Pac-Man, originally called Puck Man in Japan, is a 1980 maze 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.
Millipede is a fixed shooter video game released in arcades by Atari, Inc. in 1982. The sequel to 1981's Centipede, it has more gameplay variety and a wider array of insects than the original. The objective is to score as many points as possible by destroying all segments of the millipede as it moves toward the bottom of the screen, as well as eliminating or avoiding other enemies. The game is played with a trackball and a single fire button which can be held down for rapid-fire.
E.T. the Extra-Terrestrial is a 1982 adventure video game developed and published by Atari, Inc. for the Atari 2600 and based on the film of the same name. The game's objective is to guide the eponymous character through various screens to collect three pieces of an interplanetary telephone that will allow him to contact his home planet.
Pinball Construction Set is a video game by Bill Budge written for the Apple II. It was originally published in 1982 through Budge's own company, BudgeCo, then was released by Electronic Arts in 1983 along with ports to the Atari 8-bit computers and Commodore 64.
Centipede is a 1981 fixed shooter video game developed and published by Atari for arcades. 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.
Jet Set Willy is a platform video game written by Matthew Smith for the ZX Spectrum home computer. It was published in 1984 by Software Projects and ported to most home computers of the time.
Ms. Pac-Man is a 1982 maze arcade video game developed by General Computer Corporation and published by Midway. It is a spin-off sequel to Pac-Man (1980) and the first entry in the series to not be made by Namco. Controlling the title character, Pac-Man's wife, the player is tasked with eating all of the pellets in an enclosed maze while avoiding four colored ghosts. Eating the larger "power pellets" lets the player eat the ghosts, which turn blue and flee.
Lode Runner is a 2D puzzle-platform game, developed by Doug Smith and published by Broderbund in 1983. Its gameplay mechanics are similar to Space Panic from 1980. The player controls a character who must collect all the gold pieces in a level and get to the end while being chased by a number of enemies. It is one of the first games to include a level editor.
Tempest is a 1981 arcade video game by Atari, Inc., designed and programmed by Dave Theurer. It takes place on a three-dimensional surface divided into lanes, sometimes as a closed tube, and viewed from one end. The player controls a claw-shaped "blaster" that sits on the edge of the surface, snapping from segment to segment as a rotary knob is turned, and can fire blaster shots to destroy enemies and obstacles by pressing a button.
The golden age of arcade video games was the period of rapid growth, technological development, and cultural influence of arcade video games from the late 1970s to the early 1980s. The release of Space Invaders in 1978 led to a wave of shoot-'em-up games such as Galaxian and the vector graphics-based Asteroids in 1979, made possible by new computing technology that had greater power and lower costs. Arcade video games switched from black-and-white to color, with titles such as Frogger and Centipede taking advantage of the visual opportunities of bright palettes.
Caverns of Mars is a vertically scrolling shooter for Atari 8-bit computers. It was written by Greg Christensen, with some features later added by Richard Watts, and published by the Atari Program Exchange (APX) in 1981. Caverns of Mars became the best selling APX software of all-time and was moved into Atari, Inc.'s official product line, first on diskette, then on cartridge.
Synapse Software Corporation was an American software developer and publisher founded in 1981 by Ihor Wolosenko and Ken Grant. Synapse published application software and developer tools, but was primarily known for video games. It initially focused on the Atari 8-bit computers, then later developed for the Commodore 64 and other systems. Synapse was purchased by Broderbund in late 1984 and the Synapse label retired in 1985.
G.I. Joe: Cobra Strike is an action video game written by John Emerson for the Atari 2600 and published in 1983 by Parker Brothers. The game is loosely based on the G.I. Joe franchise and is the first licensed G.I. Joe video game. There are three game modes: single-player, two player cooperative, and two player competitive. The UK version was renamed Action Man: Action Force, based on the Action Man franchise.
Halloween is a horror video game for the Atari 2600, released in October 1983 by Wizard Video. It is based on the 1978 horror film of the same name. The game was programmed by Tim Martin. When Games by Apollo went broke, Martin and another former employee, Robert Barber, developed Halloween.
Several video games and genres have been created as a result of the release of the film E.T. the Extra-Terrestrial based on the story and themes of the original game.
In video games, first-person is any graphical perspective rendered from the viewpoint of the player character, or from the inside of a device or vehicle controlled by the player character. It is one of two perspectives used in the vast majority of video games, with the other being third-person, the graphical perspective from outside of any character ; some games such as interactive fiction do not belong to either format.
Lady Bug is a maze chase video game produced by Universal and released for arcades in 1981. Its gameplay is similar to Pac-Man, with the primary addition of gates that change the layout of the maze, adding an element of strategy to the genre. The arcade original was relatively obscure, but the game had wider recognition and success as a launch game for the ColecoVision console.
Frankenstein's Monster is a platform game developed for the Atari 2600 video game console, based on Mary Shelley's 1818 novel Frankenstein; or, The Modern Prometheus . It was released by Data Age in 1983.
Mr. Cool is an action game designed by Peter Oliphant and published in 1983 by Sierra On-Line for the Atari 8-bit computers and Commodore 64 home computers. The ports for the IBM PC and Apple II were written by John Redekopp and released the same year. The game is heavily inspired by the 1982 arcade video game Q*bert.
