Chronogamer

I hadn't seen this entry before. The keypads weren't terribly popular, and the cartridge is really boring without one, but it's not a bad cart for when it came out. Interesting that the game uses both high-resolution and low-resolution digits. Sorta odd, actually, since using high-resolution digits for everything would have taken less code.

I hadn't seen this entry before.  The keypads weren't terribly popular, and the cartridge is really boring without one, but it's not a bad cart for when it came out.  Interesting that the game uses both high-resolution and low-resolution digits.  Sorta odd, actually, since using high-resolution digits for everything would have taken less code.

 

!!! Hmm, I didn't notice that. You're right, of course. Low-res for the scores and high-res for the sequence numbers. From what I've read Atari was scrambling to come up with keyboard games because of the Odyssey^2. Maybe they used the low res for the scores because they could copy the code from a previous game? In this case, "time" might have been harder to come by than code space. Interesting though.

Maybe they used the low res for the scores because they could copy the code from a previous game? In this case, "time" might have been harder to come by than code space. Interesting though.

 

Using the same code to show the sequence number and the scores would not have been difficult if the two player's scores were shown on different lines. Even with their scores on the same line, it would have been no more difficult than the 2x2 digit lores score routine. In "Combat", using high-resolution score routines would have required tracking objects' horizontal positions, complicating things. But Brain Games relocates the sprites horizontally multiple times per frame anyway, so doing a couple more wouldn't have been any extra work.

Bite Me

 

HAHA

 

I liked all the variations. I just sucked at the Add Me modes where the timer went down too fast. Not just because the adding was a bit difficult to do in such a short time, but also because I was using the keyboard and the default key assignments were very bad to type in numbers quickly (1-3, Q-E, A-D, and X). And I didn't feel like changing them for just that variation.

 

About the discussion above, I think you guys missed the programmer/designer's goal. He basically opted for diversity, using one "font" for the score, and another for the gameplay. I think it makes sense, and since space wasn't probably an issue with game, he could afford the extra code. Also, he could have wanted to be consistent with the other games, thus sticking to low-res numbers for the mode selection and scoring.