Pac-Man, originally called Puck Man in Japan, is a 1980 maze action video game developed and released by Namco for arcades. In North America, the game was released by Midway Manufacturing as part of its licensing agreement with Namco America. The player controls Pac-Man, who must eat all the dots inside an enclosed maze while avoiding four colored ghosts. Eating large flashing dots called "Power Pellets" causes the ghosts to temporarily turn blue, allowing Pac-Man to eat them for bonus points.
Snake is a video game genre where the player maneuvers a line that grows bigger after eating something, typically apples, making the snake a primary obstacle to itself. The concept originated in the 1976 two-player arcade game Blockade from Gremlin Industries, and the ease of implementation has led to hundreds of versions for many platforms. 1982's Tron arcade game, based on the film, includes snake gameplay for the single-player Light Cycles segment. After a variant was preloaded on Nokia mobile phones in 1998, there was a resurgence of interest in snake games as it found a larger audience.
Missile Command is a 1980 shoot 'em up arcade video game developed and published by Atari, Inc. and licensed to Sega for Japanese and European releases. It was designed by Dave Theurer, who also designed Atari's vector graphics game Tempest from the same year. Released during the Cold War, the player uses a trackball to defend six cities from intercontinental ballistic missiles by launching anti-ballistic missiles from three bases.
Centipede is a 1981 fixed shooter arcade game developed and published by Atari, Inc. Designed by Dona Bailey and Ed Logg, it was one of the most commercially successful games from the golden age of arcade video games and one of the first with a significant female player base. The primary objective is to shoot all the segments of a centipede that winds down the playing field. An arcade sequel, Millipede, followed in 1982.
BurgerTime, originally released as Hamburger in Japan, is a 1982 arcade game developed by Data East initially for its DECO Cassette System. The player is chef Peter Pepper, who must walk over hamburger ingredients located across a maze of platforms while avoiding characters who pursue him.
Frogger is a 1981 arcade action game developed by Konami and manufactured by Sega. In North America, it was released by Sega/Gremlin. The object of the game is to direct a series of frogs to their homes by crossing a busy road and a hazardous river.
Landon Timothy Donovan is an American former professional soccer player. Donovan is also the manager, co-founder, and vice-president of soccer operations for USL Championship side San Diego Loyal SC, and serves as strategic advisor for English side Lincoln City. He was voted as the best U.S. soccer player of all time by a poll conducted by ESPN, along with Major League Soccer having ranked Donovan as the greatest American soccer player of all time.
Galaxian is a 1979 fixed shooter arcade game developed and published by Namco. The player assumes control of the Galaxip starfighter in its mission to protect Earth from waves of aliens. Gameplay involves destroying each formation of aliens, who dive down towards the player in an attempt to hit them.
Donkey Kong Jr. is a 1982 arcade platform game that was released by Nintendo. It is the sequel to Donkey Kong, but with the roles reversed compared to its predecessor: Mario is now the villain and Donkey Kong Jr. is trying to rescue his father. It first released in arcades and, over the course of the decade, was released for a variety of home platforms. The game's title is written out as Donkey Kong Junior in the North American arcade version and various conversions to non-Nintendo systems.
Moon Patrol is a 1982 arcade video game developed and released by Irem. It was licensed to Williams for distribution in North America. The player controls a moon buggy which can jump over and shoot obstacles on a horizontally scrolling landscape as well as shoot aerial attackers. Designed by Takashi Nishiyama, Moon Patrol is often credited with the introduction of full parallax scrolling in side-scrolling games. Most of the home ports were from Atari, Inc., sometimes under the Atarisoft label.
Fueled by the previous year's release of the colorful and appealing Pac-Man, the audience for arcade games in 1981 became much wider. Pac-Man influenced maze games began appearing in arcades and on home systems. Pac-Man was again the year's highest-grossing video game for the second year in a row. Nintendo released the arcade game Donkey Kong, which defined the platformer genre. Other arcade hits released in 1981 include Defender, Scramble, Frogger, and Galaga. The year's best-selling home system was Nintendo's Game & Watch, for the second year in a row.
Twin Galaxies is an organization and social media platform for people involved in the culture and activity of playing video games. It facilitates their interaction as well as their competition and recognizes their achievements.
Carnival is a fixed shooter developed by Gremlin and released by Sega in arcades in 1980. It was one of the first video games with a bonus round.
Nibbler is an arcade snake maze game released in 1982 by Chicago-based developer Rock-Ola. The player navigates a snake through an enclosed maze, consuming objects, and the length of the snake increases with each object consumed. The game was the first to include nine scoring digits, allowing players to surpass one billion points.
Frogs is a single-player action arcade game released by Gremlin in 1978. It notably featured a jumping character. The game's graphics are "projected" by laying the monitor flat on its back and reflecting the computer-generated graphics of the frogs and flies toward the player via a mirror at a 45-degree angle. The game was distributed by Sega in Japan.
The King of Kong: A Fistful of Quarters is a 2007 American documentary film about competitive arcade gaming directed by Seth Gordon. It follows Steve Wiebe in his attempts to take the high score record for the 1981 arcade game Donkey Kong from Billy Mitchell. The film premiered at the 2007 Slamdance Film Festival and was released in U.S. theaters in August 2007. It received positive reviews.
William James Mitchell Jr. is an American video game player and restaurateur. He rose to national prominence in the 1980s when Life included him in a photo spread of game champions during the height of the golden age of arcade video games.
Head On is an arcade video game developed by Sega/Gremlin and released by Sega in 1979. It's the first maze game where the goal is to run over dots. Designed by Lane Hauck at Sega/Gremlin in the United States, the game was a commercial success, becoming the fourth highest-grossing arcade video game of 1979 in both Japan and the United States.
Space Zap is a space-themed reflex action arcade game developed by Game-A-Tron and licensed to Midway Manufacturing in 1980. Space Zap shipped in three form factors: standard upright, cocktail, and Bally's Mini-Myte reduced size cabinet. An official port of Space Zap for the Bally Astrocade was released in 1981 as Space Fortress.
Death Race is an arcade driving video game developed and released by Exidy in the United States, first shipping to arcade distributors in April 1976. The game was a modification of Exidy's 1975 game Destruction Derby in which players crashed into cars to accrue points. In Death Race, the objective became to run into "gremlins" to gain score. The game could be played with one or two players controlling different cars. The original working title for the game which appeared on some early advertisements was Death Race 98.
