Best and worst pack-in games

[Room 34]

What do you think are the best and worst pack-in games, across all consoles?

 

My votes:

 

BEST PACK-IN: Super Mario Bros. (NES)

WORST PACK-IN: TIE - Las Vegas Poker & Blackjack (Intellivision), Super Breakout (Atari 5200)

 

[bjk7382]

Maybe I am wrong on this, but didn't the original gameboy come with Tetris. All I know is that I had that game and played it endlessly. The worst would be Combat with the 2600 and they didn't get much better when they put both Combat and Pac-man as pack-ins

[SS]

The worst was when companies stopped doing pack-ins altogether for the initial release of a system. Sure you can get “bundles” later on after the thing has been around for a year or so but nobody does ‘em on launch day. Remember when the 2600 came with two sticks, paddles, and Combat? Or the original GameBoy with headphones, a full set of batteries, and Tetris? Now that was sweet; we didn’t know how good we had it at the time!

[JerseyDevil]

Combat may be dirt common, but it is the best 2 player game of all time.

[Room 34]

I think the best two-player game of all time is the cooperative variation in Space Invaders where one person moves right and the other person moves left.

 

[Bratwurst]

The best pack-in in my opinion would be Sonic the Hedgehog 1. There was a game Sega could have gotten away with selling on its own, instead they also pack it with the system to move Genesis consoles. Unlike Altered Beast or Super Mario Bros that is a game I'll play just about any time, too. Quality title.

 

My idea of the worst pack-in would be Halo, or to phrase it better, why hasn't Microsoft bundled it with the X-box already?

 

I also remember Pole Position II as being pretty lackluster for my first 7800 cart.

[Room 34]

I also remember Pole Position II as being pretty lackluster for my first 7800 cart.

Sure, but it beats Super Breakout!

[JB]

Worst pack-in: any demo disk.

 

Best pack-in: THE MASTER SYSTEM SNAIL GAME!

Seriously, I'm very partial to MineStorm on the Vectrex.

[Ferris]

Wait a minute WHAT? ...what are you fools talking about? What planet are you guys from? Since when does a game system come with TWO controllers.... and a GAME? ....packed in for FREE? ....I've never even heard of such a thing!

 

 

BEST

Pole Position II - 7800

Super Mario Bros - NES

Tetris - Game Boy (Brick)

Donkey Kong - ColecoVision

 

WORST

Poker - Intellivision

Whatever Game was packed in - Odyssey2

Super Breakout - 5200 (c'mon they coulda done better than that B.S.)

Pong - Pong

Demo Discs - Every system since the 16-Bit era died.

[bjk7382]

Most classic systems came with two controllers. The Ataris, and the SMS, and the NES. and probly others that I can't remember.

 

Only the modern consoles make you buy extra controllers.

[Gamemaster_ca_2003]

another good one was burgertime fo the Intelivision 2

the later 5200s with Pac Man

and the later front loading NES with SMB3

[chrisbid]

well, the best thing to do would be to list all of the known pack ins first...

 

VCS - Combat (later Pac Man)

Intellivision - Poker & Blackjack (later Astrosmash and Burgertime?)

5200 - Super Breakout

Colecovision - Donkey Kong

7800 - Pole Position II

NES - Gyromite, Duck Hunt, Super Mario Bros (later World Class Track Meet)

SMS - Hang On & Safari Hunt (later Alex Kidd in Miracle World)

TG16 - Keith Courage in the Alpha Zones

Genesis - Altered Beast (later Sonic the Hedgehog)

SNES - Super Mario World (later Super Mario Allstars)

Sega CD - Sol Feace, Sega Classics (later Sewer Shark)

 

I think that was it...

[JB]

well, the best thing to do would be to list all of the known pack ins first...

 

VCS - Combat (later Pac Man)

Intellivision - Poker & Blackjack (later Astrosmash and Burgertime?)

5200 - Super Breakout

Colecovision - Donkey Kong

7800 - Pole Position II

NES - Gyromite, Duck Hunt, Super Mario Bros (later World Class Track Meet)

SMS - Hang On & Safari Hunt (later Alex Kidd in Miracle World)

TG16 - Keith Courage in the Alpha Zones

Genesis - Altered Beast (later Sonic the Hedgehog)

SNES - Super Mario World (later Super Mario Allstars)

Sega CD - Sol Feace, Sega Classics (later Sewer Shark)

 

I think that was it...

