Picture of Jakks Pacific "Paddle" console.

[izzy]

Well, my car actually does go kaboom when it backfires.

[SS]

Well, my car actually does go kaboom when it backfires.

 

Izzy will buy it!

[Curt Vendel]

I was fortunate enough yesterday to receive an advanced release of the new upcoming Jakks Atari Paddle Games Controller. (I assisted in several areas of this product design.)

 

This new game controller, just like the Atari 10-in-1 Joystick by Jakks is a reproduction of the original Atari 2600 controller. This time is a reproduction of the Paddle controllers.

 

These new game controllers come in two flavors, a single player and a new two player model which comes with an extra paddle controller wired into it for head to head gameplay. To accomodate the electronics and battery compartment the primary controller has the same lines as the original paddle but is longer with an area for the power and menu buttons, the depth is deeper but fits and feels comfortable in the players hand. For the two player version the 2nd paddle is a near perfect replica of the original Atari 2600 paddle controller.

 

The system starts up with a title/credit/trademark screen then proceeds to what I can only describe as a fantastic Menu'ing design. On the left side of the screen you see a label-end stack of Atari 2600 cartridges listing the games available to play, these include: Video Olympics, Casino, Night Driver, Canyon Bomber, Street Racer, Super Breakout, Warlords, Pong, Circus Atari, Steeple Chase, Demonds to Diamonds and as an added bonus Arcade Warlords and Arcade Pong.

 

The right side of the screen shows a Pong Arcade and Warlords arcade to select these two extra bonus arcade games, there is also a link to credits for the Digital Eclipse staff and they earned their marks on this new game consoles software side.

 

I wont go into each games details, as they all turned out very close to true to form. What I would like to point out are some key features. Most importantly was sound effects, the sounds are spot on, game play is smooth and true to the originals. I especially found playing Night Driver a lot of fun and now with Circus Atari (originally on the Joystick model which played horribly both due to poor programming and the main fact that it was a paddle game) well now Circus Atari is finally fun and enjoyable since its now playable with a paddle. Super Breakout plays well, here I noticed on several occassions just the slightest slowdown in game play from time to time, but its so minor that you have to be looking for such a flaw to notice it, so its really a non-issue.

 

Now Warlords is a LOT of fun, but lets talk about Arcade Warlords which is simply great, if you are a fan of Warlords like me, this arcade translation alone is well worth the cost of the unit, its a great translation, plays very well and the sound effects are near pefect making for a wonderful round (or dozen) of gameplay.

 

Overall video is crisp, responsive and clean, audio is superb, the menu'ing and navigation are topnotch. With only the slightest of flaws and bugs that are really only noticable if you are going out of your way to find them, this console rates a 9.5 out of 10. This is a 180 degree turn around from the sloppy job of the Jakks 10-in-1 Atari Joystick and its definitely something to put on your want/wish list.

 

Walmart and Target should be stocking their shelves in the next several days, so keep an eye out. The single player will sell for around $19.99-$24.99 and the two player for $25.99-$27.99 depending on your sellers markup.

 

 

Curt