Arcade Game Screen Quiz

[Enhasa]

http://www.arcadeshop.de/screenshotgame.php

This is a couple years old but I just learned about it so maybe you will too.


I played five times and my best is 136. That's 4th on the current high score board (last reset ~July 08), 14th all-time. I'm sure some of you can crush my score, especially if you play it enough and started learning games. I think I'm done though.

Top 10 is filled with MAME guys, heh. Also Gemant, he's the man.

[Ruldra]

Nice, didn't know about it.

Most of the time you can guess the game just by looking at the options. At one point it showed a beat-em-up and one of the two options was tetris. At another time it showed shock troopers and one of the options was RFJ.

I'll play this for a while.

[Enhasa]

Yeah, I wouldn't get nearly that high if I had to type in the answers. At SDA, people who don't know any arcade games are all getting in the 30's just from the multiple choice aspect. Occasionally the screenshot of the game has the actual title in it too, pretty funny.

[iatneH]

Is there any bonus for getting it in under a second? But I got bored anyway.

The usability could be improved, like making clickable elements larger. I was trying to go through quickly and sometimes clicked the "Go on" link without selecting an option (which I thought I had, I had tried and missed by a few pixels).

[Bloodreign]

Missed 3 and finished with 122 points, I play too many games.

[Enhasa]

iatneH: I wish there was a bonus. I usually get it under a second, at least early on. Later when there's like 6-7 choices it's even hard to read them all in time. The last time I played, I finally got the bright idea to increase the font size and that helped.

Edit: This is way off-topic, but since you mentioned usability and your location says Vancouver, are you in the HCI program at UBC by any chance? I had HCI specialization as a CS major at Georgia Tech as an undergrad (now I'm a PhD student in human factors engineering).


Btw I hate using the mouse in general so I played with keyboard. But I don't tab around either, although that could probably work. I'm a diehard Emacs guy, so I used to use Conkeror as my modern browser (which has the features I'm about to describe built-in), but I finally decided if you don't want to be a 2nd-class citizen on the Internet you have to use either Firefox, IE, or Safari/Chrome. So now I use this extension in Firefox that lets you click on stuff using the keyboard. Even better with an extension like Linkification that turns URLs into clickable links. Now I pretty much don't have to use the mouse anywhere. And yeah, it does help playing this too.

Using css, I have Flash everywhere hidden until I click on it too, which also helps because even though those cutscenes were kinda cute the first time, I didn't really want to see them after that.

[ZOM]

Had a go at it years ago(ordered a LS-32 and various sanwa buttons there once) IIRC highest was the one where I had exactly 100 points.
I wonder, is the reset only for the scoreboards or if they actually change the screens from time to time too.

[Enhasa]

Pretty sure they don't change the screens ever, because they just use whatever one pic that MAWS has.

It would be a lot sweeter if they had multiple pics for each game so you couldn't just memorize them. Just playing five times I saw a lot of the same ones on different tries.

[Ed Oscuro]

I think I played seven times at most, ranked #20.

It's scary how many of these I know. Later on having seen some of the answers helped (during the five-question runs) but more than half the time I was just clicking an answer after seeing a single character or the color layout of the screen in my peripheral vision and matching it to the game. Crazy.

I need to check out a bunch of new games now.

[Herr Schatten]

It's scary how many of these I know. Later on having seen some of the answers helped (during the five-question runs) but more than half the time I was just clicking an answer after seeing a single character or the color layout of the screen in my peripheral vision and matching it to the game. Crazy.

I need to check out a bunch of new games now.

My thoughts exactly. I thought I'd totally suck at this quiz, but it turned out I knew a lot of the answers right away, just as you describe it.

[lgb]

same thing happened to me, actually. I didn't finish it though

[DEL]

Had three goes and got 91.

I found the name of the game I've been looking for:- DEVIL ZONE.
So this quiz had a purpose for me

[BIL]

Ha, this is fun. I like that it's multiple choice. Typing would of course be a more accurate test of knowledge, but it's still interesting to match long-forgotten names and screens (I've not thought of Libble Rabble once since that 1994 EGM, and still don't know WTF it is really). Makes me realise how much information one passively accumulates while enjoying a hobby.

[Ed Oscuro]

(I've not thought of Libble Rabble once since that 1994 EGM, and still don't know WTF it is really).

Well, I finally checked it out (have it on X68000). Imagine Qix but with two arrows that pull the ends of a string that you loop around posts to tie things up. Hard to play but fun.

About Devil Zone that DEL mentioned - I saw a number of Universal games, and a number that Rob did in his arcade countdown (Demoneye-X_~ for example). I think it's much more likely to see some games than others.

At the end of my best run through the list, I was not getting repeats so much as I was getting games that I knew which hadn't appeared before.

[Enhasa]

Yeah, Libble Rabble is awesome.


I had the same thing where I would just get a glimpse in my peripheral vision and that was enough, especially early on. I think that's because the text loads slightly before the pic, so you can pretty much know what you're looking for as the pic comes in. Colorful vs gritty is often enough.

I really wish they gave you a list at the end of games you saw that go. Because I was often like "wow that game looks sweet, I gotta try it later" but 5 secs later I've already forgotten all about it. If I ever do this again, I'm gonna jot down the games as they come.

[system11]

146, not too bad.

[Lordstar]

I started but i got to about 50 perfects and realised that this was going to go on for a loooooooooooong time and gave up.

[saucykobold]

I got 84 after about six or seven tries. I thought I'd score higher, but many of these games are beyond obscure. I don't know Alligator Hunt from Almond Pinky.

[Lordstar]

a lot of the games ive never played but ive seen stills of all kinds of stuff. You could show me a lot of stills without multiple answers and i would get a fair amount right.
but if you get the options Street fighter 2 and Ms Pacman you only have to glance at the screen to know what the game is.

[handsome_rakshas]

I love this quiz! I want to type in SHMUPS and slap all other forums in the face when I get #1

[DEL]

I'm not exactly good at it, but I'm crawling up the ranking.

This trip down memory lane has reminded me of games I used to like:- Last Mission, Valtric, Devil Zone, Exzisus & Front Line.

[DEL]

Beaten Gemant by 1 point

[Thunder Force]

Neat. Played once and got a score in the 50s. I think I could get over 100 with a few retries, maybe I'll try again in the future when looking for some time to kill...

[Zeether]

I'm number 5, fuck yeah.

[saucykobold]

I'm languishing in 17th place. Most choices are obvious, but I'll eventually get a pic of an obscure racing game with three "racing game-esque" titles to choose from.

[DEL]

I gained a place.

[moozooh]

You guys are incredible. :o

[Pixel_Outlaw]

I don't know about anyone else but I was looking for interesting 80's games to try using this. Looks like I have missed QUITE A BIT of interesting looking ones. This is great exposure for overlooked titles that have 0 chance of being re-released.

[Ed Oscuro]

Another try, another 83. Almost all new screens this time though. Had a few super obscure early ones trip me up (though none of the b&w ones that I remember).

[DEL]

Local boy Gahrling told me that the Quiz breaks at 570pts. The last two times he's reached 570, the game screen goes blank and the countdown continues .

EDIT:- Gahrling is speaking with the quiz creator to fix it.

As he says:- SERIOUS BIZNESS