Well we didn’t mean bad gun ports, we meant bad game ports…
Anyhow, just because the title of a game is the same it doesn’t mean that the game will be the same. Developers have had the daunting task of porting games to run on various platforms throughout time.
In the early 80’s programmers had to write a number of different versions since no platform was pre-eminent. There were Atari 800, C64, Apple, Mac and IBM PC versions of games, but because of the specific constraints of each systems, the games were not all the same. Some games were horrific excuses of a translation. One can argue that all of the games on older systems, Atari 2600 being the main culprit, made horrendous version of the arcade original. Ok, I can entertain that argument, but some were so disappointing that they deserve special mention here.
Admittedly, Atari 2600 games were never quite the same as their arcade counterparts. However some games like Missile Command, Space Invaders, Asteroids, and Defender still captured some of the magic of those machines, and were also fun as games all on their own.
Throughout the years the home console versions have caught up in quality, up to the point that arcades have all but vanished.
This article speaks about my most disappointing experiences with home versions after playing the arcade version. (With exception to #2 which is a recent disappointing version of Alone in the Dark on xbox360.)
5. Donkey Kong (2600 – arcade)
I had three points of reference points during the 80’s:
- The high powered arcade version
- The Atari 400/800 versions (also Commodore 64) {Our family owned the Atari 400, then later the Atari 130 XE}
- The Atari 2600 versions {our cousins had the 2600}
What in the H… E… (double hockey sticks) is this about? Donkey Kong looks like the result of someone’s stomach ache! I could not believe how poor the translation was when I first played it on the 2600. Was this rushed out to meet a deadline? Was this effort the best that could be done with the resources that the 2600 provided? Thank you Coleco Vision, no wonder your not around anymore. They should have said, based on the arcade version of Donkey Kong.
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