Jump to content
IGNORED

Best Atari 8-Bit Public Domain Games?


ballyalley

Recommended Posts

I want to make a public domain compilation for my new USB 8Mb Flash cartridge.

What are some of the best public domain games for the Atari 8-bit? I'm not

talking about commercial software that is now freely distributable, but games

that were never for sale (or, if they WERE for sale, then it was only as a

distribution method-- i.e. for the disk, tape or cartridge).

 

I have a NTSC 130XE computer, so I'd want the games to be compatible with this

system. So, PD games that are PAL don't count (unless they are fully playable

on an NTSC machine and TV/monitor). I remember "back in the day" getting

some disks that had some pretty good clones of commercial software. This would

be neat, but what I'm especially looking for is original software.

 

Adam

Link to comment
Share on other sites

Well,

not sure if they all work ok on NTSC (I only have PAL Ataris), but these are some of the PD titles I like:

 

- Alex by ??? (a great Robbo version)

- Animal Party by Mario Caillahuz

- Atartris and Atartris 2 (Tetris clones)

- Bank Panik (a type-in listing and a simple clone of Bang Bank/Westbank)

- Another World (alas unfinished demo with some bugs)

- Boulder Dash / Superdash by Oliver Cyranka

- Break it by Oliver Cyranka (okayish Arkanoid clone, not so good controls as Unicum)

- (Bewe-) Golfer by Bewesoft / Jiri Bernasek

- Castle Crisis by Bryan (a great Warlords clone; available via atariage on cart.)

- Chess by ??? (from Compute, very simple chess game but good for beginners)

- Culmins (as of yet only a demo, but with many levels)

- Crownland by ??? (a nice SMB-like version, requires 128k to run)

- Cyrtabor (type-in listing and simple clone of Spindizzy)

- Dungeon Lords (type-in listing from Antic or Analog, some kind of Tutankham or Tunnel Trekker clone)

- Dynakillers by GMG (Dynablaster clone for up to 3 players)

- Dynablasters by TeBe et al. (another dynablaster clone with G2F graphics)

- Empire strikes back (an unofficial Starwars game or just a clone of Attack of the Mutant Camels)

- Filler Up and Filler Up II by Tom Hudson (a Quix clone from Analog)

- Flop & Flip (a simple clone of Flip and Flop)

- Flowers Mania by TeBe et al.

- Froggie (a Frogger clone)

- Frantic by F.T. Wittenmayer (the best Crystal Castles clone on the A8)

- Force of Four by ??? (a combat game)

- Gemdrop by Bill Kendrick

- Getris by TeBe et al (a Tetris clone)

- Gryzzles (a TB XL game)

- Gunpowder Charlie (from Atari User)

- Heartlight by J.Pelc (a Boulder Dash clone)

- Heavy Metal by Paul Lay (another Spindizzy clone)

- Hide and Seek (a type-in listing from Antic or Analog)

- Hugojagd XL by Stefan Dorndorf

- Insects (a Centipede clone)

- Into Deep by F.T. Wittenmayer (a great HERO clone)

- Jump by D. Johannsen (type-in listing from Happy Computer magazine)

- Jumper 2 (very simple but fun game by Jona Fuchs)

- Kooky`s Quest by Anschuetz/Weisgerber/Anschuetz from Antic magazine

- Laser Blaster by Mato Simi

- Let`s Frog by Ralf David (a Frogger clone)

- Let`s Hop by Christoph Ballhause (type-in listing from german Atari magazine)

- Line Up by ??? (from Chile)

- Livewire by Tom Hudson (from Analog, allthough Tempest is worlds better)

- Livewire 2 by Tom Hudson, mod. by Wolf (again, Tempest -even the demo- is worlds better)

- Logo Square by R. Dekinger (similar to Hide and Seek)

- Loopz & Loopz Dx by XXL

- Mad Marble Maze by B.Dymarczyk (a Mad Marbles / Marbles Madness clone from german Atari magazine)

- Megablast by Thorsten Karwoth

- Masterblazer by Oliver Cyranka (a simple Ballblazer clone by Oliver Cyranka)

- Mental Age (there exist 3 different versions, all of them are good)

- Mindblast by PG and Fandal

- Monex by Mato Simi

- Motie by Stan Ockers

- Ms. Bulimia by Squoquo (=Christoph Ballhause; a sort of Ms. Pacman clone)

- Mr Proper by Aleksander Martin (nice demo-game with 8 levels; start with SHIFT key !)

