Taito‘s 1980 arcade hit, Phoenix, was converted to the Atari 2600 by Michael Feinstein and John Mracek and first published in February 1983 by Atari. Although it is a decent attempt at bringing the arcade version to the 2600, it still falls short of the original. I’d say that it’s still one of the better fixed-screen shooters on the VCS, though.

Phoenix was one of the first shooters to ever have a definitive ‘boss battle’ at the end of the game, and the Atari 2600 version at least retains that. It is the main reason why Phoenix was such a hit with gamers, so it had to be in there.

The attack waves and sprites are all recognisably Phoenix, and the rudimentary sound effects add to the authenticity.

Atari had the exclusive rights to publish Phoenix on home consoles, and filed a lawsuit against a competitor – I-Magic – on the basis that their game “Demon Attack” was too derivative of Phoenix. A settlement was reached, with I-Magic still being allowed to sell Demon Attack. Meaning that Atari‘s case against Demon Attack was not successful.

More: Phoenix on Wikipedia