Yars' Revenge Advert, Game, Comic & MP3s

All together now: "Have You Played Atari Today?"

Very catchy Atari ad for Yars' Revenge, a baffling shoot-em-up written by Legendary Atari programmer Howard Scott Warshaw (also responsible for Raiders of the Lost Ark and E.T. - which is of course another story in itself).

This ad was part of a massive advertising campaign that made the Atari 2600 VCS into the first must-have video games system. The VCS itself was a solid little machine, famous for its wood-grain pannelling (which gave it it's nickname, 'The Woody'. It also came with the iconic Atari Joysticks which for an early games console were pretty well made.

Yars' Revenge turns out to be a surprisingly playable little game. A complex plot involving insectoid star warriors, the enemy Qotile race, Zorlon canons and swirling vortexes, gives rise to a simple shooter with odd, yet basic mechanics that, like all great games, takes a short while to learn, but a long time to master.

The game came with a full-colour miniature comic book entitled "The Qotile Ultimatum" which details the plight of the Yar Warriors against the evil Qotile. And beleive this was followed by the release of a long-play album containing a theme-tune and a full four-part radio drama (MP3 downloads below!)

All of this bonus material makes me love this game probably more than it deserves. It's crying out to be remade on XBox Live or the Wii or something.

Now if only someone would bag the rights and make it into a movie! You read it here first...

The comic book

Download the Qotile Ultimatum pdf (5mb)


(Adobe Acrobat Reader required - download it here)

The Album

The Game

Click here to play Yars' Revenge!

FOR MORE ATARI VCS GAMES DOWNLOAD THE RETROBABBLE TOOLBAR