Raiders of the Lost Ark

The home version of the movie; players control Indiana Jones in his quest for the Ark of the Covenant.

Gameplay

Because Raiders requires more input than is available through a single Atari 2600 controller, both left and right controllers are used in the highly unusual control scheme. The first controller moves the character, and the button uses the currently selected item. Controller two selects and drops items (walking over an item picks it up). In this highbrid action / rpg, A variety of items are acquired and used in various ways to discover the titular Ark. Later games such as Metroid would use the item-based obstacles which block progression in a similar way, many years later.

Developer Howard Scott Warshaw would reportedly dress as Indiana Jones during the development of the game; a sort of method acting for a coder. Although the game received mixed reviews (partly due to poor explanation of the unique control scheme), Raiders informed game design for years to come.