The 20 Greatest Atari 5200 Games of All-Time

This video counts down the greatest games for the 8-bit Atari 5200 console as voted for by the retro gaming community.

Video Links:
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#retrogaming #atari5200 #atari

[thelairdslair]

Full Top 50 Games List:

50 - Star Trek
49 - RealSports Baseball
48 - Millipede
47 - Q*bert
46 - Crystal Castles
45 - Keystone Kapers
44 - K-Razy Shootout
43 - Wizard of Wor
42 - Kangaroo
41 - Boulder Dash
40 - Pengo
39 - Pitfall II
38 - Gorf
37 - Mr. Do's Castle
36 - Popeye
35 - Kaboom!
34 - Miner 2049'er
33 - Zone Ranger
32 - Gyruss
31 - Moon Patrol
30 - Bounty Bob Strikes Back
29 - Jungle Hunt
28 - River Raid
27 - Ballblazer
26 - Mega Mania
25 - Vangaurd
24 - Star Wars: The Arcade Game
23 - Adventure II
22 - Mario Bros.
21 - Pitfall!
20 - Frogger
19 - Dig Dug
18 - Countermeasure
17 - Super Breakout
16 - Galaxian
15 - Gremlins
14 - Dreadnaught Factor
13 - Ms. Pac-Man
12 - Pole Position
11 - Defender
10 - Montezuma's Revenge
9 - Rescue on Fractalus
8 - Missile Command
7 - Joust
6 - Qix
5 - Star Raiders
4 - Robotron 2084
3 - Space Dungeon
2 - Pac-Man
1 - Centipede

[kenwheeler]

The much improved version of Pac-Man was the main reason I bought the system. Fortunately I waited until they decided to include it, along with Super Breakout, with the system.

[jacobwebb]

Great I always loved the 5200 games, I just couldn't get the controllers to last very long.

[cabbitkisser]

back in the 80's i never knew that atari made the 5200 or the 7800. until the 90's when i found a couple of atari 5200 at goodwill for cheap. i bought both of them & i found a lot of game's thru goodwill at the time. this was before the internet & ebay was a thing.

[taylora]

Great list! I really loved Moon Patrol also Super Cobra also, being side scrollers that also had "endings" preceding Super Mario Bros. Keep up the great work! 😎

[johnathanstevens]

Pacman, Pengo and QIX were my favorite. Realsports Baseball was cool at the time since it used digitized effects.

[billyg]

Had the 5200 back in early '83. We had Missile Command, Pac-Man, Ms. Pac Man, Joust, Pole Position, Star Raiders, Star Wars, Qix, and a few others. The games seemed closer to the arcade originals than my neighbor's Atari 2600 VCS.

[MrMegaManFan]

A very underrated console, but it really helps if you have the joystick adapter.

[SlippinnnJimmy]

The 5200 hosts the very best version of Pitfall II, by far. The real challenge doesn't even start on the 5200 until the end of the normal map.

[mrmojorisin]

Best “Best Of” list I’ve seen. For me, Dreadnaught Factor, Space Dungeon, Robotron, and Defender are the top of the top.

[Hologhoul]

I've enjoyed checking out the 5200 in recent times via emulation. Some great ports, nice to see the console get some respect despite the controller issues! What impresses me with arcade conversions generally is how many times the feel of the game is recreated, not only the visuals and sound. Defender, for example, has dozens of great versions across a plethora of systems.

[Mrshoujo]

Oddly enough, all 5200 games just needed a patch & could have been re-released on the XEGS since it was just an Atari computer underneath. A vote for the 5200 is a vote for Atari 8-bit computers.
The main reason Centipede for the Atari 8-bit / 5200 sounds like the arcade is they use the same sound chip!

[kevinstrade]

Best of all time for me, Star Raiders. I mastered that game as a kid and poured 1000's of hours playing it. But a newer release is a close second, Blaster, hypnotic to me and an amazing story behind it.

[buffalodebill]

I played all these games on the Atari 800XL with the 7800's ProLine joystick (the CX-24). Very ocassionally, I could use friend's 2600's TrakBall (the CX-22), which, as I recall, made Super Breakout actually playable (and in a result, super enjoyable - even more than using paddles). I do not recall playing other games with it, but I'd assume that its clones and games like Missile Command (which this video inspired me to do a playthrough of), Centipede & Millipede & co. and a few more may have been much more playable & enjoyable, as a result of having more control over the "cursor" position.

BTW considering that the 5200 had only some 70 games released during its life, I think that these 20 ones seem to be a nice showcase of what this system (and the whole line of Atari 8-bit home computers, for that matter) was capable of. Thumbs up.

[themadmoderator]

had some great conversions on the 5200

[nickpalance]

Sad to see that Mario Bros. and Moon Patrol and Vanguard did not make the list. Those games, published by Atari, were favorites of mine.

For other publishers, I also enjoyed Megamania and Miner 2049er. I played those two a LOT.

I did not see Lucasfilm games on the shelves during the prime of the 5200. I played them on my cousin’s C64 and once I had a 1050 disk drive for my 800XL I played them on that. The Eidolon wasn’t even offered on the 5200 but I liked that fractal-y game even more than Rescue!

[jessietomich]

My dad bought me one in the 80s. I played it a lot. My mom gave that switch box for the TV away at a garage sale making it unuseable because it back fed the power through the video cable.

[jeff-dspr]

HERO, Gremlins, Wizard of Wor, Blueprint, and Pitfall 2 were some great games for the system as well.

[VdrummerStixx]

Real Sports Baseball is my personal favorite, batting was excellent and pitching with the key pad was a stroke of genius so much fun

[Trenchbroom]

Great video. I would argue that Fire Truck from Atari (1978) was the first cooperative video game. The cabinet had player one sitting at a wheel driving the front of the fire truck with player two driving the rear of the truck from a standing position behind player one (steering the wheel in the opposite direction, just like fire trucks of old). I only got to play this game a few times in the 1970s but I enjoyed it immensely (there was a single player version called Smokey Joe but it wasn't nearly as fun).