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. The game was released during the Cold War, and the player uses a trackball to defend six cities from intercontinental ballistic missiles by launching anti-ballistic missiles from three bases.
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.
Breakout is an arcade video game developed and published by Atari, Inc. and released on May 13, 1976. It was designed by Steve Wozniak, based on conceptualization from Nolan Bushnell and Steve Bristow, who were influenced by the seminal 1972 Atari arcade game Pong. In Breakout, a layer of bricks lines the top third of the screen and the goal is to destroy them all by repeatedly bouncing a ball off a paddle into them. The arcade game was released in Japan by Namco. Breakout was a worldwide commercial success, among the top five highest-grossing arcade video games of 1976 in both the United States and Japan and then among the top three highest-grossing arcade video games of 1977 in the US and Japan. The 1978 Atari VCS port uses color graphics instead of a monochrome screen with colored overlay.
Qix is a 1981 puzzle video game developed by husband and wife team Randy and Sandy Pfeiffer and published in arcades by Taito America. Qix is one of a handful of games made by Taito's American division. At the start of each level, the playing field is a large, empty rectangle, containing the Qix, an abstract stick-like entity that performs graceful but unpredictable motions within the confines of the rectangle. The objective is to draw lines that close off parts of the rectangle to fill in a set amount of the playfield.
Galaxian is a 1979 fixed shooter arcade video 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 save his kidnapped 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.
Pac-Man Plus is an arcade game that was released by Bally Midway in 1983. It is part of the Pac-Man series of games.
Phoenix is a fixed shooter video game developed for arcades in Japan and released in 1980 by Taito. The player controls a space ship shooting at incoming enemies that fly from the top of the screen down towards the player's ship. There are five stages which repeat endlessly. The fifth is a fight against a large enemy spaceship, making Phoenix one of the first shooters with a boss battle, an element that would become common for the genre.
Donkey Kong is a 1981 arcade video game developed and published by Nintendo. As Mario, the player runs and jumps on platforms and climbs ladders to ascend a construction site and rescue Pauline from a giant gorilla, the titular Donkey Kong. It is the first game in the Donkey Kong series as well as Mario's first appearance in a video game.
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.
Kangaroo is a four-screen platform game released as an arcade video game 1982 by Sun Electronics and distributed in North America by Atari, Inc. Kangaroo is one of the first arcade games similar in style to Donkey Kong without being a direct clone. The player takes the role of a boxing glove-wearing mother kangaroo who is trying to rescue her joey from fruit-throwing monkeys. Jumping is integral to the game, but there is no jump button. Instead, the player pushes up on the joystick—or up and diagonally—to leap. The arcade version of Kangaroo has visible glitches in the graphics, such as sprites briefly flickering.
Zoo Keeper is a tile-matching video game originally developed and published by Robot Communications for browsers. It was later ported to the Game Boy Advance, PlayStation 2 and Nintendo DS by Success, which remains its best known incarnation. Zoo Keeper was released for arcades in 2004. The game was then brought to American and European shores by Ignition Entertainment, and has since been released for iOS and Android devices under the title Zookeeper DX Touch Edition by Kiteretsu.
Amidar is a video game developed by Konami and released in arcades in 1981 by Stern. The format is similar to that of Pac-Man: the player moves around a fixed rectilinear lattice, attempting to visit each location on the board while avoiding the enemies. When each spot has been visited, the player moves to the next level. The game and its name have their roots in the Japanese lot drawing game Amidakuji. The bonus level in Amidar is a nearly exact replication of an Amidakuji game and the way the enemies move conform to the Amidakuji rules; this is referred to in the attract mode as "Amidar movement."
Pac-Mania is a cavalier perspective maze game that was developed and released by Namco for arcades in 1987. In the game, the player controls Pac-Man as he must eat all of the dots while avoiding the colored ghosts that chase him in the maze. Eating large flashing "Power Pellets" will allow Pac-Man to eat the ghosts for bonus points, which lasts for a short period of time. A new feature to this game allows Pac-Man to jump over the ghosts to evade capture. It is the ninth title in the Pac-Man video game series and was the last one developed for arcades up until the release of Pac-Man Arrangement in 1996. Development was directed by Pac-Man creator Toru Iwatani. It was licensed to Atari Games for release in North America.
Ice Cold Beer is a mechanical arcade game released by Taito in 1983. The game is in a similar cabinet to an arcade video game, but where the screen would normally be there is a vertical wooden playfield dotted with holes. Two joysticks on the control panel control the height of the two ends of a metal bar that moves up and down the playfield, with a ball bearing rolling back and forth on the bar. The playfield is an amber color, and the holes in the playfield are suggestive of bubbles rising in a mug of beer.
Eggomania is an action video game released in January 1983 by U.S. Games for the Atari 2600. Similar in design to Kaboom!, which itself is a derivative of the arcade game Avalanche, the objective is to catch eggs in a hat which are thrown by a chicken.
A zookeeper is a worker in a zoo, responsible for the feeding and daily care of the animals.
Circus is a block breaker arcade video game released by Exidy in 1977, and distributed by Taito in Japan. The game is a re-themed variant of Atari, Inc.'s Breakout, where the player controls a seesaw and clown in order to pop all the balloons in the level. The game has been copied and released under different names by numerous other companies in both the United States and Japan.
Rastan Saga, known as Rastan in North America, is a side-scrolling hack and slash arcade video game released by Taito in 1987. It was a critical and commercial success and was ported to home platforms.
King Kong is a platform game programmed by Karl T. Olinger for the Atari 2600 and published by Tigervision in 1982. Based on the licensed King Kong character, the game is a clone of the first screen of Donkey Kong. It was Tigervision's first cartridge release. Tiger Electronic Toys produced a handheld version, licensed to Tandy, the same year.
