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Ladies and gentleman it is time for a true classic, AstroBlast… Originally released on the Intellivision as AstroSmash by Mattel the 2600 port followed soon after. Normally I’d do a comparison review for something like this but in the case of AstroBlast there is no comparison, the 2600 version comes out the victor, here’s why. AstroBlast uses the Paddle controllers which are a huge step up from the INTV’s rather clunky control disks, allowing for smooth and fluid movement and more engaging gameplay, the game does have the option to use the standard joystick but the Paddle is recommended in the manual. While the graphics on the INTV version are undoubtedly superior, the 2600’s zoomed in perspective makes the game a bit more challenging and fun. With the zoomed in perspective you have less time to react to incoming objects which makes the game even more frantic without having to increase the difficulty. I guess that’s my issue with the INTV version, it’s just a bit too easy, and games can go on for a very long time, they even built in a pause feature because of this. With the 2600 version the games are short, frantic, and challenging, just what I want from a 2600 shooter. Copies are fairly common and you shouldn’t have any issue finding a copy in the wild for a couple dollars. But if you just can’t find a copy to save your life then they go for 4-10 dollars on Ebay with boxed copies going for 7-20 dollars. It’s just an excellent game to play in short bursts, and is everything that I need from a shooter.

Thanks! A few comments: You can copy/paste the characters for gamma Γ and delta Δ, such as from this post. A number of the levels entered in the Draconian Δ Quadrant Sector Design Contest have names. Level with the Mega Space Stations is named The hunt for the 4 mukors as the stacked stations appear similar to the boss in the arcade game Blasteroids. It's an X and stands for eXceeds 9 lives, shown if you have 10 or more lives remaining.

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Hello everyone, AtariAddenture here. I'm finally back, and senior year is just a few days from ceasing and graduation is on Saturday. It has been awhile since I have been on here and I wanted to update you all on my personal collection! I'm up to 64 games excluding doubles of Haunted House (3), and Asteroids (2). I bought a few lots of of friends. I added some new titles to my lineup: Video Pinball Superman Spider Fighter Grand Prix Freeway Laser Blast Boxing Sky Jinks Reactor Name This Game Demons To Diamonds Night Driver Football Super Football Jungle Hunt E.T The Extraterrestrial Towering Inferno Yars Revenge (with Box) Dodge 'Em (with Box and Manual) Slot Racers (with Box and Manual) Demon Attack Star Voyager (with Box) Cosmic Ark (with Box) Atlantis (with Box) Breakaway IV (Sears Breakout) Target Fun (Sears Air-Sea Battle) Race (Sears Indy 500) I hope to increase the collection more in the future, mainly with Activision and arcade ports. Happy gaming!

