4+ player games on the 8 bit?

[guyjin]

I find it odd that Atari decided to reduce the number of controller ports to 2 in the XL/XE lines.

 

Was the feature simply not used much? What A8 games use 3 or 4 joysticks, or 5+ paddles?

[Urchlay]

MULE and Asteroids both support 4-player simultaneous play, lots of fun.

 

Super Breakout can use up to 8 paddles, but there's no real point: players take turns, so the game could have been done with one paddle that gets passed around...

[mimo]

get a multijoy interface and have some 16 player games

[olavese@online.no]

MULE and Asteroids both support 4-player simultaneous play, lots of fun.

 

Super Breakout can use up to 8 paddles, but there's no real point: players take turns, so the game could have been done with one paddle that gets passed around...

 

Mule alone is worth getting an 800 for ... Excellent fun

 

Wasn't Dandy Dungeons also 4 player? Not sure about Gauntlet, but it should have been :-)

[Bryan]

You can play 4-player Castle Crisis on any 2-port Atari.

[Rybags]

I believe MULE can be played with 3 people on newer machines (2 paddles, 1 stick).

 

That's a hack worth looking into - add 4th player ability via keyboard.

[littleman jack]

Floyd of the Jungle was a four player, as was Basketball.

 

There's a list out there somewhere on an Atari 8-bit FAQ page.

 

One game was listed as an 8 player game with the paddles.

 

I can't remember which game however. Maybe Super Breakout?

 

Yes, Super Breakout. Sorry, it's listed above. Urchlay already mentiond it.

 

I'll have to find that page again. There's a good number of games on that list.

Edited August 7, 2008 by littleman jack

[Allas]

MULE WARS 7 players with only one control

[Fletch]

Two of my favorite games, Ali Baba and Return of Heracles support all 4 ports. I remember having 16 player adventures after school way back when I resembled a youth.

 

Fletch

[+hunmanik]

There's a list out there somewhere on an Atari 8-bit FAQ page.

 

I'll have to find that page again. There's a good number of games on that list.

 

http://www.faqs.org/faqs/atari-8-bit/faq/section-69.html

[Mathy]

Hello guys

 

get a multijoy interface and have some 16 player games

Actually, I should have quoted all messages except this one.

 

Atleast mimo knows about the multijoy interface (and probably the multilink interface too).

 

Check out my Special Stuff Page for some information on both interfaces.

 

Greetings

 

Mathy

[games-video]

Cosmic Crusaders is a 12 player game (or 16 players, cannot remember without unpacking it).

 

Top right hand side, yellow cover:

 

Edited August 9, 2008 by games-video

[littleman jack]

Thanks for the link hunmanik!

[+therealbountybob]

The good old classic Dandy Dungeons is 4 player simultaneous... it's still great fun on a two port Atari 8-bit as you can control 2 players each at the same time

 

Also Thank God It's Friday

 

Am sure there are loads more...

[a8maestro]

Hi, ports 3 and 4 were probably used more than expected. But when designing the XL, Atari needed to be cheap, and needed a way to soft control the Diagnostics, OS, and internal Basic at least. So instead of spending money for another hardware chip, they took over the less used ports 3 and 4. With the XE, they added Antic and CPU controll for banked ram.

 

Dandy Dungeon is great with four joysticks, I was playing it just recently. I have it on my site at : http://www.a8maestro.com/atari/info/ballsg.htm.

 

Rick D.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

I find it odd that Atari decided to reduce the number of controller ports to 2 in the XL/XE lines.

 

Was the feature simply not used much? What A8 games use 3 or 4 joysticks, or 5+ paddles?