Spider Fighter

Spider Fighter

Atari 2600 - USA - 1st edition.

Developer Activision Publisher Activision Published 1982-??-?? Platforms Atari 2600 Genres Action, Fixed shooter, Shooter, Single-screen Distribution Commercial

Spider Fighter, is a fixed shooter developed by Larry Miller and published by Activision in 1982 for the Atari 2600. It is very similar to the Taito arcade game Stratovox.

Personal

Own?	Yes. Loose cartridge.
Won?	No. The game stops counting your score at 900,000.

My family had this game as part of a large collection of Atari games we got at a garage sale in the mid 1980s. I liked the game because it was far more interesting than some of the other fixed-shooters I had played. However, it was also so fast-paced, that I wasn't very good at it. I've never made a serious attempt to top-out the score (the game stops counting at 900,000).

Review

3	2	3	3	2

Best Version: Atari 2600

— This section contains spoilers! —

Good

• For a system that wasn't built to support dozens of sprites moving around the screen at once, the game certainly pulls it off, flicker free.
• Unlike most single-screen shooters where the targets usually follow predictable blocky routes, the enemies in the game have much more fluid movements.
• I like the idea of the Spy Pods "hatching" into stingers if you shoot the Master Nest first. It adds to the strategy of the game to take out the weaker foes first.
• The game has some pretty decent jingles for an Atari 2600 game.

Bad

• Because the Master Nests always spawn from the left, it becomes an effective strategy to hug the left side of the screen for the majority of the game, which is kind of boring.

Ugly

• The enemies often stick to the bottom of the screen making avoiding their bombs a matter of luck rather than skill.
• Like most shooters of this era, there is an all-encompassing sameness to the game. You max out the difficulty after about a dozen rounds, and then, to top out the score, it takes about another half hour of repeating the same thing over and over again.

Media

Box Art

• 

  Although it features the usual Activision rainbow motif, the cartoon artwork is pretty bad here. Not a fan.

• 

  An alternate box with a maroon background.

Documentation

• 

  Manual.

• 

  A magazine ad.

• 

  The game patch for scores above 40,000.

Play Online

Atari 2600

Representation

Strong female character?	Fail	Some of the spiders are female, but they lack depth.
Bechdel test?	Fail	There is no dialogue.
Strong person of color character?	Fail	There are no humans.
Queer character?	Fail	There are no queer characters.

Credits

Role	Staff
Entire Game	Larry Miller

Videos

Commercial.

Longplay - Max score.

Links