Circus Atari

released on Dec 31, 1979

3 rows of triangular balloons move along the top part of the screen, each overlaid with blue, green, and yellow (colors used in the original version), counting from the top row. A clown appears from the edge of the screen where there is a jumping board, and the player must move the seesaw located at the bottom of the screen so that the clown can bounce back off the seesaw once he jumps off from his starting position. If the player successfully gets the clown onto the seesaw, the clown on the other side shoots off into the air towards the 3 rows of balloons on the top of the screen. The clown may not have enough speed to reach the balloons if the first clown does not land squarely on the seesaw. Clowns bounce off of balloons, walls, and jumping boards, but will pass directly through multiple balloons if they are moving quickly enough. They will only bounce off the jumping boards when they are heading downwards, and will pass straight through the boards while moving upwards.


Reviews View More

This is like a kid's nightmare of Breakout. Even down to the game title

breakout but worse. this is miserable on joystick (i do not have paddles)

I don't even really know what is going on in this game. It was difficult to know whether I was succeeding or failing at what I was trying to do.

We had the paddle controls for this game and as a kid, I'd usually pull them out just to give this a whirl and I was never interested beyond a few minutes. Even games like Frogs and Flies had more going for it than the goofy paddle control gimmick.

Definitely not worth the time (or the paddles).