Centipede

"Excellence in a plastic case."

The Atari 2600 got famous for all of its arcade games remade for the system. Many of them turned out to be far better than the original titles. When people say this, the first games that come to mind are games like Missile Command, Asteroids, Defender, Frogger and many others. Centipede is one of them and also one of my favorites. It is very simplistic, yet very good and in a way ingenious. There were many games like Centipede that were remade better than their roots in the arcade, and in my opinion Centipede was in the top five.

Like I said, Centipede is a very simplistic game. The basic object of the game is you have to destroy a long centipede before it touches the ground. If you think about it this game is very similar to Space Invaders, just presented in a different way. The centipede will start at the top of the screen and wind itself down towards the bottom. To stop the centipede from touching the ground, you control a wand at the bottom of the screen that you control to shoot at the centipede. Depending on what level you are on, the centipede will move at different speeds.

There are also some things in this game that aren't enemies but will hurt your game if you don't take care of them. In the arcade version of Centipede, these were mushrooms, but in this game they are squares. If a centipede touches a square it will drop down a level and continue its journey on towards the bottom. But of course you can kill these squares with a few shots from your wand.

Besides the long centipedes, there are also other enemies to watch for. Through the game, spiders jump out from either side of the screen close to where you are. The spiders will jump up and down while making their way to the other side of the screen. The spiders do serve a good purpose though. They will destroy mushrooms, which will cause you lots of trouble.

If you compare this version of the game to the arcade version, they are almost identical. The only thing that is better about this version of the game is that the controls are much better. In the arcade version, you are forced to use a track ball, which made the controls a lot tougher. The game play and sound are exactly the same and so are the graphics. Both of the versions have great fun factor and replay value. If you can get your hands on one of these games, it is a good buy no matter what the price.

Graphics
Good for the Atari's standards but not too good compared to the original. It is a lot less colorful, and the mushrooms are just squares in this game. Overall for the 2600, the graphics aren't bad.

Sound
The first thing I noticed while playing this game is the background music. It is really cool and adds to the mood of this game. All of the enemies have sound effects that tell you when it is on the screen. All of the sounds are well done and overall excellent.

Controls
Luckily, we were all blessed with a joystick instead of a track ball in this game. The controls are a lot better and have now on this version of the game have been perfected.

Fun Factor
Very good. This is a fast paced game, fun, and very challenging. It offers a great level of challenge for all gamers.

Replay Value
This game will ensure you hours of game play. It challenges even the best of gamers, and will satisfy your old school hunger.

Final Words
Centipede is definitely one of the games that comes to mind when I think of classic. It's definitely worth putting in any gamers collection.

Reviewer's Score: 9/10, Originally Posted: 01/26/06