Frogger is a 1981 arcade action game developed by Konami and published by Sega. In North America, it was distributed by Sega/Gremlin. The object of the game is to direct five frogs to their homes by dodging traffic on a busy road, then crossing a river by jumping on floating logs and alligators.
Pitfall! is a video game developed by David Crane for the Atari 2600 and released in 1982 by Activision. The player controls Pitfall Harry, who has a time limit of 20 minutes to seek treasure in a jungle. The game world is populated by enemies and hazards that variously cause the player to lose lives or points.
Miner 2049er is a platform game developed for Atari 8-bit computers by Bill Hogue and released by his company, Big Five Software, in 1982. The player controls Bounty Bob through multiple levels of a mine, with the goal of traversing all of the platforms while avoiding or defeating enemy mutants. At a time when "climbing games" such as Donkey Kong had four screens, Miner 2049er had ten.
Gorf is an arcade video game released in 1981 by Midway Manufacturing, whose name was advertised as an acronym for "Galactic Orbiting Robot Force". It is a fixed shooter with five distinct levels, the first of which is based on Space Invaders and another on Galaxian. The game makes heavy use of synthesized speech for the Gorfian robot which taunts the player, powered by the Votrax speech chip. Gorf allows the player to buy two additional lives per quarter before starting the game, for a maximum of seven lives.
Buck Rogers: Planet of Zoom, known as Zoom 909 in Japan, is a pseudo-3D rail shooter released as an arcade video game by Sega in 1982. The player controls a spaceship in a third-person perspective, adapting the three-dimensional perspective of Sega's earlier racing game Turbo (1981) for the space shoot 'em up genre. It uses the Buck Rogers license, referencing the space battles, though Buck himself is never seen.
Jungle Hunt, originally released as Jungle King, is a side-scrolling action game developed by Taito and released for arcades in 1982. It was originally distributed as Jungle King, then quickly modified and re-released as Jungle Hunt due to a copyright dispute over the player character's likeness to Tarzan. Jungle King, along with Moon Patrol released a month earlier, is one of the first video games with parallax scrolling.
Congo Bongo, also known as Tip Top, is a platform game released as an arcade video game by Sega in 1983. A message in the ROM indicates it was coded at least in part by the company Ikegami Tsushinki. The game is viewed in an isometric perspective, like Sega's earlier Zaxxon (1982), but does not scroll. Numerous home ports followed.
1982 was the peak year for the golden age of arcade video games as well as the second generation of video game consoles. Many games were released that would spawn franchises, or at least sequels, including Dig Dug, Pole Position, Mr. Do!, Zaxxon, Q*bert, Time Pilot and Pitfall! The year's highest-grossing video game was Namco's arcade game Pac-Man, for the third year in a row, while the year's best-selling home system was the Atari 2600. Additional video game consoles added to a crowded market, notably the ColecoVision and Atari 5200. Troubles at Atari late in the year triggered the video game crash of 1983.
H.E.R.O. is a video game designed by John Van Ryzin and published by Activision for the Atari 2600 in March 1984. It was ported to the Apple II, Atari 5200, Atari 8-bit computers, ColecoVision, Commodore 64, MSX, and ZX Spectrum.
River Raid is a video game developed by Carol Shaw for the Atari Video Computer System and released in 1982 by Activision. The player controls a fighter jet over the River of No Return in a raid behind enemy lines. The goal is to navigate the flight by destroying enemy tankers, helicopters, fuel depots and bridges without running out of fuel or crashing.
Pitfall II: Lost Caverns is a video game developed by David Crane for the Atari 2600. It was released in 1984 by Activision. The player controls Pitfall Harry, who must explore in wilds of Peru to find the Raj Diamond, and rescue his niece Rhonda and their animal friend Quickclaw. The game world is populated by enemies and hazards that variously cause the player to lose points and return to a checkpoint.
Beamrider is a fixed shooter written for the Intellivision by David Rolfe and published by Activision in 1983. The game was ported to the Atari 2600, Atari 5200, Atari 8-bit computers, ColecoVision, Commodore 64, ZX Spectrum, and MSX.
Dragonfire is a 1982 video game written by Bob Smith and published by Imagic. The player grabs treasure guarded by a dragon while avoiding fireballs. It was originally released for the Atari 2600 then ported to the Intellivision, VIC-20, Commodore 64, Apple II, ZX Spectrum, ColecoVision, and TRS-80 Color Computer.
The Activision Decathlon is a sports video game written by David Crane for the Atari 2600 and published by Activision in 1983. It was ported to the Atari 8-bit computers, Atari 5200, Commodore 64, ColecoVision, and MSX. Up to four players compete in the ten different events of a real-life decathlon, either in sequence or individually.
James Bond 007 is a horizontally scrolling shooter published in 1984 by Parker Brothers for the Atari 2600, Atari 5200, Atari 8-bit computers, Commodore 64, and ColecoVision. It was developed and published in Japan by Tsukuda Original for the SG-1000 under the title 007 James Bond. It was the first video game based on James Bond to be given a worldwide release.
Tutankham is a 1982 arcade video game developed and released by Konami and released by Stern in North America. Named after the Egyptian pharaoh Tutankhamun, the game combines a maze shoot 'em up with light puzzle-solving elements. It debuted at the European ATE and IMA amusement shows in January 1982, before releasing worldwide in Summer 1982. The game was a critical and commercial success and was ported to home systems by Parker Brothers.
Pitstop is a 1983 racing video game developed and published by Epyx for the Atari 8-bit computers, ColecoVision, Coleco Adam, and Commodore 64. A sequel, Pitstop II, was released in 1984.
Laura Nikolich is a game designer and programmer who worked for Parker Brothers in the early 1980s where she was the sole developer for the 1982 Atari 2600 game Spider-Man and programmed the ColecoVision version of Frogger II: ThreeeDeep!.
Threshold is a space-themed fixed shooter written by Warren Schwader and Ken Williams for the Apple II and published by On-Line Systems in 1981. Inspired by Sega's Astro Blaster arcade video game, Threshold introduces many enemy ship types and wave formations as the game progresses. Reviewers found the variety distinguished the game from the many similar shoot 'em ups.
Flak: The Ultimate Flight Experience is a vertically scrolling shooter for the Atari 8-bit computers designed by Alain Marsily, programmed by Yves Lempereur, and published by Funsoft in 1984. It was ported to the Apple II, Commodore 64, and ZX Spectrum home computers. Flak was heavily inspired by the 1982 Namco arcade video game Xevious. Most critical reviews were middling or harshly negative.
