Decathlon

1983 video games Atari games Commodore 64 games

Decathlon, from Latin, "game for people with too much time on their hands". And an amazing grip. With reality, of course.

No one will be shocked to learn that a game called Decathlon was about a sport event called Decathlon, right? No one will be shocked to learn that it was a simple game, in which you compete in 10 different events and the summary of points from those events will be your final score, right? And no one will be shocked to learn that all you had to do is wiggle your joystick (not a euphemism) from left to right as fast as you can, right? In that case, you now know everything there is to know about Decathlon. Well, almost.

Of course, you also had to use the button to take the jump or throw a thing or two, but other than that it was mostly wiggling (again, not a euphemism). And, as we all know, decathlon consists of 100 metres sprints, long jump, shot put, high jump, 400 metres run, 110 metres hurdles, discus throw, pole vault, javelin throw and 1500 metres run. Yes, 1500 metres, which means you will be wiggling your joystick until the finish line. Ok, that one was a bit of a euphemism, because how else can you describe putting about 4–5 minutes of your life to put some pixels on the screen "in motion" using an intense wrist movements? No, don’t answer that!

It was a very simple game, but due to the variety of events it was a bit of fun, of course, except for the 1500 metres run, which was just a torture. Other than that, if you could keep the momentum, it was fun to play. Since there could be more than one player (the players took their attempts in turns), at least there was a chance you will not end up just playing with yourself. Ok, that one was intentional!

Our rating
★★★★☆

Video
★★☆☆☆

Audio
★★☆☆☆

Playability
★★☆☆☆