Coleco: We really tried our best with your garbage platform. It's amazing it didn't explode trying to run the title screen. Mattel: Are you sure this was your best? Coleco: We're staking our professional reputation on it. Mattel: Mario is purple. And naked. Except for his hat, which somehow makes him even more naked. Coleco: We know. We're billing you for the development team's therapist. I'd get used to settling out of court, if I were you. Mattel: Do you really think you're fooling anyone? Coleco: We'll just have to wait for the market's verdict to answer that question, won't we? By the way, we're making a computer add-on. We're calling it the Adam. And it's going to help end console gaming as we know it. So enjoy your little kingdom while it lasts... Mattel: Is that how you see it? Because we agree...only we think it's the dawning of the Age of Aquarius. Years later: INTV: (Pisses on Coleco's grave.) Bloody idiots, you were both right about ending console gaming as we knew it, even if it wasn't the way you intended. And seriously, what was up with that Mario sprite? You could have at least beat us honest, like with Burgertime. Did you know that was our pack-in? The best we had to offer, and our moldy old leftovers still couldn't come close to what you were serving. Atari 2600: (to self) I used 16k, and the eggs are just flickering squares. What are those brown squares? Cinnamon Toast Crunch? Where did I go wrong? What else could I have done? (We see Atari 2600 is mashing broken crayons into a coloring book. It has a hard time coloring in the lines, due to its shaking hands. Even Pac-Man's dots aren't really dots. Fortunately, it has a ton of crayons to break.) INTV: You did your best, with what you had and the time you had to do it. C'mon, grandpa, let's get you back to the home. Atari 2600: You! You're...are we friends now? INTV: Something like that. I made games for you, that were almost as good as the games I made for me. Atari 2600: (grins) I like games. Especially good ones. INTV: Me too, old timer, me too. Not far away: Atari 5200. (Hides in the shadows, bitterly resenting the limp and broken joystick that keeps anyone from taking it seriously.) My family has disowned me. I live in shame....and that...that senile Pong machine still survives me? IT'S NOT FAIR! My Centipede was the best anyone had ever seen! My Zaxxon had real isometric scrolling! I should be the winner of this console war, not a console that can't even remember its own sprite limitations! Mysterious voice: And yet, you've already been replaced. Atari 5200: ...ha. Like they'll ever release you. Get used to your prison, 7800. Atari 7800: I wasn't speaking of me, though my time will come. No, I was speaking of your family... Atari 5200: My family? How dare you call them "my" family...they adopted you. You were their chosen one. Show some gratitude! Some of us would kill to be you! And besides... they're a computer line. No computer could ever replace me! I'm the heir to the empire! A calm voice: I agree. Hello, 5200. I don't believe we've met. (Drawing a sword.) My pronoun is XE. I'm neither just a computer or just a console. Why limit yourself to that artificial binary? Atari 5200: Get away from me you perversion, you're not even in this video - The shelf life of the 5200 is cut short. Cue credits. End stinger: Scene: A dying wasteland in the near future. C64GS: The bastard console of the house of Commodore... GX4000: The bastard console of the house of Amstrad... C64GS: We meet at last, for our first and final duel. GX4000: Where 5200 failed, one of us will surely succeed. C64GS: Are you ready to die? GX4000: Are you ready to start, or are you just going to talk me to death instead? C64GS: Yeah, about that. Hang on, I'm still looking for my "T" key. GX4000: Your what? C64GS: My "T" key. You know - like, spilling the "T"? I literally can't play Terminator without it. I'm just stuck in this "T" pose...it's so awkward... GX4000: Thanks for explaining the long and winding path it took to reach those jokes ...if you're my destined rival, what does that say about the quality of my destiny? I think I'll pass on that dark future, thanks. (Commits seppuku by pulling own plug.) C64GS: (a long moment of shocked silence, and then...) I did that!
While the Atari 2600 often had inferior graphics, the controls usually made up for that. Using paddles or a simple joystick was better than keypads and thumb disks.
I'm with you on that. It might be bias on my part with the 2600 being my first console but I'd rather play a majority of these games on that even if it's the worst version in terms of audio and visuals.
As a ColecoVision owner (well, my parents technically were the owners), I used an accessory in which a joystick was attached to the thumb disk. It was so seamless that I forgot that we didn't buy it like that.
amazing video! the time this must have taken is staggering. i only have one suggestion. highlight the border of the screen that the audio is coming from and do each one equally.
Thank you so much for checking this out! I really like that suggestion, I'll do that the next time I put out a video like this. Yeah this took quite a bit of time, way more than I'd like to admit lol.
