1978-1983 arcade shooter countdown.

Rob · Post by **Rob** » Mon May 04, 2009 10:48 pm

Haven't played it.

Rob · Post by **Rob** » Mon May 04, 2009 11:23 pm

#5 Galaga (1981)

A lot of effort was made to make this a more stylish experience than Galaxian and I like most of those things. The drawback is that the game will now let you get away with blindly firing into groups, losing the need to make every shot count. The challenge stages add variety but mostly just stretch the length of each credit.

#4 Stargate (1981)
#3 Defender (1980)

Patting myself on the back for learning to pilot the Defender space shuttle without the original Steel Battalion control panel. As a Defender novice I slightly prefer the lack of additional cranks and levers and distracting Gradius volcanoes. I'm still pleased whenever I can save a block man mid-air and swoop down for a safe rescue (not quite as idiot-proof as Rescue).

shh

Ed Oscuro · Post by **Ed Oscuro** » Tue May 05, 2009 12:11 am

#2 Food Fight (Atari 1984)

#1 Borderline (Sega 1981)

Rob wrote:The drawback is that the game will now let you get away with blindly firing into groups, losing the need to make every shot count.

o_O

Hence, the bonus round...anyway, solid choices in this top 20, I need to try out some of these again, like Enigma II and Moon Patrol (Borderline in yoko).

Rob · Post by **Rob** » Tue May 05, 2009 12:16 am

#2 Mad Planets (1983)

Fast-paced, chaotic single screen shooter near the end of their run. The old limitations have been cast aside - move freely around the screen and rotate your ship to meet your bizarre enemies as they get increasingly mad, with many opportunities for saving men and destroying planets for extra points.

#1 Juno First (1983)

The Defender inspiration is clear in the cool looking laser and pixel confetti, also with hyperspace and decency-defying inertia. Juno First even adds a slight angle to push the limits. It then shows off with the most enjoyable shooting bonus round of the era. Restraining yourself from spoiling the enemies 3200 point potential while scooting away from confused homing bullets is about as manic as any shooter gets.

bye-b-

Rob · Post by **Rob** » Tue May 05, 2009 12:18 am

Ed Oscuro wrote:Hence, the bonus round...

A round where your shots don't count for survival, I don't get it. I was talking about the standard waves.

Ed Oscuro · Post by **Ed Oscuro** » Tue May 05, 2009 12:18 am

Oh hell yes, Juno First is the best choice.

Rob wrote:
Ed Oscuro wrote:Hence, the bonus round...
A round where your shots don't count for survival, I don't get it. I was talking about the standard waves.

I get it.

Also, you have to aim shots anyway if you want to hit the three-enemy formations for maximum points.

Rob · Post by **Rob** » Tue May 05, 2009 12:22 am

Remember to be in the spot, all enemies gon dead. We'll call it "challenge round."

Rob · Post by **Rob** » Tue May 05, 2009 12:24 am

Ed Oscuro wrote:Oh hell yes, Juno First is the best choice.

I'm glad you agree. I honestly feel closure to this thread.

professor ganson · Post by **professor ganson** » Tue May 05, 2009 12:41 am

Awesome ending to an epic tale.

Ed Oscuro · Post by **Ed Oscuro** » Tue May 05, 2009 12:41 am

Oh man, I thought there was a Juno First highscore table.

It's not as if I can't improve my score - I think mine is only around 42K or somethin.

I love Moon Patrol too.

Ruldra · Post by **Ruldra** » Tue May 05, 2009 1:13 am

Moon Patrol, Pooyan and Cosmic Guerilla are listed twice in the list.

Exerion is still #1 for me btw

Post by **nZero** » Tue May 05, 2009 1:22 am

YOU HAVE REACHED THE END OF THIS COUNTDOWN

CONGRATURATION!!

GAME OVER

nimitz · Post by **nimitz** » Tue May 05, 2009 1:35 am

ahhhh, I got it now, the list is in reverse order. The #1 game is actually Battle Cross.

In my opinion, Robotron is the best game in this list, and one of the very few game in the list that can still be enjoyed by most people today.

