The 3 best Atari 8-bit (400/800/XL/XE) games

Ranked by the scores that magazines gave these games when they came out. The list draws on 797 review scores of 473 Atari 8-bit (400/800/XL/XE) games; 75 of them have enough reviews to be ranked.

#	Game	Platform	Year	Score
1	Mercenary: Escape from Targ	Atari 400/800	1985	96.9
2	Red Moon	Atari 400/800	1985	95
3	The Worm in Paradise	Atari 400/800	1986	90.8

Highly rated, with fewer than 3 reviews

61 Atari 8-bit (400/800/XL/XE) games have a score of 90 or more, but from only one or two reviews, and no Metacritic score.

Game	Platform	Year	Score
Leather Goddesses of Phobos	Atari 400/800	1986	100
Planetfall	Atari 400/800	1983	100
Rainbow Walker	Atari 400/800	1983	100
Alien Garden	Atari 400/800	1982	100
Bandits	Atari 400/800	1982	100
Capture the Flag	Atari 400/800	1983	100
Choplifter!	Atari 400/800	1982	100
Colossal Adventure	Atari 400/800	1983	100
Cosmic Life	Atari 400/800	1983	100
Dragon's Keep	Atari 400/800	1984	100
Enchanter	Atari 400/800	1983	100
Firefleet	Atari 400/800	1983	100
Go	Atari 400/800	1982	100
Infidel	Atari 400/800	1983	100
Jawbreaker	Atari 400/800	1981	100
Jumpman	Atari 400/800	1983	100
Ken Uston's Professional Blackjack	Atari 400/800	1983	100
Kid Grid	Atari 400/800	1982	100
La Quête du Graal	Atari 400/800	1983	100
Matterhorn	Atari 400/800	1984	100
Moonmist	Atari 400/800	1986	100
Operation Whirlwind	Atari 400/800	1983	100
Pharaoh's Pyramid	Atari 400/800	1983	100
Preppie! II	Atari 400/800	1982	100
Sargon III	Atari 400/800	1985	100
Serpentine	Atari 400/800	1982	100
Spellbreaker	Atari 400/800	1985	100
Starcross	Atari 400/800	1982	100
Stationfall	Atari 400/800	1987	100
Suspended	Atari 400/800	1983	100
The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy	Atari 400/800	1984	100
The Mask of the Sun	Atari 400/800	1984	100
Troll's Tale	Atari 400/800	1984	100
Ultima III: Exodus	Atari 400/800	1983	100
Wizard of Wor	Atari 400/800	1981	100
Ballyhoo	Atari 400/800	1986	95
CuttleMania!	Atari 400/800	1986	95
Sorcerer of Claymorgue Castle	Atari 400/800	1983	95
K-Razy Shoot-Out	Atari 400/800	1981	93
Shooting Gallery	Atari 400/800	1981	92
Druid	Atari 400/800	1987	91.5
Flight Simulator II	Atari 400/800	1984	91.5
Hard Hat Mack	Atari 400/800	1983	91.5
M.U.L.E.	Atari 400/800	1983	91.5
Oil's Well	Atari 400/800	1983	91.5
Spy vs. Spy	Atari 400/800	1984	91.5
Ultima II: Revenge of the Enchantress	Atari 400/800	1983	91.5
Arena 3000	Atari 400/800	1982	90
Solo Flight	Atari 400/800	1983	90
Zeppelin	Atari 400/800	1983	90
Ace of Aces	Atari 400/800	1987	90
Head Over Heels	Atari 400/800	1987	90
Jinxter	Atari 400/800	1988	90
Knight Orc	Atari 400/800	1987	90
One-on-One	Atari 400/800	1983	90
Silent Service	Atari 400/800	1985	90
Spellbound	Atari 400/800	1986	90
Spindizzy	Atari 400/800	1986	90
The Guild of Thieves	Atari 400/800	1987	90
Theatre Europe	Atari 400/800	1985	90
Time and Magik: The Trilogy	Atari 400/800	1988	90

How the ranking works

The scores are the ones magazines gave when the games came out, all converted to a 0–100 scale. Only one review per magazine counts for a game: the most recent.
A game's score is half the average, half the median of its magazine reviews. A title opens the game's page on uvlist.net; a score opens the report with every review behind it.
A game needs at least 3 magazine reviews to be ranked. With equal scores, the game with more reviews comes first.
Metacritic already sums up many reviews, so it is never mixed with the magazines: it is used only for games with fewer than 3 magazine reviews, as their only score.
Each list shows every game with a score of 90 or more. Games with fewer than 3 reviews and no Metacritic score are shown apart: their score is promising, but rests on one or two opinions.

The lists are rebuilt each time reviews are added. To filter by genre, year, magazine or publisher, explore all the scores in the report.

More lists

Best 8-bit home computer games Amstrad CPC Amstrad PCW Apple II BBC Micro Commodore 128 Commodore 16 and Plus/4 Commodore 64 Coleco Adam Dragon 32 Acorn Electron Memotech MTX MSX MSX2 Oric Sinclair QL SAM Coupé Thomson MO/TO TI-99/4A Commodore VIC-20 ZX81 ZX Spectrum All the lists