My Slow Descent Into Loserhood - My Atari Games
Video Pinball
Rating: 5.0
High Score (So Far): 284280

I just have to give this game a passing grade even though it is terrible.  It was one of the original six (games I owned 20 years ago).  Along with Combat, Haunted House, Missile Command, Asteroids, and Defender, this game has been there (figuratively) since day Atari one.
Pinball video games suck.  For a commentary, see here.  But you already know how to play pinball.

For some reason in this game you either have a crappy turn that takes about 30 seconds, or you end up playing one ball for like 10 minutes.  I think the computer is a big fat cheater.  And that brings me to my social comment...
Haven't we all at one point thought that the computer (in any video game) was cheating?  And didn't we think it was cheating simply because we were losing?  Haven't we all cried out "that's not fair!" at our television sets?  For shame.  What would Captain Kirk say? The game is only fun if you can lose.  Think how boring it would be if you always won.  Kirky wasn't just out there imposing the American value system on alien beings for shits and giggles.  He was saying that as much as you hate to lose, winning would never be fun unless you lost once in a while.  Life would not be worth living if you can't die.  So LIVE, damn you, LIVE!!

And that brings me to the following epiphany: the reason that Atari is a glorious thing for me is that you have to lose.  I've never "beaten" an Atari game, and I probably never will. Often there is too fanatical a need to have bested the computer.  There is a need in some for a sense of accomplishment, perhaps because it is lacking in real life.  You will find no such satisfaction with this, or really any, Atari game.
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