Peter C. Niday started at Atari as a game tester and was promoted to programmer. The site has three of his Atari 2600 games, one of which never reached the shops.
Rubik’s Cube 3D (1982): an unreleased prototype that shows the cube at an angle, three faces at once, and can even solve itself. Nobody knew it existed until 2002.
Sorcerer’s Apprentice (1983): Niday was moved to this Fantasia game before finishing the cube. Mickey catches falling stars and stops the enchanted brooms, to music by Robert Vieira.
Crystal Castles (1984): his conversion of Atari’s arcade maze, with Bentley Bear collecting gems in tilted, three-dimensional castles. Niday designed new, more open mazes for the 2600, and Michael Kosaka did the graphics.
Atari passed on the cube game partly because it already had Video Cube. All three run here, so pick one below and play it in your browser.
Sorcerer’s Apprentice is a 1983 Atari 2600 game based on the Mickey Mouse segment of Disney’s film Fantasia. Peter Niday designed and programmed it, with music by Robert Vieira, and Atari released it in December 1983 for younger players. Mickey must stop enchanted brooms from flooding the Sorcerer’s cavern, running between a starry mountain top and a staircase below. You can play it here in your browser, with nothing to install.
Rubik’s Cube 3D (also known as 3-D Rubik’s Cube) is an unreleased Atari 2600 prototype programmed by Peter C. Niday at Atari in 1982. It is a completely different game from the Rubik’s Cube cartridge that Atari did sell. Instead of walking a character over one flat face, you look at the cube at an angle, with three faces visible at once, and turn its rows and columns like the real puzzle. Nobody knew the game existed until a prototype turned up in 2002. You can play it here in your browser.
Crystal Castles is Atari’s 1984 home version of its own 1983 arcade maze game. You guide Bentley Bear through castles drawn at an angle, so the mazes look three-dimensional, and you gather every gem before the monsters get to them. The 2600 cartridge was programmed by Peter C. Niday, with graphics by Michael Kosaka and sound by Robert Vieira. Getting that tilted, layered look onto a console this simple was a real achievement, and it still plays quickly and smoothly. You can play it here in your browser.