How to play Mangia online
Everything is done with joystick movements. The fire button is not used.
- Take a plate from the table: right arrow
- Eat it: left arrow
- Feed Frankie the cat (at the window): right arrow, then up, in one quick movement
- Feed Sergio the dog (on the floor): right arrow, then down, in one quick movement
- Choose one or two players: F11 (the console’s Select switch)
- Start or restart a game: F12 (the console’s Reset switch)
Gameplay
Mama walks back and forth between the stove and the table, and every time she arrives there is one more plate. Your job is to get rid of all the pasta for the level: 31 plates on level 1, rising to 49 on level 9. Each plate you eat scores points, from 5 on the first level up to 13 on the ninth, and you get an extra chance for every 1,000 points. The highest possible score is 9,999.
There are three ways to lose one of your four chances. If more than nine plates build up, the table collapses. If the boy eats 20 plates, he bursts; he grows and changes colour as a warning from about 13 plates onwards. And feeding the pets carelessly is punished too: throw pasta when the cat or dog is not in position, or while Mama is facing you, and she brings three extra plates. On higher levels Mama serves faster and the pets turn up less often.
Tips
- Watch Mama, not the plates. The only safe moment to feed a pet is when she has her back to you.
- Wait for the dog to line up. Sergio has to be right in front of you. A throw that misses costs you three plates.
- Use the colour warning. Once the boy starts changing colour, stop eating and rely on the pets for a while.
- Keep the table below nine. Eating is better than letting the pile grow, as long as the boy has room left.
History
Mangia’ was released in North America in March 1983, with a PAL version following in 1984. The North American cartridge is now one of the rarest Atari 2600 games, and AtariAge rates it at the top of its rarity scale. Reviews at the time were split. The French magazine Tilt liked the idea but not the sound, and the German TeleMatch found the concept fresh but the graphics blocky. The Italian magazine Videogiochi objected to the game’s Italian stereotypes. Years later, the author Brett Weiss called it “repetitious” and saw its main appeal as a novelty.
Similar games to play next
- Fast Food – catch flying food, but avoid the purple pickles
- Pressure Cooker – Activision’s hectic hamburger-assembly game
- Kaboom! – another game about keeping up with a steady stream of objects
- Gangster Alley – another Spectravision cartridge