Demon Attack was a subject of legal debate back in the day when Atari sued Imagic due to the alleged similarities between Demon Attack and Phoenix, a Taito arcade game ported to the Atari 2600 by Atari. Maybe some people might notice the similarities between the two, but I never did. Unless the similarity is they’re both space shooters… oh well, in any case, the two settled and Demon Attack would become a favorite… and for good reason because it’s a great game.
Demon Attack is one of those childhood favorites that I used to play constantly back in the days when I had my Atari 7800 (the system nobody got despite have some decent titles and backwards compatibility with the 2600 library) and even today is still a generally enjoyable game that follows an all-too-simple-and-familiar premise; aliens or rather “demons” are attacking you and you have to destroy them all to move on to the next level. Do well clearing the wave of demons and you earn an extra life (and this will happen often during the initial stages of the game.)
It’s a fairly simple premise that is rather easy to follow, but as you progress farther into the game, the demons become more difficult and more cunning, introducing a couple new abilities such as splitting into two smaller demons when you shoot them as well as streaming lasers that follow their position, making them increasingly more difficult to dodge. It’s a nice way to vary it up.
Graphically speaking, Demon Attack is fairly good looking. Any time an Atari video game pulls off a gradient background in the form of anything – be it a sky or in this case, the floor – I’m easily swayed to say it looks good. Fortunately, the variety of demons you encounter in this game look decisively menacing in this 2600 format and don’t come off as choppy in terms of animation despite having few frames. It’s certainly helps that the pulsing ambient background noise helps to add to the menacing atmosphere of the overall game, with the tempo rising as more demons are slain.
Now like most 2600 titles, Demon Attack has a variety of alternate modes. Usually, these make the games more difficult or some other curve ball variation. The most intriguing aspect is the 2-player alternating mode, where control of the ship alternates between the two players at pre-determined intervals. It’s a mode that keeps the tension up as both players have to be on the ready once they gain control of the ship, lest they be destroyed by the demons’ attack. It’s actually a nice little feature that I wouldn’t mind seeing in more modern games today.
Overall, if you have an Atari 2600 or 7800 for that matter, enjoy space shooters, and haven’t had the chance to play Demon Attack yet, then I highly suggest you do so. It’s fairly cheap these days and it’s a ton of fun. If you don’t have an Atari, the game is also available on the Activision Anthology set that was released for Playstation-2 several years ago. Either way, Demon Attack is a solid space shooter and a great time to be had by all.
BREAKDOWN
Graphics: 8/10 (gradient floor and menacing demons are top notch)
Sound: 8/10 (nice demonic-sounding ambient background noise, individual effects also decent)
Gameplay: 9/10 (classic shooter format with some neat 2-player alternating formats)
Challenge: 7/10 (demons adapt with new techniques every few levels, keeping the game fresh and challenging)
Replay Value: 5/10 (if you’re into classic shooters, you can’t go wrong)
OVERALL: 8/10
dtm666 