Pac-Man

Also known as: N/A

Developer: Atari

If you've seen the box art for the Atari 8-bit version of Pac-Man, you just know that there had to be someone in Atari going, "We really did some damage with that Atari 2600 port of Pac-Man. How did the Atari 400/800 version turn out? Really well?....That's not consistent….I know! To make up for good gameplay, let's make Pac-Man look like a complete and total buck-toothed doofus on the box art for the game. We'll take away any bit of cool that ol' Pac-Man has, that way we can still disappoint people! I'm a genius!" But seriously, they really did make Pac-Man look like a weirdo…and yes, if you consider fashion for the time, what Pac-Man is wearing isn't as ridiculous as it seems today…but the bucked-teeth. I don't get where those come from. I'm not one that supports bullying, but this version of Pac-Man looks like he deserves a wedgie. Anyway, let's focus on the game, otherwise I'll just be mocking this poor, fictional character all day. While it obviously doesn't look or play exactly like the arcade version, this is still a very solid port. All of the Atari 2600 issues are gone - no flickering ghosts, each ghost is a different color, and Pac-Man can turn in every direction that he's moving in instead of somehow eating pellets from the top and bottom of his head. The fruits from the arcade game also appear here, so Pac-Man can add some nutrients and fiber to his pellet diet. Box art aside, this is a very well made port of the popular arcade game, and it's well worth adding to your library if you happen to own one of the Atari 8-bit computers.

Review added: 07/26/2026

Picnic Paranoia

Also known as: N/A

Developer: Synapse Software

When I was tallying up the average score for Picnic Paranoia, there were times that it looked like I liked this game way more than the average person…and then there were times where it looked like I liked it just about as much as the average person. It seemed to vary by website, which is precisely why I like to calculate the average score from so many different sources - not everyone thinks the same. Anyway, the concept of Picnic Paranoia is that you control a guy named George, who is having a picnic. Unfortunately, some unwanted guests arrive at the picnic and begin to do their best to steal away George's feast. Armed with a flyswatter, George's goal is to swat away at the ants, wasps, and spiders that have disturbed his meal. The primary goal, however, it to focus on those ants. If enough ants find their way to a food item, they will begin to take that item away unless you can get over, squish those ants, and move the piece of food back to where it belongs. The wasps and spiders will net you more points when you swat them, but they're more there to be obstacles in your way. If a wasp touches you, you get stung and you're frozen in place for a few seconds, while spiders create nets that block your paths unless you swat through them. Each round of Picnic Paranoia is ninety seconds, with you getting bonus points for each item of food left on the table. When all food items have been stolen, the game is over. Picnic Paranoia isn't a perfect game by any stretch, but I enjoyed it far more than I thought I would. If the controls were a little tighter, I would have given this game an even higher score, but for what it is, and for the time that it was released, Picnic Paranoia is a solid action game and well worth checking out if you're looking for quality, early-80s action games.

Review added: 07/26/2026

Pirate Adventure

Also known as: N/A

Developer: Atari

Pirate Adventure Sunday, July 26, 2026 10:08 AM After Adventureland, Pirate Adventure was the next text-based adventure game created by Scott Adams, this time with his wife Alexis helping out. This one is a little more interesting than Adventureland, in my opinion, though the gameplay is largely the same. In Pirate Adventure, you start out in a very piratey place…a flat in London. You see it's where you'd start a pirate adventure because of all the arrrrrrrs in the words London and flat…..wait, there are no r's in those words. Why does this start out in a London apartment?! I suppose it's just to establish that you're playing as a non-piratey person. Anyway, as you explore your apartment, you'll eventually find that there's a hidden passage where you discovered a bloody book and a few other items. Upon reading the book and saying a magical word, you'll get transported to an island full of pirates. While on that island, the player has to build a boat to reach another island, named Treasure Island, where they're tasked at finding two pieces of treasure. The game also introduced an ally, making this the first Scott Adams game where the player shared the adventure with a second character. Like Adventureland, the game doesn't recognize words as much as the first three letters of the words, which is both good and bad…so typing in "OPE CHE" would give you the same result as "OPEN CHEST," which is great if you're lazy, but also frustrating when the game occasionally misunderstands what you typed. Overall, Pirate Adventure seems like it was a mild improvement over Adventureland, and it's considered one of the easier games that Scott Adams made. So, if you'd like to give one of his text based adventures a try, but want to start out with something a tad easier, then Pirate Adventure is the way to go. The Atari 8-bit version of the game (the text-based one, at least) decided to use a cursive font for the text. While it adds some personality to the game, it's also not as easy on the eyes in terms of reading. Much like hand-written cursive, it seems like it's easier to have bad hand writing when using cursive compared to when using standard text. Typed cursive somewhat suffers from this, too. While not unreadable, it simply looks more sloppy than standard, typed text does. It's a minor complaint, though, and other than that, this is basically the same game that you'll find on other computers.

