Dukes of Hazzard

Name:	Dukes of Hazzard
Company:	Atari
Model #:	CX-2678
Programmer:	Mark R. Hahn
Year:	1983
Released?	No
Notes:	Dukes of Hazzard was burned onto actual ROMs and ready to be released but was canceled at the last moment.

Dukes of Hazzard is an oddity among prototypes in that it was actually burned onto regular ROM chips.  These chips were just about to be put into carts and shipped when Atari abruptly decided to cancel the game.  According to the programmer the game was still being worked on, so it is a mystery as to why Atari would go through the expense of manufacturing ROM chips for an incomplete game.  The most plausible explanation is a miscommunication somewhere along the management chain, but to this day no one knows the exact reason.

The gameplay in Dukes of Hazzard is pretty straightforward. You control the General Lee and must attempt to break Daisy out of jail before Boss Hog can get his hands on her.  To perform this jailbreak, you must drive the General Lee to the top of a giant maze-like board and touch the jail (it's the big square block marked JAIL in case you get confused).  Along the way you must avoid Sheriff Rosco P. Coltrane and Deputy Enos Strate as they attempt to put an end to your reckless disregard for the law.  Wasn't this every episode of the Dukes of Hazzard?

The General Lee is represented by a little car which looks like a Volkswagen Beetle with a white X on top.  Rosco and Enos are represented by little white cars with flashing lights.  If Rosco or Enos get too close to the General Lee they will switch to ramming speed and smash into the side of your car and you'll lose a life (what ever happened to just pulling you over?).  Scattered around the level are little piles of dots (possibly nails or caltrops), which you can pick up and drop in front of the enemy to temporarily stun them.  The problem with this is that usually when you go to pick the nails up you'll hit them instead (a bug that had not been fixed yet).  If you make it to the jail before Boss Hog grabs Daisy (which is shown at the top of the screen), you'll be rewarded with a nice animation of the General Lee jumping over a broken bridge and taken to the next level.

As mentioned earlier, Dukes of Hazzard has a number of bugs and gameplay issues stemming from it still being in prototype form.  The most noticeable problem is the insane speed the cops gain when they see you.  If the cop car is anywhere near you it will ram you instantly giving you almost no chance to escape (and this happens a lot).  Beyond the difficulty concerns, bugs abound in the games collision detection routine so getting hung up on walls and barriers are a common experience.  Even your only weapon is bugged (the nail/caltrop pick up bug mentioned earlier).  You also seem to be able to drive through the lakes occasionally, but this may or may not be a bug and might depend on your speed (assuming you're jumping the lake).  There are also a number of unexplained things in the game like a flashing square on level 3 that makes the cop cars turn away if you run over it.  This same level has a giant mysterious red plus sign in the center that appears to serve no purpose.  All these bugs make playing Dukes of Hazzard a frustrating experience, and being able to get past level 2 is a major accomplishment.  This is just as well since the game is actually resets if you make to level 20 (not that that's possible without cheating).

It appears that Dukes of Hazzard may have been the victim of some good old fashioned internal Atari territoriality.  According to the programmer he and his group were stationed in New York, while the bulk of Atari's programming staff was located in California.  Apparently the California group didn't give the New York group much help or guidance and they were sort of forced to wing it.  To its credit, Dukes of Hazzard is a game that shows a lot of promise and for an unfinished prototype it's not too bad (bugs and all).  Dukes of Hazzard also has the honor of being the first 16K Atari 2600 game.  Mark had requested 16K to fit in all 256 levels he had planned and Atari management had agreed.

Interestingly this wasn't Atari's first attempt at a Dukes of Hazzard game.  Atari had previously attempted to rework the graphics in the unreleased game Stunt Cycle (based on the stand alone unit) into a Dukes of Hazzard type game.  It's unknown why Atari abandoned the Stunt Cycle version, but it may be because it was too outdated by the time it was ready for release as Atari had moved onto 4K games.  This may explain why Atari was so eager to get this substitute Dukes of Hazzard game out the door as quickly as possible.  However it's quite obvious that this version was not ready for release and needs a lot of tweaking to make it playable. Dukes of Hazzard is an interesting game with a lot of potential, it's a shame Atari wasn't willing to wait until it was ready.

Prototype Box

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