River Raid on Atari 2600

You view this from a top-down perspective, the player flies a fighter jet over the River of No Return in a raid behind enemy lines.

The player’s jet can only move left and right, it cannot move up and down the screen but it can accelerate and decelerate. The player’s jet will crash if it collides with the riverbank or an enemy craft, or if the jet runs out of fuel.

If you can keep your fuel replenished, and if the player evades damage, gameplay is essentially unlimited.

The player scores points as follows

enemy tankers (30 points)
helicopters (60 points)
fuel depots (80 points)
jets (100 points)
bridges (500 points).

The jet refuels when it flies over a fuel depot. A bridge marks the end of a game level.

Play the game

Some gameplay