Sears, the American department store chain, sold the Atari 2600 and its games under its own Tele-Games brand. Most of the 54 cartridges on this page are Atari games that Sears sold in its stores and catalogues, often under plainer names. Video Olympics became Pong Sports, Surround became Chase, Video Pinball became Arcade Pinball and Hangman became Spelling. Sears consoles came with Air-Sea Battle as Target Fun instead of Combat, which Sears sold separately as Tank Plus. Super Breakout even came out first as a Sears Tele-Games exclusive in 1981, a few months before the Atari edition.
The list covers much of Atari’s early library, from the 1977 launch titles to arcade conversions like Asteroids and Missile Command. A few to start with:
Air-Sea Battle (1977): the shooting gallery Sears packed in with its console.
Combat (1977): two-player tank duels, sold by Sears as Tank Plus.
Video Olympics (1977): Pong-style ball games, known at Sears as Pong Sports.
Super Breakout (1981): first released as a Sears Tele-Games exclusive.
Hangman (1978): the word game Sears called Spelling.
Video Pinball (1981): sold by Sears as Arcade Pinball.
Scroll through the list below and play any of these games in your browser.
Canyon Bomber is Atari’s 1979 Atari 2600 version of its 1977 arcade game, programmed by David Crane. Planes fly across a canyon full of coloured bricks, and all you decide is when to drop a bomb. It is a one-button game, but getting the timing right is harder than it looks. The cartridge also includes Sea Bomber, where you sink ships with depth charges. You can play both here in your browser.
Brain Games is a 1978 Atari cartridge of memory and puzzle games, programmed by Larry Kaplan. It packs 19 game variations into six activities: repeating sequences of tones or numbers, remembering pictures, spotting the odd one out, adding up digits, and even playing tunes. Sears also sold it under its own label. You can load it here in your browser, but please read the controller note below first.
Casino is an early Atari 2600 card game cartridge programmed by Bob Whitehead and released by Atari in 1979. Sears sold it under the name Poker Plus. It puts three card games on one cartridge: blackjack, five-card stud poker and poker solitaire, for up to four players using paddle controllers. You can play it here in your browser.
Miniature Golf is one of Atari’s early cartridges for the Video Computer System, programmed by Tom Reuterdahl and released in 1979. It offers nine holes of top-down mini golf with walls to bank shots off and obstacles that move across the course. Sears sold the same game under the name Arcade Golf. The graphics are very basic, but working out angles and distances is a quiet puzzle that still holds up for a few rounds. You can play it here in your browser.
Flag Capture is a 1978 Atari 2600 guessing game designed by Jim Huether and published by Atari (Sears sold it as Capture). A flag is hidden under one square of a grid, and you move an explorer around to find it, using clues that point you in the right direction. It looks very plain, but it is a neat little deduction game, especially for two players. You can play it here in your browser.
Dodge ‘Em is a 1980 driving maze game for the Atari 2600, programmed by Carla Meninsky and published by Atari. Sears sold it under the name Dodger Cars. You drive round a four-lane track collecting dots while a computer car drives the other way, trying to hit you head-on. It takes seconds to learn and works just as well against a friend. You can play it here in your browser.
Berzerk is a multidirectional shooter video game that was initially released for arcades in 1980 and later for the Atari 2600 in 1982. The game was developed by Stern Electronics and designed by Alan McNeil. Berzerk places the player in the role of a human fighting his way through a maze of interconnected rooms filled … Read more
Football is Atari’s early American football cartridge for the 2600, programmed by Bob Whitehead and sold by Sears as part of its Tele-Games line. It is a two-player game only: one person plays offence, the other defence, and both secretly choose a play before each snap. That makes it a guessing game between two friends as much as an action game. You can play it here in your browser, two people at one keyboard.
Basketball is one of the first basketball video games for a home console: a one-on-one match on a full court seen from the sideline, programmed by Alan Miller and released by Atari for the 2600 in 1978. It is simple, but the shooting and stealing still work well, and it is fun against a friend or the computer. You can play it here in your browser.
Yars’ Revenge is a video game developed and published by Atari for the Atari 2600 in 1982. It was designed by Howard Scott Warshaw, who also created the infamous E.T. the Extra-Terrestrial game for the same platform. Yars’ Revenge quickly became Atari’s best-selling original title for the 2600 and is considered one of the console’s … Read more