21 Unexpected Games to Love for the Atari VCS (Book)
Posted: April 20th, 2018, 5:49 pm
21 Unexpected Games to Love for the Atari VCS is a brand new book out by John Harris (a blogger on Gamasutra, I believe)
The book is an easy to read tour of the VCS / 2600. It must be hard to write a book when your audience could be 15 or 55. I was excited to see a book about the 2600, because I feel (rightly or wrongly) that the NES has become the defacto "Retro Video Game", and that most gamers can no longer enjoy pre-NES graphics.
The book is more than a set of reviews, although it has that. Each game is a rung on the ladder of the evolution of the VCS or gaming. The choice of games is interesting - its where that version is 'best'. So, you'll not find Atari Pac-Man here, since people who want to play Pac-Man will seek out other versions, but you do find Atari Space Invaders, and he makes an argument why the VCS version may be the 'best' version over the arcade version.
Each review talks about the achievement of the game, such as the many variations of Combat (and that the NES mostly gave up on the idea of variations that make many Atari games so much fun), or how Adventure pushed gaming outside of an arcade idea to replicate Colossal Cave Adventure, or the technical graphical challenge of programming Space Invaders on the VCS.
I'm only 3 games into the 21 (Combat, Adventure and Space Invaders) but already I'm torn between reading more and going off and playing some Atari.
For Space Invaders - I have a question to everyone. The author writes that before Space Invaders, 'most' games were of definite length. You played for an amount of time, and if you did well enough, you got some more time, up to a point. This way, no one could play that long on a quarter. He then writes that Space Invaders upturned that using number of lives, and if you were very very good, you could play a long time.
My question is that I think this (number of lives instead of time) gives Space Invaders too much credit (no pun intended). Maybe 'most' games had timers, but didn't Arcade Pong play until a set score? If Pong did it, then credit should go to that game. Also, this is the system used in pinball after all. Yes, pinball was EM, but to take that 'number of balls' idea to Space Invaders is not a huge leap, or am I understating it? Space Invaders is such an amazing and historic game that it doesn't need an accolade that rightfully belongs elsewhere - but does it?
Not to plug anyone's book, but if this kind of stuff interests you, you can pick this up on the most recent Storybundle bundle.
https://storybundle.com/games Its not even the 'bonus' content, so you can pick up for real cheap if you want to. It runs until the end of April, I think.
The book is an easy to read tour of the VCS / 2600. It must be hard to write a book when your audience could be 15 or 55. I was excited to see a book about the 2600, because I feel (rightly or wrongly) that the NES has become the defacto "Retro Video Game", and that most gamers can no longer enjoy pre-NES graphics.
The book is more than a set of reviews, although it has that. Each game is a rung on the ladder of the evolution of the VCS or gaming. The choice of games is interesting - its where that version is 'best'. So, you'll not find Atari Pac-Man here, since people who want to play Pac-Man will seek out other versions, but you do find Atari Space Invaders, and he makes an argument why the VCS version may be the 'best' version over the arcade version.
Each review talks about the achievement of the game, such as the many variations of Combat (and that the NES mostly gave up on the idea of variations that make many Atari games so much fun), or how Adventure pushed gaming outside of an arcade idea to replicate Colossal Cave Adventure, or the technical graphical challenge of programming Space Invaders on the VCS.
I'm only 3 games into the 21 (Combat, Adventure and Space Invaders) but already I'm torn between reading more and going off and playing some Atari.
For Space Invaders - I have a question to everyone. The author writes that before Space Invaders, 'most' games were of definite length. You played for an amount of time, and if you did well enough, you got some more time, up to a point. This way, no one could play that long on a quarter. He then writes that Space Invaders upturned that using number of lives, and if you were very very good, you could play a long time.
My question is that I think this (number of lives instead of time) gives Space Invaders too much credit (no pun intended). Maybe 'most' games had timers, but didn't Arcade Pong play until a set score? If Pong did it, then credit should go to that game. Also, this is the system used in pinball after all. Yes, pinball was EM, but to take that 'number of balls' idea to Space Invaders is not a huge leap, or am I understating it? Space Invaders is such an amazing and historic game that it doesn't need an accolade that rightfully belongs elsewhere - but does it?
Not to plug anyone's book, but if this kind of stuff interests you, you can pick this up on the most recent Storybundle bundle.
https://storybundle.com/games Its not even the 'bonus' content, so you can pick up for real cheap if you want to. It runs until the end of April, I think.