2048 2600

About the game

Every move slides all the tiles on a 4x4 board as far as they go in one direction. When two tiles with the same number touch, they merge into one tile worth their sum, and that value is added to your score. After each move a new small tile appears, and the board keeps filling up. The goal is to build a 2048 tile; the game ends when no move is possible.

This version squeezes the whole thing into a 2 KB Atari 2600 cartridge, with the board drawn by the console's own graphics chip. It also adds a mode the original never had: two players take turns on the same board, and a player keeps the turn for as long as each move merges at least one pair of tiles.

Playing it here

This is a homebrew game made for the Atari 2600: a new game by independent developers for the 1977 console, not a commercial release. It runs here in Stellerator, an Atari 2600 emulator written in JavaScript. Click Play now, then press Space for a one-player game or B for a two-player game.

There are no save states on this platform: like on the real console, a game lasts as long as you keep playing, and P pauses it. A gamepad works too.

Controls

A few things worth knowing

The high score lasts until you switch off. The best score is shown below the board, but it is erased when the console is turned off (or the page is closed), and also when you start a two-player game.

In two-player mode, merges keep your turn. The bright score shows whose turn it is. A move that merges nothing passes the turn to the other player.

Keep the big tile in a corner. The usual strategy still works here: build towards one corner and avoid moves that pull your largest tile out of it.

Credits and licence

2048 2600 was programmed by Carlos Duarte do Nascimento (Chester), with a fix by Ben Combee and PAL support by Sven Oliver Moll (SvOlli). It is a port of 2048 by Gabriele Cirulli. Both are released under the MIT licence. The licence text is linked from this page.