Clean Sweep is a variation of the popular Pong theme of the time. It looks like a mix between Breakout and Pac-Man, but it was created before both of these games.
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A precursor to Breakout that somehow doesn't feel as satisfying.
Maybe you've seen the term "TTL" thrown about before, mainly for foundational 1970s arcade games. These pre-integrated circuit boards imposed many limits on creators, from Al Alcorn's team making Pong in '72 to SEGA sending the format off with their impressive racer Monaco GP. But in the years before large-scale ICs became feasible for mass-produced games, why not just stack a bunch of transistors next to each other for old times' sake?
Clean Sweep isn't much of a game beyond its historic significance. The idea of single-player Pong, without a computer to play against, must have seemed absurd back then. Of coursed, the solution was simple: fill the screen with other balls to collect. You work to deprive the play area of its starting flourish, bringing back Pong's negative space as you go. Now the opponent is yourself, both an enabler of on-screen events and the disabler should you fail to reflect projectiles. This makes for a fun experience at first, at least until repetition & self-consciousness set in.
So here's the question: why exactly did this disappear into the annals of '70s game lore while Breakout, its clear descendant, ascended to the pantheon? There's many good answers. Atari had production & distribution leverage outmatching even mighty Ramtek, best known then for their Baseball game. Woz & Jobs' design simply had better physics and kinaesthetics, from the tetchy ball-paddle inertia to the simple pleasures of trapping a ball above the wall, watching it go to work. Most likely, the '76 game just had better timing. Pong clone frenzy was the order of the day in Clean Sweep's time, with Atari's own new products struggling to keep up. Something with more of an identity like Ramtek Baseball would have done better than another space game, or what seemed to the public like a weirder take on solo Pong.
(I find it funny how the other review currently claims Clean Sweep is the clone despite predating Breakout. One could boil either game down to "single-player Pong clone" if they really try. That's a kind of reductive take I try to avoid when possible, even when discussing something this rudimentary.)
If you're intrigued by any of this, download DICE and find a copy of Clean Sweep & other TTL games (like the original Breakout, of course!). I can't think of any arcades that might still own, operate, & maintain this relic today other than Galloping Ghost up near Chicago, sadly. And it's nowhere on modern retro collections for obvious emulation-related reasons. But it paved the way for one of the most significant '70s games, and isn't half-bad to play for a few minutes either.
Clean Sweep isn't much of a game beyond its historic significance. The idea of single-player Pong, without a computer to play against, must have seemed absurd back then. Of coursed, the solution was simple: fill the screen with other balls to collect. You work to deprive the play area of its starting flourish, bringing back Pong's negative space as you go. Now the opponent is yourself, both an enabler of on-screen events and the disabler should you fail to reflect projectiles. This makes for a fun experience at first, at least until repetition & self-consciousness set in.
So here's the question: why exactly did this disappear into the annals of '70s game lore while Breakout, its clear descendant, ascended to the pantheon? There's many good answers. Atari had production & distribution leverage outmatching even mighty Ramtek, best known then for their Baseball game. Woz & Jobs' design simply had better physics and kinaesthetics, from the tetchy ball-paddle inertia to the simple pleasures of trapping a ball above the wall, watching it go to work. Most likely, the '76 game just had better timing. Pong clone frenzy was the order of the day in Clean Sweep's time, with Atari's own new products struggling to keep up. Something with more of an identity like Ramtek Baseball would have done better than another space game, or what seemed to the public like a weirder take on solo Pong.
(I find it funny how the other review currently claims Clean Sweep is the clone despite predating Breakout. One could boil either game down to "single-player Pong clone" if they really try. That's a kind of reductive take I try to avoid when possible, even when discussing something this rudimentary.)
If you're intrigued by any of this, download DICE and find a copy of Clean Sweep & other TTL games (like the original Breakout, of course!). I can't think of any arcades that might still own, operate, & maintain this relic today other than Galloping Ghost up near Chicago, sadly. And it's nowhere on modern retro collections for obvious emulation-related reasons. But it paved the way for one of the most significant '70s games, and isn't half-bad to play for a few minutes either.
Nowadays, this is signaled as one of the first commercial "clones" in videogame history, as we understand them today, and serves as a fascinating glimpse into the artistic impulses that propelled early developers that attempted to outbeat a hit title in their own space (previously I said that game was Breakout, which was obviously wrong. The game that they were drawing inspiration from was obviously Pong). With that being said, the notion of "clone" itself entails a series of assumptions that one can't easily apply to this particular period so easily, and if anything, it's more of a testament to the fact that we are willing to categorize the past of the medium with modern, largely broad strokes. What I can say regarding Clean Sweep in particular, I think it's apparent that the impulse here orbited around filling the screen with more stuff to do, which doesn't stray too far away from the way in which we tend to distinguish original works from copy-cats today. It's usually not a fair optic, but it's also the way in which much gaming media operates, which is a problem when trying to discern what makes a particular work significant. Unfortunately, with this game in particular in particular I don't think there's that much value to extract from, as it gets boring pretty quickly.
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A día de hoy, este juego se trata como uno de los primeros "clones" comerciales en la historia de los videojuegos, tal como se entienden hoy, y sirve como muestra del tipo de impulsos artísticos que impulsaban a desarrolladores a superar un título exitoso (antes dije que era Breakout, cuando obviamente se trataba de Pong). Dicho esto, la noción de "clon" en sí implica una serie de suposiciones que uno no puede aplicar tan fácilmente a este período, y en todo caso, es más una muestra de nuestra tendencia a categorizarlo todo con brocha gorda y adecuada a nuestras sensibilidades modernas. Lo que puedo decir de Clean Sweep en particular es que, a la hora de construir su espacio de juego, parece creer que la clave es llenar la pantalla con más cosas, lo que pensándolo bien es el tipo de elemento que mucha gente emplea para distinguir un original de la copia barata. Es una mirada que puede ser muy injusta y que en ocasiones nos impide observar los detalles particulares que hacen a una obra única. Desafortunadamente, con este juego se hace difícil extraer algo de valor, porque se hace aburrido muy deprisa.
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A día de hoy, este juego se trata como uno de los primeros "clones" comerciales en la historia de los videojuegos, tal como se entienden hoy, y sirve como muestra del tipo de impulsos artísticos que impulsaban a desarrolladores a superar un título exitoso (antes dije que era Breakout, cuando obviamente se trataba de Pong). Dicho esto, la noción de "clon" en sí implica una serie de suposiciones que uno no puede aplicar tan fácilmente a este período, y en todo caso, es más una muestra de nuestra tendencia a categorizarlo todo con brocha gorda y adecuada a nuestras sensibilidades modernas. Lo que puedo decir de Clean Sweep en particular es que, a la hora de construir su espacio de juego, parece creer que la clave es llenar la pantalla con más cosas, lo que pensándolo bien es el tipo de elemento que mucha gente emplea para distinguir un original de la copia barata. Es una mirada que puede ser muy injusta y que en ocasiones nos impide observar los detalles particulares que hacen a una obra única. Desafortunadamente, con este juego se hace difícil extraer algo de valor, porque se hace aburrido muy deprisa.