Kaboom!

"The epitome of addictiveness."

Kaboom! My second favorite game for the Atari 2600 (next to Solar Fox and followed by Solaris). There isn't any description or comparison for Kaboom! You are a bunch of buckets trying to catch the bombs of the ''mad bomber'' so they don't explode.

Kaboom! was one of the few Atari games that made use of the paddle controller, and WOW did you need it for this great game.

The rundown:

Graphics: Great. The burgular is complete with striped outfit and banded eyes. The buckets don't look like buckets at all, but they suffice. The bombs are nicely done. The best part has to be the flame on the bombs. If you manage to look at it, it actually looks real. I blinked several hundred times trying to be sure my eyes weren't fooling me and my TV was on fire.

Control: Excellent. The paddles work this game to the heavens. Your buckets respond very well. The sensitivity and super speed may take some getting used to, but you will appreciate it on the later stages.

Sound: Beautiful. The ''sizzle'' of the bombs sounds surprisingly real and is the true icing on the cake for this game. When the bombs go off, the explosions are standard 2600 fare, and work very well here. The sound when you catch the bombs was the weirdest though. Didn't sound anything like something falling in water.

Gameplay: A-D-D-I-C-T-I-V-E!!!!!! Once you start, you can't stop (at least until stage 8). If your utter ability to see and catch bombs dropping at speeds beyond comprehension don't take you, the sheer anxiety of wondering just how fast these things will drop will.

Music: None. The sound is all you get.

Kaboom! has an awesome tension factor. As you progress, the burgular drops more bombs, and at an increasingly faster rate. The tension here is that the bomb-catching sound of when you catch a bomb rises higher in pitch in each stage. You'll be sweating knowing that ''Uh-oh, it's REALLY gonna be fast now!''

I highly, highly, HIGHLY recommend Kaboom! It's a great reflex game with high replayability. You won't go wrong with this one. One burgular, 3 buckets, over 460 bombs at once. Gotta catch 'em all!!!!

Reviewer's Score: 10/10, Originally Posted: 07/17/00, Updated 07/17/00