One of the first games I was introduced to on the 2600 was River Raid, back in 1982. I remember it vividly, as I was at my cousin David’s house, who was older than me, and he’d “baby sit” me so the adults could have some adult time hanging out in the dining room. We’d sit in the family room playing 2600, mainly River Raid.
This is an Activision game, and was later ported to Atari 5200, Atari 8-bit, C64, ColecoVision, IBM PCjr, Intellivision, ZX Spectrum, and MSX. The player controls an airplane in a top-down view over a river and gets points for shooting down enemy planes, helicopters, ships and balloons (for versions after the Atari 2600). By flying over fuel-stations, the plane’s tank can be refilled. The player can shift side to side and change the speed of the plane. Sections of the river are marked by bridges.
The game was highly acclaimed for its ability to stuff tons of map into small amounts of space. The map was huge and it fit on the disk because it’s randomly generated using a common starting seed, basically, imagine some of the Diablo dungeons…they’re randomly generated but the starting seed which starts the random process is also ‘random.’ (probably based on clock time which isn’t too uncommon). Atari, rather than try to make a random level each time used the level random generator to build a procedural based level rather than drawing it and saving it into the cart. GENIUS.
A more highly randomized number generation system was used for enemy AI to make the game less predictable.
Germany consider this game harmful to children, indexing it on their list of games “harmful for children” along with the game Speed Racer. It remained on their list until 2002 (since 1984) when developers petitioned it off the list before the PS2 launch of Activision Anthology (otherwise they’d not be able to put it in the game)
Some of the Germany reasons: Minors are intended to delve into the role of an uncompromising fighter and agent of annihilation (…). It provides children with a paramilitaristic education (…). With older minors, playing leads (…) to physical cramps, anger, aggressiveness, erratic thinking (…) and headaches (wikipedia)
All in all, a great game! To hear all the details on River Raid and our opinions, checkout TD Gaming Podcast Episode 78.
Ex-Ensemble Studios Folks Form New Studio
your.editor.is.SERIOUS.f’ed.up.no.really.
your.editor.is.SERIOUS.f’ed.up.no.really.
Sam Neill is an Irish actor with a New Zealand accent – he played Dr. Alan Grant in the first Jurassic Park – AND the third Jurassic Park. (Funny how he skipped the 2nd, and Jeff Goldblum skipped the third. Weirdness.) He was also the lead in In the Mouth of Madness – and his highest acclaimed film was playing the husband of Holly Hunter in The Piano.
Anyway, Event Horizon was a horror version of Solaris, and Neill was the sympathetic villian who eventually becomes a Cenobite (unofficially, but the character was a reference to the Hellraiser films.) The hero was played by Laurence Fishbourne. The film was not well received on release, but it has aged well, especially the final 5 minutes, and fans hope that the unreleased full version is somehow cobbled together and re-released.
Sam Neill is an Irish actor with a New Zealand accent – he played Dr. Alan Grant in the first Jurassic Park – AND the third Jurassic Park. (Funny how he skipped the 2nd, and Jeff Goldblum skipped the third. Weirdness.) He was also the lead in In the Mouth of Madness – and his highest acclaimed film was playing the husband of Holly Hunter in The Piano.
Anyway, Event Horizon was a horror version of Solaris, and Neill was the sympathetic villian who eventually becomes a Cenobite (unofficially, but the character was a reference to the Hellraiser films.) The hero was played by Laurence Fishbourne. The film was not well received on release, but it has aged well, especially the final 5 minutes, and fans hope that the unreleased full version is somehow cobbled together and re-released.
Answering the question of the week: my favorite Disney video game is TRON 2.0, published by Buena Vista (Disney’s VG division) and developed by Monolith (of No One Lives Forever and F.E.A.R. fame) It was a Disney licensed game, too, and cleverly tied in the original film – apparently, the movie and arcade game TRON are based on Kevin Flynn’s experiences, for example. It was awesome, but had its share of problems. It was nice use of Bruce Boxleitner, but I felt Cindy Morgan was underused, and the game ended with a “To Be Continued” which was never resolved. The multiplayer was criminally underdeveloped – it could have been so much more.
Otherwise, where else could you kill someone with a L.O.L.?
Answering the question of the week: my favorite Disney video game is TRON 2.0, published by Buena Vista (Disney’s VG division) and developed by Monolith (of No One Lives Forever and F.E.A.R. fame) It was a Disney licensed game, too, and cleverly tied in the original film – apparently, the movie and arcade game TRON are based on Kevin Flynn’s experiences, for example. It was awesome, but had its share of problems. It was nice use of Bruce Boxleitner, but I felt Cindy Morgan was underused, and the game ended with a “To Be Continued” which was never resolved. The multiplayer was criminally underdeveloped – it could have been so much more.
Otherwise, where else could you kill someone with a L.O.L.?