Another revamp of a classic is on the way with Atari once again teaming up with SneakyBox, as the 1981 title Caverns of Mars is releasing as Caverns of Mars: Recharged.
In Caverns of Mars: Recharged, players progress through 30 missions set within three primary "depths" of Mars, descending deeper and deeper into enemy territory. Blast through oncoming hostile fire, bull through debris and obstructions, and dodge other obstacles all while keeping a close eye on fuel and ammo reserves. Featuring a unique local co-op mode, players can team up with one partner assigned to navigation while the other player shoots the drone. From the trailer below, it looks pretty good!
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From the press release:
“Caverns of Mars is a great early example of a game designed for Atari’s 8-bit computers, which makes it a perfect addition to the Atari Recharged series,” said Atari CEO Wade Rosen. “It’s an intensely fun arcade-style experience in both single player and two-player co-op.”
Game Features:
- Fully Destructible: The environments in Caverns of Mars: Recharged are fully destructible; don’t hesitate to blast through any obstruction in your way, but be wary of fuel reserves. Each shot depletes fuel, but speedy travel grants time bonuses!
- Arcade Mode: Traverse the depths of Mars in three stages, strategically choosing upgrades and power-ups that will make each run unique.
- Challenge Mode: Progress through 30 bite-sized challenges across navigation, combat, and other exciting scenarios.
- Perky Power-Ups: Collect weapons that will change your strategy on the fly for tactical maneuvering. Carve a new path with a well-aimed railgun shot or let the spread of a shotgun blast do the talking for you!
You can wishlist / follow on Steam. It's releasing in March and will have Native Linux support like previous titles developed by SneakyBox.
Article taken from GamingOnLinux.com.
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7 comments
Speaking of Atari, is the VCS still in the market and is this also releasing on the VCS?
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Yes! I loved Caverns of Mars when I was a kid!
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slaapliedje Jan 26, 2023
Speaking of Atari, is the VCS still in the market and is this also releasing on the VCS?I ordered a second one. If you're in the USA, you can order one... Apparently they're still trying to figure out distribution to other countries. I saw at least one dude have a family member buy him one so he could have them ship it to the UK... pretty ridiculous.
The system is awesome though, slap in some more memory and an ssd and you can slap Linux on there and use it for a bit under Steam Deck performance (I should actually test how close they are to each other). Really neat looking system to have under your TV, that can be a full blown computer.
1 Likes, Who?
slaapliedje Jan 26, 2023
They need to work with Frontier to develop a new Star Raiders...
2 Likes, Who?
Jan 26, 2023
Speaking of Atari, is the VCS still in the market and is this also releasing on the VCS?
Wow, not only is it still around but the classic Black Walnut color with 1 modern gamepad and 1 classic stick controller is actually on sale for a pretty reasonable $299:
https://atari.com/products/atari-vcs-onyx-all-in
I know they just shoved a low end PC into a nostalgic case but apparently you can plug in an external hard drive and install Windows/Linux on it. There's a separate "PC mode" bundle which actually has a custom Debian distro pre-installed on a USB thumbstick that it can boot into. Honestly I am still sitting here shocked that this thing even exists and I can actually buy it right now and find it on my doorstep in a week. I am very oddly tempted, if only to own a weird piece of gaming history that probably won't be around for very long. Hmmm!
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slaapliedje Jan 26, 2023
It's a decent spec PC, it's not 'just shoved' in there, and has a custom PCB. AtariOS is an immutable OS based upon Apertis (a Debian based distribution made for car infotainment systems). 'PC Mode' just means you can hit escape and boot off of either a USB device or an internal SATA m.2 SSD drive. You can even put Windows on it, though I don't, as a Linux user, understand why you'd want to :PSpeaking of Atari, is the VCS still in the market and is this also releasing on the VCS?
Wow, not only is it still around but the classic Black Walnut color with 1 modern gamepad and 1 classic stick controller is actually on sale for a pretty reasonable $299:
https://atari.com/products/atari-vcs-onyx-all-in
I know they just shoved a low end PC into a nostalgic case but apparently you can plug in an external hard drive and install Windows/Linux on it. There's a separate "PC mode" bundle which actually has a custom Debian distro pre-installed on a USB thumbstick that it can boot into. Honestly I am still sitting here shocked that this thing even exists and I can actually buy it right now and find it on my doorstep in a week. I am very oddly tempted, if only to own a weird piece of gaming history that probably won't be around for very long. Hmmm!
But I own two of them now. Their Speaker Hat sounds pretty decent for what it is, though it's such an odd device (I'm actually wearing it right now, it's a decent hat). There were a lot of comments that it's not much more powerful than a Raspberry Pi, but that's incorrect, I've yet to see gnome / kde run well at all on an any RPis, but it runs quite well on the Atari VCS.
Side note: The Games for the VCS are Linux games, and they are DRM free. You can actually take a game you bought from the Atari store, copy it onto a Linux drive and play it on Desktop Linux.
My biggest complaint about the system is that the Atari Store doesn't have a cart yet, so if you want to buy multiple games at once... well you have to pay for each individually.
3 Likes, Who?
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