Breakout

**Breakout** was released in 1976 by Atari for Arcades. It was later ported to the Atari 2600, along with being released in various modern day handheld and plug and play devices.

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## Gameplay

The player has to to control the paddle, and must hit a ball upwards to break all of the blocks. If the player misses the ball, they either lose a life, or if there are none left, they die.

## Platforms/controls/differences

### Arcade

This version was for one or two players. It came in an upright and tabletop model.

#### Controls

* Move paddle–dial
* Serve ball–button

### Atari 2600

This version was created and published in 1978 by Atari. Another version was released by Sears that was known as Breakaway IV (although it is the exact same game).

This version has 12 basic games, with the ability of having up to four players per game variation. The games are divided into two groups -- being Breakout and Breakthru -- the latter of which causes the ball to go through an entire vertical row of blocks with each time it passes through the playfield.

There are basically three variations of all games (not including choosing the number of players as well), being steerable ball (the ball can be steered after it is hit), invisible walls (the blocks will not show up unless one or more gets hit by the ball), and catch ball (the player[s] can catch and release the ball from their paddle).

With four player games, they are divided into teams of two players each, which the first to destroy a wall or whoever scores the most points after a game wins.

There are also timed game variations where players try to make as many points as possible before time runs out, along with a Difficulty switch setting included (if the Difficulty switch is set in the A, or Expert position, the player’s paddle will be smaller).

#### Controls

* Move paddle–paddle
* Launch ball–button
* Steer ball–paddle (when applicable)
* Release ball–button (when applicable)

### Atari Flashback

Breakout was included in the Atari Flashback unit, which was created and released by Atari, Inc. in 2004. It was also included in the Atari Flashback 4 unit, which was created and released in 2012 by AtGames. In that version, the original Atari 2600 Paddle controllers could be used. It was also included in the Atari Flashback 5, which was created and released in 2014 by AtGames.

#### Controls

* Move paddle–joystick
* Launch ball–button

## Trivia

* The arcade game was followed by Super Breakout, having three game variations to choose from.
* The Atari 2600 cartridge came in what was known as text, picture, and orange picture label variations, along with the version that was released under the Sears label.
* Kurt Vendel programmed a version of Breakout for release as a keychain unit. By the time this version was released commercially, another programmer's version was chosen over Vendel’s, even though it was critically lauded and Vendel’s version was a closer approximation of the arcade original.
* In 2010, the Taco Bell restaurant chain released a version of Breakout on a cd for $1 for PCs that was available in certain store locations in North America and Canada. It was entitled Super Breakout, although it was actually just Breakout.