Top 5 Atari 8-bit games

[Marc Oberhäuser]

5 is just so few... Well then:

 

- M.U.L.E.

- Archon II: Adept

- Kaiser

- Goonies

- Bruce Lee

[high voltage]

The Goonies, one of the earliest simultaneously players gameplay, love it.

 

Way back I also played 221B Baker Street a lot, nice isometric Adventure/Board game.

 

Two excellent Datasoft titles.

Edited June 30, 2014 by high voltage

[Bloodcat]

Hmm.. going by games I personally own and also comparing em to the same on other platforms here are my picks:

 

Ogre

Pac-Man

Miner 2049er

Yoomp!

Pole Position (Datasoft disk)

 

2 honorable mentions:

River Raid

Up'n'Down

[Jetboot Jack]

Just five, wow that's HARD, but here goes:

 

Dropzone

Preppie

Necromancer

Blue Max

Rescue On Fractalus

 

Five top Guilty Pleasures:

 

Keystone Kapers

Donkey Kong

Popeye

Frogger

Moon Patrol

 

sTeVE

[roland p]

Hard to pick since choices will be made for nostalgic reasons...

 

- Star Raiders

- pac-man

- Donkey Kong

- Miner 2049er

- Frogger

[TMR]

Can i just say in passing how lovely it is to see some love for Moon Patrol... that's what my 600XL is for. =-)

[+MrFish]

Can i just say in passing how lovely it is to see some love for Moon Patrol... that's what my 600XL is for. =-)

 

Yep, it's a good one. I had it on my list, until I cut it down to 20.

 

The Atari has a good selection of games from the Arcade.

[am1933]

A good game is a good game-no matter if it is seen from a UK or a US perspective, that is why you will see people from both sides of the pond quoting the same titles repeatedly.

[kogden]

For me:

 

-Star Raiders - Best "3D" space sim of the era.... maybe ever. Certainly the best use of 8KB since the dawn of mankind.

-Joust - Watching my kids bicker after killing each other brings back fond childhood memories.

-Caverns of Mars - Best vertical scrolling shooter in my opinion. Fly down a hole and blow stuff up. Fast paced and lots of fun.

-Missile Command - Infuriatingly addicting arcade port. Who doesn't like shooting nukes to blow up nukes, planes and sattelites? Definitely a cold war era game.

-NecroMancer - Theme music is awesome. A good use of Atari graphics hardware.

 

Honorable Mention:

 

-SCRAM - Because nuclear power plants are awesome. Melting one down and still being able to have kids and be cancer-free is even more awesome. I have never seen another game like it.... ever. Was also written in Atari BASIC which is pretty interesting considering some of the graphics tricks.

[Jetboot Jack]

Moon Patrol is a great example of using the A8's facilities to wonderful effect - simple multilayer scrolling character mapped screen, overlaid with hardware sprites.

 

Even though the sprites are double and quad width and mono it looks really great and plays wonderfully.

 

I love the chunky wheel animation!

 

sTeVE

Edited July 10, 2014 by Jetboot Jack

[high voltage]

Anybody ever played Savage Pond, supposed to be a 'Life' sort of game. I was always intrigued by it.

[+MrFish]

Even though the sprites are double and quad width and mono it looks really great and plays wonderfully.

 

I love the chunky wheel animation!

 

I think part of the reason the wide, mono sprites work is because they're overlaid on the higher resolution and higher color background. Plus the score panel adds resolution and color to the screen.

 

I always liked the wheel animation too. The game has it's own character.

Edited July 10, 2014 by MrFish

[Wrathchild]

These are mostly on 'replay' value:

 

Alley Cat

Rainbow Walker

International Karate

Encounter! (over Dropzone & Mercenary)

Bounty Bob Strikes Back! (over Miner 2049er)

 

A big nod to the 'Access' titles - Beach Head, Beach Head II, Raid Over Moscow, Leaderboard

and 'sorries' to Boulder Dash, Rescue on Fractalus! & Ballblazer

[+MrFish]

Even though the sprites are double and quad width and mono it looks really great and plays wonderfully.

