Top 10 Worst Atari 2600 Games? (Not counting E.T. or Pac-Man)

[the_wizard_666]

Mr. Do! is very playable with nice graphics and use of colors too. Surprised to see the hate for this one. You guys confusing it with Mr. Do!'s Castle by chance? Now there's a confusing steamy pile of...

Oh no, I'm definitely not confusing anything. And I agree, Mr. Do!'s Castle is pure shit as well.

[+KaeruYojimbo]

Fair enough. Enjoy being eaten by your crocodiles, and I'll just continue dying from umm... frogs?

 

They must be the poisonous kind. I like to think of it as a relatively quick death vs. a slow, lingering one.

[Prosystemsearch]

personally I have little to no problem with VCS M. DO!. The VCS port of Do's castle, however...

[glazball]

Some of these choices are simply ridiculous - Berzerk, H.E.R.O., Pitfall 1 or 2, Demons to Diamonds, Defender, etc. Even if you aren't personally a fan, they aren't in the bottom 10.

 

I'll add: Bugs by DataAge - awful and unplayable

[TheXix]

Pac-Man is at the top of my list of 2600 games that I greatly enjoy, along with Ms Pac-Man. It isn't the same as the arcade game, not even close, but playing on game option 3 with the monsters slowed down I can actually play it for quite a while and get through something like 10 levels before the monsters speed up to a point where it gets difficult. I love Pac-Man. Maybe it's because I'm not necessarily looking for a challenge. I play video games to have fun, not to be a masochist. While Pac-Man is flawed (I won't argue with that), it is genuinely fun to play.

 

Star Ship is my favorite "short game that lasts two minutes", in the same category as Air-Sea Battle, Canyon Bomber, and other such games. After struggling with StarMaster and a host of other games where the enemy relentlessly fires back, I get to have two minutes of fun shooting Klingon warships, flying saucers, and pink robots. Don't mind me, just cruising along in my invincible star ship! Sure, there are asteroids floating around, but all they can do is slow me down. I'm not trying to get a high score or anything, just having fun... in my invincible star ship where nothing can kill me. Yeah! Eh, who am I kidding? It sucks. But I like it.

 

Defender was great back in the day. I was just a kid at the time, so what did I know? I played it to death when I was young, along with Pac-Man and many others. Defender hasn't aged well as a video game, in my opinion. The arcade game isn't very playable by current day standards because the controls are so counter-intuitive. I realize there are players who mastered those controls and got it down to an art form, but let's face the truth here: the controls were clumsy. The Atari 2600 fixes that problem with intuitive controls (just point your ship in the direction you want to go).

 

Superman (also mentioned here as a bad game) is actually kinda fun when you know what's going on and what you have to do. I like it. It's not awesome, but not terrible either.

 

Empire Strikes Back is good. I like it.

 

H.E.R.O. I have mixed feelings about. It's good, but you really have to learn the levels by trial and error, memorize your route through each level, and then play it like a proper badass. Not one of my favorites, but not awful either.

 

Tutankham is one of my favorite games, although it's too hard for me. I still like it, though.

 

Good to see that no one mentioned my all-time favorite game: Gravitar. I mostly play on game option 5 (no gravity), which is ironic because the game is about gravity. Option 5 makes it a completely different game, harder because you have to thrust everywhere, and easier because you're not struggling against gravity the whole time.

[toiletunes]

My ten worst games not already mentioned:

Wall Ball

Cosmic Swarm

Activision Decathlon

Final Approach

Backgammon

Gorf

Blackjack

Word Zapper

Human Cannonball

Space Jockey

Edited April 12, 2017 by toiletunes

[BassGuitari]

My ten worst games not already mentioned:

Wall Ball

Cosmic Swarm

Activision Decathlon

Final Approach

Backgammon

Gorf

Blackjack

Word Zapper

Human Cannonball

Space Jockey

A few thoughts on some of these:

 

Cosmic Swarm: I think this is a decent game but it does get pretty tedious. I like what it was going for, though.

