“Break out your leisure suits and peace signs - The 70’s Electronic Game sensation is back!” says the meticulously old-school packaging. Despite the shamelessly-retro modus operendi, you have to give Mattel credit for not repackaging their classic handheld LCD games with bright, acid-drenched color schemes straight out of Nickelodeon's latest cartoons.

While the design and gameplay are extremely crude, the fun actually holds up a lot longer than any of the black-and-white, generically-drawn but more visually appealing LCD games from Tiger. Since there are no graphics to speak of (only red, glowing dashes for defense, and a slightly brighter one for your running back on offense), Mattel had to have a game that was fun to play, and rely on your imagination to do the rest. The popularity of the Mattel handheld series speaks for itself. Mattel sold millions of these things from the 1970's to the late 1980's, and it blossomed into the legendary, but now defunct, Mattel Electronics. As you might remember, without Mattel Electronics we wouldn't have the Intellivision, which is arguably the best system of the golden era of video-games.

Simply put, Mattel Football is fun today, just like it was more than twenty years ago. The concept is simple. You start on your own 20 yard line and run as far as you can down the field in your alloted four downs. Run the entire length of the field and you score a touchdown. If you've never played Mattel Football before, you'll notice that simply running across the field into the endzone doesn't get you a touchdown. The field of play is dressed up to look like a football field, but you'll have to run across it multiple times to score a touchdown. The way to tell how you're doing is to check your yardage between downs. If you're on the opposite end of the football field with two yards to the endzone you'll probably score a touchdown before you get midfield. The simple AI in the moves the computer's defensive players in the direction of your running back, so the trick is to sit back and wait for them to swarm your way and create an opening. Then you simply run as far as you can without getting tackled. Understandably, the collision between players is pretty arbitrary, but it doesn't feel like you're being cheated very often.

To actually have a competitive game, you'll need two people, and the computer plays defense for both sides, but this simple game is pure hypnotic fun for one player as well. The LCD graphics (or lack of graphics) and retro packaging will appeal to older gamers who want to waltz down memory lane, but it's a great time-killer while you're on the bus or on a lunch-break. The game remains unchanged after about a quarter-century, so you might be better off picking up the original at a garage-sale, but if you're lazy and you don't mind paying $13, this comes as a highly recommended piece of game history. Mattel has rereleased their original Baseball handheld, and hopefully more are on the way.