 

They also use color-cycling on some sprites, and color switching for various phases of the different types of explosions. Both useful techniques in this case.

[jtthe2nd]

Registered just so I can get in on this topic!

 

Star Raiders - Absolutely loved this game. There was nothing like it on the Apple II or C64 and coming out during the Star Wars phenomenon? Forget about it! The sense of flying through space and blasting enemy fighters(as well as the hapless random meteor) was thrilling. The nerd in me soaked up details like the galactic chart, option of manual targeting and the rotatable 3d long range sector scan. Great, great game and to think they fit it on an 8K rom cart. Amazing.

 

Legionnaire - First true rts game as far as I know. You commanded up to 10 Roman Legions of varying skill, unit strength, and speed against hordes of barbarians. The barbarian tribes were separated into infantry tribes and cavalry tribes so you were always outnumbered 2 to 1. The game took into account factors including terrain elevation, flanking attacks, and unit morale when determining the outcome of individual skirmishes. The game came on a cassette tape so it was a sad day when my 410 program recorder died.

 

Ultima III - The graphics might be laughable by today's standards but the depth of the gameplay more than holds it's own. There are so many different things to do the game can seem overwhelming at times. You can talk to the towns folk, craft potions, sell loot, buy provisions, captain a sailing ship(and fire it's cannons!), utilize moon gates for instantaneous travel, and of course, fight monsters!

 

Infocom Text Adventures - No way can I choose just one Infocom game so I'll include the entire library of Infocom Text Adventures. I remember spending hours mapping out mazes on graph paper, something I can't imagine doing today. The text parser allowed you to type more complex and natural sounding commands than what other adventure games allowed. The writing was sometimes hilarious, sometimes foreboding, always intriguing. Sure it was frustrating at times when solutions didn't become obvious to you until after the fact but the games were very much worth the effort.

 

Hardball 2 - I am not a baseball fan but I played this game just as much as I did any of my other favorite games. The gameplay was solid, controls were very good and responsive, and I never felt like the computer cheated. Easily my favorite sports game on the Atari 800(beating out Dr. J vs. Bird, Ballblazer, and Touchdown Football.

[+RetroElectroDad]

Legionnaire - First true rts game as far as I know. You commanded up to 10 Roman Legions of varying skill, unit strength, and speed against hordes of barbarians. The barbarian tribes were separated into infantry tribes and cavalry tribes so you were always outnumbered 2 to 1. The game took into account factors including terrain elevation, flanking attacks, and unit morale when determining the outcome of individual skirmishes. The game came on a cassette tape so it was a sad day when my 410 program recorder died.

 

I've not played that game before - very interesting and will have to give it a try. It sounds like kind of a forerunner of Rome: Total War!

[Heaven/TQA]

5 games? I played most on A8? let's see

 

1. M.U.L.E.

2. International Karate

3. Ultima 4

4. Alternate Reality Series

5. Joust

 

(aehm... strange...)

 

ok... another day another 5

 

1. Dropzone

2. Rescue on Fractalus

3. Warhawk

4. Donkey Kong Jr.

5. Moon Patrol

 

ok... another day...

 

1. Spelunker

2. Fort Apocalypse

3. The Great American Cross Country Road Race

4. Ixion (remember anyone?)

5. Centipede 5200 Edition

 

ok... another day...

 

1. Flak

2. Pole Position

3. Blue Max

4. Dimension X

5. Rainbow Walker

 

ok... another day...

 

1. Wizard's Crown

2. Koronis Rift

3. Ghost Chaser

4. Ghostbusters

5. Kennedy Approach

 

ok... another day...

 

1. Donkey Kong

2. Milipede

3. Pitfall 2

4. HERO

5. Keystone Kapers

 

ok... another day...