GORF: For real? This is sort of a hidden gem for me (I love the arcade version). I feel like the game itself might be a "love it/hate it" deal, or at least an acquired taste--I didn't dig it for a while, either.

Blackjack: I dunno, it's blackjack. It's a competent enough version for casual blackjack players, although it's a cartridge rendered unnecessary by Casino.

[toiletunes]

Gorf: I might like it more if I was familiar with the arcade, but without that experience- have you played Vulture Attack? ( It's like a cheap knockoff Demon Attack.) Gorf feels like a cross between Vulture Attack and Pigs in Space.

There's a few love-it-or-hate-it games on my list. I almost included Dragster.

Edited April 12, 2017 by toiletunes

[the_wizard_666]

Activision Decathlon? Really? I actually really enjoyed playing that with my buddies. Of course, we used the Track & Field controller to not destroy our hands or joysticks, but I don't see how it could be considered one of the worst on the system even with the standard sticks.

[eegad]

1.Superman

2.Firefly

3.Any Sword Quest

 

 

Interesting to see the differences of opinions on this.

 

On the one hand, my own vote BY FAR is that Firefly is the worst game ever. I bought it for 99 cents and still felt ripped off. I also was disappointed in the Swordquest games....I don't know that I really hated them, but they weren't really full "games" to me...more like a stupid incomprehensible puzzle tied to a comic book insert.

 

But on the other hand, Superman is one of my all time favorite 2600 games. Adventure is by far my favorite, and I can't even come up with an estimate of how many hundreds (thousands?) of times I've played it through the years. But honestly, I'd have to venture a guess that Superman is probably my 2nd most played game on the 2600. Basically, same thing as Adventure....go from room to room, looking to collect objects and bring them somewhere. The only thing about Superman that I do not like is that the flickering annoys me more than Adventure does.

[AtariLeaf]

 

Gorf: I might like it more if I was familiar with the arcade, but without that experience- have you played Vulture Attack? ( It's like a cheap knockoff Demon Attack.) Gorf feels like a cross between Vulture Attack and Pigs in Space.

There's a few love-it-or-hate-it games on my list. I almost included Dragster.

 

 

Gorf is ok on the 2600, not great but not terrible IMO. The best version that I have anyway, is the C64 version. Vulture Attack is horrible though, I had two copies and sold them, pretty sure to someone here, at least one of them anyway. Dragster I never liked because I could never figure it out. Plus I can't find a game that literally only lasts a few seconds to be of any real enjoyment.

[BassGuitari]

 

Gorf is ok on the 2600, not great but not terrible IMO. The best version that I have anyway, is the C64 version.

Truth. The Commodore 64 version is tits. It's also one of, like, two games that use the Magic Voice, which is arguably worth the cost even just for GORF and Wizard of Wor.

[Atari PAC-MAN Fan]

Truth. The Commodore 64 version is tits. It's also one of, like, two games that use the Magic Voice, which is arguably worth the cost even just for GORF and Wizard of Wor.

Gorf is one of my arcade favorites. However i'm not a huge fan of Gorf on any home system. I think it's due to the Galaxians level being missing form all ports. I suspect it was due to licensing issues. If your're gonna play a perfect version of Gorf on Atari consoles, get the Atari Jaguar Version. I feel the same about Wizard of Wor. They could have done better, but I guess that's what Wizard of Wor 16K is for.

[AtariLeaf]

I can understand why many would dislike Human cannonball but that game is fun for me. It was one of the games that eventually led me to being a huge Worms fan.

[atariactionman]

I can't believe no one has mentioned Space War. I was so excited to get this cart. Great picture on the box, a nice looking cart. So plug it in and what? Where are the aliens to shoot at? What All there is to do is dock with a moving block? I was so disappointed with this. I have only played it a handful of times in the nearly 40 years Ive had it. Still got it neatly boxed up. But hate this oh God yes!