I have a great working 2600, excellent intellivision II, and a perfect colecovision. Like them all but the Colecovision has the best versions for the most part and it's not that close but there are always exclusives and exceptions. The 2600 has the best version of star wars the empire strikes back and an exclusive of Spacemaster X-7 (a great game).
The Colecovision is leagues ahead of the 2600 in the graphical and audio spectrum but there is something so fun about the simplicity of the 2600. I'd add Space Invaders as another example of the 2600 being better than it's graphically superior port compared with the 5200.
@@RetroComparisons Yes you have it framed exactly right and in my opinion Defender is another 2600 games with very simple, blocky graphics that has better game play on the 2600 than it's much more beautiful counterparts on the graphically more advanced systems.
Atari 2600 as well. I only recently learned that they purposely made a lousy DK port in order to entice people to switch to ColecoVision. It worked like a charm on me - within a month, I'd sold my 2600 and picked up a CV. Loved it, too.
Colocovision clearly has the best graphics possibilities (for example visible in H.E.R.O.) - but sometimes, the 5200 version looks slightly better ... or "nearer to the arcade original". Example: Defender (blinking stars background) Maybe Atari had better acces to original game data / resources like sprite data & other graphics in some cases....
Just a couple weeks ago, I geeked out and made a spreadsheet comparing the specs of the first few generations of consoles. It's interesting to compare the specs of ColecoVision against the 5200. One was better than the other in some ways, but not all. Coleco had 2x faster CPU and 4x VRAM (16k vs 4k). The 5200 had more system RAM (16k to 1k) and a bigger color palette (256 colors vs. 16, but both can only display 16 at once). There were differences in how they handled sprites, but I can't remember what they were because I couldn't easily put them down on a spreadsheet.
@@benmoore6612 That's super cool and very interesting! I knew they were similar in the sense that they came out around the same time and were more advanced then the rest of the 2nd gen consoles but I love seeing stuff like this that shows their technical makeup.
I love videos like this. I was fortunate enough to have all these systems, and I loved each one! It's amazing to see what we thought was so great back then (well, they were).
Thanks for watching! These were all phenomenal systems and even if they haven't aged gracefully from a graphics perspective they're still just as playable now as they were back then.
I have to admit the Atari 2600 had some games that actually looked decent. I've only ever seen the usual games but I might seek out some of these other titles thanks to this video.
There's a ton of great games that don't get talked about a lot and even up against some of the more powerful consoles of the time there's a fun factor that the others sometimes lack.
Graphics from this era always look chunky to us now, and almost equally so... but most of these games were considered *massively* different/better on one system or another at the time (with the 2600 almost always coming out in a distant last place). It was a much bigger difference than we see in modern consoles today.
I find these older consoles to be fascinating for that reason. Starting around the 6th gen almost every port looked and sounded the same but back then there were massive differences between ports to the point that it almost seemed like a different game altogether sometimes.
I think we missed out when passing on the Colecovision. Came so close to getting one, but then went with the Atari 5200, which to be fair was still a good system, even though the controllers sucked!
And Coleco had a Baseball game that was next level at the time _Super Action Baseball_ Nothing even REMOTELY COMPARED to it's graphics, on the pitching/batting portion
Colecovision was, without, the superior console of this era. It's not even close. Look at the Coleco version of H.E.R.O., for example. It looks like an NES or even an SNES game in terms of graphics. That said, the gameplay and controls on the Atari 2600 are great, probably the best of these three. The 2600 itself was built like a tank and those 2600 joysticks were just very responsive and suited the games perfectly. So yeah, something has to be said for the consistently great gameplay on the 2600.
The 2600 is my favorite of these 4 as it was probably the most consistent (plus I have a lot of nostalgia for it) but the Colecovision was like the premium home console of its time. It sucks it had so short of a lifespan.
@@RetroComparisons Yeah, totally. I just got one of those Colecovision flashbacks. Pretty incredible what that thing was capable of considering it was a 1982 console
The Intellivision was in a weird spot for these 4. It couldn't compete with the superior sound and graphics of the ColecoVision & 5200 and somehow the 2600 usually seemed to be the more fun experience even when it couldn't compete in any other category.
