Atari Revival


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Atari Revival is the latest classic game compilation from Infogrames.  This collection consists of a modernized version of the classic Atari coin-op Warlords, along with the previously released versions of Missile Command and Combat.

This title is only available for the PC.  The package consists of three jewel-case size manuals & three CD's.

Let's start off with a look at Missile Command.  This modern take on the classic coin-op game was originally released in November of 1999.  I'm not going to spend too much time reviewing the game in this article, as my original in-depth review of the game can be found here.  I suggest you take a look at it.  Screen captures of gameplay action can be found there as well.

Missile Command consists of two different games:  Classic Missile Command & Ultimate Missile Command. 

Classic Missile Command is an updated version of the classic coin-op game that we all know and love.  Gameplay remains exactly the same as the original coin-op game, but new graphics and sounds have been added to bring the game up to modern standards.  There are two modes for playing the Classic mode of Missile Command:  Single Player, and Head-to-Head.  The Head-to-Head mode is for two players who alternate defending the Earth.  You can also use different difficulty settings for each game.  You can set the difficulty settings for each player, which is a nice touch.  That allows an beginner player to keep up with an advanced player.

The second portion of the game, Ultimate Missile Command, is a new 3D version of the game.  If you have ever played Missile Command 3D on the Atari Jaguar console, you should feel right at home.

You control three ships with missile launching abilities.  You will be sent around the world defending Earth from wave after wave of incoming missiles.  The first mission will take you to Australia, where the aliens have launched their first attack.  The Australian cities are below you, and you can see the missiles coming down directly at you.

This part of the game plays like Classic Missile Command, but it has an entirely different perspective, as you see the missiles coming down directly at you.  You must look up in the sky and shoot them down before the missiles hit your cities.  Successfully defend your cities from several waves of missiles, and defeat the "boss" for that particular assault, and you are carried away to another place somewhere on Earth to stop the next attack.

I gave Missile Command a 90% rating at that time, and I still feel it is one of the better re-releases that have come out in recent years.

The second game in this package is Combat, which was released less than a year ago.  Combat was developed by Magic Lantern Playware, which is located in Monmouth, IL -- just a bit south of my hometown of Moline, IL.  I was unaware that there were any active game developers near my hometown.  The last game developer from my area was Ezra Sidran's group, known as Intergalactic Development.  They were famous for their "Universal Military Simulator" games for the Atari ST, Amiga, and PC in the late 80's.

Combat attempts to take the classic tank battles from the Atari 2600 cartridge & bring it up to modern standards.  The "tank" portion of the Atari 2600 Combat cartridge was based on Steve Bristow's TANK coin-op game.  Steve was the original Vice President of Engineering at Atari.

As you may recall, the TANK coin-op & the Combat cartridge were two-player games.  An overhead view of a maze was placed on the screen.  You and your counterpart had to drive your respective tank through the maze and shoot the other guy before he gets you. 

Combat has some serious gameplay problems because it strays from this formula.  While there is a multiplayer element to this game (that I will get to in a minute),  the main game consists of driving your tank (via a third-person perspective) from one end of a maze to another.  Throughout the maze are computer controlled tanks, guns, and other obstacles that must be avoided or destroyed.  At the end of the maze is a "portal" that will transport you to the next maze.

Now, I am not going to say that this is a bad concept, because this aspect of the game does have it's fun moments.  However, it just doesn't FEEL like the original TANK or Combat games.

More often than not, the game becomes an exercise in patience.  The controls in this game, and the overall maneuverability of your tank, is just plain awful.  Your tank moves as though it is on a solid sheet of ice, and you must over-compensate your moves to keep from sliding all over the place.  Adding the concept of inertia to this game was a great concept, but it has been so poorly implemented that it makes the game almost laughable.  This problem has been made worse by the fact that narrow paths have been placed in the game.  If you happen to be on one of these narrow paths, and you lose control & stray too close to the edge, you will fall off into oblivion & lose a life.

Getting back to the multiplayer stuff I mentioned a moment ago, there are options to play head-to-head against other people via LAN & Internet.  The multiplayer menu can be set up to find other people who want to play online.  You can play for a set amount of time, or to a number of points that you specify.

One thing that has been a thorn in my side with these classic re-releases has been the lack of included history, or emulated versions of the original games.  Magic Lantern & Infogrames came through on this game, as they have included an Atari 2600 emulator, and the ROM files for Combat, and the unreleased Combat 2.  I was really happy to see these included.  Another nice inclusion is a map editor for making your own multiplayer mazes.

Anyone who knows me well is aware on my feelings about graphics.  I think there is too much emphasis on graphics, and not enough emphasis on gameplay in many modern gaming titles.  Having said that, the graphics in this title fail in every way possible.  Everything seems lifeless.  The game is played in a bland & sterile environment.  Polygon counts for the objects in this game are ridiculously low, so everything has a crude & blocky appearance.  Granted, this may have been done because it is a budget title, and to pay homage to the original game.  I don't object to keeping things simple, but it is almost too simple.

The few graphical tricks that appear in the game are almost overused.  The heat effect under your tank & the vapor trail from your engines look almost kind of cartoony.  The vapor trails in particular are distracting.

I also noticed some severe problems with clipping.

Another problem is the way that you save your progress.  The game consists of 10 levels spread out between multiple "worlds."  You can only save a game between "worlds."  Saving between levels is not permitted.

