---
title: Street Racer also known as Speedway II (Sears)
tags:
- car
- motorbike
- plane
- racing
- skiing
- sport
- vertical scrolling
years:
- '1977'
params:
  specs:
  - label: year of release
    value: '1977'
  - label: companies
    value: Atari
  - label: type
    value: game
  - label: media
    value: cartridge
  - label: requirement
    value: paddles
  - label: systems
    value: Atari 2600
  - label: number of players
    value: 1 - 4 players (versus)
  - label: staff
    value: Larry Kaplan
  screenshots:
  - title: Street Racer
    subtitle: ''
    text: ''
    image: null
  - title: Street Racer - car crash
    subtitle: ''
    text: ''
    image: null
  - title: Street Racer - 3 players
    subtitle: ''
    text: ''
    image: null
  - title: Street Racer - 4 players
    subtitle: ''
    text: ''
    image: null
  - title: Slalom
    subtitle: ''
    text: ''
    image: null
  - title: Slalom - 3 players
    subtitle: ''
    text: ''
    image: null
  - title: Slalom - 4 players
    subtitle: ''
    text: ''
    image: null
  - title: Dodgem
    subtitle: ''
    text: ''
    image: null
  - title: Dodgem - rigth player crashed into an obstacle
    subtitle: ''
    text: ''
    image: null
  - title: Dodgem - a variation with 2 obstacles at the same time
    subtitle: ''
    text: ''
    image: null
  - title: Jet Shooter
    subtitle: ''
    text: ''
    image: null
  - title: Number Cruncher - 2 players
    subtitle: ''
    text: ''
    image: null
  - title: Number Cruncher - 4 players
    subtitle: ''
    text: ''
    image: null
  - title: Scoop Ball - catch the balls (crosses!)
    subtitle: ''
    text: ''
    image: null
  - title: Scoop Ball - release the caught balls into the coming Computer Scooper...
    subtitle: ''
    text: ''
    image: null
  - title: Box
    subtitle: ''
    text: ''
    image: null
  - title: box - back
    subtitle: ''
    text: ''
    image: null
  - title: cartridge - text label
    subtitle: ''
    text: ''
    image: null
  - title: cartridge - picture label
    subtitle: ''
    text: ''
    image: null
  - title: documentation - cover
    subtitle: ''
    text: ''
    image: null
  - title: Documentation - page 1&2
    subtitle: ''
    text: ''
    image: null
  - title: Documentation - page 3&4
    subtitle: ''
    text: ''
    image: null
  - title: Documentation - page 5&6
    subtitle: ''
    text: ''
    image: null
  - title: Documentation - page 7&8
    subtitle: ''
    text: ''
    image: null
  - title: Documentation - page 9&10
    subtitle: ''
    text: ''
    image: null
  - title: Documentation - page 11
    subtitle: ''
    text: ''
    image: null
  machines:
  - /museum/atari-vcs-2600
  company: /companies/atari
  oc_id: 463
  source:
    url: https://web.archive.org/web/20230603202006/http://www.old-computers.com/museum/software_detail.asp?id=463
    date: '2023-06-03'
---

"The cartridge that'll tell if you really should be out in the street driving. Controlling the action with your remote controller, steer your way through 27 different games and variations. Race against the clock or race against a friend."

Street Racer was one of the nine titles originaly released with the Atari VCS system.

The cartridge offers 27 game variations based on 6 games: Street Racer, Slalom, Dodgem, Jet Shooter, Number Cruncher, and Scoop Ball. Each game has a two minute and sixteen second time limit.

**Street Racer**\
Street Racer illustrate the main game principle from which others are derivated. Each player use the knob on their controller to steer his car around the vertically oncoming cars. Press the controller button to accelerate speed. You score one point for every car you pass.

1, 2, 3 or 4 players each control one car on the track playfield. In one and two-player games, each player uses a separate vertical track. In three and four-player games, two players share one track.

Street Racer was insipired by arcade game [Speed Race](/software/speed-race/), from Taito (1974), which pioneered vertical scrolling racing video games, though the genre long existed before with electro-mechanical arcade games.

**Slalom**\
Same as Street Racer, but here you control a skier who must pass through the gates...

**Dodgem**\
Almost the same game as Street Racer though the object here is to move your car from the bottom to the top of the track while dodging oncoming obstacles. Your score one point each time you reach the top of the track.

Your car look more like a spaceship, and oncoming obstacles like asteroids. Thereby, Dodgem seem to be more a port of the Atari early arcade game [Space Race](/software/space-race/), than a variation of Street Racer...

**Jet Shooter**\
In this variation, your car become a jet fighter, and obstacles are ennemy planes. While piloting your aircfaft, you must destroy as many ennemy planes as possible by shooting as them. A small shoot'em up for 2 players...

**Number Cruncher**\
Same game as Street Racer, except oncoming cars are replaced with numbers (2,4 or 6). You score the face value of each number you squash with your chopper...

**Scoop Ball**\
The object here is to catch balls (crosses!) and deposit them into a Computer Scooper. Use your moving Scooper to catch the balls. Continue to catch balls until a Computer Scooper appears on the screen. When you steer your Scooper into the Computer Scooper, you score three points and deposit the ball or balls you've collected.

Sears also published a version of Street Racer under the name Speedway II.

Larry Kaplan, the programmer of the game, says in an interview (see link below):

*"Street Racer is the game that lacks good game play. I took out the moving playfield because it didn’t flow right (it tended to flicker). If I could change the game to have a smooth-scrolling playfield, it would make the game play better."*