What is the worse atari game ever made?

[Rom Hunter]

DEVELOPMENT HISTORY

 

BurgerTime was a priority for the Marketing department. After losing out on the best arcade licenses to Atari and Coleco, Mattel Electronics made a deal with Data East USA to put their arcade games onto Intellivision. Data East had limited distribution in the United States, so none of the games Mattel Electronics obtained were very well known. But BurgerTime was so good that Bally/Midway, the largest arcade game distributor, licensed the title from Data East. Soon BurgerTime was in arcades everywhere. Mattel had accidentally acquired a hit.

 

Not wanting this to go to waste, Marketing decreed that BurgerTime would appear on every platform Mattel supported: Intellivision, Atari 2600, Colecovision, IBM PC, Apple II, Aquarius and handheld.

 

Ron Surratt, manager of Atari 2600 programming, inspected the game and came to a conclusion: it couldn't be done on Atari. Marketing asked what additional programming resources would be required. None, Ron replied, it can't be done. What hardware modifications needed to be made to the cartridge? You're not getting it, Ron said, it can't be done. No, Marketing came back, you're not getting it: BurgerTime WILL be released for Atari.

 

Ron set about programming the game. A hardware scheme to give him more memory to work with was devised, but complicating matters was that the game was not allowed to flicker.

 

A hardware restriction of the Atari 2600 is that when too many moving characters - sprites - are in a row on-screen, they begin to flicker. In the original M Network games, APh Technology Consulting did a great job of orchestrating sprite movements to minimize this flicker - far better than Atari had in their own original releases. Marketing had jumped on this, pointing to the lack of flicker as proof of M Network superiority. Of course, this meant that all new games had to meet the standard of the early ones: no - or very little - flicker.

 

Unfortunately, the highest scoring move in the game, dropping all of the bad guys - nasties - at one time, requires that they all be in a row. So how could he keep a row of sprites from flickering? Ron used something of a cheat: a regular sprite's look is defined by the programmer, but there is also a special sprite - a missile - defined by the hardware. A missile is simply a rectangle intended, as its name implies, to be used as the graphic for a projectile. The programmer cannot change its shape, only its color and width. Despite its graphical limitations, missiles do have one advantage: they don't flicker when in a row with other sprites. So Ron made a square missile orange and called it a slice of cheese, made another square white and called it an egg, and made a thin missile brown and called it a bread stick. Voila: no flickering.

 

Some fans of BurgerTime were disappointed to find that the chef was being chased around the maze by colored squares and sticks, but most were happy that the gameplay was quite faithful to the original arcade version and to Intellivision BurgerTime.

 

Edited December 29, 2010 by Rom Hunter

[Rom Hunter]

Burger Time is horrific IMO.

I agree, but I read somewhere that it was quite an achievement programming wise.

 

Perhaps Thomas can tell us more about it.

 

 

I wonder how it can be an achievement in terms of programming when it is such a terrible game?

Shadow of the Beast on the Amiga sucks too, but it's one of the most famous Amiga games ever made, because of its programming achievements.

 

[R.O.T.S]

There are quite a few to choose from but i was not keen on quite a few of the early Atari and i do not think some types of sport can be simulated very well with such poor tech-spec.Lets face it ET and Pacman are far from the worst games its just people felt dissapointed and cheated after what were simply rushed jobs but i would rarther play either than Tic Tac Toe

Here is just a few off the top of my head:-

 

Brain Games

3D Tic Tac Toe

Boxing

Tunnel Runner

RS:Baseball

RS:Football

Bowling

Video Olympics

Street Racer

Code Breaker

River Patrol

Canyon Bomber

Football

Title Match Pro Wrestling

Edited December 29, 2010 by R.O.T.S

[schuwalker]

Apparently alot of you haven't played Firefly?

[earthdefence]

mmm i didnt like the atari 2600 bowling

[Miss 2600]

 

Here is just a few off the top of my head:-

 

Brain Games

3D Tic Tac Toe

Boxing

Tunnel Runner

 

 

Whoa! I thought Tunnel Runner was one of the favorite games for AtariAgers (I don't have that one, though)

[lhfreak]

Slot Machine.

[Rik]

AFAIC, there's no such thing as the worse game.I seen games called the worse by some, and the same games called great by others .Some swear E.T is the absolute worse, we all know a lot like E.T.Just because a majority say a game is bad doesn't mean it is, that's up to the individual to decide no matter what others say.If i listened to reviewers opinions of which games not to buy, i would of missed out on a lot of great games.So, that's how i look at it.

Edited December 30, 2010 by Rik

[Belfry]

Halloween. The first ever video game DECAPITATION!

 

Heads will roll......(I know...BAD JOKE!)

[R. Jones]

[ . . . ]

 

Also, a lot of the recent "L@@k! I haz made Atari gamez!" homebrews are awful esp. when put to cart and boxed and sold for $40 as a "limited edition"

 

N.E.R.D.S. anyone?

Yes. I have a theory on this. I think bB has made possible the worst Atari games.

 

Before I traveled with the carnival, I experimented with making games on the 2600. Now that I'm living in a more stable place, my sweet gf likes to have tv. I've been using the Atari to run simple apps for EMDR, meditation, and some imagination experiments.

 

The Atari 2600 is a very raw, primal, abstract, larval, difficult, simple, game system. Before you can start playing around with anything, you have write the display. Each instruction is written in assembly; they are physical locations, actual spaces for electrons to flow. There isn't that abstraction where you work with ideas like "triangles" and "values".

 

Assembler programmers on the 2600 are forced to acquire a certain amount of respect for the machine. Home-brewers are programming for the love of it. No one is going to spend weeks writing the display, and the physics engine, and the levels, and the sound and testing it, and then finish up their loose ends with an afternoon of loveless work.

