games. If you remember the Atari, the cartridges that 3rd party companies came out with were out there. Not one company had the same design. Look at ColecoVision, Intellivision, Imagic, Activision, Parker Bros, Data East, they all had different looking cartridges. It may not mean much to the gamers, but to Nintendo, it helped build a standard! When you looked at a cartridge, you know what system that game goes to!!
Now as I said before Atari did nothing to prevent the saturation of the market with games!! Aside from the many different companies, coming out with games, too games were being released by just one name. Nintendo created strict regulations that allowed a software company to make only 5 games per year, that was it! It was the kind of decision that was needed to prevent what happened, only two years earlier, to occur again!
What software companies did was to create subsidary companies!! For example, Ultra Games was a subsidary of Konami!! Which is why if you look, the first Metal Gear was uner the Ultra label!!
It is because of this and so many other reasons, why IMHO, the NES should be in a higher spot than Atari!! Mikey D, I think you need to step back and see if you are just arguing a point because it's me making it, or do you truly believe what you're saying! It's no rose colored glasses I look through, maybe you ought to put down yours!!
Oh and just because you see one lil girl playing a Hula Hoop, that doesn't invalidate my statement!! I still say Barbie being the number 1 girls toy since I think it's inception should be listed as number 1 on vh1 's list!! It's not a preference either, I was never too much into Barbie, I had some, but it's what I believe to be closer to reality that the Hula Hoop being number 1. I mean Hula Hoop was the rage for a decade like someone said, but Barbie has been the rage for decades! Emphasis on the plural!! That's one to grow on Mikey D.
