Even if you weren’t around for the release of E.T. for the Atari 2600, you’ll know all about its infamy and how it was used as a scapegoat for the video games crash of 1983. You’ll also likely have heard that Atari tried to bury it—quite literally—in a New Mexico landfill (they found some copies in 2014 and made a documentary about it). But was E.T. really that bad? Yes it was. But could it be fixed? Well, yes it could. Or at least that’s what neocomputer.org has claimed in an article on the game and attempts to make it somewhat playable:
If we can identify the reasons why [E.T. was hated], we can try to address them. Here are the problems this page will address:
- The game seems incredibly complex. This isn’t a real problem. Once you learn how to play, it’s really very simple. You just need to read the manual, or watch a tutorial video, to understand it.
- The game is incredibly hard. It’s difficult for novices to complete the game even on mode 3, the easiest setting. Fortunately, this can be fixed.
- You spend a lot of time accidentally falling in to wells. I believe that I know reason why this happens to so many people, and what can be done to fix it.
- E.T. is not green. I’m really surprised that this isn’t a common complaint. We’ll fix that as well.
The article also demonstrates how to fix your copy of the game using a hex editor meaning you’re only minutes away from no longer being afraid and no longer being totally alone with a game that’s no longer the worst ever.
