Arcade Games- Old and Obscure stuff
Being as I am almost literally as old as the hills (if the hills are on the far side of 40), and back in the day, I was never really into console games (I had 2 cartridges for the Colecovision. Yeah, 2!), but I played a metric ton of Arcade games, and here are the oldest and most obscure I can remember, with Videos.
Battlezone- not obscure, but old.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Ctr54kopo8I
Venture-Old *and* Obscure!
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=PA9Y-63-tss
Star Trek Strategic Operations Simulator- I was there when they released the game and got a T-shirt at the Arcade!
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=lZj9WLFe6cY
Thayer's Quest-Remember Dragon's Lair? Like that.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=BDIGrePEx8s
Dragon's Lair- First game on Laser Disc
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=i6em4GRiRY0
Satan's Hollow-Fight devils in Redneck Country!
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ibCt6pfHvfc
The Journey Game- Based on the Band.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=gFksPf8amMs
Trivial Pursuit- Based on the Board Game (being a history geek, I always played "Cleofactra")
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=LkXgSv-sIwI
Qix-Mark out areas and keep away from the Spark!
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=zZt64cECO5g
Phoenix- Fight against firebirds
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=RkCqxKFYOJo
Q*Bert- Play a little foul-mouthed creature and turn the blocks a different color. Keep away from enemies!
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=b-LR3036LuI
Burger Time- Make burgers by making ingredients fall. Keep away from hot dogs, and eggs.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=UZ2T6e4NObE
What weird, old and obscure arcade games do you remember playing?
Battlezone- not obscure, but old.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Ctr54kopo8IVenture-Old *and* Obscure!
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=PA9Y-63-tssStar Trek Strategic Operations Simulator- I was there when they released the game and got a T-shirt at the Arcade!
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=lZj9WLFe6cYThayer's Quest-Remember Dragon's Lair? Like that.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=BDIGrePEx8sDragon's Lair- First game on Laser Disc
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=i6em4GRiRY0Satan's Hollow-Fight devils in Redneck Country!
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ibCt6pfHvfcThe Journey Game- Based on the Band.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=gFksPf8amMsTrivial Pursuit- Based on the Board Game (being a history geek, I always played "Cleofactra")
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=LkXgSv-sIwIQix-Mark out areas and keep away from the Spark!
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=zZt64cECO5gPhoenix- Fight against firebirds
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=RkCqxKFYOJoQ*Bert- Play a little foul-mouthed creature and turn the blocks a different color. Keep away from enemies!
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=b-LR3036LuIBurger Time- Make burgers by making ingredients fall. Keep away from hot dogs, and eggs.
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=UZ2T6e4NObEWhat weird, old and obscure arcade games do you remember playing?
3
Comments
This one stood out .. named Supaplex
: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Supaplex
also Commander Keen (although to be honest i only played that for the pong game that came with it), Chip 'n Dale Rescue Rangers: The Adventures in Nimnul's Castle (i can't believe i remember that one. had to do some google searching to find it), and Battle Chess (i liked the animations whenever you took a piece)
The Pit: Retrieve the diamonds before the robots get you or destroy your spaceship with their tank.
Food Fight: Eat the icecream before it melts or the chefs catch you. Use the piles of food as ammo to hit them.
Crystal Castles: Collect the gems, avoid enemies, defeat the witch.
Crazy Climber: Ascend without falling
Rally-X: Collect the flags, avoid the red cars
Rampage: As a monster, destroy the city without dying yourself.
Altered Beast: Zeus resurrects you to rescue his daughter. Unleash your inner beast to beat bosses.
Sinistar: BEWARE! I LIVE! RUN, COWARD! RUN, RUN, RUN! I HUNGER!
Paperboy: Deliver papers, break the windows of non-subscribers, try not to get hit!
DigDug: Kill monsters by exploding them with your air pump. Or drop rocks on them.
side scroller beat 'em ups were fun (like the simpson's and ninja turtle, streets of rage) Striker's 1945 was my favourite of the vertical shooters, although Raptor: Call of the Shadows and Raiden are definitely up there as well. SkiFree was also a lot of fun, but then i discovered this a few months ago:
mind blown O.o
I still remember that boom sound when atomic stuff falls on my head.