- Munchy Madness by Paul Lay (a Boulder Dash clone, thanks to MM Designer, there`s more than one version)

- Myriapede by Landon Dyer

- Mule Wars by Mario Caillahuz (especially version 1.1 with one player surviving)

- Nibbly by TeBe et al.

- Omidor by Peter Sabath

- Oxygene by TAT (=The Atari Team)

- Pacmunch Jr. by Ken Siders (a Pacman clone)

- Parallax by ??? (from Antic or Analog)

- Qb by ??? (released here at atariage some years ago)

- (Super-) Querg Chess by John White

- Radzone by Robert Stuart

- Reaxion by Jason of Cosine

- Roll `em by ??? (I guess this was from Antic or Analog)

- Scorpions and Scorpions 2 by XXL

- Sir Pac by ??? (a Pacman clone)

- Speed Matter by Claas and Uwe (a nice Tron clone with great sound!)

- Super Reversion by P. Burgess

- Super Miner and Super Miner 2 by Kemal Ezcan (fore-runner of Cavern of the lost Miner)

- Swapz by Fandal

- Syntron by Jon Snyder (a very simple Robotron clone)

- Syntron 2 / Escape from Syntron by Jon Snyder (a very simple Berzerk clone)

- Tactwar by Mark K. Akita

- Taifun by Thorsten Butschke

- Think & Work by J. Schilcher (a good Socoban/Soco-ban clone)

- Trackstar by Bill & Alison Halsall (a good Track and Field clone)

- Unicum by Andre Christiansen (a great Arkanoid clone)

- Warsaw Tetris by A. Bukszo and Tomasz Komatkowski (great Tetris clone)

- Warsaw Robbo and Warsaw Robbo 2 by P.W. Software (great Robbo versions)

- Xagon by ??? (kind of a Q*Bert clone, but much better!)

- Yoomp by FoX et al.

 

And if you happen to have 320k memory you may also add:

- Bomb Jack by Vega, TeBe, et al.

- Yie Ar Kung Fu by Vega et al.

 

These are just some fileversions (single diskfiles) from my personal collection. Think I could list the same number of PD`s of my bootdisk (or multiple-file-disk) versions here... but enough for now. - Andreas Koch.

Edited by CharlieChaplin
Link to comment
Share on other sites

Great list by CharlieChaplin. Wow, who needs the formerly commercial ROMs with all that amazing PD stuff. Too bad about Reaxion. That is a great one with great graphics.

 

I always liked Outpost. It was a type-in BASIC game from COMPUTE! It would make the interior speaker on the 400 and 800 click, in a nice touch. I guess you'd have to compile it to put it on a cart.

Link to comment
Share on other sites

These are just some fileversions (single diskfiles) from my personal collection. Think I could list the same number of PD`s of my bootdisk (or multiple-file-disk) versions here... but enough for now. - Andreas Koch.

 

You forgot mentioning the formerly commercial games and apps by AMC-Verlag (including the great arcade clones "Bilbo" (Ladybug) and "Tales of Dragons and Cavemen" (Roc'n'Rope) and the cute "Herbert" titles. According to the ABBUC site, Armin Stürmer gave the rights to some guy with the strange name of Andreas Magenheimer and he released them into the Public Domain (as Freeware). Don't know this guy, but he's quite the man ;).

 

 

Thorsten

Link to comment
Share on other sites

These are just some fileversions (single diskfiles) from my personal collection. Think I could list the same number of PD`s of my bootdisk (or multiple-file-disk) versions here... but enough for now. - Andreas Koch.