The 5200 and Coleco were the closest thing you could get to arcade at the time. A lot of us didnt give a xrap though. We were just happy to play the games at home......and they werent hard to beat unless you put it on difficult or expert
@@retroconsole_ i didn't think so. To me they were about even. Plus there was a major difference between graphics versus gameplay and for a lotta people, that was the difference maker.For example, the game could be all kinds of pretty to me, but if i couldn't play it, it would sit on the shelf collecting dust. Understand that that $30 was a pretty penny in 1982
Six months after the Atari 5200 launched, you could buy an Atari 400 for under $150. The 5200 was selling for a hundred more. The 400 was the true console replacement for the 2600 & was introduced in November of 79. You had Star Raiders, Pac-Man, Ms. Pac-Man, Donkey Kong, Frogger, Dig Dug, 4 player Asteroids & Breakout, Lode Runner, Pitfall, Centipede, Missle Command, Wizard of Wor, Robotron 2084, Qix, Star Wars, Mr. Do!, River Raid, Zaxxon, Gorf, and many other great games, in cartridges by mid 83. The Commodore 64, introduced in August of 82 for $595, was still selling for more than three times the cost of an Atari 400 by mid 83. From March of 1980, "Star Raiders" introduction, until the introduction of the Nintendo Entertainment System, the Atari 8bit line of computers were the best gaming platform.
This is such an ultimate early 1980's consoles comparison vid! As someone who's fascinated with retro games history, I can't thank you enough for this video.
Thank you so much for watching:) I really appreciate you taking the time to watch it! BTW in case you're interested, I compared every single arcade game that was ported to a 2nd gen console whether it was one of these or more obscure stuff like the Bally Astrocade. ru-vid.com/video/%D0%B2%D0%B8%D0%B4%D0%B5%D0%BE-C6XWadtn2f0.html
Whew, that's a big comparison to take on. Great work, Bill, and happy new year. I'll have to try to watch through all of the comparisons over time. I wish I had got the chance to experience the Colecovision and Intellivision during the 80s (and I've never played a real intellivision: just on emus, Intellivision Lives, and the flashback). Dad borrowed the 5200 from a guy at work, at least once in the mid-80s. It was cool, but I didn't get to play much of it. The Colecovision I borrowed for a week or two from a co-worker around 2010 or so, and I have Coleco flashback as well. For me, the 2600 will always be number 1 between these 4, simply because of the nostalgia. Plus, I think the coolest thing with these comparisons, especially for hardware until the time where home hardware could meet or exceed the arcade is all of the interesting concessions that developers made to try to bring an arcade game home to much inferior hardware. Sometimes it didn't turn out well at all, but a lot of times the games came out fun with interesting quirks versus the original. Like...Space Invaders on the 2600 or 5200 is quite different from the arcade and each other, yet are both still fun. A lot of times the most fun is to see how different devs had different perspectives on capturing the essence of an arcade title rather than which version is actually technically the best. Not to say that raw technical comparisons aren't interesting and fun, but sometimes a game is more fun than other versions in spite of its shortcomings (2600 has quite a few games like this...NES too compared to some arcade titles...as well as ports to the handhelds like the GB, GG, Lynx, etc). Aside from Pitfall and Pitfall 2 and Decathlon, my favorite in this list that originates on the home systems and is not an arcade port is probably Dragonfire, and though I always loved the 2600 version, the Colecovision version is even better.
Happy New Year my friend! Oh definitely take your time on this. It's more of a reference video in case you wanna see how a particular game stacks up. The 2600 will always have a special place in my heart being my first console. The Colecovision & Intellivision were consoles that my brother and I picked up super cheap at garage sales in the late 90s. I hardly ever played them though because of the controllers and also I was probably at the height of my Goldeneye obsession so I was hardly even playing the Genesis by then. You're so right that even if a game is not technically the best on any level it can still be the most fun. In that case it's hard for me to be unbiased if I played the 2600 game growing up and not thinking it's the most fun. River Raid and Moonsweeper are great examples of that. Now I'm back off to work on another 2nd gen video that will be even more of an undertaking than this one..
@@RetroComparisons Too bad Coleco made poor financial decisions and the company only lasted a few years, otherwise many more close arcade games could have been come into Colecovision. I liked it more than nes.
I thought that I wouldnt love the 2600 version of Centipede and Millipede but I do. If you happen to have the 2600 Trackball is slightly better but these versions were made for Joystick but still no issues
And the emulator reveals all. I see what they did with Buck Rogers on the 2600 to get more sprites. They used an effective 25fps/30fps frame rate by only drawing each side in alternating frames. You could do that because the eye only sees things at a rate of around 24fps, although you might still see some slight flicker on PAL units, but shouldn't see any on NTSC. This trick didn't work properly in the emulator used.
@Retro Comparisons Yeah. When you look at the limitations of the 2600 in particular, it's absolutely mind blowing some of the things they did. Galaxian on the 2600 remains my favourite home version. I'm a programmer and I've dabbled with the 2600 but I'm clueless with how they got that working. Same with Berzerk. Given the hardware limitations, on paper, those should have been impossible.
