The Intellivision name has been dragged through the mud over the last few years, thanks to video game industry ‘legend’ (that title is currently in dispute), Tommy Tallarico, hyping up the Intellivision Amico; a console that may turn out to be entirely constructed of smoke, mirrors and empty promises.

Yet the Amico’s Intellivision branding gives it a sense of nostalgia for a certain generation of video gamers, mostly in the US, who grew up with toy company Mattel’s technically superior, Atari 2600 competitor.

Outside the US, that nostalgia is definitely not as widespread, however.

As I noted in my review of the Evercade’s Intellivision Collection 1 cartridge, I don’t recall ever seeing an Intellivision on sale or on display anywhere in the UK, neither did anyone I know ever own one.

Despite this lack of familiarity with – and nostalgia for – the Intellivision’s software library, I really enjoyed Intellivision Collection 1.

Would I also enjoy a second compilation of Intellivision games?

First things first; I only touched on this briefly in my review of the first collection, but at times the Intellivision’s unique controller setup can prove a real barrier even to just starting a game in these collections.

It’s an annoyance that could have been fixed with per-game button mapping, but instead the workaround that Evercade’s devs have settled on is to allow players to bring up a virtual number keypad to make selections on.

The problem is, this will do something different in each game and it’s not properly explained on screen as to how best to just get things moving.

Which means you’re often scrabbling around trying to make games just work, which is often an issue with handheld emulation consoles – but it’s a layer of complexity that the Evercade usually avoids and removes in the interest of pick up and play functionality.

So it’s a disappointment that the Intellivision cartridges can prove a bit problematic when it comes to numerous games they contain.

So, what games do we have here then?

There’s 12 games on Intellivision Collection 2 – with sports and racing games over represented.

Racing games, for example, include Auto Racing (which is a nightmare to even get started in, thanks to the aforementioned control issues), ambitious but flawed and unresponsive Motocross, as well as the similarly awkward Stadium Mud Buggies.

I wouldn’t have been sorry if none of these were included, in all honesty – though if you’re someone who experienced them the first time around, your mileage may vary.

Sports titles are represented by Mountain Madness: Super Pro Skiing – which is fine, but feels a little unresponsive on the Evercade’s d-pad – and Super Pro Decathlon, which makes an admirable attempt to cover all ten events in a, yes, decathlon.

One of my favourite games on the cartridge, Sharp Shot, is actually a compilation of four very basic titles, each of which only uses one button; they’re basically mini-games, each of which revolves around the timing of your button press.

They’re nicely varied though, with a passing-based American Football game, one in which you torpedo submarines, another that sees you shooting down alien spaceships and, finally, a game where you fire arrows at monsters in a maze.

Though very simplistic, there’s no control issues and switching between each game is fast and smooth. It’s a great experience.

Is it ok to admit that I have no clue what was going on in Vectron? It’s a nicely abstract looking title, but I couldn’t work out what I was doing without outside assistance!

Star Strike is an aesthetically interesting 3D shooter, but I found its perspective and enemy placement pretty unintuitive.

Reversi is a decent enough game of classic abstract strategy board game Othello, as long as you can set it up with the weird Intellivision controls and options.

I enjoyed the dungeon crawling action of both Cloudy Mountain (with its original Dungeons and Dragons branding removed!) and Tower of Doom, but they do require a bit of background reading first. Worth getting stuck into though!

Finally, the piece de resistance: Hover Force.

This is a game that really impresses, with top notch presentation and some great gameplay ideas; it’s a game in which you’re both fighting fires and taking down terrorists, from a first person, top down view of a city while flying a helicopter.

It must have been quite the experience back when it was released!

So there’s a few bright spots here, but unfortunately the Intellivision Collection 2 has numerous issues and several games that just aren’t worth persevering with, given the control issues.

It’s a real shame, but this is one Evercade cartridge I can’t recommend – given that I only enjoyed a few of the dozen games on offer.

You can purchase the Intellivision Collection 2 cartridge from Amazon here.