Megamania
Megamania is a classic single-screen shooter programmed by Steve Cartwright and published by Activision in 1982 on the Atari 2600, and in 1983 on the Atari 5200 and Atari 8-bit computers. This is one of my favorite Atari 2600 games, and a favorite of the single-screen space shooter genre.
I first played the game as one of the many games in a used collection of Atari game my parents bought us kids at a garage sale. I once programmed by own version of Megamania in QuickBASIC.
Contents
Status
I own Megamania for the Atari 2600. My highest score is 111,920, well beyond the score of 45,000 needed to earn the Activision Megamaniacs patch, but a far cry from when the game stops counting at 999,999.
Review
5 | 6 | 4 | 3 | 4 |
Best Version: 44%
Good
- Despite the Atari 2600's memory restrictions, Cartwright packed a lot of variation into this game's enemies. Their movement patterns vary, they look different, and each have several variations.
- Even though the ship designs repeat, the palette shifts and the enemy ships adopt new movement patterns in subsequent waves giving the game more variety.
- Being able to control the ship's gun in different ways was a nice addition.
- The game has really nice sound for a 2600 game.
Bad
- Due to the extreme limits of the Atari 2600, the game is unfortunately too repetitive.
- Although the enemies all have different movement patterns, they're really all just variations on a theme.
Ugly
- Nothing.
Media
Box Art
Documentation
Videos
- youtube.com/watch?v=c8v-wtcDGpo - Longplay of a full score of 999,999.
Ports
Port | Released | Porter | Publisher | Notes |
---|---|---|---|---|
Atari 2600 | 1982-??-?? | Activision | Activision | Original release. |
Atari 5200 | 1983-??-?? | Activision | Activision | More detailed graphics and additional sound effects. |
Atari 8-bit | 1983-??-?? | Activision | Activision | Nearly identical to the 5200 port. |
Credits
Role | Staff |
---|---|
Entire Game | Steve Cartwright |
Links
- mobygames.com/game/megamania - MobyGames.
- en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Megamania - Wikipedia.