Atari Anniversary Edition

"Nothing like getting your fix, old school style!"

When I saw Atari Anniversary Edition sitting on the shelf for $14.99, I quickly thought about all of the years I played the Asteroids arcade at my cousin's home. WOW...for $15 bucks I could play it from the comfort of my couch instead of a bar stool in his basement. It was too good of a deal to pass up. If you continue to read on you will find out why, but most likely you don't need a review to know how cool these games are. I would like to state that I have not yet played any other ports of this game so I can't compare them.

There are 12 games. Each game has viewable art, which mainly consists of photos of cartridges and boxes. There are video interviews as well. You really have to be a fanatic to sit down and view and watch everything.

When I first played Asteroids I was thinking ''what is this crap on the left, right, top, and bottom of the screen?'' Then I hit start and went to the options and removed the ''cabinet art'' and enlarged asteroids to properly fit my screen. AWESOME. Not all games have that option but all of the games that you need to remove that junk do. WOW...I am still impressed, because quite frankly, I couldn't hardly see my triangle (ship) before that.

I was disappointed that there was no VGA or memory card support (yes I was so overwhelmed after I saw this on the shelf for $15 that I didn't bother to look what the game actually supported. Now don't let my over-enthusiastic love of Asteroids think that I am pumped just because of that game. Many of these games are great, if not all of them except one or two.

The Lineup

--Asteroids--shoot big ''rocks'' and little space ships, turn left, turn right, hit the thrusters and then blast off into hyper-space. The control is extremely awesome. Having never played with a joystick before you will find yourself chasing down rocks and shooting them on the fly.

--Asteroids Deluxe--Same as above except you have a shield. Finally some one gave the gamer a chance to extend that quarter by another 20 seconds.

--Battlezone--Drive a tank, wreak havoc, try not to jump back when you get shot and your tv screen cracks.

--Centipede--Shoot the bug, mushrooms, spiders, anything that moves, there are no friends in this game.

--Crystal Castles--Avoid blobs and collect gems, you are a bear that can jump and run. Other than that I don't know what else you can do. I am not sure what is a gem and what is a blob, so I just run around.

--Gravitar--Asteroids on LSD, this is one time you don't want to get sucked.

--Millipede--Is there really a difference?

--Missile Command--Insane action, fire your weapons at incoming missiles and save your cities, Alpha Delta Omega!

--Pong--Tennis in its' purest form, paddle bug is fixed, no more just bouncing the ball straight across the top for easy points (well actually you have the option to leave the bug unfixed if you want). I can't tell the difference between difficulty levels on 2 player action, they all seem the same...hard.

--Super Breakout--Arkanoid but harder (due to sensitive control). Bounce a dot (ball) off of your pong paddle up into space and hit blocks until they are all gone.

--Tempest--Awesome gunning action down a 3-D tube, great control with the Dreamcast controller.

--Warlords--Bounce fireballs into your buddies castle. I still can't make out the graphics to see just how to do that though.

Graphics-8
--Considering that games are roughly 20 years old, the graphics won't hold up to anything produced today. That however, is not the point as these games are arcade perfect and not lacking in any way shape or form from the originals. The only noticeable difference is that you played them on a monitor in the arcade, and you can only play them on a TV at home, which produces a slight degradation in the resolution. Overall they are still excellent and sharp. I would have given it a 10 if had VGA capabilities and allowed for us to play it on the monitor.

Sound-9
--All original beeps and blimps are there from the arcade.

Control-5
--Most of the games have great control, but games like Pong, Missile Command, and Super Breakout are very touchy and hard to control. Don't look into this as a reason not to buy the game. Just be prepared to be on the edge and ever more neurotic when playing the above games. It makes them 10x more intense.

Funfactor-9
--If you enjoyed the arcade versions, you will enjoy these. Although simple in form, as a group, they constitute a great package that will keep you entertained for a good period of time and then keep you coming back for more.

Challenge-6
--Each level becomes more difficult until it reaches the point of impossibility. These games were not meant to be beat. They were made to make high scores and enter your three letter initials...not A S S like we always put in. The control issue plays a factor in the games mentioned above and adds greatly to the challenge.

Replayability-9
--It is hard to be bored with these games. They always answer the call for that quick fix you need for nerve twitching, button mashing, old school, neurotic shootem up fun.

Pros
--Excellent for the price ($14.95). 100% Arcade original. Great replayability.

Cons
--No VGA capability. No memory card saves (high scores will be lost). Poor control in a few games.

Overall this game is MUST HAVE for any person who has ever pumped more than two quarters in any of these games...if you are reading this, that should include you. Up front, I love Asteroids and don't care much about the other games. However, if there is only one game you love, it is still worth buying because the rest have decent gameplay and can hold your attention. They are all great and I find myself switching between games all of the time. It is not like you just play one. The funfactor and replayability is outstanding. To relieve my nerves I like to go in and take my stuff in intense, daily 15 minute doses. It just hits the spot somehow and gives you that good old school joy.

Reviewer's Score: 8/10, Originally Posted: 07/05/01, Updated 07/05/01