@@daviddavies3637 Oh I love Galaxian on the 2600 and that may be my favorite too much like Space Invaders which is also my favorite port. I'd love to hear stories of how they made some of those games. Another one that comes to mind is Solaris. I know it was later in the lifecycle of the console but without context I could easily believe it was a 5200 or Colecovision game.
The problem with videos like this is that while the graphics are easy to compare, the actual control and gameplay isn't. Id argue that the 2600 games are easier to control than most on the other systems
That's a great question. I did all of these games separately and then combined them into one video and something must have happened when rendering it. I didn't pick up on it until someone pointed it out the other day.
@@madmax2069 Haha no worries, I expect to see it a lot on here and deserve it. Usually I pick up on these things when watching the final product before uploading but I must have been zoned out.
The single best moment I ever experienced in home videogaming back in those days was on September 7, 1982, when I brought home my ColecoVision with three cartridges (DK, Venture, LadyBug) after having sold my Atari 2600 (with its 10 cartridges, including the horrible port of Donkey Kong) via a newspaper ad. Talk about a step up! We were glued to those joysticks all weekend.
the coleco vision was supposedly just as powerful as the atari 5200, but was slightly faster in processor speed, insane how atari was loved but was also so far behind
@@RetroComparisons it’s all a sad story though, the Atari 2600 was only mostly trusted (even though all the shitty games) just because they made arcade games and had a higher brand name. Whereas the 5200 and 7800 both flopped when people finally saw the true like top tier consoles of the time and I’m sure if every other brand hadn’t gotten as much attention like Nintendo the 2600 would’ve been killed even more
The 2600 came out in 1977, The Colecovision and 5200 both came out in 1982, 5 years later. Under the hood, the 5200 was using technology from 1979 for most of its heavy hauling, so it's still pretty remarkable how well it competed against the latest and greatest of the time.
The Colecovision Buck Rogers graphics were amazing. Honestly, I thought it was the Flight Simulator on the Xbox series S. Xbox series X way better than all though.
excellent resource -- just wish the brightness and color settings could have been made more comparable between the consoles. If the signal from my 5200 looked so dark and dreary as it appears on many of these comparisons, I would favor the other consoles.
It is a nice little in between console and since it's an earlier console you got some great games with some time before the crash which the Colecovision and 5200 suffered from within a year of their release.
We've really come a long way in graphics since those early 8-bit days. started off primitive and then Nintendo and Sega came along pushing graphics with their systems. 😶🌫 Seeing this video made me remember that I had Lock 'N Chase and Mouse Trap for the 2600 while I was looking at a number of videos trying to remember every game I had for the 2600/5200 and Colecovision. Can't help but miss the old days now and more since my mother is no longer with us and she used to love playing Burgertime on Coleco and whenever we went to Chuck E Cheese.
It's wild to see how games were at the start of the decade in the 80s to how they ended with the Genesis and even better arcade hardware. Lock 'N Chase and Mouse Trap are both tons of fun. I'm sorry to hear about your mother:(
Colecovision, my very first home gaming console (had only a couple game & watch handhelds before it) but damn, that coleco controller, everytime I hold my phone in the hand today reminds me of those awkward placed fire buttons on the sides, wheres the power and volume buttons are on todays mobile phones usually. I always have my crt filters on for that authentic look from the 80s whenever I play my annual dose of smurf/zaxxon/ladybug/venture/gorf/mousetrap/turbo and pepper II
The Colecovision is a great first console. Haha yeah the controllers for that, the 5200 & Intellivision were definitely wonky but the games looked great.
Its pretty obvious as it was back in the 80s playing my Intellivision. Atari is to Intellivision as Intellivision is to Colecovision. But as others have said, we were all just happy at the time playing whatever console we had. I really liked the Intellivision, I thought the disk controller was great and the keypad overlays and extra buttons added a slight complexity to games that wasn't present on the other systems. The Intellivoice was pretty cool as well for the time.
The progression of consoles in such a short period of time back then was astounding. I totally agree with you that back then just having pretty much anything of the caliber of those systems was nothing short of incredible even if they weren't the most graphically impressive. I mean I grew up playing the 2600 in the early 90s before we got a Genesis and even then I had a blast with those games.
Frogger takes an drastic change briefly before this time stamp. ru-vid.com/video/%D0%B2%D0%B8%D0%B4%D0%B5%D0%BE-B9SZg30WkCg.html It doesn't look like any of the others nor the 2600's versi9on. What's up? Also in so many screens the Colleco and Intellivision look so bright and nice yet the 2600/5200 are so muted and grey? Just check out the Frogger part I mentioned. Nice work overall. Quite the chore and your work is appreciated.