Of the nine titles that Atari released in 1977 I have reviewed three of them, them being Combat™, Star Ship™, and Indy 500™, I think it’s about time to add another to that list. Now I think we can all agree that some of these titles have not aged all that well, sure they were well liked back in the day (with the exception of Basic Math™ BLECH) but they were all new and unique ideas that hadn’t really been explored before on a home console, yes the Channel F did it first but Atari did it right. Due to these games extreme old age and dated graphics ‘Atari detractors’/12-20 year olds playing whatever new game is popular today always use them as a reason to mock and criticize the console, and while some of those criticism could be warranted, yes the graphics haven’t aged well and the sounds are very basic (No Timmy CD’s did not exist back then) the core gameplay is still solid. One of the launch titles that always seems to get a bad rep is Street Racer™ and I can tell you exactly why, the graphics are terrible. Well the graphics are almost terrible, yes the ‘car’ does not look like a car it looks more like the drive train of a car rather than a whole car, but this isn’t the whole story. Many people who are inexperienced with the 2600 often forget that there is more to the game than the default game variation; if you had the picture label cartridge and no manual/box you wouldn’t know that this game has 27 game variations with 6 different gameplay styles. Each style has its own set of graphics, so here’s what I’ll do; I’ll write out a separate paragraph about each gameplay style and highlight the game variations that are the most fun out of each of them. Game #1: Street Racer™, variations 1-6 This is a rather generic avoid ‘em type game where you move your car side to side at the bottom of the screen and avoid incoming cars. You gain one point for every car you pass 99 points ends the game if you don’t run out the 2 minutes 16 second time limit first. The default game has one player against the ‘computer’ which really means the other car is moving side to side while accelerating recklessly and missing the other cars out of sheer luck. I would recommend that you play the two player variation, game 2, if you can get another person to play with you. I feel the need to mention the acceleration which is a bit odd to get the hang of. Unlike with other games of this type, think Enduro, you don’t have any reference for your acceleration so you hold down the button and you won’t know how fast your going until you hit the back end a car going the speed of sound. Instead of maintain your momentum letting go of the accelerate actually slows you down so you’ll have to get good at feathering the throttle to maintain your optimal speed while avoiding cars and talking shit to your opponent. There are three and four player variants but I would advise against them since players three and four won’t have a very good time since they’re placed halfway up the screen and have even less time to react than you. The optimal variation is game 1 for one player, game 2 for two players and game 5 for a more frantic two player since there are now two incoming cars on the screen at once. Game #2: Slalom, variations 7-12 This variation is my personal favorite. In essence Slalom is the reverse of Street Racer™, instead of avoiding a large obstacle in your path you must squeeze between two large obstacles, going from around to between. The game is made somewhat easier since your skis are narrower that the car was so you will have plenty of space to weave through obstacles. The game plays identically to Street Racer, same points, time limit, acceleration, and even variations, the only differences are the graphics and obstacles. My preferred variations are 7 and 8 for one and two player gameplay, and game 11 for two players and two incoming obstacles, just like game 5. Game #3: Dodgem™, variations 13-16 Dodgem™ shakes the formula up a little bit, instead of avoiding obstacles to gain points you must make it to the top of the screen while avoiding obstacles to gain points. You control a small buggy (though it looks more like a mushroom of wheels) and avoid moving obstacles, yes the obstacles move side to side, and try to get to the top of the screen. This is my second favorite variation after Slalom since it properly uses acceleration, instead of increasing the speed of the obstacles, like in the previous two games; it increases your speed which gives you far greater control. Dodgem™ doesn’t have any three or four player modes only one and two player. I would recommend all of the variations actually; variations 13 and 14 are just one and two player modes of the standard game while variations 15 and 16 have two obstacles at once making the game more frantic. With either one or two players this game is good fun. Game #4: Jet Shooter™, variations 17-20 This game is pretty self explanatory; you shoot incoming enemy jets for points, and honestly I don’t think this game really stacks up to the previous three. There are two issues that make me dislike this game somewhat. First off is the acceleration, it’s automatic so you’ll have the jets coming at you as fast as they possibly can right off the bat and since you use the only button of the controller for shooting you have no control over this. The second issue is the shooting itself, your shots move so incredibly slowly that if you miss a shot you’ll have to avoid five or six enemy jets before you can shoot, and miss, again. Despite how fast this game moves the action is incredibly slow. The game variations are copied from Dodgem™, but I would recommend that you skip this game and play the jet mode in Combat™ instead. Game #5: Number Cruncher™, variations 21-24 Instead of avoiding obstacles like in all of the previous modes here you actually want to hit what’s coming at you. In Number Cruncher™ all you do is hit the incoming numbers with the tip of your motorcycle that looks more like a man in a wheelchair, the value of the number you hit (2,4,6) is added to your score, first to 99 wins. If you don’t hit the numbers with your head you’ll collide with them and lose time, though you can mitigate this by moving your head into the number when you collide with it so the collision cuts short and you’re on your way muck quicker. This is the fastest paced game on the cartridge as you are actively trying to hit things, which is quite fun I’ll admit. The game variations just add more players as the numbers already come two at a time, I would recommend variations 21 and 22 for the one and two player games as three and four players can get a bit crowded. Game #6: Scoop Ball™, variations 25-27 Scoop Ball™ is more complicated than any of the other game modes on this cartridge. Your objective is to collect balls and deposit them in a Computer Scooper while avoiding obstacles. You can collect points by just collecting the balls (one point) but you can get even more points by collecting multiple balls and them depositing them into the scooper (three points). I noticed that as you collect more points the game gets more difficult, there are fewer balls and scoopers and more obstacles, and even later on the objects and obstacles start to move. Not only does this game have multiple ways to score points it also has scaling difficulty for each player, which is pretty darn impressive. Unfortunately this game has only three variations and none of them are single player, you can play variation 25 but it isn’t as much fun as playing against somebody else. All in all I am amazed at how much was stuffed into this tiny 2K cartridge, frankly it’s incredible. If I were to order my most to least favorite of the games it would be: Slalom, Dodgem™, Number Cruncher™, Scoop Ball™, Street Racer™, and Jet Shooter™. I didn’t even mention that the difficulty switches can be used as well, if you switch them to A you’ll lose points instead of time when you collide with obstacles which changes the game up somewhat. This is an essential Paddle game for everybody’s collection, everybody should own a copy. Thankfully this is an incredibly common game; you can find it in dump bins at every game store that sells Atari for 2 dollars or less. If you’re feeling a bit crazy and want to get a boxed copy you probably won’t have to pay too much, the cheapest boxed copy is sitting at 10 dollars while nicer looking copies are listed for 11-15 dollars. G out and get this game if you haven’t already, I think you might just enjoy yourselves.