ATARI BYTES

Are you ready for some football? Well, too bad. This week on episode 155 we're gonna slam dunk on Kareem Abdul Jabbar as we're playing Atari BASKETBALL from 1979. Then we'll celebrate Dr. James Naismith's creation of the wholesome American game of basketball with some mildly suggestive poetry in the style of Victorian era erotic literature. I'm not slapping the "explicit" tag on this episode, but...

Episode 154 fires at you like a cannonball, screaming profanity and peeing itself with fear like a human. That's right, we're playing from Atari's early days the "what the hell, let's try this" title, the 1978 classic HUMAN CANNONBALL. Those of you who didn't get enough of your aggressions out by splatting flailing stick figures into the ground in "Circus Atari", this game is for you. But does thi...

HAPPY NEW YEAR! You could ring in 2019 watching a ball drop, while drenched in expensive champagne and kissing your favorite person. OR... ...you could crack open whatever was on sale and come on out to the movies. Tuxedo is optional. This week on episode 153, we're reviewing the 1982 action hit  sort of action-y flop MEGAFORCE. This is the movie which inspired the MEGAFORCE game. (See episode 129...

Ho - Ho - HO...ly cow! It's the Christmas episode of ATARI BYTES! In episode 152, we set aside the egg-nog-drenched game console to wish you all a joyous holiday season. To thank you for your support throughout the year, please enjoy the world debut of my original poem 'TWAS THE NIGHT BEFORE ATARI CHRISTMAS. Now go ask Santa to stop using the Pac-Man cart as a coaster for his milk. And the E.T. ca...

We hope you already peed, because once the cross-country race that is this week's episode gets going, we're not stopping. It's the Activision game ENDURO, from 1983. So, this week's story probably has something to do with eggplant farming. Racers! Ready! Get set! Listen to 151! Thanks to Kevin McLeod at Incompetech.com for creative commons use of his songs "Take a Chance", "Reformat" and "Pinball...

Much like the unnamed karate-practitioner in Broderbund's 1988 port of KARATEKA for the Atari 7800, my moves are lightning fast and totally ineffectual. But we both look great with bare feet. Bunions are in now, right? Why is Mr. No Name - let's call him "Ed" - storming the castle of evil warlord Akuma? Why does Akuma leave his doors unlocked? Is the lovely, Princess Mariko longing to be saved by....

Episode 149 offers up GOPHER, a 1982 U.S. Games title for those among us who long to bash in the brains of a furry little creature with a shovel.  In the game, you are a farmer defending your carrot patch from relentless gophers stealing your crop. You are armed with a shovel which you wield with merciless glee. Sometimes you actually use to fill in the holes the gopher leaves, but, mostly, you're...

What goes better with reheated Thanksgiving leftovers than the disturbing jelled, canned cranberry podcast equivalent ATARI BYTES? If I had to venture a guess, I'd say this week's episode IS THE SINGLE GREATEST PODCASTING EXPERIENCE YOU WILL EVER HAVE... during the time you listen to this particular podcast.  In episode 148, we're playing VENTURE, Coleco's 1982 port of the classic arcade game that...

Take a deep breath and bend over to touch your toes! Your  tic-tac-toes , that is. And 1 and 2 and 1 and 2... This week on episode 147, we're playing an early Atari effort from 1978: 3D TIC-TAC-TOE. Was making tic-tac-toe three dimensional an innovative twist on a perennial diner placement favorite or was it a distracting, pancake-themed riddle over nothing more worthy than a gravy stain on that p...

Despite the waves of political unrest, some 8 million tourists visit Egypt every year to take in such amazing sites as the Great Sphinx. Therefore, when the listener stats come in for episode 146 of the show, iMagic's RIDDLE OF SPHINX, we're expecting similar numbers. That's reasonable, right? *Ahem* Anyway, as the son of the Prince of Egypt, you are the ultimate tourist striving to get in line ah...

This week on episode 145 of ATARI BYTES, we dive deep into the valley of the poisonous mountain cacti (plural for cactus) that is the intersection of philosophy and science. For example: If the universe encompasses everything we know, but the universe is also expanding, WHAT is it expanding into? Mallory said he climbed Mt. Everest simply because it is there. What the hell does that mean? That sec...

We've got a spook-tacular Halloween-ish episode this week. You won't get any candy, but it could be worse. You could get a bag full of rocks. (Sorry, Charlie Brown) We scare ourselves silly* with the 1983 Xonox title GHOST MANOR. *Not actually that scary.** **The game has not so much in the way of ghosts as it does have frolicking little boys and girls playing amongst the tombstones.*** ***That's...