 

1. Star Raiders

2. Star Raiders 2

3. Asteroids

4. Dig Dug 5200

5. Rally Speedway

 

ok... another day...

 

1. Flip & Flop

2. Boulder Dash

3. Summer Games

4. Kikstart

5. Montezuma's Revenge

 

 

sorry... 5 to pick very hard...

[The Eidolon]

1) M.U.L.E.

2) Alternate Reality - The City

3) Ultima IV

4) Spelunker

5) Boulder Dash

 

Also had a lot of fun with:

Infocom games (but better on other systems)

Pitfall 2 (though I played it on a 5200 with a grumpy analog stick)

7 Cities of Gold

Bruce Lee

The Eidolon

Rescue on Fractalus

Koronis Rift

Jumpman/Jr.

Archon 1-2

AR: The Dungeon

Ultima II-III

Montezuma's Revenge

Journey to the Planets

Shamus

Zorro

Pinball Construction Set

Gyruss

Robotron 2084

Joust

Ghostbusters

Mario Bros.

 

I'm sure there are many others I would have liked if I had

played them on that platform at the time.

[Lost Dragon]

Elektraglide-Just loved the look of it, superb music and it was the one game a lot of my C64 owning mates used to come round and play.

Alley Cat-Just so much fun.

Star Raiders:Probably the very 1st Killer App game i ever clapped eyes on.

Rescue On Fractulus-probably the second killer app and hated the sloth like C64 version when i played it years later.

Phantom-much better than Gauntlet on A8.

[Subby]

What's funny with me is I play/ed many games, but so few games that much.

 

But the ones I do call favorite include:

Star Raiders

Eastern Front 1941

Miner 2049er

Jumpman

Nukewar/Sink the Bismark (?!) Yes, really. These were two of the first games I bought, and I played the snot out of them since that is all I had. And even more importantly for me, since I'm not a programmer I impressed myself by figuring out the code worked and how to modify it to make the game act differently. But, yes, these two are not very good games. Just remember the other reason I played them so much, at the time I only had a 5" B/W TV, so slow text only games worked best. And I have never been able to get into text adventures, tried a bunch though.

 

Honorable mention:

Scram (This one was popular when I took my Atari 800 to sea on patrol.)

Tanktics

Edited July 17, 2014 by Subby

[kiwilove]

For me - back in the day memories - ones that I truly enjoyed playing were:

 

1.; Dropzone - as Defender was such a dud in comparison. Dropzone showed how it should have been done. Would have loved to have seen his unofficial Defender, before he wrote Dropzone.

2. Bristles - Much more fun than Miner 2049er - as you didn't get killed off while playing, but could carry on.

3. Lords of Karma - text only 48k adventure game. The theme really appealed to me, back then. First timers to this, should know that it displays a 'working....' message and takes about 5 minutes to initialise before it's ready to play.

4. Encounter - serious fast action - got to meet Paul Woakes and was lucky to see this running before it's release.

5. AtariBLAST! - Have to put in a plug for this unfinished game, as it's shaping up pretty good so far. I believe it is pushing the hardware to it's limits? Still a long wait till it's anywhere near finished - but the wait should be worth any one's while...

 

Would have listed Star Raiders as No.5 because your instrument panel was so important in this game - and it was so immersive.

 

Harvey

Edited July 18, 2014 by kiwilove

[+MrFish]

I was able to make a list of about 60 games. But I decided to get it down to about 20 that I didn't see listed here. Not necessarily my top 20, since I'd agree with a lot already mentioned here, but ones I think need mentioning. Listed in alphabetical order only.

