Third-party games are Atari 2600 cartridges made by companies other than Atari itself. That seems normal today, but in the late 1970s nobody outside a console maker published games for its machine. The change came from Atari’s own staff. In 1979 a group of its programmers, including David Crane, Alan Miller and Bob Whitehead, left to found Activision, the first independent console game developer. Atari sued, but the case was settled by 1982, with Activision paying royalties and the idea of third-party publishing left standing. Activision also printed its designers’ names on boxes and manuals, something Atari did not do.
Other companies followed quickly. Imagic, co-founded by former Atari programmer Rob Fulop, brought out games such as Riddle of the Sphinx (1982). Toy and film companies joined in too: Parker Brothers with Tutankham, Coleco with Zaxxon, and Mattel’s M Network with BurgerTime. Starpath went further with its Supercharger add-on, which loaded games such as Communist Mutants from Space from audio cassette and raised the console’s memory from 128 bytes to over 6 KB.
Activision’s own hits remain the best-known third-party games, including David Crane’s Pitfall! (1982) and Frostbite (1983). By 1983 so many publishers had flooded shops with cartridges, of very mixed quality, that the glut is often named as one cause of that year’s video game crash.
Browse the full list below and play games from dozens of publishers right here in your browser.
Chopper Command is a horizontally scrolling shooter designed by Bob Whitehead and released by Activision for the Atari 2600 in 1982. You fly a helicopter gunship over the desert, shooting down enemy jets and helicopters before they can wreck the convoy of trucks rolling along below. It is quick to learn, and the splitting enemy missiles keep you dodging as much as shooting. You can play it here in your browser.
Busy Police is an unlicensed copy of Activision’s 1983 chase game Keystone Kapers, designed by Garry Kitchen. It was made in Taiwan and sold in Canada by the Zellers department store chain, under a new name and without Activision’s permission. Underneath the new title it is the same game: a slapstick policeman chasing a thief through a department store against the clock. You can play it here in your browser.
Cabbage Patch Kids: Adventures in the Park is an unreleased Atari 2600 prototype from 1984. Coleco planned it as a conversion of its ColecoVision game based on the popular dolls, and the 2600 version was programmed by Ed Temple at Individeo. It was finished but never sold, and it only became public after prototype chips turned up at a flea market in 2008. You can play it here in your browser.
Care Bears is an unreleased Atari 2600 game that Parker Brothers had in development in 1983, programmed by Laura Nikolich. It was meant to be a simple game for young children based on the popular Care Bears characters, but it was cancelled and never reached the shops. What survives is an early prototype that is closer to a graphics test than a finished game. You can try it here in your browser as a piece of Atari history.
BMX Air Master (spelled BMX Airmaster on some listings) is a BMX stunt game for the Atari 2600, developed by Sculptured Software and published by TNT Games in 1989, late in the console’s life. You ride a half pipe, a quarter pipe and a big ramp jump, and score points for loops, flips, rotations and combinations of tricks in the air. Up to two players take turns. You can play it here in your browser.
Bobby geht heim (“Bobby goes home”) is the German release of Bobby Is Going Home, a cheerful side-scrolling platform game made by the Taiwanese company Bit Corporation in 1983. The game is the same: you walk young Bobby home, jumping over ponds, holes and broken bridges and dodging birds, bats and other animals on the way. You can play it here in your browser.
Bobby Is Going Home is a side-scrolling platform game for the Atari 2600, made by the Taiwanese company Bit Corporation in 1983. You guide a small boy named Bobby on his walk home, jumping over ponds, holes and broken bridges and dodging birds, bats and other animals on the way. It plays a lot like Activision’s Pitfall!, but with a gentler, more cheerful feel and bright, busy backgrounds. You can play it here in your browser.
Boxing is a 1980 sports game by Activision, designed and programmed by Bob Whitehead. It was one of the four cartridges Activision launched with that summer, the first games ever sold for the Atari 2600 by a company other than Atari. Two fighters trade punches in a ring seen from above, and the rules fit in one sentence, yet footwork and timing decide every bout. You can play it here in your browser, against the computer or a friend.
Bugs is a 1982 paddle-controlled shooting game from Data Age, a short-lived Californian publisher of Atari 2600 cartridges. You have landed on a dead planet ruled by intelligent “Super-Bugs”, and you have to blast them as they crawl out of their nests before they damage your ship. At the same time you must deal with the Phylax, creatures that seep through your hull to attack your weapon. You can play it here in your browser.
Bump ‘n’ Jump is the Atari 2600 version of Data East’s 1982 arcade driving game, released in 1983 by Mattel Electronics under its M Network label. You drive up a winding road, knocking other cars off the track and leaping over water. The other cars are targets rather than rivals, which makes it more aggressive than an ordinary racer. You can play it here in your browser.