Atari 2600+ 10 in 1 Multicart Challenge

PengPeng0118 · December 3, 2023

Fellow Gamers,

I present to you a summary of my process in creating a challenge for the Atari 2600+ which takes advantage of the newly released 10 in 1 cartridge. This cartridge being announced gave me the idea for a timed challenge for “completing” all ten games as fast as possible in a row. This format was inspired by the Nintendo World Championships multicart as well as the popular Marihour challenge. Please see below for a write up on what I am classifying as “completing” each game. I encourage all readers to leave feedback on whether or not a score or objective feels too easy/hard. This is meant to be moderately challenging for the average video game player.

The game order will follow the game list on the cartridge.

Game 1: Adventure®

Default Game 2 difficulty B, complete the game.

Game 2: Combat®

How do you do 1 player Combat®!? Well, after some research there are websites that have competitive categories for Combat®, essentially rack up most points till the internal game timer of 2 min 16 seconds runs out. For this challenge tanks with guided missiles in the complex maze and earn 20 points seemed like a nice representation for the game. Game 7 difficulty B.

Game 3: Dodge ‘Em™

A fair amount of players have maxed this one with certain patterns but referring to the Atari Log Book I decided a reasonable score of 600 on Game 1 difficulty was a good challenge.

Game 4: Haunted House®

Default Game 4 difficulty B, complete the game. Game 4 made sense to me because it introduces the master key in a random location.

Game 5: Maze Craze™

This was unexpectedly challenging to decide on due to the number of game variations. I ultimately decided on Game 4 (Capture) Auto Peek, visibility 2. This game mode displays on the top of the screen reading left to right 1 - 4 - 2. Game mode 4 is capture where you (cop) have to capture the robbers, this felt the most true to the title for me. In practice I found the auto peek function to be preferable over the manual peek. Visibility 2 removes the center strip of the screen until the auto peek activates. I feel this amount of visibility provides a bit of a challenge while greater invisibility would make it so most players would just run into walls blindly.

Game 6: Missile Command®

Game 1 difficulty B score 50,000 points. I found this score to be a reasonable score to achieve for an average player.

Game 7: RealSports® Volleyball

Game 1 B, win/complete the game by getting to 15 points.

Game 8: Surround™

Game 4B, most game modes aren’t 1 player but 4 is and has the ramp up in speed feature providing a little more of a challenge vs. the regular speed 1 player mode. Remember to use the joystick on the right side, not left!

Game 9: Video Pinball™

Game 1B, Scoring 100,000 points seemed like a good number. Fairly achievable and should not take too much time to get to. The intent of this challenge also is to try and not make any one game take too long compared to the others.

Game 10: Yar’s Revenge®

Game 2B, Score 70,000 points. The shield changes to blue and seems like a reasonable stopping point. The ending time for the run can be when the shield changes color which I find fitting to complete the challenge.

Additional Notes:

The run would start when player movement in Adventure® begins and ends when the shield turns blue in Yars Revenge®. Timing does not stop at any point in between so that means physical time to change dip switch settings, swapping left joystick to right for Surround™ and any in-game resets all count towards the total elapsed time.

If you made it this far you’re awesome and please let me know what you think down below!