Jump to content
Have You Played Atari Today?
2600|5200|7800|Lynx|Jaguar|Forums|Store  
  • entries
    309
  • comments
    816
  • views
    55,562

About this blog

I review games... How original...

Entries in this blog

 

Skeet Shoot (Apollo)

So I’ve been thinking back on my Skeet Shoot ‘review’ and I’ve come to the realization that three paragraphs of me saying hahaha isn’t sufficient to vent my frustration with this game, so I’m gonna go the whole nine yards and give this lousy piece of shit a full review, not because the game deserves it but because I want to insult it more. Skeet Shoot was Apollo’s very first game, and boy does it feel like it, though I’d say it feels like a first year game dev major’s scrapped project more than
DoctorSpuds

DoctorSpuds

9
 

Sir Lancelot (Xonox)

Well now if this isn’t a sight to behold, we’re back in the land of Xonox. These guys produced some of the most advanced, and beautiful games on the 2600, and they packaged them in a very unique way. When it comes to exotic cartridges Xonox has the competition beat with their Double Ender cartridges, each side has a different game and the things are massive. Playaround also did double ended cartridges but we don’t like to talk about them, since Xonox did it first and they did it best. I have on
DoctorSpuds

DoctorSpuds

5
 

Shark Attack/Lochjaw (Apollo)

This is a game that needs no introduction, which is good since I’m running out of things to fill the first paragraph with, especially when it comes to Apollo. But seeing as how this game in particular is somewhat legendary I’ll strive to give it an introduction of sorts. Shark Attack had a difficult birth, originally it was marketed as Lochjaw, which is a horrible name probably on par with Spectravision’s Tape Worm. Lockjaw is a symptom of a Tetanus infection where the infected person’s mouth wi
DoctorSpuds

DoctorSpuds

0
Sewer Sam (Interphase)

Sewer Sam (Interphase)

Some games are unfortunate enough to gain a reputation for being absolutely terrible, perhaps deservedly or undeservedly. It seems my game today has garnered quite the reputation and I feel that it is undeserved. Sewer Sam is a game from Interphase Technologies Inc. a small company that had a library of four games published across multiple consoles and computers. They only published two games on the Intellivision, Sewer Sam and Blockade Runner, but are most known for their smash hit B.C.’s Quest
DoctorSpuds

DoctorSpuds

1
 

Seaquest (Activision)

I like me some Seaquest, it’s just one of those games that is so simple in premise but absolutely masterful in its execution. The premise is simple, collect stranded treasure seeking divers while blasting away sharks and enemy subs who are pursuing them. As the game progresses the enemies come in larger numbers and are more aggressive while divers are fewer and farther between. You also have an oxygen meter that will deplete far too quickly for your liking, you can resurface to fill your meter b
DoctorSpuds

DoctorSpuds

1
 

Sea Monster (Bit Corp.)

How many games has Bit Corporation made?!? (Or at least been credited with making/stealing) I keep finding more and more all the time, as is the case for today’s game. Technically I can’t play this game since the copy I own is in the PAL format and will therefore display improperly on my TV, but I still own a physical copy so it’s okay. It seems though in the definitive list of Bit Corp. games I have reviewed all but two, and soon it shall be one, the one I don’t currently own is Space Tunnel, o
DoctorSpuds

DoctorSpuds

2
 

Sea Hunt (Froggo/Sancho)

Froggo... Froggo is my favorite publisher... they made such good games... Oh wait! Duh! They never made anything for 2600... Scratch that they made some boxes... and uh, the warranty cards were actually made out of card stock. Okay Froggo Sucks, they are the whipping boy of the Atari library, and deservedly so. Every single game released by Froggo on the Atari 2600 was either stolen, or stolen, the game we're looking at today, Sea Hunt, was torn from the rotting fetid hands of Sancho. Froggo has
DoctorSpuds

DoctorSpuds

1
 

Sea Hawk (Froggo/Sancho)

RUN EVERYBODY!!! IT'S FROGGO!!! Here's another Froggo classic, which of course is stolen from the rotting coffin that contains the corpse of Sancho, It's Sea Hawk! And my god... It's glorious. I won't pretend for a second that this is a good game,it really isn't, but it's still not the worst game that Froggo put out there, we all know which game that is. In essence Sea Hawk is Defender, but worse, or depending on how you look at it, Star Fox, but better. Seriously this game has very little in th
DoctorSpuds

