What is the game that Atari 8-bit is "known for?"

[supercat]

Star Raiders probably didn't push the platform to it's limit but the machine is definitely known for it and it was probably one of if not the top seller on the machine. It's still being talked about today.

 

Star Raiders may not have pushed the 800 to its limits, but it pushed the Atari 800 far beyond anything any other home computer had done or would do for quite some time. It wasn't the earliest first-person-space-shooter, but it was the first non-feeble one.

[MEtalGuy66]

Part of the problem with discussion is the original question.

You seem to have people either going the "known for" route or "pushes the platform to it's limit" route.

 

First of all, I think both qualify as far as "landmark title" goes. But neither title may meet all the criteria.

 

Star Raiders probably didn't push the platform to it's limit but the machine is definitely known for it and it was probably one of if not the top seller on the machine. It's still being talked about today.

 

Alternate Reality: The City definitely pushes the chipset to the limit... but I don't think the machine is "known for" it. I certainly haven't seen any articles dedicated to it beyond old reviews and it's available for several machines. I think it was actually more popular on the C64.

 

There have been several quite extensive websites devoted entirely to Alternate Reality. The absolute consensus of EVERYONE iv'e ever seen involved in the AR scene is that the Atari 8-bit version is by far the most complete, most graphically and musically embellished, and has the highest degree of playability. It is widely considered to be "the only version to play" and the overall best version by far. Not coincidentally, the ATari 8-bit is thep latform that the game was first developed on and conceptualized for.

 

Star raiders may not "push the limits of the chipset" in the sense that it is utilizing every trick and feature to get maxiumum colors on screen, or best use of the pokey for sound & music, but in the sense that it is calculating and displaying realtime pseudo-3d combat area, tracking multiple players withing this space, and depicting explosions, space-rocks, variable speed, etc. with very few and minor "bog downs" is pretty kuch making efficient use of "throughput" of the CPU and display hardware. And as I said before, with the limitation of 8k of code, and 16k of RAM, I would call it a pretty damn efficient use of resources, if not a absolute maximization...

[Xebec's Demise]

I wonder how much compensation he recieved from atari, since they ended up selling it as a smash hit title for their next 10 machines. heh. and since they never asked him to write the game to begin with..

 

That same website also says this about Doug and Star Raiders:

 

"Sadly software licensing was different in those days, and he didn't make a penny off the game."

 

Edited October 2, 2007 by Xebec's Demise