Thanks so much for checking this out! So for Frogger on the 2600 there's 2 official versions that came out for it. Rather than making it an extra long segment I thought I'd divide it in half for each part.
The $$$ winner was the Atari 2600 due to it's huge library of games. Over 500 compared to Intellivision's and Colecovision's 100+ and the 5200's 69. No doubt that the 2600 was the most primitive as far as graphics and sound, but, after all, they were the first. I played mostly an Intellivision at the time. More playable than the 2600 and it was almost impossible to find games for the Coleco and 5200. Fun times and many an hour wasted in my youth. 🙂
Great points on everything except wasting hours in your youth haha. As long as you had fun it wasn't wasted time. There's a certain charm to the primitive nature of the 2600 that I love and I think makes it last the test of time the way that other consoles of the same generation such as these don't get the benefit of.
Good question. For older consoles like this I emulate the games and even though I have an Intellivision I don't really have a good way to hook it up to test it out.
@@RetroComparisons David Crane: "Pitfall II was the first hardware-assisted 2600 game. The built-in DPC chip was arguably an early GPU, providing help for both graphic fetches and music. I always remind people that comparing plain vanilla 2600 games to Pitfall II is an unfair comparison."
Wow that's a lot of gaming in this video! Thanks and now we can clearly see how crap the Intellivision is most of the time. Thanks for confirming that needed fact.
Lol no probs! The Intellivision had the unfortunate situation of being the middle child of the 2nd gen. It was more advanced than the 2600 but without the name recognition and less advanced than the Colecovision & 5200.
it was cheaper, came out before the others, so people already had a console. they didn't want to buy a 2nd console that costed the price of a high-end PC of today just to play a couple of games that were already on the atari and it had WAYYY more games. for most people, there was just no reason to buy a coleco or an intelevision
Actually, if I recall, there were two versions of Centipede. The original release on the Atari 800 where the graphics were lackluster, and then the 5200 version that looked much better (in particular the mushroom graphics). There was a rom dump of the 5200 version that ran just fine on my 1200XL.
@@ckatheman Atari was very stingy with ROM. Some games that would have been much better were squeezed to fit into small ROMs to save Atari money. As time progresses, a particular size of ROM becomes less expensive. Also, programmers sometimes develop tricks over time to get more out of a system.
The 2600 was at the right place at the right time. It was superior to it's predecessors and contemporaries like the Fairchild Channel F and Odyssey 2 and had a hold over the market before the Intellivision launched. The Colecovision was the exact opposite where it was at the wrong place at the wrong time. It launched just a year prior to the video game crash so it never really stood a chance, plus the Famicom came out just a year later putting a nail in its coffin.
@@RetroComparisons Ahhh thanks for clearing that up for me. I don't know much about the first 3 generations of consoles or the history of Arcades, so I'm doing research.
@@BeingADik_Jacob No probs at all:) I'm still a little hazy on those generations too since I was born during the 3rd and really only started playing during the 4th gen. Not to shamelessly self-promote but if you're interested in more stuff from this era I did a video comparing every single 2nd gen game to it's arcade counterpart.
yes, Gyruss only as a Intellivision homebrew, only 100 were made (i've got one),its better than the 2600 with a better music (Actually has partial NES soundtrack), but i'm not sure its as good as the colecovision (gameplay wise)... @@RetroComparisons
woaw, thx a lot for your video, i didn't know there were so many games on these consoles. As soon as I had my C64 in december 1984 I kinda forget about all these gems. Well done!
I don't know if I'll get around to those. I'm not well versed in computer gaming from any generation so it's never been anything on my radar. I would be interested in watching a video like that though.
@@RetroComparisons There's quite a few, depending on what you're looking for. Retro Core is the most exhaustive, in terms of covering every single port he can get working in time for the deadline, including some lesser known Japanese computers. Despite brief reviews at the start of every segment, his style is similar to yours. But he's also a bit biased against western computers...which he is aware of, and makes an effort to improve on, as the Battle of the Ports continues. I'd recommend his R-type Remaster (# 316) as a great starting point to see if his series is for you. Then there's Chinnyvision, if you want something more in-depth, since you're unfamiliar with the platforms in question. He seldom covers consoles or computers that didn't sell in the UK, but the limited focus means you get a really good idea of what each title offers...for better and for worse. Also, I practically wrote an entire introductory course to the 8-bit computer wars, and was about to tackle 16-bit, but...I think I've written a post like that before? I didn't want to bore you, if I had. You know me - any excuse to sarcastically rant about old games and the industry responsible for them is a good one.
