Game Review

Dig Dug is one of those titles it seems everyone remembers from the golden age of arcades, and for good reason; it's an original, fun game that appeals to a wide audience. A mix of action and strategy, cute and detailed graphics, and addictive gameplay made the arcade original an instant hit, but can the Atari 2600 version stand up to it? A reasonable question after the disasterous Pac-Man port, and surprisingly, the Atari 2600 version is a faithful adaptation of the arcade classic! It has all of the elements; the gameplay recreates the original action and strategy quite well, all of the original characters are there, sound effects are pretty good, and even the background music theme is present (something that's not always a given on the 2600, although in this case it sounds like they had to transpose to a minor key or something to make it work with the 2600's note capabilities).

It is, of course, no surprise that the Atari 2600 graphics aren't nearly as detailed. The dirt maintains the colored gradiations, but is otherwise a solid color with some stripes and has perfectly rectangular tunnels instead of the more granular, organic shapes of the original. The color changes as the levels progress are there, and follow the arcade game accurately. Rocks do look more like boxes than rocks, and there is naturally some flicker due to the large number of characters on the screen. But really, despite all the graphical differences, the gameplay is there and the graphics are clear enough to not get in the way. There are also two difficulty levels, Easy and Normal, although I think the easy is a little too easy. But overall, this is a solid conversion that I give an A-. Dig Dug is still fun to play even today!