After playing a vast majority of the Atari 7800 library, we felt that it was time to retire from playing this system. So, as one final send off, we decided to count down the top 10 greatest games the system has to offer.
When we went into reviewing Atari 7800 games, we really didn’t know what to expect. What we did know is that there is an improvement over the controller and it is the systems that competed against the Nintendo Entertainment System (NES). Beyond that, everything else was just shooting around in the dark for us.
Initially, we were passively just playing these games from time to time. If they happen to pop up in our game rotation, we played it. After a while, though, we started noticing that no game on thus system had made any top great games 10 lists. So, it seemed like a simple thing to resolve, just play more Atari 7800 games. Eventually, some good ones are bound to crop up sooner or later, right?
Well, as it turns out, the system had inferior specs to the NES in many ways. The sound chip being one big way. As we played more and more, it became clearer and clearer that there were a lot of inferior quality games to be had on the system compared to other systems.
Still, we marched ahead hoping for something good to crop up anyway. As the library of games we were interested in playing dwindled, it was becoming more and more of a case of finding a needle in a haystack. With many nights of asking, “Why?”, “What?”, and, “Are you kidding me?”, good games eventually did turn up. Unfortunately, it was only after almost flipping through the entire library to find them.
While three games scored high enough to appear in a year end top 10 list, only 2 ever made it (sorry Food Fight, but that was a difficult year to get on that list!). Despite the difficulty of finding enjoyable games that compete well for the time of release, we did manage to find some that provided a certain degree of entertainment value – even if they had their own respective flaws. So, here it is, the top 10 greatest Atari 7800 games of all time.
1. Mean 18 Ultimate Golf (Golf) (84%)
2. Pole Position II (Racing) (84%)
3. Food Fight (Action) (80%)
4. Dig Dug (Action) (78%)
5. Xenophobe (Side Scrolling Shooter) (76%)
6. Ballblazer (Sports) (72%)
7. Fatal Run (Survival/Racing) (70%)
8. Joust (Action) (70%)
9. Desert Falcon (Shooter) (70%)
10. Ikari Warriors (Top Down Shooter) (70%)
Drew Wilson on Twitter: @icecube85 and Google+.