 

You forgot mentioning the formerly commercial games and apps by AMC-Verlag (including the great arcade clones "Bilbo" (Ladybug) and "Tales of Dragons and Cavemen" (Roc'n'Rope) and the cute "Herbert" titles. According to the ABBUC site, Armin Stürmer gave the rights to some guy with the strange name of Andreas Magenheimer and he released them into the Public Domain (as Freeware). Don't know this guy, but he's quite the man ;).

 

 

Thorsten

 

 

Well,

you forgot something the starter of this topic wrote:

"I'm not talking about commercial software that is now freely distributable, but games that were never for sale..."

so I tried not to list any former commercial titles like the AMC or KE-Soft or other stuff. Ok, did some small mistakes here and there, but anyways...(thanks for the info, Miker!) On the other hand, in the good old days magazine software also wasn`t PD, but it was always treated that way...

 

And err, in case you don`t not know (the smiley may mean the contrary): Andreas Magenheimer = Andreas Koch = me !!! I married in 2007 and I was the one (not my wife) who changed his last name, because Magenheimer was such a long and unusual name... Thus, I have all the AMC and KE-Soft (and other stuff) on my PC harddisk and already released it as PD/Freeware on various sites. My thanks therefore have to go to Homesoft, Chrodegang and two guys from former SSMB for officially removing the AMC copy-protection for me. (Yes, they did it officially, since I got/heired all the AMC stuff, but could not release nor distribute it, due to copy-protection.)

 

-Andreas Koch

 

P.S.: Here in Germany Warsaw Tetris never had been sold commercially, it was PD/freeware right from the start - maybe a mistake by the distributors maybe they did it intentional...

Link to comment
Share on other sites

Great list by CharlieChaplin. Wow, who needs the formerly commercial ROMs with all that amazing PD stuff. Too bad about Reaxion. That is a great one with great graphics.

 

 

Yeah,

every now and then I think that too and would like to have some of the PD/Freeware titles on cart...

Besides, there are some A8 PD games similar to Reaxion (but with much simpler graphics and less colours), like Flip by N.Hagemann or Crazy Quader by R.Fuchs (from the east-german Bit Power magazine) and approx. three other games of which I do not remember their names right now...

 

Last not least, how about some PD Lemmings clones, I am not a big fan of Lemmings but we have quite some existing titles on the A8:

 

- Tommingi by Tomek Borygo (absolutely unsure if this was/is PD - what do you say Miker?)

- Lemmingi by Orion Software (two demo versions 1996)

- Lemmingi by Orion Software (full version with approx. 22 levels 1997)

- XMAS-Lemmings by Datri (1998, disk version by Fandal 2005)

- Lemmings prevision by Mariusz Krupiwnicki and Marek Druzdowski (1 level only)

(and The Brundles by KE-Soft which once was a commercial title)

 

-Andreas Koch.

Link to comment
Share on other sites

One of my most favorite PD games is in BASIC!

 

It is called Nerm of Bemer.

 

Altough it is in Basic, it has a very very very good gameplay.

 

I love it.

 

Marius

 

 

Yes,

it is a nice game, Basic but good. How about these PD/Freeware titles:

 

- Zand`s Labyrinth (Stephan Baucke)

- Nibbly (TeBe, etc.)

 

to name a few of the dozens of Snake/Serpentine/Nibbler clones... -Andreas Koch.

Link to comment
Share on other sites

  • 1 year later...

Well,

not sure if they all work ok on NTSC (I only have PAL Ataris), but these are some of the PD titles I like:

 

- Alex by ??? (a great Robbo version)

- Animal Party by Mario Caillahuz

- Atartris and Atartris 2 (Tetris clones)

- Bank Panik (a type-in listing and a simple clone of Bang Bank/Westbank)

- Another World (alas unfinished demo with some bugs)

- Boulder Dash / Superdash by Oliver Cyranka

- Break it by Oliver Cyranka (okayish Arkanoid clone, not so good controls as Unicum)

- (Bewe-) Golfer by Bewesoft / Jiri Bernasek

- Castle Crisis by Bryan (a great Warlords clone; available via atariage on cart.)