DoctorSpuds

1
 

Room of Doom (Commavid)

It seems we have returned to the realm of the obscure. I have reviewed a game from this company before, and ever since I have been yearning for another of their games. Commavid is one of THOSE companies, none of their games ever had a wide release despite their overall quality and are as such rather rare today, two more companies I would define as one of THOSE companies are Tigervision, and Avalon Hill. AS I was browsing through Ebay, as one does, I found a listing for Room of Doom by Commavid i
DoctorSpuds

DoctorSpuds

3
Robot Tank (Activision)

Robot Tank (Activision)

When I was just getting into the 2600 I was still ignorant to the complexity that some games managed to achieve. So imagine my surprise when I plopped Robot Tank into my 2600 for the first time. It is quite clear that Robot Tank was made to be Activision’s answer to Atari’s Battlezone, and it really feels like it. Also reading the back of the box, this game apparently takes place in October 2019, so it is the perfect time for me to review it. Funnily enough, the prediction of a robotized militar
DoctorSpuds

DoctorSpuds

1
 

Robin Hood (Xonox)

As I said yesterday we’ve returned, albeit briefly, to the hallowed land of Xonox, but if you take a moment to tear your eyes away from the pristine graphics, and the unique gameplay you’ll see that there’s shit in them there hills. Many people from the infomercial era know the name of K-Tel, y’know those guys who peddled everything from ‘greatest hits’ record to the Veg-O-Matic, and The feather touch knife. Here’s the thing, they never really went away, they’re still in business, usually sellin
DoctorSpuds

DoctorSpuds

0
 

River Patrol (Tigervision)

The year is 1986, you are a kid who just got his weekly allowance and you’re going to your local Kaybee Toys or Radio Shack to pick up a new game for your Atari 2600. The store is running a sale, 90% off all Atari 2600 games, the NES is taking the country by storm and stores want to dump their old stock, what a bargain! You walk up to a huge dump bin full of games; they’re all there, Imagic, U.S. Games, Parker Brothers, and a bunch of Atari. You start to dig around and at the bottom of the bin i
DoctorSpuds

DoctorSpuds

1
Rescue on Fractalus! (Lucasfilm)

Rescue on Fractalus! (Lucasfilm)

Alright, so I think this’ll be a good game to start the 5200 with, Rescue on Fractalus! RoF was one of the first in a long line of games from Lucasarts, and as first games go this is amazing. I won’t bore you with a history of Lucasarts or of the 5200; I already did a whole write up on that, so let’s just jump into Rescue on Fractalus!     FRACTALS! I don’t know what they are, or how they are utilized in this game, all I know is that they were used to make a full fledged 3D
DoctorSpuds

DoctorSpuds

1
 

Red Sea Crossing (Inspirational Video Concepts/Steve Stack)

Wait a second… Wasn’t I supposed to review Video Life from Commavid? Well I was, but I decided against it because there really wasn’t anything to review, all you do is look at the pretty pictures while your ears explode, so I decided to instead replace it with a game that’s not currently on the R10 list but I’m fairly sure will be on it eventually, Red Sea Crossing. It’s odd, isn’t it, that three of the rarest 2600 games are also the only three religious themed games in the 2600 library? It seem
DoctorSpuds

DoctorSpuds

0
 

Rare doesn't mean valuable

I have a rant for you, I’m very tired and it’s very rambly but I think I may have made a few good points.   Here’s something odd that many people have a hard time coming to terms with, rarity does not equal value. When the topic of old games comes up in conversation I usually have to reiterate this multiple times, and almost every time I do this the person I’m talking to gets that greedy little gleam in their eye. “Oh, I have a Nintendo/Atari/Sega in the basement, and I have a bunch of
DoctorSpuds

DoctorSpuds

4
 

Ram It (Telesys)

And the award for the second worst game title goes to… … …Ram It! I don’t even know why they went with this name in particular because you don’t actually do any ramming in the game whatsoever. I wish I could give this game a full review but due to the simplistic nature of every aspect of the game a single paragraph will have to do. Graphically the game looks good but doesn’t impress me all too much, sure the amount of colors on display are cool but I’m just not getting any of that Wow Factor lik
DoctorSpuds

DoctorSpuds

0
 

Raft Rider (U.S. Games)

