Played from a top-down perspective, you are an adventurer sneaking into the haunted mansion of Zachary Graves in search of an urn. The ghost of Graves roams the dark halls of the mansion, and spiders and bats have taken up residence as well. Your character appears as a pair of eyes shining out of the darkness, which has a certain minimalistic charm about it. 2600 titles are rarely known for their graphics, but the setting of Haunted House allowed the rudimentary graphical capabilities to be used to good effect.
At first look the game may not seem either frightening or challenging. The brightly colored walls in the screenshots certainly don’t create much atmosphere, but these shots are actually of the game on its easiest setting. It makes for a better image, allowing you to see more of the game field, but on all but the easiest difficulty settings those walls and the playfield are completely black. You find your way around the mansion by lighting matches (you have an endless supply) which create a small glow around your character and will show the walls, doors and any items hidden in the rooms. Items are urn pieces (it is broken into three, all of which must be found to reassemble it), a scepter that wards off ghosts, and key that can be used to open locked doors. The trick is that you can only hold one item at a time. Once the urn is rebuilt, you must make your way to the front door of the mansion and make your escape.
At the higher levels of difficulty the game can be quite exhilarating. Trying to escape from the ghost of Mr. Graves as he chases you through dark rooms only to come to a locked door for which you have no key is probably one of the more thrilling moments of frustration you’ll encounter in a 2600 title, and having the urn completed but trying to find a route to the front door that doesn’t require a key (since you cannot carry it and the urn at the same time) can leave you scratching your head, especially when you catch the notice of a bat or spider. The gameplay is simple and basic, but is an excellent example of how the early hardware of the 2600 could create an engrossing gaming experience that is better than the sum of its parts. The game is still in circulation as part of an iOS release (Atari’s Greatest Hits) and part of the Microsoft Game Room for XBox 360.
In 2010 Atari released a direct sequel to the original game on Windows, Wii and Xbox Live Arcade. A cartoonish style was given to the game, which tells the tale of the original hero’s two grandchildren searching the Graves manor for clues to their grandfather’s disappearance (apparently he never did escape with that urn). Gameplay is fairly simple as you search throughout the manor for clues, fight off ghosts and ghouls (which are harmed by light sources) and solve simple puzzles to get around.
The game takes queues from the original title, but has received poor marks for its simple and somewhat repetitive gameplay. However, this new title is clearly aimed more at children, and taken as such it’s actually a rather fun little romp. If you were looking at the game and honestly expecting something along the lines of Resident Evil, you’ve only yourself to blame for that.
2014 saw the release of yet another Haunted House title from Atari, this time an iOS game. Although it is playing homage to the original game in title and theme, the game otherwise bears no resemblance, being instead another “endless runner” game. What the game has going for it is a cartoonish style that’s rather fun and a twist on the usual game mechanic: you do not control your character directly, but as he runs you instead interact with the environment around him, using swipes and gestures to ward off monsters, open up new pathways and spring traps before he triggers them himself. It makes for a slightly more cerebral exercise than the usual runner, and deserves points for trying something new.
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