 

That's exactly what a lot of bB games are tho. Batari (Fred Quimby) has created several excellent kernels, and put a lot cleverness, love, knowledge, and hardwork into the engines that drive bB. The games that he makes with it show all that (try Gingerbread Man if you're doubting bB). Some programmers scratch out a few hours of uninformed, unpassionate, carless, and boring code on top of batari's engines, and call that their game.

 

I'm not knocking bB. I'm not knocking all bB games; jrock, Atarius Maximus, RT, and others have made interesting software with it. I'm hesitant to criticize the people that are just exploring; i like exploration. NERDS I'm quite willing to criticize. Solar Plexus, . . . meh.

[+Random Terrain]

I'm not knocking bB. I'm not knocking all bB games; jrock, Atarius Maximus, RT, and others have made interesting software with it. I'm hesitant to criticize the people that are just exploring; I like exploration. NERDS I'm quite willing to criticize. Solar Plexus, . . . meh.

Just remember that Solar Plexus was made when batari Basic had fewer features.

 

And yeah, experimenting/exploring/learning are great, it just sucks when people want to rush a buggy, unpolished mess to cartridge. Putting it in a pretty box won't make the game any better. They don't have to spend 8 years trying to make the game as perfect as possible, but it would be nice if it didn't look like they slapped it together over the weekend. What godzillajoe said seems to be true for some ("L@@k! I haz made Atari gamez!"). It's as if they don't care about the player and just want the label of "Atari 2600 programmer" to feed their ego or boost their low self-esteem. We need to have higher standards without falling into crippling perfectionism where nothing gets done.

[getbent]

Golf is awful. Also, Starship, Pacman, Crystal Castles, and Zaxxon.

Edited December 30, 2010 by getbent

[Miss 2600]

I loved Zaxxon when I was a kid. It was one of my favorite games!

[tz101]

Did I mention Sssnake?

[godzillajoe]

Why no love for Crystal Castles? That's a great port considering the system limitations.

[+Random Terrain]

Why no love for Crystal Castles? That's a great port considering the system limitations.

Maybe because it's as bad as the arcade version?

 

Programmer #1: "I have an idea! Let's make a game like Pac-Man where it's harder to eat the dots. You can actually walk past them!"

 

Programmer #2: "Great idea! And what if the player can get stuck on the walls?"

 

Programmer #1: "Perfect!"

[godzillajoe]

Ha. it's not a bug, it's a feature!

[BydoEmpire]

Data Age's Airlock is the worst Atari game I've ever played. It's terrible.

[tz101]

^

Hmmmm, another rotten one from Data Age. Imagine that.

[Chuck D. Head]

Why no love for Crystal Castles? That's a great port considering the system limitations.

Maybe because it's as bad as the arcade version?

 

Programmer #1: "I have an idea! Let's make a game like Pac-Man where it's harder to eat the dots. You can actually walk past them!"

 

Programmer #2: "Great idea! And what if the player can get stuck on the walls?"

 

Programmer #1: "Perfect!"

 

I am surprised this one gets as much love as it does. I played the hell out of the arcade game and heard several people say it was a great port, so I tried it. Instant regret. I'd love to have a go at this game again with the ball, havent seen a machine in ages.

[Red 5]

I love Air Lock. It's all kinds of fun and has a great victory screen.

 

 

Karate is undebateable as the worst game ever made for any system. Just because the people are big means nothing. It is unplayable. It is broken. It is ugly. It serves no purpose. It is pointless. It is a disaster. If you think there is a worse game than Karate it only means you haven't played Karate. Rule one of Karate, don't play Karate. I'm on a boat. Look at the Atari, look at me, look at Karate. It's an abomination against God.

[Red 5]

There are quite a few to choose from but i was not keen on quite a few of the early Atari and i do not think some types of sport can be simulated very well with such poor tech-spec.Lets face it ET and Pacman are far from the worst games its just people felt dissapointed and cheated after what were simply rushed jobs but i would rarther play either than Tic Tac Toe

Here is just a few off the top of my head:-

 

Tunnel Runner

 

HOW DAAAAAAAAAREEE YOU SIR ! ! ! HOW DARE YOU ! ! !

 

LOCK THE THREAD ! !

 

Banned for life! Banned for life I say ! ! ! Where are the moderators?!?!?! BLASPHEMY ! ! !

 

Tunnel Runner is quite simply the best Atari game there is. It is brilliant. That is all!

 

(Getting the pitchforks and torches.)

[toptenmaterial]

never really liked desert falcon or kangaroo

desert falcon on the 7800 is quite good actually, never played the VCS version but I bet that depth perception was impossible and that your bird dies a lot

[Stan]

Bugs

 

There is no comparison. E.T., yeah, it has some bad things going on, but it still has some semblance of gameplay. Bugs has absolutely nothing. The storyline is interesting but doesn't translate at all, the bugs don't really look like bugs at all (one is in fact a salamander), the "Phalanx" is easily the most annoying enemy in video game history, the collison detection is questionable, the firing angle is horrid, and you rarely play for longer than a minute because it's literally impossible. There is nothing else to say. This should be judged on the quality of the graphics, sound, and especially the gameplay, none of which this horrid thing has.

[Atari_Falcon]

It's not so clear for myself.

 

I was most disappointed when I finally got Donkey Kong Jr for my Atari 2600. I mean it still is a good game, but graphics look ugly and you play a green ape... no fruits on screen and sound is also not more than average:( Really disappointing. I still like it for it's gameplay, but it was my biggest disappointment.

 

Regarding E.T. and Pacman, I think they are far away from being the worst. Pacman might have been a big disappointment, but it is not a bad game.

 

Pac Kong is really bad, I never played it for more than just a few minutes. Should be beyond the worst games of all time