My Top 5 Worst Atari 2600 Games Ever Video

[bigfriendly]

49 minutes ago, zzip said:

I remember seeing Adventure on in-store kiosks in the 2600 heyday, and even then I thought the game looked absolutely terrible even by 2600 standards!

I remember the first time I saw Adventure very well. It was probably in the first 3-6 months of 1982. My friend Jim and I were at K-Mart with my Mom and we naturally wanted to go check out the electronics department so she turned us loose while she was doing her shopping. They had a 2600 set up with Adventure plugged in. I agree that even by 1982 standards it could have been joked on with the simple dot man and the duck dragons but we never even noticed that. We were so caught up in the fact that you had the freedom to move about in so many different rooms and castles that we were blown away by the game. He got it before I did and I played it at his house whenever I was over there. I remember everybody often laughing at how silly the dragons looked but the game was so much fun that you just didn't care. To me it's kind of like watching Star Trek TOS with the goofy low budget effects and cheap sets but the stories are so good that you just don't care. Good times gents. Good times:)

Edited March 19 by bigfriendly

[bigfriendly]

On 3/16/2024 at 5:08 PM, LS650 said:

I know some folks will consider this heresy, but I prefer Lost Luggage over Kaboom!  😆

LOL! That's blasphemy!

[Flyindrew]

My top 5 worst 2600 games

 

1.)Airlock

2.)Donkey Kong Junior

3.)Miniature Golf

4.)Swordquest (all of them)

5.)Raiders of the Lost Ark

[zzip]

1. Swordquest Fireworld

2. Swordquest Earthworld

3. Swordquest Waterworld

4. Swordquest Airworld

5. Any unreleased Swordquest prototypes found in the Atari dumpster

 

[bigfriendly]

1 hour ago, zzip said:

1. Swordquest Fireworld

2. Swordquest Earthworld

3. Swordquest Waterworld

4. Swordquest Airworld

5. Any unreleased Swordquest prototypes found in the Atari dumpster

 

I sure wish I was a gazillionaire then I would hit up Michael Rideout for that smooth solid gold Fireworld Chalice:)

[BillDMatt]

On 3/18/2024 at 5:09 PM, Avenger75 said:

Defender is definitively among the 2600 games I enjoy a lot. 

A choice is always subjective, and I can understand some don't like it,  but  this game is sometimes ranked among the best games on the 2600.

In the arcade version, the control of the fighter is quite complicate, and the 2600 version  is more easy to manage. Stargate is the best evolution of the game.

 

Knowing there are dozen of 2600 games that are really ugly are unplayable, I can not consider Defender as being among the worst one.🤔

what I did like about the atari version was using a city backdrop vs a mountain backdrop,   just made more sense.   how many people are wandering around in the basin of big mountains?  Slim pickings for those Aliens. 

Edited March 25 by BillDMatt

[+cvga]

1 hour ago, BillDMatt said:

what I did like about the atari version was using a city backdrop vs a mountain backdrop,   just made more sense.   how many people are wandering around in the basin of big mountains?  Slim pickings for those Aliens. 

I liked that too. I always considered Defender a pretty good port, especially because I was horrible at the arcade game and it just sucked quarters out of me. Once I got the 2600 version I improved a bit on the arcade version also.

 

Atari 2600 Defender made to a US stamp. I thought that was an interesting choice.

[Living Room Arcade]

A little off topic.  Guys, I just discovered Defender City (link).  Have you guys seen this?  It's awesome!  Look

Same city landscape, same "yellow hat" and "blue square" enemies, but your ship doesn't disappear when you fire.

It's Stargate hacked to look like the old Defender.  If you liked the old Defender, I think you'll agree that this hack is AWESOME!!  

Edited March 26 by Living Room Arcade

[Tinman]

24 minutes ago, Living Room Arcade said:

A little off topic.  Guys, I just discovered Defender City (link).  Have you guys seen this?  It's awesome!  Look

Same city landscape, same "yellow hat" and "blue square" enemies, but your ship doesn't disappear when you fire.

It's Stargate hacked to look like the old Defender.  If you liked the old Defender, I think you'll agree that this hack is AWESOME!!  

I hadn't seen that before, but I definitely will try it!

[zzip]

15 hours ago, cvga said:

I liked that too. I always considered Defender a pretty good port, especially because I was horrible at the arcade game and it just sucked quarters out of me. Once I got the 2600 version I improved a bit on the arcade version also.

I think the 'city' was the least of the problems of the 2600 port.    things like the ship disappearing when you shoot,  "swarmers" that don't swarm and a few other things just removed a lot of the things that made the arcade version great.   At the same time,  I didn't expect much from the 2600, so I never hated this port the way I hated Pac-man.

[BillDMatt]

17 hours ago, cvga said:

I liked that too. I always considered Defender a pretty good port, especially because I was horrible at the arcade game and it just sucked quarters out of me. Once I got the 2600 version I improved a bit on the arcade version also.

 

Atari 2600 Defender made to a US stamp. I thought that was an interesting choice.

it also showed us how much better using multidirectional joystick was than  the combination left right stick and  up and down fire buttons on the arcade.     I know a lot people love the button layouts on many arcade games, but to me space invaders, Defender, Asteroids all just play better with a joystick.  

[Lostdragon]

On 3/19/2024 at 1:40 AM, christo930 said:

Defender was not a bad game. What it was is a poor port of the arcade Defender. Stargate/D2 showed what could be done, at least with an extra kb of RAM. Plus, I think Defender was only 4k while Stargate was 8k plus the extra 128 bytes of RAM. It probably could have been much, much better as an 8k game even without the extra RAM. It's actually surprising that they released it as a 4k game. Asteroids also came out in 1981 and was released as an 8k game.

 

 

 

A totally fair appraisal. 

 

 

From the coder Q+A:

 

 

Q: How long did it take you to code and test Defender (2600)?  How did you manage to do so much with so little storage?

Bob Polaro: About 6 months was the standard for most of these games.  We were able to get away with such little ROM (4K) and RAM (128 bytes) because we didn’t stress graphics as much as game play.  The low-res playfield had a lot do with it as well.  Most of the space was for logic.  The drawbacks for the machine were the cycle limitations per scan line (called the 76 cycle blues) and only having 5 objects to move around: 2 missiles, 2 players, and a ball.  If the calculations in the game loop exceeded a certain time the screen would roll, which was considered "fatal".  Surprisingly enough however, we had lots of colors because all the lums were available.

Q: What are the steps to doing a coin-op translation like Defender?  Do you get use of a coin-op to play?  Do you get a copy of the original source code to look at?  Do you work with video tapes or screen captures?

Bob Polaro: We had all the games in house that we translated to.  The main challenge with Defender was getting it to work and feel right using only the joystick rather than all those buttons.  A number of people actually preferred this version because of the ease of play.  Hardcore gamers obviously like the coin-op version.  The long range scanner was also quite tricky.  The only thing I would have done different if I had to do it over again would be to make more of an effort to avoid the ship from disappearing when firing.  The original source is usually useless to us because of the major design changes.  Screen captures were also unnecessary.  We just need the game play, then we add the graphics.  Usually a whole game would be completed by just using boxes as the objects.

 

 

https://www.ataricompendium.com/archives/interviews/bob_polaro/interview_bob_polaro.html
 

[bigfriendly]

5 hours ago, Living Room Arcade said:

Same city landscape, same "yellow hat" and "blue square" enemies, but your ship doesn't disappear when you fire.

It's Stargate hacked to look like the old Defender.  If you liked the old Defender, I think you'll agree that this hack is AWESOME!!  

Thanks for sharing I will check this out:)