RealSports Boxing

The RealSports line was Atari's attempt to give its 2600 sports titles a single brand identity and distance them from the extremely stripped-down games of the late seventies. The boxing entry is one of the late additions — it did not appear until 1987, by which point the console's best years were long past and the market belonged to a newer generation of eight-bit systems.

The view is side-on and you can play against the computer or a second person. That second option always worked best for boxing on old consoles: the game does not need to simulate a clever opponent, it only needs to respond quickly and readably. The 2600 offered one joystick and one button, so distinguishing between punches had to be handled through stick direction and timing rather than a menu of different blows.

Technically this sits near the edge of what the console could manage. The Atari 2600 had minimal graphics capability, and two fighters occupying a large share of the screen was a demanding proposition for it. Anyone comparing this against boxing games released on the NES in 1987 will see a very obvious gap in both detail and smoothness.

Viewed today, RealSports Boxing is more interesting as evidence of how long the Atari 2600 stayed on shelves than as a sports game in its own right. On OldGame.cz it is kept as a profile with release and publisher data, useful when mapping the console's late catalogue.