Nowhere NEAR complete.

Later Genesises came with Sonic 2.

The SMS also came with Hang-on/AstroWarrior and whatever the 3D bundle came with. And the snail game!

The SNES was also bundled with Zelda 3 or the Super Gameboy. At least at WalMart. Late late SNESes came with Yoshi's Island.

[RCmodeler]

I also remember Pole Position II as being pretty lackluster for my first 7800 cart.

 

You can't be serious? Pole Position 2 was one of the best games of the early 80s. I think that was an *awesome* pack-in.

 

5200: Super Breakout- yep, definitely the worst. It's a brand-new system with cutting-edge 1982 graphics, and you choose to give away a game that even the lowly 2600 could do in 1979?!?!? That's not a good way to showcase the new system.

[Bratwurst]

You can't be serious?  Pole Position 2 was one of the best games of the early 80s.  I think that was an *awesome* pack-in.

 

Racing games =

 

Come on, I got Food Fight the following week! I played that ten times more than I did with Pole Position. Atari really could have done better, especially in the face of Super Mario Bros.

[JerseyDevil]

well, the best thing to do would be to list all of the known pack ins first...

 

VCS - Combat (later Pac Man)

Intellivision - Poker & Blackjack (later Astrosmash and Burgertime?)

5200 - Super Breakout

Colecovision - Donkey Kong

7800 - Pole Position II

NES - Gyromite, Duck Hunt, Super Mario Bros (later World Class Track Meet)

SMS - Hang On & Safari Hunt (later Alex Kidd in Miracle World)

TG16 - Keith Courage in the Alpha Zones

Genesis - Altered Beast (later Sonic the Hedgehog)

SNES - Super Mario World (later Super Mario Allstars)

Sega CD - Sol Feace, Sega Classics (later Sewer Shark)

 

I think that was it...

 

NES Gyromite was a pack-in for the Robot? Correct?

[gamerz]

I swear when I got my atari 2600 it had asteriods as a pack-in...it was the only game I had for a couple of months

 

 

cool...post 100

[jhd]

I swear when I got my atari 2600 it had asteriods as a pack-in...it was the only game I had for a couple of months

 

When I got my 2600 (Spring 1982), it included both Combat and Asteroids as pack-ins.

 

On the worst list, remember that the Coleco Gemini included the 2600 verision of Donkey Kong -- that really showed off the system!

 

I think the pack-in was later changed to Mouse Trap.

[chrisbid]

 

 

NES Gyromite was a pack-in for the Robot? Correct?

 

 

yeah, the NES set that came with the robot had Duck Hunt and Gyromite. Funny thing was that SMB was included with the barebones set, and quickly became more popular, thus the Action Set that came with the Zapper and the NES's version of combat - Super Mario Bros. / Duck Hunt combo cart was released

[Ze_ro]

Best: Super Mario World (SNES)

Worst: Speedway - Spinout - CryptoLogic (Odyssey^2)

 

--Zero

[Nukey Shay]

Hmm...nobody's mentioned the Fairchild's "hockey" and "tennis"

[DeV0]

Best i think is asteroid built in for the 7800.

 

Worst is IMHO Altered beast with the mega drive.

[Room 34]

*EDIT* Never mind. I wrote a long rant before I saw someone was in Canada. I am probably out of line.

[DracIsBack]

LOL.

 

Best packins?

 

I've gotta give it to:

 

Super Mario Bros - NES

Alex Kidd In Miracle World - SMS II

Sonic - Genesis

 

Worst Packin:

Hands down:

 

Flight Similator II, Bug Hunt and Missile Command - Atari XEGS.

[joeybastard]

BEST: Super Mario All Stars + SM World - late in life for the SNES (I would actually give to Nintendo for overall having the best pack ins.)

VCS: Combat - 3rd best 2 player game after Indy 500 and Warlords.

CV: Donkey Kong

 

 

WORST: 5200 Breakout just sucks. It's not even as good as the VCS version with paddles.

Keith Courage in Alpha Zones for the TG16. I've grown to appreciate this game a bit more, but overall it's pretty lame.

Sewer Shark for the Sega CD: It sucks.