- Chess by ??? (from Compute, very simple chess game but good for beginners)

- Culmins (as of yet only a demo, but with many levels)

- Crownland by ??? (a nice SMB-like version, requires 128k to run)

- Cyrtabor (type-in listing and simple clone of Spindizzy)

- Dungeon Lords (type-in listing from Antic or Analog, some kind of Tutankham or Tunnel Trekker clone)

- Dynakillers by GMG (Dynablaster clone for up to 3 players)

- Dynablasters by TeBe et al. (another dynablaster clone with G2F graphics)

- Empire strikes back (an unofficial Starwars game or just a clone of Attack of the Mutant Camels)

- Filler Up and Filler Up II by Tom Hudson (a Quix clone from Analog)

- Flop & Flip (a simple clone of Flip and Flop)

- Flowers Mania by TeBe et al.

- Froggie (a Frogger clone)

- Frantic by F.T. Wittenmayer (the best Crystal Castles clone on the A8)

- Force of Four by ??? (a combat game)

- Gemdrop by Bill Kendrick

- Getris by TeBe et al (a Tetris clone)

- Gryzzles (a TB XL game)

- Gunpowder Charlie (from Atari User)

- Heartlight by J.Pelc (a Boulder Dash clone)

- Heavy Metal by Paul Lay (another Spindizzy clone)

- Hide and Seek (a type-in listing from Antic or Analog)

- Hugojagd XL by Stefan Dorndorf

- Insects (a Centipede clone)

- Into Deep by F.T. Wittenmayer (a great HERO clone)

- Jump by D. Johannsen (type-in listing from Happy Computer magazine)

- Jumper 2 (very simple but fun game by Jona Fuchs)

- Kooky`s Quest by Anschuetz/Weisgerber/Anschuetz from Antic magazine

- Laser Blaster by Mato Simi

- Let`s Frog by Ralf David (a Frogger clone)

- Let`s Hop by Christoph Ballhause (type-in listing from german Atari magazine)

- Line Up by ??? (from Chile)

- Livewire by Tom Hudson (from Analog, allthough Tempest is worlds better)

- Livewire 2 by Tom Hudson, mod. by Wolf (again, Tempest -even the demo- is worlds better)

- Logo Square by R. Dekinger (similar to Hide and Seek)

- Loopz & Loopz Dx by XXL

- Mad Marble Maze by B.Dymarczyk (a Mad Marbles / Marbles Madness clone from german Atari magazine)

- Megablast by Thorsten Karwoth

- Masterblazer by Oliver Cyranka (a simple Ballblazer clone by Oliver Cyranka)

- Mental Age (there exist 3 different versions, all of them are good)

- Mindblast by PG and Fandal

- Monex by Mato Simi

- Motie by Stan Ockers

- Ms. Bulimia by Squoquo (=Christoph Ballhause; a sort of Ms. Pacman clone)

- Mr Proper by Aleksander Martin (nice demo-game with 8 levels; start with SHIFT key !)

- Munchy Madness by Paul Lay (a Boulder Dash clone, thanks to MM Designer, there`s more than one version)

- Myriapede by Landon Dyer

- Mule Wars by Mario Caillahuz (especially version 1.1 with one player surviving)

- Nibbly by TeBe et al.

- Omidor by Peter Sabath

- Oxygene by TAT (=The Atari Team)

- Pacmunch Jr. by Ken Siders (a Pacman clone)

- Parallax by ??? (from Antic or Analog)

- Qb by ??? (released here at atariage some years ago)

- (Super-) Querg Chess by John White

- Radzone by Robert Stuart

- Reaxion by Jason of Cosine

- Roll `em by ??? (I guess this was from Antic or Analog)

- Scorpions and Scorpions 2 by XXL

- Sir Pac by ??? (a Pacman clone)

- Speed Matter by Claas and Uwe (a nice Tron clone with great sound!)

