''GATO'' is a real-time

submarine simulator A submarine simulator is usually a computer game in which the player commands a submarine. The usual form of the game is to go on a series of missions, each of which features a number of encounters where the goal is to sink surface ships and to ...

first published in 1984 by Spectrum HoloByte for DOS. It simulates combat operations aboard the Gato-class submarine in the

Pacific Theater The Pacific Ocean is the largest and deepest of Earth's five oceanic divisions. It extends from the Arctic Ocean in the north to the Southern Ocean (or, depending on definition, to Antarctica) in the south, and is bounded by the continen ...

of World War II. ''GATO'' was later ported to the Apple IIe,

Atari ST The Atari ST is a line of personal computers from Atari Corporation and the successor to the Atari 8-bit family. The initial model, the Atari 520ST, had limited release in April–June 1985 and was widely available in July. It was the first pers ...

, and Macintosh. In 1987, Atari Corporation published a version on cartridge for the

Atari 8-bit family The Atari 8-bit family is a series of 8-bit home computers introduced by Atari, Inc. in 1979 as the Atari 400 and Atari 800. The series was successively upgraded to Atari 1200XL , Atari 600XL, Atari 800XL, Atari 65XE, Atari 130XE, Atari 800XE, ...

, to coincide with the launch of the Atari XEGS.

Gameplay

The player is tasked with chasing Japanese shipping across a 20-sector map while returning for resupply as necessary from a submarine tender. The islands on the map are randomly generated and not based on real-world geography. Combat is conducted using a screen with a view through the periscope and at various gauges and indicators. The game has multiple difficulty levels, the highest of which requires the player to translate mission briefings which are transmitted only as audible

Morse Code Morse code is a method used in telecommunication to encode text characters as standardized sequences of two different signal durations, called ''dots'' and ''dashes'', or ''dits'' and ''dahs''. Morse code is named after Samuel Morse, one of ...

. The MS-DOS and Apple IIe versions contain a

boss key A boss key, or boss button, is a special keyboard shortcut used in PC games or other programs to hide the program quickly, possibly displaying a special screen that appears to be a normal productivity program (such as a spreadsheet application) ...

which replaces the game screen with a spreadsheet.

Development

''Gato'' was developed by student programmers in

Boulder, Colorado Boulder is a home rule city that is the county seat and most populous municipality of Boulder County, Colorado, United States. The city population was 108,250 at the 2020 United States census, making it the 12th most populous city in Color ...

Reception

''Billboard'' magazine reported in June 1985 ''Gato'' coming in at number 6 of a national sample of retail sales and rack sales reports. In 1985, ''

Computer Gaming World ''Computer Gaming World'' (CGW) was an American computer game magazine published between 1981 and 2006. One of the few magazines of the era to survive the video game crash of 1983, it was sold to Ziff Davis in 1993. It expanded greatly through ...

'' praised the game for being simultaneously easy to play and having deep, detailed strategy. 1991 and 1993 surveys in the magazine of strategy and war games, however, gave it one and a half stars out of five, stating that "it was adequate in its time, but not exemplary in any regard". '' Compute!'' stated that "''Gato'' promises realism, and it delivers ... tlives up to its claims". Jerry Pournelle wrote favorably of the game in '' BYTE'', stating that he wished he could slow the game down but "I've certainly wasted enough time with it ... Recommended", and that he preferred the black-and-white Macintosh version to the color IBM PC version.

Reviews

*''The V.I.P. of Gaming Magazine'' #2 (Feb./March, 1986)

References

External links

* *{{Internet Archive game, id=msdos_GATO_1984, platform=MS-DOS
Of AJAX, GATO, and Bill ScottReview
in GAMES Magazine 1984 video games Apple II games Atari 8-bit family games Atari ST games Cancelled Atari 7800 games Commodore 64 games DOS games Japan in non-Japanese culture Classic Mac OS games Single-player video games Spectrum HoloByte games Submarine simulation video games Video games developed in the United States Video games set in Oceania Pacific War video games