This week on episode 143, we get a demonstration of what happens when you title a game by smashing two words together to create a third word.  This week's game is ASTROBLAST, an unholy union of "astronomy" or "astronomical" and "blast". Personally, I thing "Astronomical Blast" is just as, if not more, inviting a game title as Astroblast, by M Network in 1982 never asked me.  The title is enough to...

In "Ghostbusters", Rick Moranis told Sigourney Weaver he was the key master. Well, cool as Rick was, he's got nothing on you, my friend. For, with a little luck, you can be the STARMASTER. This week, we're playing the 1982 Activision game STARMASTER. Anyone can wish upon a star. Catch a falling star. See stars if you smack your head on the game console after passing your eighteenth straight hour o...

You got to know when to hold 'em. Know when to fold 'em. Know when to walk away. Know when to run.  Then prepare to get laughed at and possibly shot by the dudes you're playing with at the Old West saloon, because we're not playing poker on episode 141 of the podcast, we're playing BLACKJACK.  This 1977 title from Atari is one of the original nine the company released with this new-fangled devil-m...

This week's episode is dedicated to tennis great Serena Williams, who was beaten recently by a young upstart. Serena, if you're listening (and reading those show notes), you are welcome to come play TENNIS from Activision with me anytime. I assure you, you will have no trouble beating me. That's right, in episode 140, we're playing the 1981 Activision (squee!) game TENNIS. "What's this one about?"...

"Wouldn't you rather play a nice game of chess?" - Joshua, the WOPR US defense computer, speaking to Matthew Broderick in "Wargames". "Life moves pretty fast. If you don't stop and look around once in a while, you could miss it." - Matthew Broderick, though I think that was in a different movie. Anyway, this week, we're playing the 1979 Atari stalwart VIDEO CHESS. You thought you knew chess, but y...

Sometimes, the setups for these blurbs write themselves. Are you ready? Here we go. This week's game is Atari's 1988 offering for the 7800 console CRACK'ED. Join us to find out if this game is all it's CRACKED up to be. Low-hanging fruit, friends. Or low hanging eggs, we should say. And we have to protect them from snakes and relentless birds. Seriously, Hitchcock's movie "The Birds" has nothing o...

This week, we're battling the flagship of the Galagan fleet on ATARI BYTES, the flagship of all the podcasts on the Internet.* *Might not be the actual flagship.** **The podcast is mostly just tolerated. We're playing the 1987 Atari 7800 port of Namco's legendary GALAGA. The. Best. Game. Ever. Okay, that's debatable, but as much as has been said about the virtues (and some deficits) of the game, h...

Just when you thought it was safe to go back into the podcatcher… ATARI BYTES Episode 136 SHARK ATTACK (formerly known as LOCHJAW) is circling ever closer to its prey - I mean its listener - offering you a unique take on this 1982 Apollo game.  This week's story could feature sharks...but that's a little on the nose, don't you think? We might go with a "My Dinner With Andre" type think piece inste...

If your lock is warped, do you need a skeleton key with scoliosis to open it? We have many questions in episode 135, WARPLOCK from Date Age, 1982. None of which will be answered. How will the ship get free of the space/time warp leaving it at the mercy of the space pirates? If you warp time, does that mean I can watch Sharknado 6 live again? If you lock space, and you call a locksmith, can you jus...

In 2018, the ATARI BYTES podcast life support systems malfunctioned, freezing the host and leaving him in suspended animation. When he was revived five hundred years later, no one had a podcast app. NOOOOOOO! The future is scary, friends. But the future is a safe space in episode 134, BUCK ROGERS PLANET OF ZOOM from Sega, 1982. Why? Because Buck is here protecting us. Well, not actually US. He's p...

In Episode 133 of Atari Bytes, we release our bopper!  It's both creepy and cosmic, man! Our game this week is COSMIC CREEPS from Telesys, 1982. Your orbinaut must save the cosmic kids from the space station before the planet's orbit is in retrograde and the moon is in Sagittarius, but only when Uranus is visible. Or something. And why, exactly, are we unleashing our bopper in front of the orbinau...

Imagine slimy worms maneuvering blindly through the topsoil, pooping and plotting the demise of civilization. Not unlike this podcast. In episode 132 of ATARI BYTES, we're playing the 1982 20th Century Fox game "WORM WAR I". War is hell, inspiring much moving poetry. It also inspired this week's somewhat less moving poetry.  Thanks to whoever wrote the kid's nursery rhyme "Inchworm" for making thi...

Yodelayheehoo! The hills are alive with the sound of...sparse, but integral music in episode 131, MOUNTAIN KING.  This 1983 CBS Electronics game boasts a dark cave, diamonds, spirts, both flame and skull, and a quest for the mysterious golden crown. Bats and spiders and grumpy spirits bar your way. Sort of like life.  The look of the game is simple..but what about the narrative lying underneath th...