[BassGuitari]

I can't believe no one has mentioned Space War. I was so excited to get this cart. Great picture on the box, a nice looking cart. So plug it in and what? Where are the aliens to shoot at? What All there is to do is dock with a moving block? I was so disappointed with this. I have only played it a handful of times in the nearly 40 years Ive had it. Still got it neatly boxed up. But hate this oh God yes!

Space War gets a pass from me because it really is a pretty fun 2-player game, IMO. But that's its problem, along with many other early releases like Combat, Street Racer, and Slot Racers--without somebody to play with, there's not much game there.

 

Edit: I think the space docking game is kinda fun, actually. At least in small doses. You feel like you're in one of those old sci-fi movies where they're landing on a planet or something. "6 degrees starboard....hard to port...thrusters to 20%...." and other nonsense. It's maybe the most cerebral arcade-style game I can think of aside from Lunar Lander (the arcade version, not the Star Ship version).

Edited April 22, 2017 by BassGuitari

[+FujiSkunk]

Space War was a port of one of the first popular computer games, Spacewar! for the PDP-1. If you had kept up with computer games before the Atari 2600, you knew what you were getting. Agreed though, the artwork is a bit misleading otherwise.

[+FujiSkunk]

Space War was a port of one of the first popular computer games, Spacewar! for the PDP-1. If you had kept up with computer games before the Atari 2600, you knew what you were getting. Agreed though, the artwork is a bit misleading otherwise.

[Atari PAC-MAN Fan]

Space War could have been awesome. I know it was the early days of the 2600, but they could have at least made a black background with white dots instead of a green background. Someone should make a remake or something to replace the original Space War.

[polyex]

The Texas Chainsaw Massacre

 

I don't like calling something the worst, but I would say this was my biggest Atari disappointment as a kid. When I was 12 I saw the Texas Chainsaw Massacre movie on a VHS rental and loved it. When I saw an ad in the back of Fangoria magazine announcing an Atari 2600 version of the movie, I immediately ordered the game with money that I managed to scrounge up from birthday gifts, odd jobs etc. If I remember correctly the game came out late. It was supposed to come out for Christmas (1982?) and it did not arrive until some time after that. This just added to the anticipation. When it finally arrived I was busting at the seams to play. After the first round or two I was like, uh oh, this is it? Now I look back at the game with some sentimental feelings, but at the time I remember being disappointed a bit. I still have the original cart, my mother threw out the box which sucks as they are worth a fortune.

[NE146]

I'm surprised anyone would pick Superman.. in my opinion it's one of the best early VCS titles by far and is still fun & playable today.

[NE146]

Space War was a port of one of the first popular computer games, Spacewar! for the PDP-1. If you had kept up with computer games before the Atari 2600, you knew what you were getting. Agreed though, the artwork is a bit misleading otherwise.

 

I don't know how many of us as kids in the late 70's knew about the PDP-1. I'm sure a lot more of us were more familiar with the Cinematronics arcade game (which was based on it of course).

[zzip]

I don't know how many of us as kids in the late 70's knew about the PDP-1. I'm sure a lot more of us were more familiar with the Cinematronics arcade game (which was based on it of course).

Exactly, although that arcade game was IIRC kinda rare and almost as obscure as the PDP-1

[high voltage]

I can understand why many would dislike Human cannonball but that game is fun for me. It was one of the games that eventually led me to being a huge Worms fan.

Same here, and Artillery Duel

[+FujiSkunk]

 

I don't know how many of us as kids in the late 70's knew about the PDP-1. I'm sure a lot more of us were more familiar with the Cinematronics arcade game (which was based on it of course).

 

You're right, of course. I didn't mean to imply that people have to be familiar with the PDP-1 game to know about Space War. It actually made its way across several early computer systems, along with the arcade game. I should have said, those familiar with the game's history prior to the 2600 would have known what they were getting... misleading artwork notwithstanding.