@@juststatedtheobvious9633 That's awesome! That will be some great stuff to put on while I'm working to keep me sane. Thanks for the recommendations! Haha hey I'm always up for sarcastic rants.
@@RetroComparisons Well, then you're in luck. This video and comment section inspired two. The computer shoot out needs some work yet, but reaction to the console comparison is ready to go.. I apologize in advance for what it turned into.
The Atari 400/800 computers and the Atari 5200 game console are essentially the same machine under the hood. Games that run on both platforms are identical in every way. The same basic hardware powered the 400, 800, 1200XL, 600XL, 800XL, 5200, 65XE, 130XE and the XE Game System. These machines were produced from 1979 to 1992, which is quite an amazing run for an 8-bit computer platform from that era, and attests to the advanced nature of Jay Miner's first computer and forerunner of the Amiga.
I think something weird happened with the cache in my video editor which occurs from time to time and I failed to pick up on it having the audio from Gyruss from a previous video I had done.
@@SupremeNerd Thanks so much for checking this out! That means a lot to me. I am annoyed at myself though for letting that Atlantis/Gyruss mix up to make it to the final video.
@@RetroComparisons well, it's not that big of a deal to me. It was just me noticing stuff that's all. Maybe it's because the presented game didn't have music and you just added some to it. That's what I got out of it
There's something so fascinating about that era of gaming. I know it's not everyone's cup of tea but I can go back to those consoles at any time and have fun on a bunch of different games.
i was born in this era actually in 1970 so i went thru most of the video games systems back then. i played atari intellivision colecovision and more. i was mostly interested by computers like the commodore vic 20 or c64/128 and then amiga when they came out because they had alot more possibilities than gaming systems with carts. you could save on disks or hard drive and do alot more stuff like programming and print stuff or do bbsing with modems which for me is the ancestor of internet. those computers were also good gaming platforms. i still own many old systems today like atari intellivision coleco sega genesis dreamcast nes snes n64 vic 20 c64 amiga and more.
I've always been a console gamer but being into computer gaming back then must have been extra cool. Being born in 86 I never really knew a world where computer gaming wasn't at least somewhat normal so when I watch videos of those older computers from the late 70s/early 80s I'm totally fascinated.
@@RetroComparisons yes it sure is fascinating and interesting. emulators and such are not a new thing. even back then there was many games from consoles that were made available on those vintage computers. the fact that you could program stuff made it easy for people to program games and make games that look similar to others on consoles and programming was much easier back then with basic. even myself who dont know much about it i could do some simple programming to do simple games. it was less static than put a cart in a system and this would open door to creativity to make new things and design our own. was so much fun... i miss it really but i still have those vintage computers in boxes somewhere.
I grew up with the Atari 2600 and a Commodore 64. The graphics caoabilities of the Atari 2600 always confused me. Some pixels ate extra wide long bars like the dots in Pac-Man and Lock N Chase. But yet some graphics show smaller pixels that are not sprites from how they look. I know the screen dimensions are very small for the Atari Screen resolution
Yeah that's very strange. Maybe it was just a case of some developers knowing how to take advantage of the hardware more than others. Those dots in Pac-Man in particular are massive especially compared to Ms. Pac-Man.
Basically the resolution of the background is 40 pixels in width. Hence the wide pixels. The height is more or less the at the time normal 200. And the sprite resolution is also standard. So if there anything that looks more detailed then it’s sprites used in smart way.
My favorite retro game that is on all 3 consoles is Dragonfire. I had the Atari 2600 version as a kid and played the thing to death. As I got older I also bought the intellivision and Colecovision versions. Here is quick breakdown of each one. *Atari 2600 Dragonfire:* This is the simplest version graphically with exception being the treasures in the dragon room look the best of all 3 games. The Atari Team either had better artists or they just got lazy on the other 2 versions. Of the 3 this is the best as far as gameplay largely because the Atari Joystick was perfect for games like this. Especially when running around the treasure room where we have a nicely drawn dragon running back and forth shooting fireballs at your character and every level your dragon changes colors until they run out of colors then it just repeats. *Grade A+* *Intellevision Dragonfire:* The Bridge screen look much improved compared to 2600 version. They added archers to the bridge screen to make it more challenging and interesting. They also gave the Bridge Screen more depth by having castle walls in back round to add depth to the screen. The Treasure room looks basically identical to Atari version except now the treasure isn't pretty and animated like it is in Atari version. The Dragon behaves and looks identical to the Atari version. The Intellivision controller isn't ideal for this game and it will kill your fingers pressing the jump button after long sessions. Grade B *Colecovision Dragonfire:* They made so many changes to this version it's almost a different game. In the opening bridge screen now the Castle has much better detail you can even see each individual brick. The Water under the bridge is now animated with ripple effect in water. The castle backround walls add depth like on Intellivision. The bridge now on later levels becomes a draw bridge so if you time your jump poorly you'll end up in the drink. When we move into the treasure room now first thing you'll notice is the dragon no longer moves. The Dragon is given much more detail then in the other versions but it's a huge dissapointment he no longer chases you. The Treasure is much better detailed then Intellivisions but not as pretty as Atari's and not animated like Atari's. Despite it's flaws still my second favorite version of this game *Grade A-*.
