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PC | Action | Intellivision Lives!

There is no Boxart for - Intellivision Lives!
  • GRAPHICS: 3.0
  • SOUND: 3.0
  • CONTROL: 3.0
  • FUN FACTOR 4.5
  • AVG USER SCORE n/a
  • AVG CRITIC SCORE 4.4
Winner of the GamePro Editor's Choice Award

Review: Intellivision Lives!

Review by Peter Olafson | 01/01/2000 | 00:00:00 AM PST

This charming interactive history lesson takes a fond look back at Mattel Electronics' beloved early '80s console and to play many of its games. To judge from the evidence, Intellivision isn't just alive, but living it up.

To judge from the evidence, Intellivision isn't just alive, but living it up. This charming interactive history lesson takes a fond look back at Mattel Electronics' beloved early '80s console and to play many of its games. Exploring the CD is an adventure in and of itself.

In the early '80s, I was an outsider. I had one of the 10 million Atari 2600s-the 900-pound video-game gorilla of that era-and regarded the preserve of the 3 million Intellivisionaries as a mysterious and wondrous place. The games seemed comparatively rich, the gameplay full of subtleties.

Intellivision Lives! bears out that perception. It comes with emulators for Windows 95/98 and the PowerMac, more than 50 released games and around 20 unreleased ones. They play without problems-though offline manuals and keyboard configs would be convenient--and, with experience, develop all sorts of sweet nuances. If you've ever wondered why emulators are such a hit, wonder no more. In Intellivision's day, raw gameplay was everything, and that hasn't changed.

And, really, what's not to like? The extensive text-from development histories to hardware descriptions to oddities and Easter Eggs--is written in a consistently lively, informed but non-technical voice. The information is organized cleanly, indexed and hotlinked so you can click on highlighted passages for more info. The package runs entirely off the CD. (At most, it installs a version of QuickTime.) It fine on a Pentium-200, Pentium II-450, Pentium III-500 and on a 350 mHz Macintosh G3. And, 15 years after Mattel closed down its Intellivision division, an infectious enthusiasm beams from virtually every screen.

Intellivision does live. Here's proof.