Your Atari retreat

[Your Atari retreat]

I'd like to hear some descriptions of the "Atari Retreats" that people have created in their homes - areas (usually in the basement) reserved for classic videogaming, and preferably emphasizing the 2600. Can anybody post a link to a photo of their Atari shrine?

[Atari Haiku]

These are great! :-)

 

My guesses for MindMaster's last three... Bump N Jump, Vanguard, Decathalon... ?  (I could be way off!)

 

Sorry, but all three are wrong!! Try again...

[Top Games for Destroying your Controllers and/or thumb]

I have to imagine Decathlon and Boxing are two of them. Any others?

[Atari Haiku]

Barnstorming. Don't know of any other games featuring weathervanes...

[Atari Haiku]

...and this one...

 

left right left right left

faster than the speed of sight

then drop on purpose.

[Atari Haiku]

And this one...

 

a wall on each side

each flashing crazy colors

my ship shoots upwards.

[Atari Haiku]

Okay, try this one:

 

We're scrolling today

can we hop over the grey?

soon we reach bottom.

[The Broken Joystick Awards!!!]

I actually think Golf is a decent game. It was my dad's favorite. It's pretty playable once you figure out how to handle the club.

[Atari Haiku]

Here's a tougher one...

 

On this strange planet

critter attacks from the side

my skeleton frys.

[Atari Haiku]

Can you name these games?

 

four castles of brick

A ball bouncing between them

three warlords will fall.

 

where is the chalice?

it's not in the gold castle

that would end the game.

 

rocks floating in space

a ship lost among them all

photon torpedos.

 

two creatures per world

beam them up to the big ship

fight rocks yet again.

 

video wafers

you've got to be kidding me

way too much flicker.

[The Broken Joystick Awards!!!]

A "Broken Joystick Award" is given to Atari 2600 games of dubious distinction.  I invite you to vote for your Broken Joystick winners in each of the following categories:

 

Category A:  Worst Adaptation of an Arcade Game

B:  Worst Activision Game Ever

C:  Worst Imagic Game Ever

D:  Worst Game Ever Produced for the 2600

E:  Worst Sports Game Ever

F:  Worst Graphics

G:  Worst Game Company

 

Here are my own choices:

 

A: Worst Arcade Adaptation: Among the games I own it would have to be Pac Man - but I suspect Zaxxon is worse.

B: Worst Activision: Probably Oink!.

C: Worst Imagic: Probably Fire Fighter.

D: Worst Game Ever: Swordquest Anything. Even if it was supposed to be a puzzle, it should have been way better than it is.

E: Worst Sports: the Karate game.

F: Worst Graphics: Hangman

G: Worst company: Froggo

 

and we'll add H, worst Atari game. My vote goes for Flag Capture.

[The Broken Joystick Awards!!!]

A "Broken Joystick Award" is given to Atari 2600 games of dubious distinction. I invite you to vote for your Broken Joystick winners in each of the following categories:

 

Category A: Worst Adaptation of an Arcade Game

B: Worst Activision Game Ever

C: Worst Imagic Game Ever

D: Worst Game Ever Produced for the 2600

E: Worst Sports Game Ever

F: Worst Graphics

G: Worst Game Company

[Pac Man Construction Set]

My dream game, probably most likely for a PC, would be a "Pac Man Construction Set". Construct your own mazes, choose the colors of all playfield elements, program the AI for each monster, set the energizer time lengths, set the point values, perhaps even a graphics editor to make your own bonus fruit objects...

 

a could happily while away quite a lot of time with that.

[The first homebrewer to do this would be a god...]

...develop 1 player versions of what are currently only 2 player games.

 

Imagine 1 player versions of...

 

Combat

M Network Super Challenge Football

M Network Armor Ambush

 

Combat would be the first challenge. The tanks might be difficult (because of the obstacles) but the jet fighter AI shouldn't be too hard to program.

[Can you solve the Mystery of Fishing Derby?]

I think it's to prevent sprite flicker. If both players happen to be reeling in  fish at about the same height, and the pair of fish pass upward through a scanline with a third fish, some flickering will have to be used to display them all. I think this is probably generally why it can't be done.

 

That's what I was wondering - if it was a flicker issue, or if it was done to make the game more competitive (there's a mini-race to get the next fish at all times).

[Can you solve the Mystery of Fishing Derby?]

...that is, why can only one fisherman reel in at a time?

[What games other than "Combat" were included with]

...was Combat the only one, or did they switch to other games in later years?

 

I always thought Combat was a strange choice, seeing as it's 2-player only.

[ACTIVISION vs. IMAGIC!!]

I think Activision is our winner based on the count of replies so far.

[ACTIVISION vs. IMAGIC!!]

Let's settle this once and for all (or try to..)!! Which company made better games for the 2600, Activision or Imagic? I'm interested to see which company gets more support.

[Switchbox for multiple classic systems. Does it exist?]

I went to Radio Shack looking for a switchbox that would let me hook up multiple (3 or preferably more) classic systems to one television. The only switchboxes they had were for modern-era systems only. I know there are people on these boards who must have several old systems connected to one television - how's it done?

[Favorite classic console/portable]

Atari 2600 of course is #1.

 

I also really like the NES for collecting home versions of arcade classics (pre-1985), such as Centipede, Pac Man, etc. SNES is also useful for this.

[Where were you when you first saw the Atari 2600]

...I was sitting on the floor of the bedroom of the kid next door, watching a black and white TV. He had combat, adventure, and missile command.

 

I didn't see atari in color until I got my own. I started with the same 3 games as my neighbor, plus Space Invaders... it was heaven. I saw Adventure in color for the first time...the white dragon was red!

[I need to fix shaky paddle controllers for Kaboom!]

...what's the best method? I've heard you can spray something on the inside of the controller (after removing the knob) but I don't remember what.

 

Kaboom! is painful when your controller has the shakes.

[Very first impression of Pac Man]

I remember back in the day, when Pac Man was added to the games in the local ice cream parlor (they had about 5 machines), my buddies and I at first thought it was either a "girl" game or a kiddie game. Back then there were no "cute" games - everything was space shoot-em-ups aimed at the young male audience. We also thought it was strange - sort of Japanese or something - what did "Pac Man" mean, anyway? At first we only played Pac Man when there was a wait for Defender, Tron, Phoenix, or Berzerk.

 

Little did we know that the little "loser" game in the corner of the store would eventually get us all addicted and become the mother of all arcade games...

[Quest for the Rings (Odyssey2)]

Any Quest for the Rings owners (or former owners) out there? My childhood friend had it. I'm wondering if anybody used the boardgame part of it more than once.

 

I always wanted to see a Quest for the Rings for the VCS/2600.