Atlantis

"The Fate of Atlantis rests in your hands..."

Atlantis...the underwater haven filled with treasure, secrets and mystery. The great Indiana Jones went for it, MacGyver found it...but now, stinking alien invaders have discovered it beneath the sea! These damn punk aliens want to destroy the city and leave it a smouldering ruin. Do you have what it takes to fend these bug-eyed aliens off?

Like other games from the Atari-era, Atlantis is being assaulted by and waves waves of attackers, each with varying skills and different methods of attack. The longer you survive, the more enemies you'll need to swat down from the sky. How are you're going to do that, exactly? With your charged up gun turrets, of course! You have three of these weapons with which to defend the city with, two on either side of the screen and the third in the center. Simple controls mean just pointing the control pad in a certain direction to fire that certain turret. For example, an enemy ship is coming in from the left, all you need to do is just push the joystick to the left and just like that, the left cannon fires. Easy stuff, eh? Who needs complex button combos when just simple "point it over there" controls work just as good.

How strong are these enemies? So-so. Your city is protected by a large shield to protect it from damage, but once its down, Atlantis is a sitting duck. However, depending on your amount of points, you can replace and rebuild the city to restore your chance of surviving. The attacks come at different speeds, so it's not just you hammering away on the fire button, it's about timing, patience and grit. How long can your trigger-finger twitch for as you watch enemy ships get closer and closer? It's really, intense stuff, but you may find yourself slightly bored during the first few levels, where the "enemies" are nothing more than slow moving dots across the screen, and it's only once the big boys come to town when things get interesting. If you can get through the tedium of the first few levels, then you'll be hammering away with this game all through the night...

The graphics in the game are reasonable for the day, but it's not great or anything. Small things such as little alien craft exploding causing large flashes of light strobing across the screen are just those small details which add up to great gaming. The effects are nice, sure, but the actually graphics of the turrets, and enemies? ...Well...They're rather...squarish, undetailed. Don't get me wrong, I'm not complaining, since the Intellivison isn't renowned for its abilities, but it certainly does beat Missile Command, as the missiles that were coming down were nothing but giant dots with white lines coming out the back. Here, you've at least got something which *LOOKS* alien enough. As I've said, not great, but good for what it is.

Audio for Atlantis is nothing but sound effects, but they are welcome. The explosions, zip-zaps of alien craft as they zoom across the sky, the cannon-fire...it's all there. Not truly varied, as they're repeated again and again, sometimes very tedious, but once again, Atlantis is a game which delivers when it's pushed to the limits, with enemies zooming across the screen, exploding and firing at your turrets - the mangled mayhem choir of doom and destruction. It doesn't hurt your ears, but fuels that killer instinct. There's no real music or funky, speedy soundtrack is included, but I reckon I can let that go, since the sound effects definitely make up for it, maybe not the whole 100%, but they're there and that counts.

What can I say about Atlantis in closing? Well, it's a bit like Missile Command and Space Invaders in one package. It has a great colourful city to defend with plenty of enemies with excellent effects to defend it from. It's action-packed and insane on your fingers, but well-worth picking up and playing if you can still find a cart floating around.

Reviewer's Score: 7/10, Originally Posted: 11/16/05, Updated 06/21/06