There are shocking number of pornographic Atari 2600 cartridges, 8 by my count, released in the early 80’s. All were created by two renegade gaming publishers, Mystique and Playaround, these adult games were meant to appeal to a much broader and mature audience than the typical kiddie fare that Atari was releasing. Much has been written, dissected and discussed regarding titles such as Bachelor Party, Beat ‘Em and Eat ‘Em, X-Man, Lady in Wading, et.al. but one of the most offensive and depraved of all the Atari porn has to be Custer’s Revenge. I’m sure these titles were cited as cautionary tales when Nintendo was creating their lockout chip for the NES to ensure they would have total control of what could be developed and published for their console.
The premise is simple. You control a naked and erect General Custer and you attempt to get “revenge” for your defeat at Little Big Horn (in which he died) by having sex with a naked and tied Native American woman. It’s quite clearly a rape fantasy game even if the game’s designer ultimately claimed the sex was mutual (BDSM fantasy defense I suppose). I purchased my copy of Custer’s Revenge from an eBay auction in the early 2000’s after I somehow heard of Atari porn existing. I never made it a mission of mine to own all of the X-rated Atari games so this is the only Atari porn title I currently have in my collection. It would be an interesting piece of history to have them all but since they tend to go for significantly more than your average Atari cart, I haven’t felt the need. As a an actual game, Custer’s Revenge is pretty lame and it gets repetitive quickly. All you need to do is move Custer from the left side of the screen to the right while dodging what appear to be arrows coming from the sky. If you succeed, you then press the joystick button repeatedly to simulate sex with the woman tied to the post on the far right of the screen. Then you start over. The game doesn’t offer much replay value after you’ve shown everybody within ear shot what it is you’re actually playing and the shock factor wears off. Custer’s Revenge makes for a decent conversation piece but nothing more.
Rating: D+
Currently in my collection: game with faux leather case, manual, box
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