Seeing that list and playing (replaying) these games made me realize something though. Shmups were not really born in 1978 with Space Invaders. They were born in 1984 with games like 1942, Star Force, Gyrodine, Vulgus...and then Gradius, Tiger Heli, Terra Cresta, Section Z in 1985

These early games (pre 1984) can be pretty good but in the end they don't have all that much in common with actual shmups. Xevious is one of the very few games in that whole list that actually plays and feel like a shmup, . Unfortunately, not a very good one.

I think the main reason is that "shooting games" as a genre did not exist back in the early 80s, so developers did not have any kind of rules to follow when making these games, the result is a lot of experimentation with different gameplay mechanics. It was only in 1984 or so that the genre was recognized as such and that developers started making shooting games with some basic idea as for how to make this kind of game "work" and be fun.

That being said, "single screen one-dimensional shooters" can be considered an actual genre, this genre pretty much died with the videogame crash of 1983 and games that were more like "shmups" (Xevious) spawned similar games in the following year and the "shmup" genre survived. In that sense, the first real shmup is actually Xevious.

Davey · Post by **Davey** » Tue May 05, 2009 1:52 am

Ed Oscuro wrote:Oh hell yes, Juno First is the best choice.

I totally agree, but I think I've only played about 5 of the games in this list, so what the hell do I know.

Actually, I was kind of hoping it wasn't #1 because I wanted to see what hidden gems were even better. No such luck.

Rob wrote:The drawback is that the game will now let you get away with blindly firing into groups, losing the need to make every shot count.

There is one slight advantage to being accurate. You're only allowed 2 (or 3? it's been a while) bullets on the screen at the same time, and when you miss that leaves more time until you can shoot again. It's usually not a big deal, but sometimes it comes into play when enemies are diving at you and you get a little too trigger happy.

Twiddle · Post by **Twiddle** » Tue May 05, 2009 2:12 am

4 shot mode + fast shots in galaga = party all night

what's even worse is that every retrocab that has galaga + pac man has that mode enabled so the game is lol easy

professor ganson · Post by **professor ganson** » Tue May 05, 2009 2:13 am

nimitz wrote:Xevious is one of the very few games in that whole list that actually plays and feel like a shmup.

That seems right.

nimitz wrote: Unfortunately, not a very good one.

You might try playing for XBLA achievements some day. Definitely adds to the drama. Most people praise Xevious for innovation, but it's also fairly polished. The uneven difficulty is an issue, it takes too long to get going, and the sound is grating. For a game from this period, I'll live with all of that. The landscape is bizarre in a good way, the controls are really nice once you get used to the relatively slow movement of your ship, and the difficult parts scoring-wise are very clever. The difficult parts survival-wise are a bit cheap, but no more so than Psikyo. It's easily the most impressive game I've played from this period. Games like Centipede, while great, lack the imagination or scope. Only Robotron matches Xevious, imo, but it's great for such different reasons. Hard to compare, really.

Rob · Post by **Rob** » Tue May 05, 2009 2:24 am

Davey wrote:Actually, I was kind of hoping it wasn't #1 because I wanted to see what hidden gems were even better. No such luck.

Yeah, me too. I'm happy to be reintroduced to the game, though, since I hadn't played it in 7-8 years. I'm sure it's not too hard to beat, but I can't touch my old score (380k) yet. Now in the Mars Matrix-Strikers II MAME rotation.

I was usually playing with sound disabled since most of these games are annoying as hell to listen to, but the intro and sound effects are also great in Juno.

Rob · Post by **Rob** » Tue May 05, 2009 3:24 am

nimitz wrote:I think the main reason is that "shooting games" as a genre did not exist back in the early 80s, so developers did not have any kind of rules to follow when making these games, the result is a lot of experimentation with different gameplay mechanics.

The stuff between Space Invaders and Galaxian were partly experimental (stuff like Cosmic Guerrila and Astro Invader, one-off styles), but the 'rules' were clearly defined after Galaxian. The enemies don't all rush you, there are no defenses to break through/hide behind. You are on one side, a "safety zone," the enemies stick to the other side. Most scrolling shooters are like this. It gives you space to react to whatever they toss out at you. Dodge attacks, shoot. Even if you can move all over the screen, you stick to this safety zone. I think that feels like the forum's definition of a shooting game.

