Intellivision Lives!

"Not bad, but could've been better..."

Any person who grew up in the 1980s obviously remembers Mattel's foray into the video game world with the Intellivision. Dubbed as 'Intelligent Television,' the Intellivision sported superior graphics and sounds to the Atari 2600, which had been holding the top spot in the video game industry at that time. It also featured a more advanced controller. This would lead to one of the first video game battles the industry would experience. While the Intellivision didn't last forever in the market, thanks to the great video game market crash of 1984, it still lives on in the hearts of many classic gamers. To commemorate it, Crave Entertainment released this package to whet our classic gaming appetites. While it's not that bad, it could've been a lot better in my opinion.

Graphics: 8/10
One of the biggest points of the Intellivision at the time was how much better its games looked compared to the Atari 2600. While the comparison is obvious, there are some times where the graphics could've been a little sharper. For example, in Tower of Doom, your character always looks the same regardless of what kind of class you choose. Also, games like Baseball and Football aren't exactly bad, but the player sprites could've been a bit sharper I'm sure.

On the other hand, some games look pretty sharp, such as Night Stalker, which has the look of a cavern in terms of the walls and the darkness of the background, complete with a spider and its web. The loading screens for Dark Castle are pretty sharp too, although there could've been some more variety in the colors.

Also, the Intellivision had the feature of full text, meaning things like a 'Game Over' message or other information would be fully written onscreen, unlike the Atari 2600.

Sounds: 9/10
All the sounds come out fine and in their full glory. Unlike the package you may have experienced on the PS One, everything sounds the way it did on the original console, and there's no muffled sound effects. When you hear something explode, it sounds like it's really exploding! I wish some of the sounds could've been tweaked so they didn't sound as annoying. For example, the motor in Auto Racing is just plain annoying. Also, the crowd sounds in many sports games is pretty much the same sound reused over and over, which, on its own, isn't all that great.

Controls: 7/10
The Intellivision had a round disc that the player pressed to move the character in the appropriate directions (kind of like a directional pad) as well as four side action buttons (two on either side) and a numeric keypad. This allowed for more complex gameplay in the games, many of which actually came with a pair of controller overlays to help you remember what each button did. Unfortunately, remapping every button to a Dual Shock 2 controller would be near impossible. There are two options, one, by holding a trigger button on the top of the controller and moving the right stick in a certain direction for a number. Or, pressing select will bring up an onscreen keypad with a cursor that you can use to press the key you need to use. Either way, it's cumbersome and could've been fixed with a little tweaking.

On the other hand, some buttons were remapped for the Dual Shock 2 controller perfectly. Night Stalker used a Robotron-like interface, where you pressed the numeric keypad buttons to shoot in a certain direction. On this version, the four action buttons, which are arranged in a cross shape, take care of this, simplifying things big time.

Replay: 7/10
There's a huge variety of games to play on this compilation. Unfortunately, some games required two players to be played on the original, which means you'll need two Dual Shock 2 controllers simply to load these games up. I've heard a report that these games can be played single player, but I couldn't confirm this for myself. Come on, they should've made it an option to have a computer opponent rather than having to use 2 controllers! As it stands, some of the Intellivision's better games can't be played unless you have two controllers.

While there are a lot of interesting titles to play, some of them seem rather obscure, and some are hard to work with due to the clunky control interface. Also, many people will notice that only one of the three Dungeons and Dragons games were included, as well as the omission of other third party games (probably due to licensing problems, but we can hope for the future.) Of course, if you're a diehard collector, you won't mind.

Overall: 6/10
Having only owned an Intellivision briefly, I can't really say that every classic gamer will find this compilation useful. If you've never played Intellivision before, it's best to rent before you buy. If you're really into classic games, then this may be some television you'd be unintelligent not to watch!

Reviewer's Score: 6/10, Originally Posted: 02/16/04