"The NES compitition that wouln't be."

First I think it would be best to give you a slight history on the Atari 7800. Back in the infancy of gaming, one king ruled supreme. There was no Sony from a video game perspective, no sonic, not even the shiny grey machine had stepped to the throne. Atari was the undisputed god of the industry still. After the crash of 83-84 and the failure of the 5200 most would think Atari would be anxious to rebound and claim the console market again out of the ashes. Unfortunately for Atari, the new CEO had no such wishes. He shelved the Atari 7800, gutted its extras and concentrated on Atari's computer field. By the time it was released, the NES had its chokehold on the market and it had no chance at competition.

Specs 8
I wont give detailed specifications that most people wouldn't even take the time to read so I'll put it like this..... The Atari 7800 was an 8 bit system like the NES and had one great advantage over it. The 7800 was backwardly compatible with Atari's 2600 games. This would give the buyer a huge library of games instantly. Unfortunately the system had only 2 channel sound. It was capable of showing 256 colors.

Controllers 6
Joysticks. Some pretty awkward joystics. They're rectangular of sorts that you hold in your left hand and control with your right. Each also has two buttons (one on each side). Compared to the 5200 controllers, these things are amazing. Also several games use a light gun similar to the NES's and there are quite a few titles to support it.

Games 9
The system was released with a very good racer that most nostalgic video game players have played called Pole Position 2. The system was home to some very good arcade ports such as excellent versions of Galaga, Dig Dug, Xevious, Donkey Kong, and even Pac Man. One of my personal favorites is an addictive spin-off of Gauntlet called Dark Chambers. Some of the most innovative games came at the end of the systems short life. The Munsters rip off Midnight Mutants is as close to an action RPG as your going to get on the system. For the sports fan, there are the traditional generic Basketball, Football, Baseball, and Hockey games along with the acclaimed 3D future sport game, Ballblazer.

Collectivity 10
Perfect system for the newbie collector. Most games other than the few 3rd party games are easily found and since the system had a short shelf life, the number of titles is limited to a manageable amount for a rookie. Tank Command and Water Ski will pose I problem for most collectors and if you find them, they'll cost a pretty penny.

Overall 8
I happen to love my little obscure machine. There was enough ingenuity here to spawn a great tyrant of a system, but the special things were mostly whisked away (keyboard, highscore cartridge, etc.) If it was only released before the NES and with its set of extras, we might never have had a SNES, N64, Gamecube or even a Gameboy. Atari might very well have continued its dominance to this day had Nintendo been beaten in the 80s.

Reviewer's Score: 8/10, Originally Posted: 12/15/04