- Super Reversion by P. Burgess

- Super Miner and Super Miner 2 by Kemal Ezcan (fore-runner of Cavern of the lost Miner)

- Swapz by Fandal

- Syntron by Jon Snyder (a very simple Robotron clone)

- Syntron 2 / Escape from Syntron by Jon Snyder (a very simple Berzerk clone)

- Tactwar by Mark K. Akita

- Taifun by Thorsten Butschke

- Think & Work by J. Schilcher (a good Socoban/Soco-ban clone)

- Trackstar by Bill & Alison Halsall (a good Track and Field clone)

- Unicum by Andre Christiansen (a great Arkanoid clone)

- Warsaw Tetris by A. Bukszo and Tomasz Komatkowski (great Tetris clone)

- Warsaw Robbo and Warsaw Robbo 2 by P.W. Software (great Robbo versions)

- Xagon by ??? (kind of a Q*Bert clone, but much better!)

- Yoomp by FoX et al.

 

And if you happen to have 320k memory you may also add:

- Bomb Jack by Vega, TeBe, et al.

- Yie Ar Kung Fu by Vega et al.

 

These are just some fileversions (single diskfiles) from my personal collection. Think I could list the same number of PD`s of my bootdisk (or multiple-file-disk) versions here... but enough for now. - Andreas Koch.

 

A nice list of games, but only a few of those are US origin. I know this post is late to the party, but the TC specifically asked for NTSC. I'm curious about PD games too and I'm a bit disappointed to see so much PAL specific stuff here. Myriapede and Froggie I know for sure are PD and NTSC. I like what I tried of Myriapede.

Edited by BrianC
Link to comment
Share on other sites

  • 2 weeks later...

Supereversion is a Reversi program written in BASIC but it was extremely well done! It would be great if someone can compile this program because it would be well worth the effort - IMHO. I'm pretty sure that it originally came from one of the Atari magazines.

 

Enjoy!

atx4us

Reverse.zip

Edited by atx4us
Link to comment
Share on other sites

Supereversion is a Reversi program written in BASIC but it was extremely well done! It would be great if someone can compile this program because it would be well worth the effort - IMHO. I'm pretty sure that it originally came from one of the Atari magazines.

 

Enjoy!

atx4us

 

 

Well,

 

Superreversion had been published in Analog magazine (re-published in a german magazine, not sure if this was legal or not). You can easily compile it with the TB XL compiler and then you will get a *.CTB file, next use the CTB-linker to link Runtime.COM and *.CTB into one file and voila - you now have one *.COM/*:XEX file. That`s how I did it - the game reacts pretty fast now (no more 40 seconds initializing at the start, almost no init. at all!), alas the cursor also moves extremely fast now...

 

-Andreas Koch.

sup_rev.zip

Link to comment
Share on other sites

Supereversion is a Reversi program written in BASIC but it was extremely well done! It would be great if someone can compile this program because it would be well worth the effort - IMHO. I'm pretty sure that it originally came from one of the Atari magazines.

 

Enjoy!

atx4us

 

 

Well,

 

Superreversion had been published in Analog magazine (re-published in a german magazine, not sure if this was legal or not). You can easily compile it with the TB XL compiler and then you will get a *.CTB file, next use the CTB-linker to link Runtime.COM and *.CTB into one file and voila - you now have one *.COM/*:XEX file. That`s how I did it - the game reacts pretty fast now (no more 40 seconds initializing at the start, almost no init. at all!), alas the cursor also moves extremely fast now...

 

-Andreas Koch.

 

Thank You!!! I've always wished that this program was compiled into a binary file. Also, thanks for the hints on how to compile BASIC programs - Most useful hints indeed!

 

If there seems to be enough interest in this game, I can modify the program to make the speed adjustments.

 

Hayden

Link to comment
Share on other sites

  • 8 years later...

Join the conversation

You can post now and register later. If you have an account, sign in now to post with your account.
Note: Your post will require moderator approval before it will be visible.

Guest
Reply to this topic...

×   Pasted as rich text.   Paste as plain text instead

  Only 75 emoji are allowed.

×   Your link has been automatically embedded.   Display as a link instead

×   Your previous content has been restored.   Clear editor

×   You cannot paste images directly. Upload or insert images from URL.

Loading...
  • Recently Browsing   0 members

    • No registered users viewing this page.
×
×
  • Create New...