Megamania is an Atari 2600 game designed by Steve Cartwright and published by Activision in 1982. It took about six months to develop the concept, and another three months to fine tune the game. It was later released for the Atari 5200 and Atari 8-bit family in 1983, ported by Glyn Anderson. The Atari 2600 version was also bundled in with the Activision Anthology release in 2002.
In Megamania, the gameplay resembles that of Space Invaders. Rather than being aliens or spaceships, however, the enemies in this game are various objects such as hamburgers, bow ties, and steam irons.
Megamania (Atari 2600)
The object is to shoot them down before the energy bar at the bottom of screen is depleted, all while avoiding the oncoming enemies and their own projectiles attacks. Each of the enemies fly in select patterns and as soon as they hit the bottom of the screen, they re-appear at the top until shot by the player. The player's spacecraft depicted in the game is a cross between the U.S.S. Enterprise and Klingon battlecruiser from the Star Trek universe.
The first cycle scores 20 to 90 points in 10 point increments each round for each object defeated; after the first cycle, every object destroyed scores 90 points. Once a wave is cleared, the player scores bonus points equal to the value of the object times the number of energy units remaining. Every 10,000 points gives the player an extra life; the player can have no more than six extra lives in stock at a time. If a player exceeds a score of 999,999 the game ends. Anyone who scored above 45,000 points could send Activision a picture of their screen and receive an 'Official Megamaniac' emblem.
Gameplay-wise and in terms of graphics, MegaMania bears a very strong resemblance to Sega's 1981 arcade title 'Astro Blaster'. Both games feature nearly identical patterns of approaching enemies with the player relying on an 'Energy' meter. Also, the player's ship bears a remarkable similarity in both games.
The Atari 2600 version is included with Activision Anthology (2002). A visually updated version is part of Arcade Zone for the Wii (2009). Steve Cartwright would re-use the code for Megamania for a later Atari 2600 game Plaque Attack.
More details about this game can be found on
Wikipedia.org.
Find digital download of this game on
GOG
or
Steam.
Videogame Console:
This version of Megamania was designed for Atari 2600, which was commercially very successful video game console of second generation produced by Atari from 1977 to 1992. It was the first console that used removable memory modules with games. At the time of its greatest fame, more than 30 million units of this console were sold for about $ 200 a piece. To date, the game library for this console contains nearly 1,000 original games. More information about the
Atari 2600 can be found here.
Recommended Game Controllers:
You can control this game easily by using the keyboard of your PC (see the table next to the game). However, for maximum gaming enjoyment, we strongly recommend using a USB joystick that you simply plug into the USB port of your computer. If you do not have a joystick, buy a suitable USB controller on Amazon or AliExpress or in some of your favorite online stores.
Available online emulators:
5 different online emulators are available for Megamania. These emulators differ not only in the technology they use to emulate old games, but also in support of various game controllers, multiplayer mode, mobile phone touchscreen, emulation speed, absence or presence of embedded ads and in many other parameters. For
maximum gaming enjoyment, it's important to choose the right emulator, because on each PC and in different Internet browsers, the individual emulators behave differently. The basic
features of each emulator available for this game Megamania are summarized in the following table:
If you like Megamania you'll probably like also some of the similar games in the overview below. The games you see here
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This version of Megamania was designed for Atari 2600, which was commercially very successful video game console of second generation produced by Atari from 1977 to 1992. It was the first console that used removable memory modules with games. At the time of its greatest fame, more than 30 million units of this console were sold for about $ 200 a piece. To date, the game library for this console contains nearly 1,000 original games. More information about the
Atari 2600 can be found 