In short, the concept behind this game is sound.  I think there were some great ideas behind this game, but they just weren't executed properly.  As a result, your tank will probably bounce out of control over and over again.  Despite the fact that I did manage to finish the game, I will probably never pick it up again.

The only real "new" game in this package is Warlords.  The game consists of an emulated version of the arcade classic, and a new 3D version.

Gameplay in Warlords is best described by saying it is a multiplayer version of Breakout.  In the corner of each screen is a castle made up of bricks.  You control a shield that deflects a fireball launched by a dragon.  The fireball moves around the screen, and you attempt to shield your castle, while deflecting it at an enemy castle.  If the fireball makes it through a hole in your castle & hits the King inside, you are out of the game.  The last player standing is the winner.

This game is, in my opinion, one of the most fun multiplayer arcade games ever created.  Playing with three of your buddies is a blast.

This new game sticks to the original gameplay fairly closely, although there are some new additions.

For example, there are some "powerup" items that appear randomly.  If you deflect a fireball and it hits a powerup item, you earn that powerup.  Some of the powerups include:

• Speedup:  Temporarily increases the speed of the fireballs
• Repair:  Repairs all of the destroyed bricks in your castle
• Enlarge Shield:  This will temporarily double the size of your shield, which makes the game much easier to play
• Reverse Control:  This will really annoy your opposing players, as it temporarily reverses their controls (right becomes left, and left becomes right)
• Invisible Shield:  Another one that will drive your opponents crazy as their shields will become invisible for a brief time
• Switch Castles:  Moves the players to a different castle
• Random:  Gives you a random powerup

Some of these powerups are just ridiculous.  For example, there is a "dual shield" powerup.  This powerup will give you one shield on each wall of your castle.  While this sounds cool at first, the implementation makes the game harder to play than if you only had one shield.  Your overall movement is restricted to 50% of what it was, and the corner of your shield will be completely exposed.  (Your shield has two facings: one for each side.  The shield will not round the corner of your castle.)  If you're trying to catch a fireball that is headed for the corner with your top shield, it won't completely make it to the edge.

There are quite a few "themes" to the castles as the levels progress.  There is an outer space, a medieval theme, and a theme that looks like the inside of a computer.  Each world has a new theme.

I was amazed at how easily I went through the single-player version of the game using the default settings.  I blew through it pretty quickly, and it just didn't seem like the game was very difficult.   The game did get more difficult when I switched to the "Hard" version.

As for multiplayer, that is what this game is all about.  The old Atari 2600 Warlords cart was one of the best "party" games ever created, and this new PC version does manage to recapture the fun of playing with a group.

As for bugs, I noticed some SEVERE issues with collision detection that did affect gameplay.  I'm not sure if the problem is with the shields, or with the fireballs.  I can't even count how many times I thought I had properly deflected or captured a fireball, only to have it pass through & clobber my castle.  This is absolutely inexcusable, and just shows to me that this game was either poorly designed, or poorly tested.  I am amazed this slipped through.

Let's discuss one other bug.  The original Warlords coin-op has been included via an arcade emulator.  As usual, the boys at Digital Eclipse have provided a rock-solid emulation of the original.  However, I discovered something completely by accident.  I managed to "fat-finger" some keys while attempting to exit the program, and a menu from the old "Atari Arcade Hits #2.  (The original Warlords was included in that package several years ago, along with Asteroids Deluxe, Battlezone, Millipede, and several other classic Atari coin-op games.)  Sure enough, I was able to select AND PLAY the other games on this menu.  I have included some screen captures of what I discovered.  I haven't been able to bring this menu up again, but it just seemed strange that this other stuff is buried somewhere in the game.

The 3D graphics of the game look nice, but they don't add anything to the game.  Sometimes, the animations going on in the background are a huge distraction.  There is a level with rainfall, and another with floating asteroids.  Granted, it all looks fine, but it is a HUGE distraction from following the fireballs.

Sounds are appropriate, but nothing to write home about.

Conclusion:

Atari Revival is an interesting collection.  For $19.95, you get three modern re-releases of classic games.

I had a hard time giving this package a rating.  In the end, I gave each game an individual rating, and rated the package based on the "average" of the three games.

Missile Command is one of the best examples I have seen on how to take a classic title and upgrade it to modern standards.  The developers stuck to the formula that made the original game great, and didn't mess with the gameplay.  I gave this game a 90% rating when it came out several years ago, and the score is still valid today.

Combat, however, was doomed from the beginning.  As a result, we end up with a game that just doesn't play, look, sound, or feel like the original "TANK" coin-op or the Atari 2600 "Combat" cartridge.  The game does have it's moments, but it is not Combat.  Finishing this game is, in my opinion, a monumental task as the controls in this title are about as bad as I have seen.  I gave this game a 35% rating.

Warlords is a nice game that has translated nicely to modern PC's.  However, the distracting backgrounds and collision detection problems will frustrate you.  I gave this game a 65% rating.

Manuals are nothing more than jewel-case inserts.  They have all of the appropriate information, but are nothing to write home about.

One additional thing that annoyed me is that these games MUST be played with the CD in the drive.  Considering that we live in a day of 80GB hard drives, there is no reason why music, and other aspects of the game can't be installed to your system.

All in all, I'd say this is an above-average compilation.  You should certainly consider picking up the package if you are a fan of Missile Command or Warlords.

For more information, visit the Atari Interactive
homepage at http://www.infogrames.com