E.t.
I’m going to second E.T. I loved getting me them Reese’s Pieces. Of course, it was nearly impossible to get E.T. to levitate when you needed him to!
Frogger and Pole Position were favorites, as well as Breakout (which is VERY hard to play on a Playstation, when you don’t have the turny-paddles).
And Combat. For the sheer blocky, pellety fun of it.
Decathalon and my all-time favorite, Zaxxon.
Remember (Challange of) Nexar? For some reason nobody ever does. It had graphics designed to make your brain explode. Plus the game never ended.
http://www.ataritimes.com/2600/reviews/challengeofnexar.html
http://www.atariguide.com/4/430.htm
Freeway! I forgot Freeway!
It might be borderline cheating, but my favorite was Dragonstomper. Yes, you needed the Starpath Supercharger (and a good half-hour to load the game), but oh, was it glorious in it’s infancy-RPG style.
Big, big into Adventure and Yar’s as well.
Defender.
Mountain King.
Super Breakout.
Demons to Diamonds (loved how I could shoot the other guy playing).
Star Raiders.
And does anybody remember that Swordquest series? Awful, pointless games but I liked them… did they ever finish that series?
Color me surprised - wasn’t that true of most games for 2600 - could just go on and on forever, unless there was a time limit? I know Demon Attack is an exception, because I did manage to beat that one. Then I never played it again.
I remember seeing one of those at my cousins house so many years ago.
My favourite game was the upwards scrolling shoot 'em up with a flashing background that lasted for 5mins at which time it needed to be switched off and allowed to cool :rolleyes:
I remember Earthquest, I think one or two others may have been released. What I remember about Earthquest was that the game meant nothing to the puzzle- it was in the manual where the words “prime” and “number” were highlighted.
Ms PacMan
Super Breakout
…and what’s that game where the parts of this machine go flying off into houses and you need to run around reassembling the machine (and if you go into the wrong building, you pick up a bomb)? I can still hear the song in my head. Do-do-DO. DO-di-doodle-oodle. Do-do-DO.
You know that treasure sound byte? It goes do-do-do-DO-da-DO. In my head it would always say, “You got the DIA-mond RING!” or “You got the MON-ey BAG!” No, I’m not normal.
Did anyone else mail away for the Pitfall Harry patch that you could get for getting a certain score? (I think I’ve got you beat here for dorkiness, Dooku.)
Oh, I liked Joust too.
And Taz! Taz was the best of all.
I’d say it’s a close tie. BTW, for a trip down memory lane, check out sceenshots and sound clips from old 2600 games here. I totally forgot about this one: Human Cannonball.
Yars’ Revenge
Lock ‘n’ Chase
Asteroids
Fast Eddie
Kaboom
Space Invaders
Kangaroo
Combat
Earthquest and Firequest were available through retail outlets. Waterquest was only available through the mail order Atari catalog, and Airquest was never finished thus never released.
I didn’t have a 2600, I had the 1600 XL. Which was better, since it had a keyboard and you could program it (in BASIC, of course), but the cartridges didn’t match, so it was very difficult to get games.
My favorite was Centipede, the first game I ever beat. Well, it didn’t exactly have an ending, but I played it to the point where it crashed because the game programming wasn’t able to handle that level.
And Breakout kicked butt, but I was only able to play it when visiting friends, because we didn’t have it.
Decathlon was my all-time favorite, but man, the blisters!
Yar’s Revenge, and Video Pinball were the ones that I managed to reach the ‘infinite play’ stage (getting so good at winning extra lives that the game just continues until I get too exhausted).
Pitfall rocked.
And I tried taking pictures for those patches, but could never get a good photo of the screen. I think I qualified for at least a half-dozen or so.
And now that you mention it, I remember Nexar (or was it Nexus?) man, that was a psychedelic game.
Wow, this thread brings it back. I got my 2600 for Christmas 1981 with four cartridges: Combat (came with the machine), Space Invaders, Missile Command, and Asteroids. I think all my other favorites have all been mentioned here: Adventure (my all-time favorite, Easter Egg and all), Video Pinball, Berserk, EarthWorld, Defender, and Night Driver. Vague memories of E.T., Pitfall, Pac-Man, and Frogger.
If I recall correctly, the 2600 was named retroactively, after the 5200 came out, but when I first got it, it was just called an Atari, not an Atari 2600. True? In any case, I had only the original and never upgraded. My baby sister (14 years younger) had Nintendo and kicked my butt at Super Mario Brothers when she was 8.
Funny, but when I think of the Atari 2600 I can remember the smell not only of the plastic cartridges but also of chlorine…guess I must have played a lot after swimming.
I almost flunked Eighth-grade English because of Super Breakout – playing that was more fun than doing homework. 
But of all the titles, the one the stands the test of time the most is Adventure.
The series was Swordquest, titles were Earthworld, Fireworld, Waterworld (best according to afficianados). All pretty inscrutable. Solve a riddle get a number. Relate to comic book somehow. Fun!
My faves
Laser Gates
Pressure Cooker
Escape From The Mindmaster (used the Supercharger; PSEUDO 3D MAN!)
Adventure
Missile Command
Bezerk
Defender
Breakout
My friend had Raiders of the Lost Ark and we played the hell out of it trying to “win.” Out of stubbornness, I suppose b/c I don’t remember it as being all that great a game.