Game EXP: Atari Greatest Hits Volume 1 (NDS) -Atari 2600- Action Pt. 1

 

We now move from games in the Adventure category to the Action category on the Atari 2600 from Atari Greatest Hits Volume 1 on the Nintendo DS; yes I realize that Action should have come before Adventure, but that is apparently just how we roll here.  The first three games are an odd mix of games akin to skeet shooting, Mine Sweeper, and one of the best mini-games from Pilotwings 64.  Maybe that is not the best way of introducing games that were released on a console in the early 1980s, but those are the comparisons that come to mind when I think of the three games featured today.  Like a lot of the games in this entire collection, there were some I had preconceived notions about either based on the title, the cartridge art and description, and from reading the instruction manual before playing.  As was the case with several of the Action games, I was disappointed by some, and wonderfully surprised by others.

Air-Sea Battle

This took me a little bit to figure out on the game setup screen, but only after I selected the 1 Player Anti-Aircraft game option, because it was the first to come up as a single-player game, did I grasp what it was that I was trying to do?  Air-Sea Battle is essentially a stationary version of Missile Command where you play against another player to see who can shoot down the most enemies.  Also to note, regardless of the mode you play, the enemies do not fire back, they only move across the screen at various levels and at fluctuating speeds.  Unlike Missile Command though, I could not aim my shots, and I could only fire one shot at a time and could not fire again until my first shot either hit a target or flies up and off of the top of the screen.  What I noticed about the computer opponent, is that they fire as often as possible, even if there is no target approaching.  What I liked about this approach for the computer player, is that it eliminates any question that the computer is implicitly cheating by timing its shots and I doubt that there is background code running to time the computer's shots with how frequent or how fast the enemies go across the screen.

Of the three games I played, I lost all of them, but they were still kind of fun.  Maybe?  I could see this being fun if you are playing as a two-player game, maybe with a group of people and trading off if you win/lose.  As a single-player experience, yeah, just kind of meh.

Verdict No

Game 1: 12 - 7 (1 Player Anti-Aircraft)

Game 2: 36 - 29 (1 Player Anti-Aircraft, Obstacles)

Game 3: 20-18 (1 Player Torpedos)

Flag Capture

I should probably lower my expectations based off of the cartridge art for games, but Flag Capture got me.  I thought I was going to play some kind of naval form of tag, but what I got instead was something closer to Mine Sweeper.  You play as a person-shaped icon moving around a nine-by-seven grid trying to collect an invisible flag while hoping you do not come across a bomb.  When you start the game, or after you get blown up by a bomb, you start in the upper left corner, you then move to different squares, pressing your one Atari button and you are either given a direction that the flag is in, or a number presumably indicating the number of spaces away the flag is, but it is up to you to determine which direction to search if the space gives you a 3.  If you do capture the flag, a new flag is randomly placed on the board and you respawn back at the start.

As a single-player game, there is little to do but try to get as many flags within 70 seconds.  I tried multiple game modes and the one where the invisible flag moves (although how frequently and how fast was never clear) felt nearly impossible.  This seems like it was intended to play against another player and there could be an element of fun that way, but playing Flag Capture as a single-player game is just dull, and I probably could have gotten a few more games in had I not looked at each of the 10 different game modes (of which only three are single-player), then had to circle back to play a single-player game.

Verdict: No

Game 1: 0 (1-Player, Stationary Flag)

Game 2: 0 (1-Player, Flag Moves (Bouncing off Edges)

Game 3: 7 (1-P, SF)

Game 4: 3 (1-P, SF)

Game 5: 0 (1-P, FM (BoE)

Human Cannonball

What is it about someone getting fired out of a cannon that is fun?  Both for the person watching and the person setting the angle of the cannon and pressing the button that fires the person out of said cannon in hopes that the person lands safely in a basket like some flesh and bone form of basketball?  Human Cannonball is about what I was expecting but turned out to be more fun than I had thought.  Let me clarify.  I figured that Human Cannonball was going to be about firing someone out of a cannon at a target, which is essentially what the entirety of this game is.  But the animation here is surprisingly smooth, the sound of the cannon is satisfying and when you land on the ground (or hit a barrier) the smack just feels right.  In the base mode of the game, from what I can tell, the speed at which the person exits the cannon is randomized, but you have to set the cannon's angle and lob the person into a basket a set distance away.  If you miss, the speed changes and the ground gets a point.  If you manage to land the person in the basket, you get a point.  But there is a fair amount of anticipation as you wait the seconds after firing the cannon to see if you accurately calculate the right angle based on the cannon firing speed.  Sometimes you know immediately that you undershot and other times, you miss the basket by mere pixels.

But I feel like I get this game.  I can easily imagine a sheet of paper with successful angles against speeds written on them in a way that only makes sense to an eight-year-old so that when the cannon speed sets itself to 31 mph, you know that you can make them in with an angle of 60.  But then there are additional modes where the cannon placement changes along with the cannon speed, or even with falling barriers between the cannon and the basket that you have to shoot your person through.

I am not 100% sure on what a winning score is because I never won, but I definitely had a lot of fun, even in the single-player game.

Verdict: Yes

Game 1: 3 - 6 (Random Speed)

Game 2: 5 - 7 (Random Speed)

Game 3: 0 - 7 (Random Speed w/ Windows)

So those were the first three games in the Action category.  Not entirely what I was expecting when I initially thought of action as I thought it might have been something more like a platformer or side-scrolling shoot'em up, although being shot out of a canon at a target is pretty action-y.  And while one for three in this collection is not the best rating to have, there will be three more games next Friday ranging from a patience-oriented quick-draw to a semi-first-person shooter.

~JWfW/JDub/The Faceplantman/Jaconian
I'm Gonna Rock It. . .