''Atari Vault'' is a collection of one hundred video games that

Atari Atari () is a brand name that has been owned by several entities since its inception in 1972. It is currently owned by French publisher Atari SA through a subsidiary named Atari Interactive. The original Atari, Inc. (1972–1992), Atari, Inc., ...

had produced for

arcade cabinet An arcade cabinet, also known as an arcade machine or a coin-op cabinet or coin-op machine, is the housing within which an arcade game's electronic hardware resides. Most cabinets designed since the mid-1980s conform to the Japanese Amusement Ma ...

s and its

Atari 2600 The Atari 2600, initially branded as the Atari Video Computer System (Atari VCS) from its release until November 1982, is a home video game console developed and produced by Atari, Inc. Released in September 1977, it popularized microprocessor- ...

home console system, dating from the 1970s, 1980s, and 1990s. The collection was developed by

Code Mystics Code Mystics is a Canadian video game developer specializing in both the emulation and remastering of older video games for modern systems, and porting of indie titles. History Code Mystics was founded in 2009 by Jeff Vavasour. Prior to this, Va ...

, who had helmed similar collections of Atari games to other platforms, to work on

Microsoft Windows Windows is a group of several proprietary graphical operating system families developed and marketed by Microsoft. Each family caters to a certain sector of the computing industry. For example, Windows NT for consumers, Windows Server for serv ...

macOS macOS (; previously OS X and originally Mac OS X) is a Unix operating system developed and marketed by Apple Inc. since 2001. It is the primary operating system for Apple's Mac computers. Within the market of desktop and lapt ...

, and

Linux Linux ( or ) is a family of open-source Unix-like operating systems based on the Linux kernel, an operating system kernel first released on September 17, 1991, by Linus Torvalds. Linux is typically packaged as a Linux distribution, which ...

via the Steam client. The games, where possible, have been updated to include modern-day features such as local and online multiplayer and online leaderboards.

Games and updates

The games included in the collection include ''

Asteroids An asteroid is a minor planet of the inner Solar System. Sizes and shapes of asteroids vary significantly, ranging from 1-meter rocks to a dwarf planet almost 1000 km in diameter; they are rocky, metallic or icy bodies with no atmosphere. ...

'', ''

Centipede Centipedes (from New Latin , "hundred", and Latin , " foot") are predatory arthropods belonging to the class Chilopoda (Ancient Greek , ''kheilos'', lip, and New Latin suffix , "foot", describing the forcipules) of the subphylum Myriapoda, an ...

'', ''

Missile Command ''Missile Command'' is a 1980 shoot 'em up arcade video game developed and published by Atari, Inc. and licensed to Sega for Japanese and European releases. It was designed by Dave Theurer, who also designed Atari's vector graphics game ''Tempest ...

'', ''

Tempest Tempest is a synonym for a storm. '' The Tempest'' is a play by William Shakespeare. Tempest or The Tempest may also refer to: Arts and entertainment Films * ''The Tempest'' (1908 film), a British silent film * ''The Tempest'' (1911 film), a ...

'', and ''

Warlords A warlord is a person who exercises military, economic, and political control over a region in a country without a strong national government; largely because of coercive control over the armed forces. Warlords have existed throughout much of h ...

''. The collection includes a mix of

arcade Arcade most often refers to: * Arcade game, a coin-operated game machine ** Arcade cabinet, housing which holds an arcade game's hardware ** Arcade system board, a standardized printed circuit board * Amusement arcade, a place with arcade games * ...

and

titles, including several titles released in both formats. The list of games also includes a number of titles that had been in development for the Atari 2600 but never were formally released as Atari 2600 but were found and distributed later in other Atari game collections such as the

Atari Flashback The Atari Flashback series are a line of dedicated video game consoles designed, produced, published and marketed by AtGames under license from Atari SA. The Flashback consoles are "plug-and-play" versions of the Atari 2600 console. They conta ...

. The full list of games included is: Code Mystics handled the port, previously having developed the '' Atari Greatest Hits'' series for the

Nintendo DS The is a handheld game console produced by Nintendo, released globally across 2004 and 2005. The DS, an initialism for "Developers' System" or "Dual Screen", introduced distinctive new features to handheld games: two LCD screens working in tan ...

, a similar collection of games updated for a modern system. For ''Atari Vault'', they have worked to ensure that the games in this title would be considered the definitive modern versions, according to developer Matthew Labunka. They spent time to obtain fine details on the look and presentation, such as getting digital imagery of the arcade cabinet art to present alongside the game screen. The updated versions will be running the original games'

ROM image A ROM image, or ROM file, is a computer file which contains a copy of the data from a read-only memory chip, often from a video game cartridge, or used to contain a computer's firmware, or from an arcade game's main board. The term is frequentl ...

, wrapped into an emulator made in the

Unity 5 Unity is a cross-platform game engine developed by Unity Technologies, first announced and released in June 2005 at Apple Worldwide Developers Conference as a Mac OS X game engine. The engine has since been gradually extended to support a varie ...

game engine. In addition to original settings that were normally available to arcade players, the player can access options that were limited to the arcade cabinet operator, such as difficulty and length of a single play session. Art and related materials are also available for each game for the player to review. Where possible, the games have been updated to include both local and online multiplayer, and games use Steam-based score leaderboards. The games have been tuned to use the

Steam controller The Steam Controller is a game controller developed by Valve for use with personal computers running Steam on Windows, macOS, Linux, smartphones or SteamOS. The controller was designed not only for games developed for controller users, but also ...

, enabling precise controls for the games, particularly for games that used

trackball A trackball is a pointing device consisting of a ball held by a socket containing sensors to detect a rotation of the ball about two axes—like an upside-down ball mouse with an exposed protruding ball. Users roll the ball to position the on-s ...

input devices, like ''Centipede''. Code Mystics worked with

Valve A valve is a device or natural object that regulates, directs or controls the flow of a fluid (gases, liquids, fluidized solids, or slurries) by opening, closing, or partially obstructing various passageways. Valves are technically fittings ...

to fine-tune controller profiles for various games before release.

Notes

References

{{Portal bar, Video games 2016 video games Atari arcade games Atari video game compilations Code Mystics games Linux games MacOS games Video games developed in Canada Windows games