8 replies to this topic

[jnice]

Not sure if this post belongs here or if I'll immediately get angry responses from programmers, but whatever...

As a kid, I was a huge fan of air hockey. My parents bought a cheap used table at a garage sale and we played on it for years. We also had an Atari 8-bit computer. One of my dreams was to one day program an air hockey game for the computer, but I barely learned any programming for it and I never started the project.

Recently I was thinking how the Atari 5200 controllers could be ideal for controlling "air hockey paddles". A circle representing the paddle could be controlled based on the position of the joystick. Dead center (a place rumored to exist on the controllers) would put you in the center of your side of the table, for example. Control would be similar to how the joystick is used for games like Missle Command, Centipede and Star Wars: The Arcade Game, except you'd only get to move around on your half of the board (or possibly slightly over the middle line?).

Anyway, I thought this would be like taking Pong to the next level, and I'm not of anyone making an air hockey game for any video game system (I could see something like this working on the Wii). There would be two player-controlled circles (for the paddles) and one red circle (for the puck). Getting the angles and velocities for the puck movement, depending on how the paddles come in contact with it, or how the puck isn't hit and it eventually slows down til it stops, could be a challenge for someone, but maybe a fun challenge.

What do YOU think? This would be an easier programming idea than the multi-level games for both Thundercats and The Mysterious Cities of Gold that I will begin programming 40 years from now for the Atari 5200.

[SoundGammon]

...the trackballs would also work nice, anywhere you stop spinning is where the puck would stop...

[jnice]

SoundGammon, on Sat Aug 27, 2011 10:07 AM, said:

...the trackballs would also work nice, anywhere you stop spinning is where the puck would stop...

True, that could also work... Would anyone think playing a simulated version of air hockey on the Atari 5200 could be fun?

[ledzep]

I've wondered about that, actually. Both the 5200 and the Vectrex (and others, I'm sure) have analog joysticks, they'd be perfect for an air hockey game. You could even use the fire buttons to "lift" and "drop" the paddle to simulate stopping the puck by smacking the paddle down on it (whether that's a legal air hockey move or not is beside the point since almost everybody does that when playing air hockey so there would be an expectation of at that as at least a game option). I think it would be a great game, you could have a random crappy arcade mode where the table would have a dead spot here or there, just like the frustrating air hockey tables that I remember from arcades.

[bobotech]

I thought you could only use 1 5200 trackball controller on the 5200 or can you use 2 5200 trackballs on the same system? I ask that because I thought that was why there were 2 keypads on the 5200 trackballl, one for player one, and the other for player 2. I have no idea, I never had one but still want a 5200 trackball.

I like the idea of a 5200 air hockey.

[Rex Dart]

Sounds like a good idea; the faster you move the stick, the harder you smack the puck. Wouldn't be the first air hockey game; I'm pretty sure the PS1 and Wii both have one. I think I had one for Win3.1 that I played a lot of, too. You could always throw in some power-ups if you think it's dull.

[riffraff]

There was Air-hockey in a mindscape game on the c64 (and Amiga too?) called Indoor Sports.. Although that one did not use an analog control.

Atari 5200 would be a nice platform for an Air-Hockey game =)

[SRGilbert]

I'm not sure how the PS1 or Wii versions do it, but the main concern I would have is the screen size and speed of the puck. To feel like real air hockey, the puck would have to move pretty fast, otherwise you just have Pong. Problem is that the screen isn't very big, so I'm not sure you could return it!

I'm not sure on the Trak-ball either. Like the paddles in the real thing, I think it would work better to hold on to the stick.

Cool idea though!

[Schizophretard]

I think it would be cool. It would be cool if it had a bunch of other games in it too like a Video Olympics II. For an example, there could be a variation that has Breakout bricks on top and you bust them out air hockey style. It could be called Puckout. Another variation could be like Foozpong like on Video Olympics but hitting the button makes the paddles flip like in real foosball. There could be puck pinball, bowling, and stuff like that.