Galaxian

Also known as: N/A

Developer: Atari

The Atari 8-bit version of Galaxian turned out to be nowhere near as good as I thought it would be. It's still an okay experience, but it's nowhere near as excellent as the arcade original was. In fact, this may be the worst port of Galaxian that I've happened to play. The alien ships move in a choppy way, with jerky motions during dive attacks…they also stall or hover above your ship in an awkward fashion at times, which is a bit different than the fast, aggressive swoops of the ships in the arcade version. On the positive side, it does manage to keep everything colorful and the developers managed to avoid any flickering…but I wish that they had put as much time into the alien motions and behaviors to get those aspects of the game correct. The sound also feels like a disappointment here…everything sounds basic and uninspired. I normally give older hardware a pass on stuff like that, but since I know the Atari 8-bit hardware can do better, it feels like this was another aspect that could have been improved upon if the developer(s) had bothered to do so. With all of my complaining, though, this is still a functional port of a beloved arcade game. It's nowhere near the quality of the arcade original, but given the hardware that it's running on, it should have been able to come a bit closer than this. This port of Galaxian is a prime example of a game not necessarily being bad while still managing to be a disappointment.

Review added: 08/01/2026

Gorf

Also known as: N/A

Developer: Roklan Software

The Atari 8-bit version of Gorf is good, but it's aso nothing special…it has some nice effects during the Space Warp stage and when the flag ship blows up…but otherwise, this is a pretty basic-looking game. If you've never played Gorf before, the game is split into four stages (five in the arcade original). The first stage, Astro Battles, is a Space Invaders clone. Instead of having barricades on the bottom for you to duck behind, there is a force field instead. When shooting, the force field disappears, though, so in order to attack, you also leave yourself vulnerable. The second stage is Laser Attack, where you shoot down two formations of enemy ships, with four of the ships dive bombing you, while the last ship fires lasers down at you. The third stage in the arcade was Galaxians, and it played exactly like Galaxian. It was pulled from this release due to copyrights. So, the third stage in this game is Space Warp. This is the most impressive stage, with lines on the screen giving you a mild 3D feel, and with enemies seemingly far away at the beginning of the warp, slowly circling their way towards you, getting larger in appearance until they get to where you are, when their ship size becomes roughly the same as yours. Back then, there weren't too many games that bothered to adjust the size of moving objects for depth perception, so I've always liked the Space Warp level design. The last level is the boss fight of the game - the Flag Ship. Like the first level, there is a force field, but unlike the first level, the force field now protects the enemy flag ship. Your goal is to chip away at the force field and then fire away at the flag ship until you see an impressive-for-the-time explosion. Afterward, like most games o thee time, you find yourself back in the first stage, with increased difficulty, to do it all again. Anyway, if you like Gorf, then you'll probably like this port - it's mostly well done. If you're not a fan of Gorf, there's not really anything here that would convert you into a fan.

Review added: 07/21/2026