 

Arcade:

Castle Crisis - multi-player, fast arcade action, polished, and tastefully done recreation of Warlords

Commando - shooting, grenade tossing, multi-level/multi-mission, secret areas, variety of terrains

Donkey Kong Jr. - nice use of character mode, colorful, cool sound effects and animations, multi-screen

Frogger - classic, smooth scrolling screen sections, nice music, sound effects, colorful graphics

Gyruss - smooth animation, nice musical theme and sound effects, fast shooting, bonus rounds

Ixion - unique, fast action, shooting, bonus rounds

Jr. Pac-Man - evolved Pac-Man action, with option for number of ghosts

Mario Bros. - one or two player, nice sprites, animations, sound effects and action

Missile Command - classic, fast action, cool sound effects, track-ball control

Xenophobe - one or two player, split screen, blast 'em up, nice sprites, animations, and scenes

 

General:

Bandits - unique horizontal shooter, nice animations, interesting sound effects, challenging gameplay

Blue Max - shooting, bombing, plane can sustain various damage types, refueling, repair, reloading

Druid - strategy Gauntlet style game, variety of scenes and enemies, nice use of character graphics

Eastern Front 1941 - classic, simulation, smooth scrolling map, multiple difficulties

Leader Board - nice graphics, smooth animation, realistic sports gameplay

Midi Maze - first person, networked, multiplayer free for all with chat in the mid-eighties? you bet!

Robbo - varied, challenging overhead puzzler, with nice, clean graphics

Shanghai - classic puzzle game in hi-res, detailed graphics, pull-down menus, plus mouse operation

Spy vs Spy (I, II, III) - unique, split-screen one or two player, nice graphics, animations, and humor

Summer Games - multi-player, multi-event detailed sports action, great presentation and animations

 

I'll add one:

 

Crystal Castles - fun collect-'em game, nice sounds and graphics, challenging game play

 

Controls seem a little tricky at first, especially since things move pretty quick. Once you get the hang of things it's really fun though. A trackball in joystick mode may work well -- I haven't tried one yet. Trackball is what's used in the arcade.

 

They could have done better in the sprite department. I think the 2600 version did a really good job with sprites, especially considering the limitations. The single color bear looks quite good, as does most everything else. The playfield mazes of course are much better on the 8-bit version. The 8-bit version should have had better sprites too.

Edited January 8, 2015 by MrFish

[Mr.Amiga500]

1. BallBlazer - Real-time 3D (pseudo-3D) was amazing for the time, but split-screen 3D with each player having his own view was mind-blowing.

 

2. Montezuma's Revenge - At the time, most games had only a few different screens that repeated - and you had to complete each one before moving to the next, usually with an annoying time limit. I loved how Montezuma's Revenge had no time limit at all and it seemed like the number of rooms were infinite. I think this was the first game I ever played that gave a real sense of exploration.

 

3. Blue Max - The landscape seemed to go on forever, but the most amazing thing was that it was different every time you played it. Most games at the time had repeating patterns (predictable and very limited). I'd never seen randomly generated landscape before. Once again, there was a sense of exploration and discovery.

 

4. Rescue on Fractalus! - 3D fractal landscape and watching stranded pilots run up to be rescued was so amazing for the time. (funny too)

 

5. Berzerk - A bit simplistic compared to other games, but it was my favourite arcade game of 1980 and Atari had the best home version.

[trailblazer]

(Random order)

 

Preliminary Monty

Alley Cat

Pole Position

Yoomp!

The Great American Cross-Country Road Race

[+MrFish]

Legionnaire - First true rts game as far as I know. You commanded up to 10 Roman Legions of varying skill, unit strength, and speed against hordes of barbarians. The barbarian tribes were separated into infantry tribes and cavalry tribes so you were always outnumbered 2 to 1. The game took into account factors including terrain elevation, flanking attacks, and unit morale when determining the outcome of individual skirmishes. The game came on a cassette tape so it was a sad day when my 410 program recorder died.

 

It looks like they purchased the source code to Eastern Front 1941 and hacked it into their own game.

Considering that the source code could be purchased for $150, that's a steal, for an ace framework and

cutting down loads of development time.