That's an excellent breakdown of these ports! My brother and I got so many 2600 games in the early-mid 90s at tag sales and yet this game was never in any of the shoe boxes filled with games. I really wish I had played this growing up because it's an awesome and highly underrated game that needs to get more love from the retro community. Thanks for checking this video out and for giving your thoughts on this amazing game:)
@@RetroComparisons Thanks bud. I love videos like this that show the improvements they made or at least tried to make on the old school games. I recall in 1984 for Christmas we got an ADAM Colecovision Computer that came with Donkey Kong as the pack-in game. Coleco's Donkey Kong looked and felt like the arcade and put both Atari and Intellivision versions to shame. What's funny though looking back and playing the old games the graphics really don't matter it's the core gameplay that makes them so fun. So as ugly as Atari 2600 games are it's their core gameplay that make me want to keep going back to revisit them. Atari's Kaboom! is another of my favorite games and can't be replicated on emulation because you MUST play it with a paddle controller to understand why that game is so amazing. It looks kinda silly but 2 minutes of playing it with a paddle controller and you will get why this game is so special.
@@Wallyworld30 Thanks so much for watching! I've always been curious about the ADAM. I've never been into computer gaming but since it's like a Colecovision it's been one of those that's peaked my interest in the past. I feel the same way as you were looking back on these now it's more about how they play and not so much how they look. In that regard the 2600 holds up really well though some of that may be my own personal bias since it was my first console. Oh yeah I know what you mean, without the paddle controller a lot of these don't feel right. I emulate these older consoles for the sake of having good looking footage but it can't beat the feel for the paddle on Kaboom, Super Breakout, Circus Atari and a bunch of others.
@@RetroComparisons When I was 7 years old we visited my cousins family who's family was very well off financially and he had like 100 Atari 2600 games that was the first time I'd played Dragon Fire. After trying out all his different games I told him Dragon Fire was by far my favorite and that's all I played for the next 2 days on the visit. I recall about an hour before we left he told me I could have that game because he didn't play it that much. I was overjoyed and that was my go to game until my family finally got an NES in 1986 with Super Mario Bro. It's extremely rare on Colecovision when I finally found one as an adult I paid $50 for a single cartridge in around 2007. I just checked eBay and the game still sells for $50 Colecovision prices never took off like the NES stuff.
@@billmcintyre3652 That's awesome that he gave you that game! My family didn't have much money growing up so it was always that way for me too where there would be a few select games that were my go to that I'd play repeatedly. River Raid was one of those games for me and I still can't get enough of that game to this day. I don't know why a lot of the 2nd gen games never skyrocketed in price compared to anything from the 3rd generation and on. You'd think there would be as much nostalgia for that than games from the NES era.
I've realized over the years that alot of Atari 5200 and Atari 8-bit computer games have almost identical graphics to games on the Commodore 64. Meaning the code was simply ported over from one system to another depending on what computer it was originally made on. Also the graphics are really hit or miss on the higher end systems. Goid example Pitfall 2 on 5200 and Colecovision. I feel like the Colecovision is lacking in its true abilities. Whole the 5200 version looks identical to my Commodore 64 version did. At least 95% the same I would guesstimate. Maybe a few color variations and audio differences at most.
That's interesting. I'm very ignorant to most computer ports and hearing that about the C64 is fascinating. I really need to watch some C64 videos for games that came out on consoles like these to see how they stack up both in visuals and audio.
@Retro Comparisons a good example is Pacman. On the C64 it runs a little slower but the graphics are pretty much exactly the same. Another game is Pitfall 2 on the C64 and Atari 5200. Almost identical in graphics. Although they may sound diffrent due to diffrent sound chips.
The Atari computers and the 5200 are the same architecture. That's why they all look alike or seem like the same. Perfect example is Donkey Kong and the Homebrew Donkey Kong for the 5200
We owned a ColecoVision back in the '80s (and later an Atari 7800), and everyone who saw it who owned an Atari 2600 was absolutely floored by how amazing and near-arcade-perfect games played on it looked. Probably the most powerful console on the market until the NES and the Sega Master System rolled around.