@Night_Watch Skifree seems similar to the game "ski or die".
Edit. It was a great game though.
This doesn't really fit into the really old classic category, but the only arcade game I played maybe a couple dozen times was Ferrari F355 Challenge. In terms of in game features, there wasn't really anything to write home about. The game only featured one car (the Ferrari F355 Challenge), and you and all of the AI competitors used identical cars (other than color). And there were only I think 5 tracks to choose from.
It provided something I (at the time) didn't have at home. It had a steering wheel, manual gated shifter complete with clutch, and 3 monitors. If you wanted to use the gated shifter and clutch you had to choose the expert mode which disabled the traction control and ABS, which made it pretty challenging. It was also very challenging because you always started in last place, and the race only lasted 2 or 3 laps, if you're quick enough to not run out of time before the end. You had to drive pretty fast and pretty much make no major mistakes if you wanted to get to the end of the race before time ran out. I've never gotten 1st place in that game. I remember I was so happy that one time when I climbed my way up the field and finished the race 3rd at the Suzuka track.
I was kind of sad when they stopped making this game. The machine itself was also very high maintenance because of so many mechanical moving parts that have to take a lot of abuse, mostly the shifter. The arcades that had them didn't really take good care of them, and a lot of them didn't work very well after a while.
Now I have a full racing gaming rig at home with seat, steering wheel, and manual gated shifter, so there's no point for me to go out to play arcade racing games anymore.
(guy in the video is not me)
Sonic Dig Dug:
Robocop
very fun--Wizard of Wor, including monsters which disappear and dramatic music
the quirky Bagman
and the best arcade game ever--Tron
https://www.google.com/search?q=Hiroshi+Yamauchi&oq=hir&aqs=chrome.1.69i57j69i59j0j69i61j0j69i60.1145j0&sourceid=chrome&ie=UTF-8#q=Hiroshi+Yamauchi&safe=off&tbm=nws
Popeye
Asteroids
Tank
Galaga
Space Invaders
Joust
Kangaroo
Mouse Trap
I could probably come up with a dozen more of these. I think I spent half my high school and college years in arcades. Heck, I was even around for Pong. @LadyRhian, I think you and I are of similar age.
EDIT: Almost forgot my all-time favorite: Arkanoid!
You know you can still play these with MAME, right?
RASTAN: Classic D&D/Conan barbarian warrior on a quest to slay a dragon (while fighting classic mythical monsters along the way)
http://www.youtube.com/v/kFBs3X2LVAc?version=3&hl=en_US&rel=0
THE LEGEND OF KAGE: I loved this game and its music. A short sword-wielding ninja with an unlimited supply of shuriken fighting rival ninjas and fire-breathing monks on the way to rescuing (yet another) princess. I always thought Kage was female, from the character's hair and clothing (I guess I was wrong all these years).
http://www.youtube.com/v/vVhAlxIAuG8?hl=en_US&version=3&rel=0
I really liked the music in this version of Tempest
My mother had convinced my grandparents to buy her a Magnavox color TV shortly before I was born, in 1965. There was a whole Magnavox store at a local mall called Eastgate, in Chattanooga, TN, where they sold those big, cabinet, color TV's, which were a new thing in 1965, and that store, where once we went "just looking" during my early childhood, had the new Odyssey game console in there, with all kinds of display promotionals, just before Christmas of 1973 or so. I was about 7 years old, and she got it for me for that Christmas, or actually, she convinced my grandparents to get it for me.
That console was a huge part of my childhood, and I went from that, within a year, to wanting to go to Eastgate all the time to play pinball, Pong, and Tank, at an early arcade called "Games a la Mode", which, oddly, served ice cream in an arcade containing all the latest gaming technology of the time, dominated, of course, by pinball machines, but, they also had race car games and all the latest video game technology (of which Pong and Tank were the vanguards.)