It was only in 1984 or so that the genre was recognized as such and that developers started making shooting games with some basic idea as for how to make this kind of game "work" and be fun.

It's pretty clear they knew what made a game fun by Galaga since people remember it more fondly than Xevious. That's because they focused on the core elements of shooting games. Xevious was a gimmick. Xevious was different in that it removed the break between levels, not standard after that. You could shoot at objects on a lower plane, also not standard. And had ugly crap scrolling in the background. Scrolling graphics were already done and I don't think they are an essential element to shooting games anyways.

Experiments are what keep the genre fresh, and I think the worst experiments were trying to turn shooting games into scrolling adventure games. Bringing back key shooting, technical, scoring elements are what made the late-90s a good time for arcade shooters. Mars Matrix and Dangun have more in common with Juno First than Xevious.

MOSQUITO FIGHTER · Post by **MOSQUITO FIGHTER** » Tue May 05, 2009 3:28 am

Nice, I was wondering where Juno First was going to place. Great choice.

nimitz · Post by **nimitz** » Tue May 05, 2009 3:37 am

#12 (1982) NIM - 312,775

felt like i had to at least put a Robotron score up since it's the best game in the list. I'm playing with the shitty dualshock2's analog mushrooms which are horrible.

I"ll try to get 500K tomorrow

edit :

It's pretty clear they knew what made a game fun by Galaga since people remember it more fondly than Xevious.

I am positive that Xevious is more remembered/played than Galaga in japan and that it was more popular back in the days.

Also, what I meant when saying that Xevious is the one that feels the most like an actual shmup has nothing to do with the scrolling or the level transitions. What makes Xevious feel like a shmup is the unrestricted 2d movement, the bullet and enemy patterns, the snipers, the feeling of "progression" through a game (instead of repetive levels), the way enemy formations come on screen and leave for good, dead or not.

Don't get me wrong, galaga is awesome and shares more similarities with shmups than most games in the list. And this is even truer for the next game in the series : Gaplus/Galaga 3.

Ed Oscuro · Post by **Ed Oscuro** » Tue May 05, 2009 3:38 am

nimitz wrote:Xevious is one of the very few games in that whole list that actually plays and feel like a shmup,

Like Fighter and Attacker :?

Anyway, an update on Moon Patrol (about 16K points, somewhere over that).

Too much INERTIA in this game, and it doesn't really compare well with Gallop.

The first two stages are mindless fun (I got a 59 seconds clear time in both of them) but the third stage...ugh, landmines that you have to jump over.

I like how every wheel has an independent suspension and the whole moon buggy bounces up and down depending on where that is, and you can straddle a landmine between your front and middle wheels and not get exploded. I wouldn't depend on it though. It's a bit sad you can't ram through the third stage fullspeed, and it's even sadder than the extreme inertia makes me end up shortfalling jumps, which is no fun when slowing down is essentially planning your next three jumps in advance.

Rob · Post by **Rob** » Tue May 05, 2009 3:45 am

Ed Oscuro wrote:it doesn't really compare well with Gallop.

professor ganson wrote:Games like Centipede, while great, lack the imagination or scope [of Xevious].

:\

"the imagination" part, I mean, another airplane shooter vs. Centipede. Really? The theme and execution is unlike anything here that isn't its sequel.

Ed Oscuro · Post by **Ed Oscuro** » Tue May 05, 2009 4:09 am

Rob wrote:
Ed Oscuro wrote:it doesn't really compare well with Gallop.
:|

It is from 9 years earlier, of course. If somebody hacked the landmines out + better up-weapon selection + better acceleration + deceleration = awesome

It reminds me of Mass Effect for some reason ;)

Also, ganson is clearly wrong

Rob · Post by **Rob** » Tue May 05, 2009 4:11 am

Ed Oscuro wrote:It reminds me of Mass Effect for some reason

Ha! Did for me too.

I think it's best to be a little cautious with accelerate, at least when you have less predictable hazards (saucers).

