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 by Johnny Liu |
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Why
did I damn myself to a steady diet of ramen for the next few weeks? For the
love of the game. Just as there are new games constantly coming out, there are
old games that you want to go back and revisit.
Each of us has our own gaming history, and the games that we grew up with have etched their permanent marks. To fulfill the desire to relive he glory days, some people buy full-on cabinets. Others enjoy the games of their heyday through the boon of arcade emulation.
Now fans of old Atari games can travel back in time with the Atari Anniversary Edition, a commercially released emulation compilation of 12 Atari arcade games from the late 70s and early 80s. The chosen 12 are Asteroids, Asteroids Deluxe, Battlezone, Centipede, Crystal Castles, Gravitar, Millepede, Missile Command, Pong, Super Breakout, Tempest, and Warlords.
Most of you are familiar with this batch already, but for the uninitiated, here's the rundown. The titles included are broken down into a few different gaming themes.
First off are the 'bouncy' games. Pong, as if you didn't know already, is digital ping-pong. Two white vertical paddles bounce a square ball back and forth...over and over again. Super Breakout has you bouncing the square ball against a wall of bricks. Warlords is essentially a four-player version of Breakout, with castles in four corners fending off a bouncing fireball. The weirdest and most obtuse objects in video game land just seem to have the innate ability to bounce.
Five of the games use vector graphics, an old-school line-rendering graphics system that led to some of the first 3D games. Battlezone, for instance, is a first-person tank game that marked an important step in using the third dimension. Asteroids and Asteroids Deluxe place you in the cockpit of a spaceship fending off asteroids. Gravitar pits your planet against malicious extra-terrestial attacks, and Tempest is a vector-based shooter.
The third group of games share the classic trackball control system. Crystal Castles is kind of like an isometric Pac Man. Missile Command has you protecting three cities from scores of nasty missiles. Centipede and Millipede pit your little shooter against an onslaught of creepy crawlies. I remember spinning the Centipede trackball in the lonely arcade of a Chinese restaurant that has since been torn down. By no coincidence, this is my favorite in the collection.
The Dreamcast version, unfortunately, suffers from poor emulation. Both the rasterized and vector-based graphics look muddy and ugly. Unlike the PC version, there's no option to soup things up with the Enhanced mode. The option is there, but try as I might, there's no way to switch it off the Original setting. At the very least, I would expect it to look as good as it once did. Disappointing.
What about Seganet? Just think about bouncing a ball back and forth with someone in Cleveland threatening to "Pong your ass!" Networked versions of any one of these games would sweeten the pot. Oh well.
The
controls aren't very good. Sure, the game can be played with your Dreamcast
controller, but to the people who want this game the most it isn't the same.
The controller works well for some games, like Centipede and Millepede,
but is awful for Crystal Castles and Warlords. And as far as I
know, there isn't a Dreamcast trackball or dial to whet that appetite.
There's a selectable overlay for each game that simulates the borders of an arcade game cabinet. It adds a little arcade flair, but in some cases (such as the vector based games), it makes the screens far too tiny. Thankfully, these frames can be unselected, giving you a full-sized screen.
Frankly, these games aren't for everyone. While Centipede, Tempest and Missile Command still seem to hold up rather nicely, the other games aren't really as fun as they once were. I mean, Pong? Can you really sit and play that for more than a few minutes a week? Super Breakout? Maybe if they never released Arkanoid, I guess, but let's be honest. Warlords was fun at the time, but the controls render it unwieldy.
In turn, the best part of the game is the historical treasure trove of information. There's a museum of images that includes everything from Atari pins and patches to arcade vendor advertisements for the individual games. These archives are highlighted with video interviews of Nolan Bushnell, the creator of Pong and Atari.
I recently went to a symposium of video games and art and heard Nolan Bushnell speak in person. As one of the 'founding fathers' of video gaming, he offers a plethora of insightful commentary concerning the beginning of the industry and particularly the business side of developing Atari.
While the Dreamcast edition is still on the cheap side, the emulation is just lousy in comparison to the PC. Plus, the PC benefits from a greater ease of interface, everything from creating your own gear to interfacing your PC to a JAMMA cabinet. The historical background is still all there, but the video quality is diminished and the image files can't be as easily copied to your hard disk. If you had to get this game, get the PC version.
| Revolution Report Card |
| C- |
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+ Cheap |
