Atari controller "keychains" -- with games

While its merits as a keychain are questionable (not to mention potentially painful), these officially-licensed Atari game-on-a-controller units from Basic Fun should prove to be geek catnip for anyone who remembers the good old days when game consoles were wood-paneled and had switches for black-and-white or color. The familiar 2600 joystick model is available in two variations, one with Asteroids and Millipede and one with Centipede and Yar's Revenge, while the paddle gives you Pong along with Breakout and Warlords -- although if the reviews are any indication you shouldn't expect completely faithful versions of the games. Each unit will set you back about $15, which includes the six foot RCA cable for connecting it to a TV (yeah, you gotta remember to tote that along with your keychain), but not the three AA batteries required to power it.

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[PDubNYC @ Sep 5th 2006 5:53PM]

The paddle one should come with Kaboom.

Pretty stupid idea though really.

[The Jeremy @ Sep 5th 2006 5:57PM]

I think Warlords was the ultimate Atari 2600 paddle game, if one got 4 people together to play it. Otherwise, I'd take Super Breakout over Kaboom. Jedi Arena was fun with two players...

Oh the memories...

[Enzo @ Sep 5th 2006 6:06PM]

centipede and yar's revenge. awesome.

[Rik @ Sep 5th 2006 6:08PM]

Nah, if you really want old school the only way to go with a paddle is a game of slalom from Street Racer! As for the joystick they need a link up option for Combat :)

[RobotTank @ Sep 5th 2006 6:28PM]

Is that an Atari 2600 keychain in your pocket or are you just happy to see me?

[Mike @ Sep 5th 2006 6:54PM]

These have been at Barnes & Noble for awhile. I can't remember the first time I saw them But I know they are there cause I was reading teh boxes yesterday.

[Rick @ Sep 5th 2006 7:24PM]

Explain this to me PLEASE!!! Why in this day and age can't we faithfully reproduce a game thats nearly 30 years old? I just don't F**KING understand it? Doesn't matter if its this keychain thingy or if its the arcade games via Xbox Live. It's gotta be one of three things: 1) Programmers are just goddamn lazy 2) Programmers are retarded or 3) The 2600 hardware is more powerful than an Xbox 360 or whatever chip they are slapping into these keychain thingys. Please enlighten me...Thank you.

[Matthew Castillo @ Sep 5th 2006 7:28PM]

-_- how did I know the comments would be full of lewd "is that an atari in your pocket" jokes.... Seriously tho, I wouldn't carry one of these in my pocket. Sitting down wrong could cause serious injury o.O

[Groovy @ Sep 5th 2006 8:01PM]

What about Berserk? I don't know of any other game where you can make the character "pee" on a wall.

[Roger @ Sep 5th 2006 8:20PM]

Your via link has the wrong URL

[Dave Ross @ Sep 6th 2006 12:20AM]

Rick, check out the comments from the original engineer on this project at AtariAge. Originally, this was supposed to be based on his "Atari on a chip", like the Flashback 2. But the company decided to switch to a NES on a chip design, like the original Flashback, joystick, and paddle products. These NES clone chips are dirt cheap, and I'm guessing Atari just licensed their NES versions of the games from their earlier projects to Basic Fun.

So, at least in this case, it's a case of penny pinching leading to the reuse of an already crappy clone on quite different hardware from the original game. But it's good enough for kids who never played the original, and adults who just want a quick, cheap nostalia trip, so I'm sure it's a success in the manufacturer's eyes.