London Blitz

Take up the role of a British Army Royal Engineer in London during World War II. You must comb the city looking for unexploded Nazi bombs. Once found, you have to defuse them before they explode and kill helpless civilians. It is London Blitz for the Atari 2600.

This game was years ahead of its time. Navigate the streets of London from a first person pseudo-3D perspective. You also have a map you can reference by pressing the red button on your joystick. When you find a bomb you go into defusing mode, where you must move switches around on the bomb case in an attempt to deactivate it.

Playing London Blitz takes some practice, especially in the area of bomb defusement. Also people used to new style 3D games may find navigation difficult because all the walls in this game look the same (this was common in older games, but unheard of in anything made after 1989 or so).

There are some graphical errors when playing this game in an emulator, but those errors do not show up on a real Atari 2600. (The game seems to use the 2600 hardware in an undocumented way that the emulator cannot properly match).

During World War II, German bombs turned daily existence in London into a nightmare. Hoping to undermine the strong spirit of the British, every night the Germans dropped bombs on the citizens of London. Mast bombs exploded on impact, but some would sit minutes, hours, or days before detonating. It was up to the British Army Royal Engineers to find and defuse these unexploded bombs (UXBs). There were many types of UXBs and the engineers had to learn each. The bombs did have some things in common: they required sharp thinking, delicate treatment, and split-second timing. in LONDON BLITZ you are assigned to the Royal Engineers and are tasked to keep your sector of London free of bombs. There are several types of bombs, each requiring special skills which you had better learn. Excellent performance will be rewarded by promotions, but damaged property may get you 'busted.

The box and cartridge are both decorated with the same image. It is a scene of a bombed out London street, Big Ben is visible in the background (along with a lot of smoke and fire). A British Army Sergeant sits in the center of the road tinkering with a fairly unrealistic looking bomb (which does match the bombs in the game perfectly).

This is the most common of all the Avalon Hill titles. It is valued at around $40 USD, and games with boxes and manuals may go for more.