The videogame market was a battleground, everybody and their grandma were duking it out seeing who could get the biggest slice of that delicious money pie. Smaller companies stuck to the burgeoning market of home computers, though some did strike into the more lucrative console market, usually with very mixed results. Larger companies though, had the money to publish on console, usually they would snap up a small videogame company and have them produce games while acting as the publisher and poc
DoctorSpuds

DoctorSpuds

0
 

Racquetball (Apollo)

I get the feeling that this will be the final game I review from Apollo in a very long time, there is only one left for me to review after this and it’s Guardian and I don’t have the 100+ dollars lying around to buy it with. The game I’ll be looking at today is Racquetball, and is the perfect example of a good idea executed poorly. I would also say that Racquetball is also a victim of the 2600 hardware itself, a game this complex simply needed better hardware to power it, probably something arou
DoctorSpuds

DoctorSpuds

0
 

Rabbit Transit (Starpath)

Alright, so what genre of game is Starpath trying to improve upon today? We’ve already gotten FPS space shooters, Galaga, Breakout, Asteroids, first-person-maze-puzzle-solving, RPG, and Defender, out of the way, so what’s popular and doesn’t have a particularly amazing home port? Well Q*Bert of course! Yes, Starpath’s eighth offering, Rabbit Transit, is a Q*Bert clone, and a damn good one if I might add. I’ve already done a comparison review on the three most popular console ports of Q*Bert, so
DoctorSpuds

DoctorSpuds

2
 

Quest for Quintana Roo (Sunrise Software/Telegames)

Sunrise was a blip on the radar of the 2600 library, they appeared, released a single game, and vanished, just like that. Even though they only released a single 2600 game it doesn’t mean they didn’t release others on different systems. They released a few games for the Colecovision, and released ports for their main game Quest for Quintana Roo for several major consoles and home computers of the time, including the Atari 8-bit line and the Colecovision. Sunrise was also responsible for the Cole
DoctorSpuds

DoctorSpuds

0
QIX 5200 (Atari)

QIX 5200 (Atari)

Qix is a fun little arcade game than seems to defy any standard one would care to throw at it. Qix was an arcade release from Taito back in 1981 and by all accounts it was a modest success and it was all about drawing rectangles, hmmm. Qix was very slow to reach a home audience with the first home releases being for the Atari 5200 and 8-Bit computer line in 1983 with it finally reaching other consoles and computers in 1989 and into the early 1990’s, the Apple ][ version didn’t come out until 198
DoctorSpuds

DoctorSpuds

4
 

Q*Bert (Parker Brothers)

This is going to be a comparison piece between the three most popular console ports of Q*Bert from the second generation of game consoles. We will be comparing the Atari 2600, Mattel Intellivision, and Colecovision ports of Q*Bert. Despite all being the same game there are a hefty amount of differences between the three. But the outcome of this review is not certain. since all the versions have their own strengths and weaknesses. Let's start with the graphics.   Which console has the b
DoctorSpuds

DoctorSpuds

1
 

Popeye (Parker Brothers)

There are a lot of strange games out there, I know I keep reiterating this point but it’s like if I sneeze I find more weird games. I had previously though this particular game to be fairly normal but then I gave it a little though and realized that no this is a strange game indeed. Cast your eyes over to Japan and to Nintendo, it was 1982 and their home console, the Famicom, was still a short while away so what do they do in the meantime? Arcade games I guess. I don’t know why they chose Popeye
DoctorSpuds

DoctorSpuds

2
 

Pooyan (Konami)

This game doesn't sit right with me... I'm not a real big fan of this game in the first place. The first time I played this game was on an NES 250-in-one multicart, and something about it just rubbed me the wrong way. The 2600 version, which is the only version of Pooyan that was released for the home console market outside of Japan by the way, is far inferior to the Famicom port which is far inferior to the arcade, a winning combination if I've ever seen one. Graphics?   Ugly... It seems that
DoctorSpuds

DoctorSpuds

16
 

Pool Game Extravaganza!

I have too many pool games, and by that I mean I have more than one. Surprisingly, or not if you’ve seen my collection gallery, all but one of my pool games are for PC which will give us a very wide range of graphics sounds and gameplay. I will be covering four and a half games in this review so I’m going to try and limit myself to just one paragraph per game, though depending on the game things might be longer. The games in order of viewing are Trick Shot by Imagic, Sharkey’s 3D Pool by Micropl
DoctorSpuds

DoctorSpuds

1
AtariAge
Forums
Store
General
Follow AtariAge

Copyright ©1998-2021 AtariAge

×
×
  • Create New...