Review added: 07/26/2026

Pooyan

Also known as: N/A

Developer: Western Technologies

Aside from the obvious graphical differences, and the fact that the game is displayed on a horizontal screen instead of a vertical one, this port of Pooyan is pretty faithful to the arcade original. If you've never played Pooyan before, here's the concept…You control a mother pig named Mama, and your goal is to defend your little piglets, known as Pooyans, from a small army of wolves that like to use balloons to float up or down the screen. The wolves have shields and will fire back at you, so your attacks need to be precise if you want to save your young'uns. You're armed with arrows, great for popping the balloons, if your aim is right…but every now and then, you'll also be armed with the ultimate weapon - meat. While I'd, personally, take a bow and arrow over a hunk of meat if I was in a struggle of life or death, Mama knows how to make meat a deadly weapon. Throwing the meat, she can take down multiple wolves with a single shot…if you time your shot correctly, that is. Anyway, if you want to play a home port of Pooyan, then this is a pretty solid one. If doesn't look as pretty as the arcade original, but the gameplay is still there. So, if you're a fan of trying to save the Pooyans, then you'll probably appreciate Datasoft's effort here.

Review added: 08/01/2026

Popeye

Also known as: N/A

Developer: Western Technologies

The Atari 8-bit port of Popeye does a pretty solid job of bringing the arcade game home. It contains all three levels from the arcade, as well as some characters and aspects of the levels (like that dastardly Sea Hag and the punching bag and bucket on the first level) that some of the other home ports are missing. While the game doesn't look anywhere near as nice as the arcade game, it still looks decent enough, and you're able to tell what is what without needing to use your imagination too much. The game plays pretty well, and Parker Bros. included some difficulty settings, allowing players to start at a more forgiving difficulty than what they'd see at the arcade, then slowly graduate themselves up to a higher difficulty as they get better. Likewise, veterans of the arcade looking for a challenge can increase the difficulty so that they can test their spinach-eating skills. Overall, if you're looking for a faithful port of Nintendo's arcade game, then Western Technologies did an excellent job here. Aside from the graphics, everything else seems to be on par with the arcade game, and the difficulty settings help make this port just a little bit nicer than the arcade, in terms of gameplay. If you're a fan of climbing up and descending down stairs while avoiding that tubby ol' bully, Bluto, then this home port of Popeye is well worth adding to your collection.

Review added: 07/26/2026

Preppie!

Also known as: N/A

Developer: Star Systems Software

In Preppie!, you control a character with one of the best/worst names in the history of video games - Wadsworth Overcash. The story of the game is that ol' Wadsworth did not win the Skeezer's Loop, an annual oyster-eating bash. This oyster-eating contest requires participants to eat as many raw oysters as a lottery determines…and poor ol' Wadsworth drew a very large, undisclosed number. The manual does say that his last conscious memory was finishing oyster number seventy-nine before someone substituted a heavily-salted V8 juice in place of the Perrier that he had been using to wash the oysters down. Losers of Skeezer's Loop are sentenced to a full day of golf ball retrieval on the world's most dangerous golf course - the Nasty Nine. The manual goes on several more pages explaining the backstory, but I think you get the gist of it - you need to retrieve golf balls. Preppie! plays a lot like Frogger, but instead of simply reaching the top of the screen, you goal is to get the golf balls and bring them back to where you started. If that means that you have to go all the way to the top of the screen to get a ball, then you need to come all the way back down afterward. You can also only hold one ball at a time - Wadsworth's pampered baby hands can't handle the weight of more than one golf ball at a time. As weird as it sounds, that one, simple addition to the gameplay made me more hooked to Preppie! than I think I had ever been hooked to a game of Frogger. Anyway, if you want an interesting spin on the Frogger formula, or if you just want to control a rich kid named Wadsworth Overcash as he avoids lawnmowers and jumps on the backs of alligators, then Preppie! is a game that you'll likely find plenty of fun in.

Review added: 07/27/2026