Venetian Blinds Demo (Atari 2600)
| Statistic | Rating |
|---|---|
| Set Difficulty | 1/10 |
| Approximate time to master | One hour |
| Minimum numbers of playthroughs needed | One |
| Number of missable achievements | Zero |
| Does difficulty affect achievements? | Not applicable |
| Hardest achievement of the set | Blinds Over Matter |
Activision's Venetian Blinds Demo is an amusing and fascinating piece of Atari lore. "Venetian blinds" are a programming technique that exploits the Atari 2600's per-scanline graphics draws to produce more sprites aligned horizontally than are normally possible. These are called "Venetian blinds" because only every other line of the sprite is drawn, making each one appear slotted like Venetian blinds:
Activision was founded by ex-Atari employees who were unhappy with their anonymity. One of those founders was Bob Whitehead, who developed the Venetian blinds technique for Video Chess as pictured. Despite Activision not having used the technique in any of their own games, Atari threatened to sue them for stealing trade secrets like the Venetian blinds technique. Atari likely knew the lawsuit was frivolous, but nonetheless, they didn't want the competition, and Activision wasn't sure how they'd fare in court (though of course, they ultimately had no issue).
To lighten the mood, Bob Whitehead and David Crane produced the Venetian Blinds Demo, an interactive set of literal Venetian blinds with a nice sunset in the back. (The sunset was later used in Barnstorming.) This demo was brought to CES 1982 and displayed privately as a joke, then forgotten until it appeared on the PC, Mac, and GBA versions of Activision Anthology as an easter egg.
This is a joke game, and as such, it's not worth very many points, nor revisiting after you've mastered it. That said, it's fun to play with and easy to master. Who can turn down free site awards, eh?
Let There Be Light! (0)
Raise the Venetian blinds.
Press the joystick up until the blinds go no higher.
Curtain Call (0)
Close the Venetian blinds.
Press the joystick down until the blinds go no lower.
The Venetian Peek (0)
Open the blinds as minimally as you can and leave them there.
Close the blinds completely, then tap the joystick up until only a tiny amount of the window casing can be seen. This, and any of the specific positioning achievements, might take a try or two. Keep playing with it. For me, this activated with the bottom blind shifted slightly and none of the casing visible.
Half Open or Half Closed? (0)
Open the blinds to the center of the window and ponder this question.
Align the very bottom of the blinds with the horizontal window grill and wait a moment.
Colorblind (1)
Raise the Venetian blinds in black and white mode.
Set the core to black and white. By default for Stella, this will be the R3 button on the controller. Then raise the blinds as high as they'll go.
Ten-Acity (1)
Raise and lower the blinds 10 times.
50 Shades (2)
Raise and lower the blinds 50 times.
Blinds Over Matter (3)
Raise and lower the blinds 100 times.
These require, in total, 100 blind open/close cycles, meaning 100 opens and 100 closes. It'll take you about ten minutes in real time. Make sure you open and close them completely. This is only difficult because it's so mind-numbingly tedious.
Admire the View (5)
Gaze upon the lovely sunset for one hour.
Open the blinds completely and wait an hour in real time. I went to bed for this one and woke up with it completed. Leaving RetroArch open for an hour works just as well, of course. If you're impatient or just want all of this to end, using the fast-forward option is also recommended.