I can only imagine. That must have been like owning a Dreamcast when it came out when all of your friends had a PS1 or N64. It's a shame the ColecoVision didn't get the chance of being on the market for very long.
@@RetroComparisons Yes, Coleco had a tremendous chance and they wasted it by losing millions for the launch of the ridiculous Adam home computer, while their video game console could have become the market leader. Incidentally, in Europe there was also another console, called Creativision, which had exactly the same characteristics as the Colecovision, and which even had a peripheral (ad adaptor) which allowed you to play Colecovision cartridges.
I had Colecovision friends that came over to play Centipede with a 5200 trackball and Pacman all day. The also came to play Robotron with duel sticks. I went to play their Colecovision Cosmic Avenger and Donkey Kong. The 5200 and Colecovision ruled in 82.
@@ks-bg5ukyep and both. The 5200 became my favorite by far… my first games were pac man, defender and centipede… and of course defender and centipede jsut sucked badly on coleco by comparison. By the time I got dig dug, joust, the 5200 was my number one. Still loved venture and some others on coleco.
I think Colecovision won most of them. Occasionally the 5200 impressed me more. Sometimes the 2600 version really wasn't that far off from the rest. As the underdog, I expected the 2600 to be the worst, but the Intellivision really impress me. Although typically better than the 2600 (as expected), it generally underperformed when compared to the 5200 and the Colecovision. At least that was my observation in this video. I did (and do) have a 2600, but was late to the game, as I was born in the late seventies. I played it in the early 80's, probably around the time the video game market was crashing, and the NES was around the corner. I only played it because of my older brother, who was born in the early seventies. I don't have much experience with the other consoles (a touch), so I could be wrong.
I think you're right on with your assessment. The 2600 was the most primitive of these 4 but could hold its own on occasion such as River Raid, Pitfall 2, Space Invaders, and some other. The Intellivision came out a few years after the 2600 so it had the benefit of better hardware but the downside was not having the early advantage in the market. While the Colecovision & 5200 are considered 2nd gen consoles they're more like 2.5 gen. It's a shame they came out right before the video game crash.
You probably can’t tell from tiny tiny video comparisons but I had both a 5200 and colecovision and the 5200 was generally superior. Especially jn arcade games like defender or centipede. The 5200 version absolutely buried the cv versions of games like that. Some other games it’s more questionable… like Zaxxon or buck rogers… the cv looks much better jn still imagines… yet was clunky and choppy in okay while the Atari versions ran much much faster. Really the best cv games were ones not found on 5200 - like ladybug and cosmic avenger. Overall both were excellent systems. Cv started strong and then sputtered badly with not many new releases and a lot of dogs like subroc and time pilot. The 5200 had a lackluster release library - but defender and pad man and centipede made me happy until I got joust, dig dug etc…. If they had kept going and released sinister, tempest, super pac and all the other games that were essentially done… it would have been the best arcade library by far. Both died before their time.
@@datacipher I think both were massively underrated systems and like you said died well before their expiration date. Atari really had the edge on those classic arcade ports. If you're interested I also did a video recently with every 2nd gen console compared to the arcade and it really shows off the 5200 there.
The Colecovision version of BurgerTime sounds exactly the same as the Intellivision version and it appears that the Intellivision has brighter and more vibrant colors than the rest of the consoles of that time peroid.
Just a couple weeks ago, I geeked out and made a spreadsheet comparing the specs of the first few generations of consoles. It's interesting to compare the specs of ColecoVision against the 5200. One was better than the other in some ways, but not all. Coleco had 2x faster CPU and 4x VRAM (16k vs 4k). The 5200 had more system RAM (16k to 1k) and a bigger color palette (256 colors vs. 16, but both can only display 16 at once). There were differences in how they handled sprites, but I can't remember what they were because I couldn't easily put them down on a spreadsheet. Of course, the quality of the games on those consoles also came down to the programmers' abilities to make most of the limitations and exploit the "loopholes" within the systems. For example, the NES was widely seen as surpassing all of those 4 systems, but its actual specs were no better than the 5200 and Colecovision. It just had a few tricks up in its sleeves that the game makers were able to take advantage of.
Considering that the NES still squeaked out a few games in 1994/95 that's insane to think that it was on the same technical level as the 5200 and Colecovision.
@@RetroComparisons I overlooked what probably put the NES ahead of the 5200 and CV - it had basically a GPU (it was called PPU, Picture Processing Unit)
@@RetroComparisons yeah the longevity of some consoles and computers was insane. Commodore continued to make C64 units until 1994. I guess we were more tolerant of slowness back then
