Megamania is an Atari 2600 game by Steve Cartwright and published by Activision in 1982. Versions were released for the Atari 5200 and Atari 8-bit family in 1983. Megamania is similar to Sega's 1981 arcade title Astro Blaster. Both games have nearly identical patterns of approaching enemies with the player relying on an "energy" meter. The player's ships are remarkably similar in both games.
The game took Cartwright six months to initially develop and another three months to fine-tune.[2]
The band The Tubes performed a Megamaniatheme song in a 1982 television commercial advertising the Atari 2600 version of the game.[3]
Gameplay
Atari 2600 gameplay screenshot
Megamania gameplay resembles that of Astro Blaster, but rather than being aliens or spaceships the enemies are various objects such as hamburgers, bow ties, and steam irons. The object is to shoot them down before the energy bar at the bottom of screen is depleted, all while avoiding the oncoming enemies and their own projectile attacks. Each of the enemies fly in select patterns and as soon as they hit the bottom of the screen, they re-appear at the top until shot by the player. The player's spacecraft depicted in the game is a cross between the U.S.S. Enterprise and Klingon battlecruiser from the Star Trek universe.
Scoring
The first cycle scores 20 to 90 points in 10 point increments each round for each object defeated; after the first cycle, every object destroyed scores 90 points. Once a wave is cleared, the player scores bonus points equal to the value of the object times the number of energy units remaining.
Every 10,000 points gives the player an extra life; the player can have no more than six extra lives in stock at a time.
If a player exceeds a score of 999,999 the game ends.[4]
Patch
Anyone who scored above 45,000 points could send Activision a picture of their screen and receive an "Official Megamaniac" emblem.[5]
Development
Megamania was designed by Steve Cartwright for Activision. Prior to working at the company, Cartwright had gone to college with David Crane, one of Activision's founders.[6] When Crane and Alan Miller created their own company Activision, the found quick success leading them to hire new employees, which included Crane's friend Cartwright.[7]
After being hired by Activision, Cartwright had to develop a game.[7] He recalled the influence to create the game was after he had seen Astro Blaster at a Chuck E. Cheese restaurant.[8] Cartwright developed a ship similar to that of Astro Blaster. On designing the ship, he realized how simple the graphics had to be for the system with eight bits and one color for the ship.[9]
Developing for the Atari 2600 was difficult, with Cartwright stating that the code to define how the objects displayed was very complicated, noting it required multiple objects moving horizontally, passing each other vertically, missiles passing vertically through rows of objects, which Cartwright explained as "might seem like a trivial task using today's technology actually took months of late-night coding to figure out."[10]Megamania was coded to fit a 4 kilobyte ROM for it's graphics, code and sound.[11] It took over nine months to code.[12]
After completing code for gameplay, Cartwright felt that the market was over loaded with outerspace-themed shooter games but were confident in the gameplay of Megamania and thought of ways to make it stand out in the marketplace. Some ideas were to title the game Space Game as an anti-marketing effort. Tom Lopez at Activision suggested the title GadZooks! which led to Activision's ad agency unveiling its concpet that the game was about a spaceship commander who had nightmare after eating too much junk food, leading to enemy ships becoming objects like hamburgers, spinning dice, tires and bowties. After this, the game was then titled Megamania.[11]
Megamania was released for the Atari 2600 on September 24, 1982.[14]
Ports of the game were announced for consoles like the ColecoVision, Atari 5200 and computers such as the Commodore 64 and MSX.[15]Megamania was released for the Atari 5200 in November 1983.[16] Game critic Lou Hudson reported that Atari 5200 version of the game was not planned to be heavily promoted until after the Christmas season, to keep it from competing with the Atari 2600.[17] The Atari 8-bit version was released in 1984.[18]
The ports add a title screen and more detailed enemies, plus the names of the enemies listed in the manual have changed. There are "ice cream sandwiches" instead of "cookies," "refrigerator magnets" instead of "bugs," and "diamond rings" instead of "diamonds."[19][20]
Reception
In JoyStik, an anonymous reviewer called "one of the most original variations of the bottom-shooter concept ever created exclusively for home console" and that "even the best Invaders players will find surprising new challenges".[1] The reviewer gave the game high ratings for game play, longevity and graphics.[1]
Lou Hudson writing in the Fort Worth Star-Telegram gave the game a mixed-review, finding it too derivative of Space Invaders and that the graphic and theme was better than the game itself, while also describing it as "Space Invaders with a vengeance", noting the more complicated patterns that enemies approach you in Megamania. Hudson concluded that "It's a nightmare all right, and in terms of color, detail, variety and toughness, it's a very good nightmare. I just can't get all that excited over [Space Invaders] games any more."[17] The Atari 2600 version of Megamania received an award for "Most Humorous Home Arcade Game" at the 4th annual Arkie Awards.[21]
Video magazine reviewed the Atari 8-bit version in 1984, describing it "hardly different" in terms of gameplay from the original Atari 2600 version, but emphasizing its "visually enhanced" graphics that allow players "to clearly distinguish what each wave of attacking objects is supposed to represent".[22]
Reviewing the Atari 8-bit Computer version of the game, Computer Entertainer stated that it was even better than the Atari 2600 version of the game, noting challenging gameplay, fast-paced action, high quality sound effects and the graphic and humor, specifically noting details like treads on the tire enemies as they spin. THe review concluded "the variations on the invasion game are many, but few have the graphic excellence and superb challenge of Megamania."[13] Michael Blanchet gave a negative review of the Atari computer and 5200 versions of the game, writing that the game was not significantly better than the original for the Atari 2600. While praising the graphics, Blanchet stated that the claims of the game being a parody of shoot-'em ups was weak, declaring that "at first the idea of fighting off hamburgers might solicit a nervous giggle or two. But any amusement quickly fades. Facades and hype aside, Megamania is just another shoot-'em-up."[23]
The editors and writers of the magazine Video and Computer Gaming Illustrated listed Megamania as the best Atari 2600 game in March 1984.[24] The game was also the runner-up as the Best game for consoles, only being beaten by Centipede.[25] The publication specifically noted the games various enemy designs, attack patterns, and excellent sound effects.[26]
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Activision (1995). Activision's Atari 2600 Action Pack 2 (Macintosh). Activision. Level/area: Help > History > Steve Cartwright on "Plaque Attack". So I basically took a lot of code from MegaMania and reworked it
Sources
"More Great Games for Other Systems". Activision Fun Club News. Activision. Spring 1984.
"Space". JoyStik. Vol. 1, no. 3. December 1982.
"Presenting: The First Annual Vista Awards!". Video and Computer Gaming Illustrated. No. 14. Ion International Inc. March 1984. ISSN0739-4373.
