Atari Launches reboot of Asteroids

Published: March 30, 2015 5:06 PM /

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Asteroids

Asteroids: Outpost is a reboot of 1979's iconic arcade game Asteroids. According to Eurogamer, it was made available on Steam for Early Access on March 27th in a new campaign to reboot several of their classic games.  The Asteroids reboot was made by indie developer Salty Games and published by Atari.

While the 1979 original was a top-down survival space-shooter in which players dodged asteroids and shot them for points, the reboot is a first-person sandbox-survival game in which the player has to create a base and protect it. You play as a space marine protecting and repairing your base, mining for resources and managing oxygen as you attempt to survive.

https://youtu.be/ew8UDBQ1Ueo

The game is currently receiving mixed reviews on Steam, with some of the reviewers saying it's too under-developed to be on Early Access, while others take interest in the game's concept.

Atari plans on getting "young and innovative" developers to reboot several other games in their library as well, according to Atari's COO Todd Shallbetter.

"Asteroids is the first of a long series of re-births, and we are considering doing the same for our other iconic games such as Warlords, Adventure, Tempest, Missile Command," Shallbetter continued.

Earlier this year, Atari expressed interest in rebooting Roller Coaster Tycoon with a new name and new IP. Atari currently plans to release the game in 2016 under the name Coaster Park Tycoon.

Last month, Tempest 2000 developer Jeff Minter said Atari blocked his new game TxK - a spiritual sequel to Tempest 2000 - from being released on several platforms. A year before that, in Feb. 2014, TxK was released for Playstation Vita and received critical acclaim.

Atari clarified their position, saying they've been in contact with Minter since the game's release.

"Atari values and protects its intellectual property and expects others to respect its copyrights and trademarks. When Llamasoft launched TxK in early 2014, Atari was surprised and dismayed by the very close similarities between TxK and the Tempest franchise. Atari was not alone in noticing the incredible likeness between the titles."

Are you interested in playing Asteroids:Outpost? If you played the game, what did you think of it? Let us know in the comments.

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My name's Mathieu. I like Oscar Wilde, Charles Schulz and Kool G Rap. I also like video games. My favourite is Half-Life, which I played religiously… More about Mathieu