Jakks Pacific Atari TV Games Paddle

 

 

 

 

 

Released by Jakks Pacific in 2004 and again licensed from Atari Interactive, this was the follow-up to their Atari joystick plug-and-play system.  It again uses a NOAC (Nintendo-on-a-chip) and the conversions were done by Digital Eclipse this time.  The system resembles an original Atari paddle controller, although it's longer and heavier.  It features A/V output and runs on 4 AA batteries.  2 different variations were released - 1-player model and a 2-player model.  The 2-player model includes a standard-sized Atari paddle for the second player.  It includes 13 games:

Arcade Pong
Arcade Warlords
Breakout
Canyon Bomber
Casino
Circus Atari
Demons to Diamonds
Night Driver
Steeplechase
Street Racer
Super Breakout
Video Olympics
Warlords

The 3 paddle games that were included on the 10-in-1 joystick (Breakout, Circus Atari, and Pong/Video Olympics) are included again, so at least this time around you can play them with a paddle.    Although all the games this time around were originally designed to use the paddle controller, they included every paddle game Atari released except one - Backgammon.  They could have also included the unreleased Stunt Cycle prototype to have everything.  The inclusion of the arcade versions of Pong and Warlords are nice, but they could have continued along that path and included the arcade versions of Breakout, Night Driver, and Super Breakout, as well as some of the other Pong variations.

Digital Eclipse did a good job of trying to replicate these using NES hardware, but there are some noticeable differences.  The following comments are courtesy of Greg Bendokus:

Arcade Pong - considering the original was pure TTL logic (no software), this is a recreation... and not an accurate one.  Has both single and 2-player modes, and a 12-8 o'clock paddle range!  The game randomly resets while you play, and occasionally the ball bounces through the top of the screen after the computer hit it and the game stopped; even Game Reset wouldn't serve another ball.  Also, your paddle passes through the adjacent pixel to your score near the top of the screen, rendering it impossible to play (PIC), for how can you read the angle of the incoming ball if it has has to pass through your score?  This gives the left player a HUGE advantage in a 2-player game.

Arcade Warlords - Best gameplay of the bunch.  12-4 o'clock paddle range, which is perfect here.  You can start normally as the lower-left king with the 2nd paddle.  The bounce sound is wrong and annoying, and the end music is terrible with the wrong pitch, and it stutters.

Breakout - sounds are a tad higher in pitch than the original but it plays exactly like the VCS cart.

Canyon Bomber - perfect gameplay but bomb drop sound has no 'buzz', just noise ,which sounds like TV interference.

Casino - plays the same but the shuffle sound is wrong; there's a low musical tone mixed in there.

Circus Atari - perfect gameplay but the sound is a disaster.  The bounce sound is a stuttering musical tone.  Hitting balloons sounds like the same pitch as the bounce sound but with hiss added.  The death sound is just hiss, like dipping a cigarette in water.

Demons to Diamonds - perfect gameplay but color palette is totally wrong.  The death sound is also much higher pitch than it should be with no 'noise' in it like the original.

Night Driver - suffers greatly from decreased paddle sensitivity, as it handles like a dead fish.  Sounds are horrible - no skid sound, you just hear what sounds like a leaky balloon.  Crash sound is a bunch of hiss just like the death sound in Circus Atari.

Steeplechase - the gameplay on the original was no great shakes, which is why Atari sold it as a Sears exclusive.

Street Racer - there's NO engine sound, just a constant loud buzz which sounds like constant 60 cycle hum the whole time you play.  The 'scoop ball' sound is also missing   This game is audio-wise the worst of the bunch.

Super Breakout - plays the same.  Of the many different sound schemes, at least one of them has no sound at all here.  All of them basically sound wrong.  Paddle sensitivity is improved here, 12 o'clock to 3 o'clock range.

Video Olympics - game sounds are much higher pitched (miss sound is correct) so if you keep the ball alive, only dogs can hear the increasing pitch of the tones after a while.  Has a 12-6 o'clock paddle range, but almost impossible to play on game variation 1 when the ball gets to the top speed.

Warlords - every sound is horribly wrong, and the bounce sound is particularly bad.  At least you start as the correct king in the 1P game.  Has the same hiss sounds as the other games.
 

 

 


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