Midway

USA publisher and developerfounded in 1958-11-01 closed in 2010-06-09 status: dead

356
games
6.7
per year
52
years active

aka(s): Midway Games, Midway Home Entertainment

Midway Games Inc., known previously as Midway Manufacturing and Bally Midway, and commonly known as simply Midway, was an American video game developer and publisher. Midway's franchises included Mortal Kombat, Rampage, Spy Hunter, NBA Jam, Cruis'n, and NFL Blitz. Midway also acquired the rights to video games that were originally developed by Williams Electronics and Atari Games, such as Defender, Joust, Robotron 2084, Gauntlet, and the Rush series.

The company was founded as Midway Manufacturing in 1958, as an amusement game manufacturer. The company was then purchased by Bally Manufacturing in 1969, and used the Bally Midway name in the 1980s. In 1973, Midway moved into the interactive entertainment industry, developing and publishing arcade video games. The company scored its first mainstream hit with the U.S. distribution of Space Invaders in 1978. Bally then merged its pinball division into Midway in 1982. In 1988, Midway was purchased and re-incorporated by WMS Industries, Inc. In 1994, WMS purchased Tradewest to bring home video game market in-house, with it becoming Midway Home Entertainment in 1996, the same year that Midway made its initial public offering of stock. In 1998, WMS spun off its remaining shares of Midway. Midway was ranked the fourth largest-selling video game publisher in 2000.

Notable collaborators: Steve Polge, Jesper Kyd, Dave Nutting, John Paul and Barry Leitch

It is known for Arcade's Greatest Hits, Defender, Doom, Earth 21xx, Gauntlet, Gex series, Micro Machines, Mortal Kombat, NBA Jam, Pac-Man, Quake, Rampage serie, Robotron, Shadow Hearts, Spy Hunter, Unreal Tournament

Releases per year

1973 7
1974 5
1975 4
1976 4
1980 1
1982 2
1984 1
1986 2
1987 1
1988 1
1990 1
1991 1
1992 1
1993 6
1994 2
1995 7
1996 20
1997 21
1998 19
1999 21
2000 26
2001 17
2002 35
2003 30
2004 18
2005 25
2006 31
2007 23
2008 14
2009 4

350 video games with valid date were considered (98.3%)

Overall rankings

9
129
78
27
0
3.5
average

Common gametypes

action/reflex19%sport18%shooter13%racing/driving11%fighting11%other24%

Top platforms

  Xbox 46
  Arcade 45
  PS2 43
  PS 35
  GBA 25
  Windows 25
  GameCube 22
  N64 21
  Dreamcast 13
  X360 13
  GBC 9
  Wii 8
  Saturn 7
  PS3 7
  Mega Drive 6