How to play Atlantis online
- Fire the centre cannon (Acropolis Command Post): Space bar with no arrow key pressed
- Fire the left sentry post: hold the left arrow key and press Space
- Fire the right sentry post: hold the right arrow key and press Space
- Second player (game 3): fire button A
- Start a new game: F12 (the console’s Reset switch)
- Choose a game variation: F11 (the console’s Select switch)
Gameplay
Atlantis is made up of seven installations along the sea floor. Three of them are guns. The Acropolis Command Post in the middle fires straight up, while the two sentry posts at the far left and right fire diagonally across the screen. The Command Post also projects a force field over the rest of the city, so the Gorgons have to destroy it before they can hit anything else.
Gorgon ships fly back and forth across the sky in lanes, dropping lower each time. Once they reach the fourth lane they are close enough to fire their deathray at the city. Each wave is faster than the last. Shots from the sentry posts are worth twice as much as shots from the Command Post:
| Target | Command Post | Sentry post |
|---|---|---|
| Large Gorgon vessel | 100 | 200 |
| Gorgon Bandit Bomber | 1,000 | 2,000 |
Hitting a Bandit Bomber also destroys all the ships flying behind it in the same formation. At the end of each wave you get 500 points for every part of Atlantis still standing, and every 10,000 points rebuilds one lost installation, starting with the Command Post. The game ends when all seven installations are gone and none are left in reserve. There is no way to win: sooner or later Atlantis falls, and as it does, a small ship escapes from the ruins.
Game variations
- Game 1: the standard game, with all three cannons and waves that keep getting faster.
- Game 2: the same, but the Command Post cannot fire, so you must rely on the two diagonal guns.
- Game 3: for two players. The first joystick fires the left sentry post and the second fires the right one. The Command Post does not fire.
- Game 4: the speed rises more slowly, which makes it a good game for learning.
The difficulty switches have no effect in this game.
Tips
- Use the sentry posts. Their diagonal shots score double, so aim with them whenever the angle works.
- Clear ships early. Anything that reaches the fourth lane can fire, so deal with ships in the upper lanes first.
- Listen for the Bandit Bomber. It makes a humming sound before it shows up. If you fire nonstop, the noise of your guns can hide that warning.
The story behind Atlantis
Imagic was set up in 1981 by former Atari and Mattel staff, and Dennis Koble was one of its founders. Atlantis came out a few months after the company’s first three cartridges and became the company’s second biggest seller after Demon Attack and earned a Certificate of Merit as a runner-up for Video Game of the Year in 1983. Versions followed for the Intellivision (with aiming crosshairs and a day-and-night cycle), the Odyssey 2, the VIC-20 and Atari 8-bit computers.
Imagic ran a high-score contest for the game in 1982. Good players could keep going almost forever, so Koble made a harder version, Atlantis II, with faster ships worth fewer points, to decide the final. The ship that flees the ruins at the end also links Atlantis to Imagic’s next game, Cosmic Ark by Rob Fulop, which continues the story.
Similar games to play next
- Atlantis II – the harder contest version, with faster Gorgon ships
- Cosmic Ark – the follow-up, starring the ship that escapes from Atlantis
- Demon Attack – Imagic’s best-selling shooter
- Missile Command – another game about defending cities that cannot be saved forever