Genre: Arcade
Developer: Atari
Publisher: Atari

As hip as wireframe vector graphics were in the 1970's, they became totally superseded by polygonal visuals. By contrast, sprites are forever: and where the other home versions of this all-time classic used nothing more than colorful blobs, this 7800 rendition's space rocks have finely shaded crevices and craters, and even rotate at various speeds! Meanwhile, the ship is anti-aliased, while the score font and handsome title screen round out the best-ever home version of the arcade hit.

The 1970's-vintage 2600 sound chip housed in the 7800 isn't particularly robust or capable-- but when it comes to imitating the iconic Asteroids sounds, it's more than up to the task: the "Jaws"-like "beep... boop" is perfectly represented, while the rock destruction and alien sounds are appropriately spacey and echoey. Rock on!

For those who haven't played it, Asteroids involves flying around a fully wrap-around, single-screen arena, blowing up asteroids while avoiding the flying pieces. This 7800 rendition plays wonderfully: the inertial movement weight feels perfect, as does the rate of fire and difficulty ramp. There are both two-player competitive and cooperative modes, in addition to three difficulty levels.

This is the best-ever home conversion of one of the all-time great arcade games: it has superb graphics, ultra faithful sound, and pitch-perfect gameplay. What's not to like? Asteroids may not quite have the strategic depth of some of its contemporaries, but all the same it's a timeless formula which stands up even today.