Ed Oscuro · Post by **Ed Oscuro** » Tue May 05, 2009 4:16 am

That's one other thing the game doesn't having going for it; the fact that you can only really protect the back end of your buggy and just jump instead of flying all over means that going through the first two areas with the throttle wide open depends a lot on luck. My least favorite thing (up to the land mines) is seeing a red bomb from the yellow saucers drifting slowly towards the canopy of the buggy.

professor ganson · Post by **professor ganson** » Tue May 05, 2009 4:26 am

Rob wrote:
professor ganson wrote:Games like Centipede, while great, lack the imagination or scope [of Xevious].
:\

"the imagination" part, I mean, another airplane shooter vs. Centipede. Really? The theme and execution is unlike anything here that isn't its sequel.

I was thinking of Centipede as a very creative reaction to the original Space Invaders formula. Xevious is its own formula, perhaps. Same for Robotron and Missle Command, though these didn't prove as fruitful as Xevious.

Ed Oscuro · Post by **Ed Oscuro** » Tue May 05, 2009 4:43 am

I think being a good game does more for the human race than being the first in a line of cookie-cutter clones that all use pretty obvious hardware features. As I noted before, the main thing Xevious has going for it (aside from the general clumsiness - especially when backpedaling, the ugly (although it gets mad points for the Nazca lines), and the fun sounds) is the bomb, which while realistic is one of the worst persistently (somewhat) used features in shooters ever.

The Xevious style bomb was never really popular in these games, although as I noted Namco tried to carry on with it, which led to such clunkers as Fighter & Attacker - games that should have been excellent but ended up with limited popularity because of a poor design choice.

I guess Xevious's lasting contribution to gaming was inspiring the name of the original developer of the Metal Slug games, the Irem spin-off (being a bit facetious here).

Compare this all to Centipede, which really has no relationship to Space Invaders aside from the single-screen setup, so far did it advance past it. Centipede is a fine example (centipede tunnels aside) of careful game design, with every single element designed with a clear purpose. Even the way the gun handles is considered an important aspect of the design, in opposition to simply holding onto the "hey we can do three shots at once now, this is better than Galaga fo sho" Xevious model. Almost the iconic example of a "Zen garden" theory of game design in practice.

Dale · Post by **Dale** » Tue May 05, 2009 5:03 am

Davey wrote:
Ed Oscuro wrote:Oh hell yes, Juno First is the best choice.
I totally agree, but I think I've only played about 5 of the games in this list, so what the hell do I know.

Actually, I was kind of hoping it wasn't #1 because I wanted to see what hidden gems were even better. No such luck.

Youjyuden is awesome all though I think it's a little ahead of this era. It's a cross between Commando, Legendary Wings with a little Xevios. The only pre-83 game that's awesome I don't see on the list I can think of is The End. Brutally hard game by Stern(same people who did Astro Invader they now just do PinBall games). Deals with overwhelming just like AI.

Rob · Post by **Rob** » Tue May 05, 2009 5:12 am

I think The End is by Konami. I saw a group of shooters I missed - it and Pioneer Balloon looked the most promising. Most others were Space _____. I'll try it out.

Just tried Gaplus which was pretty meh. Had me moving all over the place just because I could. :]

The main Centipede-SI connection is with centipede movement, I think, but start shooting it, or watching it bounce off of mushrooms or hit a poisonous 'shroom. Doesn't automatically kill you if it reaches the bottom. Small similarity. Guess you might also compare mushrooms to bases, but different function. This is where the imagination comes into play. Much more of a leap from SI to Centipede than whatever space shooter to Xevious. Scramble already translated the shooter to a scrolling environment, with bombs.

BrianC · Post by **BrianC** » Tue May 05, 2009 5:12 am

More games with Atari 2600 ports:
Pooyan
Time Pilot
Stargate
Defender
Juno First (homebrew)

From what I played, Juno First is a pretty impressive homebrew effort for the 2600 (I got the rom on the Atari Age forum).

Out of the non homebrew, Stargate (later re-released as Defender II) is the most impressive of this batch and blows away the Defender port. Having to use two joysticks takes some getting used to, though.

shmups.system11.org

1978-1983 arcade shooter countdown.

Re: 1978-1983 arcade shooter countdown.