In the game, a pilot of an intergalactic space cruiser has a nightmare where his ship is being attacked by food and household objects.

In Megamania, the player is a pilot of a machine referred to as both an intergalactic space cruiser and a mobile blaster.

After a day of work, the pilot gorges themselves on food ranging from ice cream to pizzas and began to hallucinate.

At home after falling asleep, the pilot finds themselves in a nightmare being attacked by various food and house hold objects such as hamburgers, steam irons and bow ties.

The goal of Megamania is to accumulate points by knocking out as many enemy objects as possible by firing the ship's missile launcher at them before the players own fleet of three space cruisers is destroyed.

Prior to working at the company, Cartwright had gone to college with David Crane at the DeVry Institute of Technology in Phoenix.

[10] Cartwright found developing the game for the Atari 2600 to be difficult, especially for code to define how objects were displayed.

which led to Activision's ad agency unveiling its concept that the game was about a spaceship commander who had nightmare after eating too much junk food, leading to enemy ships becoming objects like hamburgers, spinning dice, tires and bowties.

[14] Electronic Games listed Megamania along with Robot Tank (1983), Enduro (1983), River Raid (1982) and Pitfall!

[15] Sales figures are not known, but Jim Levy did not include Megamania when discussing which of Activision's games that had sold over one million copies in an interview in June 1984.

[22][23][24] A version of Megamania developed by the South American group Ivolgamus appeared in Arcade Zone (2009) for the Wii.

In JoyStik, an anonymous reviewer called it "one of the most original variations of the bottom-shooter concept ever created exclusively for home console" and said that "even the best Invaders players will find surprising new challenges".

[5][28] Lou Hudson writing in the Fort Worth Star-Telegram gave the game a mixed-review, finding it too derivative of Space Invaders and that the graphic and theme was better than the game itself, while also describing it as "Space Invaders with a vengeance", noting the more complicated patterns that enemies use to approach the player in Megamania.

[29] Reviewing the Atari 8-bit Computer version of the game, Computer Entertainer stated that it was even better than the Atari 2600 version of the game, noting challenging gameplay, fast-paced action, high quality sound effects and the graphic and humor, specifically noting details like treads on the tire enemies as they spin.

While praising the graphics, Blanchet stated that the claims of the game being a parody of shoot-'em ups was weak, writing that "at first the idea of fighting off hamburgers might solicit a nervous giggle or two.

[35] Scott Alan Marriott of AllGame echoed earlier favorable reviews that what set Megamania apart was the variety of patterns the enemies had, and declared it "one of the most enjoyable games in Activision's impressive library" for the Atari 2600.