Agent X
Member
Click here to read IGN's review. Interestingly enough, they didn't give this a numerical score (perhaps because it's a compilation...but that never stopped them from scoring compilations before).
They seemed to have a major beef with the presentation of this package. I agree with them that the arrangement of the games into "galaxies" isn't necessarily the best idea in the world, though it's far from the worst. The screen shows a skyscape with several "galaxies" (they're really more like constellations), each representing a certain genre. You have an arcade game galaxy, a sports galaxy, a racing galaxy, a mind games galaxy, an "arcade at home" galaxy (for home versions of major arcade games), and so on. You select a constellation, and then you see a group of games from that genre arranged alphabetically, at which time you can choose one. It's not that difficult to navigate. If you're still having trouble looking for a particular game, just consult the manual. It lists all the games alphabetically, and it will tell you what galaxy your desired game resides in.
OK, that's the worst part of the user interface. Now, here's where I start to disagree with the review.
I'm surprised that the reviewer completely missed one major aspect of the package, which is an incredible benefit to the user. What I am referring to is the method of selecting game variations.
Here's a brief history of Atari 2600 game variations (2600 veterans can just skip to the next paragraph now). Most cartridges have several different variations, which could be selected using the Game Select switch on the system. Some variations offered more lives, or started you at higher levels, or provided different maps, or altered the physics. The catch was that back in the early days, the cartridges didn't have a lot of memory (usually 2 or 4 kilobytes), and the screen resolution was rather low, so they couldn't use text menus or descriptive icons. Instead, there was simply a number in a corner of the screen. You had to look in the manual at a list or a graph to figure out what the number meant. If you didn't happen to have the manual handy...well, I hope you memorized the game variations! Here are a couple of examples (in HTML format) to give you an idea: Asteroids, Missile Command.
In Atari Anthology, what Digital Eclipse did was used the power of the modern video game console, and overlaid a translucent text window over the lower 1/4 to 1/2 of the screen. This text window explains what the current game variation does. No more trying to figure out what the difference was between game 7 and game 8--you now have it all laid out for you in plain English on the screen. This could've come in very handy in Activision Anthology or Intellivision Lives, where you frequently have to exit out of the game, look at the manual on the screen, go back into the game, and then make your selection.
Again, I can't believe the reviewer didn't even bother to mention this outstanding feature. I'm just happy that the developers thought of this! It more than makes up for whatever minor flaws are in the arrangement of the "galaxy" menus.
I wonder how the reviewer would've preferred to have the games sorted, if not by genre? The two most obvious choices are alphabetically by name (in which case you can simply check the manual as it is now), or chronologically (which probably wouldn't help anyone other than historians or hardcore Atari fanatics).
Activision Anthology on PS2--while a groundbreaking title as far as compilations go--had an attractive but haphazard method which listed the games on a rotating cartridge rack in almost--but not quite proper--chronological order. I found it odd that the reviewer considered this the benchmark for game selection, because (IMO) that the weakest part of the package, especially since the chronology isn't even correct. The GBA version of Activision Anthology improved greatly on this by arranging the games in alphabetical order. Midway Arcade Treasures has them grouped alphabetically, although they used icons rather than the title (the title would appear when you highlighted an icon). Intellivision Lives also uses the genre approach just like Atari Anthology, except with arcade cabinets rather than constellations. All of these methods have their own strengths and weaknesses.
Perhaps it would be best if they gave the user the option to choose any one of these methods of sorting the games. Some emulators on computers do this, but I haven't seen any classic game compilations on video game consoles offer this yet. Until then, we'll just have to make do with what the developers offer us, and I haven't seen any here that are totally insurmountable.
They seemed to have a major beef with the presentation of this package. I agree with them that the arrangement of the games into "galaxies" isn't necessarily the best idea in the world, though it's far from the worst. The screen shows a skyscape with several "galaxies" (they're really more like constellations), each representing a certain genre. You have an arcade game galaxy, a sports galaxy, a racing galaxy, a mind games galaxy, an "arcade at home" galaxy (for home versions of major arcade games), and so on. You select a constellation, and then you see a group of games from that genre arranged alphabetically, at which time you can choose one. It's not that difficult to navigate. If you're still having trouble looking for a particular game, just consult the manual. It lists all the games alphabetically, and it will tell you what galaxy your desired game resides in.
OK, that's the worst part of the user interface. Now, here's where I start to disagree with the review.
I'm surprised that the reviewer completely missed one major aspect of the package, which is an incredible benefit to the user. What I am referring to is the method of selecting game variations.
Here's a brief history of Atari 2600 game variations (2600 veterans can just skip to the next paragraph now). Most cartridges have several different variations, which could be selected using the Game Select switch on the system. Some variations offered more lives, or started you at higher levels, or provided different maps, or altered the physics. The catch was that back in the early days, the cartridges didn't have a lot of memory (usually 2 or 4 kilobytes), and the screen resolution was rather low, so they couldn't use text menus or descriptive icons. Instead, there was simply a number in a corner of the screen. You had to look in the manual at a list or a graph to figure out what the number meant. If you didn't happen to have the manual handy...well, I hope you memorized the game variations! Here are a couple of examples (in HTML format) to give you an idea: Asteroids, Missile Command.
In Atari Anthology, what Digital Eclipse did was used the power of the modern video game console, and overlaid a translucent text window over the lower 1/4 to 1/2 of the screen. This text window explains what the current game variation does. No more trying to figure out what the difference was between game 7 and game 8--you now have it all laid out for you in plain English on the screen. This could've come in very handy in Activision Anthology or Intellivision Lives, where you frequently have to exit out of the game, look at the manual on the screen, go back into the game, and then make your selection.
Again, I can't believe the reviewer didn't even bother to mention this outstanding feature. I'm just happy that the developers thought of this! It more than makes up for whatever minor flaws are in the arrangement of the "galaxy" menus.
I wonder how the reviewer would've preferred to have the games sorted, if not by genre? The two most obvious choices are alphabetically by name (in which case you can simply check the manual as it is now), or chronologically (which probably wouldn't help anyone other than historians or hardcore Atari fanatics).
Activision Anthology on PS2--while a groundbreaking title as far as compilations go--had an attractive but haphazard method which listed the games on a rotating cartridge rack in almost--but not quite proper--chronological order. I found it odd that the reviewer considered this the benchmark for game selection, because (IMO) that the weakest part of the package, especially since the chronology isn't even correct. The GBA version of Activision Anthology improved greatly on this by arranging the games in alphabetical order. Midway Arcade Treasures has them grouped alphabetically, although they used icons rather than the title (the title would appear when you highlighted an icon). Intellivision Lives also uses the genre approach just like Atari Anthology, except with arcade cabinets rather than constellations. All of these methods have their own strengths and weaknesses.
Perhaps it would be best if they gave the user the option to choose any one of these methods of sorting the games. Some emulators on computers do this, but I haven't seen any classic game compilations on video game consoles offer this yet. Until then, we'll just have to make do with what the developers offer us, and I haven't seen any here that are totally insurmountable.