ATARI BYTES

As Intellivision Month draws to a close in episode 231, prepare to be swept off your feet by the enchanting tale of "Beauty & the Beast"! Soak up that Disney Magic!

*checks notes*

Sorry, not the Disn…

Intellivision month rolls on in episode 230 like a poker chip off the chest of a gambler who has passed out after a sound thrashing by Lady Luck.

We're playing Mattel's LAS VEGAS POKER & BLACKJACK fr…

Intellivision Month continues in episode 229 with SPACE BATTLE, Mattel, 1979. In this era of social distancing, "space" is a concept we know well. "Battle" is, unfortunately, something we've seen all…

Any old episode could give you swords.

Any old episode could give you serpents.

But this week in episode 228, to launch INTELLIVISION MONTH 2020, we're giving you SWORDS AND SERPENTS.  I know! How ca…

ATARI BYTES episode 227 explores a concept many of us in this pandemical age in which we live may have forgotten: commuting from one place to another. That place, specifically, is outer space. We're …

The game this week on ATARI BYTES is an unreleased prototype. The episode is not.

Or is it?

We're playing COMBAT TWO, announced by Atari in 1982 for a 1984 release that never happened. Yet, here it i…

On ATARI BYTES episode 225, we've got no time for losers...'cause we are the CHAMPIONS!

...of the World!

Or at least CHAMPIONSHIP SOCCER from Atari, 1980.

Grab your cleats and some of those long sock…

Beamrider! Go, beamrider! (To the tune of "Greased Lightning"? No?)

In episode 224 of ATARI BYTES, we're playing the 1983 Activision spacey shoot 'em up BEAMRIDER. Blast the alien invaders because ap…

This week in ATARI BYTES episode 223, we're playing the 1983 Activision game SEAQUEST. Your sub must DIVE DIVE DIVE! to rescue treasure-hunting divers. Insert obligatory "We all live in a yellow subm…

ATARI BYTES episode 222. Three of the same digit in the episode number. Three names for the same game. Coincidence?

Yes. Yes, it is.

We're playing homebrew "ATARI CLIMBER" in our continuing effort to…

In ATARI BYTES episode 221 this week, we dive deep to the depths of Atari Ocean, dodging fierce sharks and the surprisingly tender embrace of amorous octopi, to bust open the treasure chest that cont…

THE CARNIVAL IS IN TOWN!

In episode 220, we flagrantly defy stay-at-home orders to go to the carnival. Okay, not really. But we are playing Sega's 1980 Atari 2600 game CARNIVAL. Grab a corn dog, do s…

So, in 1981, Atari was wanting to do a follow up to the hugely popular ASTEROIDS. What to call it? Asteroids II? Boring. Asteroids Again? Kind of whiny. And it doesn't play up the goal of improving o…

Like a gaming geyser, the Flashback 9 spews forth a fountain of gaming fun in episode 217 with the water-based AQUAVENTURE. This 1983, never released Atari prototype pits flippered-man against finned…

Until now, I think the "newest" Atari game I had talked about on the show was from, like, 1988. Episode 216, though, is breaking new ground...by revisiting old ground. 

In 2007, AtariAge produced ADV…

Wooooo! Are you hot, or is it just me? Episode 215 is on FIRE!

We're playing SWORDQUEST: FIREWORLD, the second in the series of four adventure games Atari created in the 1980s that tied into a contes…

In episode 214: GOLF, we consider Atari's answer to the question: How can we take a game designed for walking around outside in nature and make it less healthy?

We also say goodbye to daredevil Mad M…

If sports is a metaphor for human competition, auto racing is a metaphor for life as a whole: going round and round as fast and loud as possible, consuming as many resources as possible, without actu…

On episode 212 of ATARI BYTES, we learn that maybe not all board games need to make the jump to the TV screen.

To be fair, our discussion of Atari's 1979 BACKGAMMON adaptation could be colored by the…

Episode 211 of ATARI BYTES asks you, the listener, to test your MEMORY and remember back to a time long ago. CONCENTRATE and get ready to MATCH the fun you had with Hunt & Score in episode 192 as we …