Out of the large library of games on the Atari 2600, most of my favorites are located in the paddle controller games. The intensity of head-to-head combat in Warlords, the luring simplicity of Super Breakout, or the strangely addicting Circus Atari, always had me coming back for more. However, there is one game that stands as my all time favorite single player paddle controller game, and that game is Demons to Diamonds.
Demons to Diamonds didn’t have a very large following as some games on the Atari 2600, but this doesn’t mean that the game doesn’t have much to offer. The object of the game is simple: you shoot demons, they turn into diamonds, you collect the diamonds. You control a ship at the bottom of the screen, similar to the one in Space Invaders. Many demons will spawn in the rows above your ship and your job is to maneuver and shoot them.
There are two types of demons in the game: red and blue. Your objective is to shoot only the red ones, which will subsequently turn into diamonds, which you will want to shoot for points. If you shoot a blue one, it will transform into an indestructible grey skull which will then shoot you with projectiles. This makes it much more difficult to strategically annihilate the red demons.
The game starts off pretty simple, but increases in difficulty very quickly, making the game rarely get boring. The further you progress, the faster the demons will reproduce and the harder it will get to shoot around the blue demons that manage to get in the path of your laser. This brings me to another small, but interesting aspect of the game: your weapon. Rather than shooting a typical projectile shot like in most shooting games (Galaga, Space Invaders or Galaxian), the laser you are armed with extends from your ship, making a continuous laser beam from your ship to your target. This makes it much harder to shoot the demons and diamonds that are located in the furthest row back. You will have to account for all the traveling blue demons in the lower tiers so that they don’t end up walking into the path of your laser.
My favorite aspect of the game though, has to be the two player option. In the two player option, the second player controls a ship on the top of the screen, shooting down. You may choose to either play cooperatively, shooting demons and collecting diamonds, or you may play competitively, shooting around blue demons and taking down your opponent. Playing cooperatively opens a whole new play experience, so if you have a friend that wouldn’t mind playing an overlooked Atari 2600 game from the early 80s, I really encourage you to give it a try.
I give this game a strong recommendation to anyone who owns a 2600, and if you don’t own one, then let this be my reason for you to add one to your collection. The game is pretty common, and can be found for relatively cheap. I got my copy at a pawn shop for two dollars. If this option isn’t available to you, then pick it up on Amazon for a dollar with a little extra for shipping. Either way, you should totally pick this one up...you’ll be thanking me when you do.
Go ahead and check out some gameplay. You deserve it:
