I Robot (1983)

The first videogame using 3-D filled polygons. I, Robot placed the player in a at the time bewildering landscape of surrealistic shapes and sounds. Using a Hall-effect joystick, two fire buttons and two buttons to control the players viewing angle, the player controls "Unhappy Interface Robot 1984" as he tries to clear each cleverly designed level of red tiled polygons.

I, Robot was, apparently, originally to be called "Ice Castles". The game was a complete flop at the time, players were really unable to cope with the surrealism and "newness" of the graphics. Although probably not the entire reason why the hall-effect joystick was not copied by other manufacturers, Atari was granted a patent now expired for a "finger control joystick utilizing Hall effect", which can be viewed at http://www.patents.ibm.com/details?pnUS04459578__s_clms1

The game play consists of moving robot1984 over all of the red tiles while avoiding objects flying at you from the back of the screen. Eliminating the red tiles diminishes the shield at the back of the playfield which prevents you from flying to the next level. To get to all the red tiles, players sometimes need to leap across empty space which creates a permanent bridge between the two points. Leaps across empty space have to be timed so that the "eye" of Big Brother in the back of the playfield, which randomly opens and closes, does not see robot1984 and destroy him. When all of the playfield's red tiles have been eliminated, the shield disapears and the player can then leap to the final red tile on the level which destroys the "eye" and ends the level. The victorious robot then jumps off the playfield and flys through space to the next puzzle-like playfield. While flying through space, the player needs to avoid polygon obstacles while blasting stars. Every five levels, the space flight sequence is replaced with a flight through space ending with a large "head." The head, when faced, shoots spikes at the player in the real world - not robot1984. All the spikes need to be shot while in front of the robot or they will circle behind and destroy him. The playfields are not randomly generated. However, they always vary from level to level. A unique feature of the game, which greatly aids game play on some levels, is the ability to change one's perspective of the playfield at anytime by moving the "camera" viewpoint through a certain range of possible locations. The camera viewpoint always remains behind robot1984. An interesting option called "Doodle City" allows the player to spend a few minutes drawing and experimenting with the game's polygon objects. Drawing objects can also be animated, spining or orbiting on one of their axis. Players chosing to spend time in "Doodle City" can switch to the game with a diminished number of lives based on how long they spend doodling.

I Robot is an ultimate grail for us. The second game to real time render 3D objects after Cube Quest, and does it full time. The hardware Atari used for this was unique to the game, making it very difficult to find. Presently, we have a working PCB, but are in need of the plastic control panel, and a working Atari switching power supply.