Asteroids

created and published by Atari in 1979, running on Arcade

type: shooter
genre: Science Fiction, Arena shooter, Asteroids-like
perspective: bird's-eye
player options: single player

languages: eng

3.8/5

Find at ADB

bootleg(s): Meteorites

Description

With your space ship you have to destroy all the drifting asteroids on the screen. When shot, these will break into small ones. Beware of the shooting UFO!

The second game to use a vector display. Drew many elements from the vintage Spacewar!, such as the hyperspace panic button.

70,000+ units sold!

The first game to record players initials and their high scores.
Also first game to record players faces, initials and their high scores. Ralph Baer had the idea of putting a camera in an arcade unit so gamers could have their picture next to their highscores. Great idea right? Atari thought so, so they tested it by putting it in an old Asteroids unit that had been sitting in a arcade for years. This way they could test the reaction to the camera feature independently of the to the reaction to a theoretical new 'camera game'. Turns out the camera feature dramatically raised sales on the old game. Atari was very excited at first. But then abruptly, they called Baer to say they weren't interested in the technology and warned him that probably no one else would be either. This was due to an unexpected use that a patron had found for the high score camera. After making 1st place he climbed the cabinet and dropped his pants to offer a visual aid to compliment his #1 score. However, the videogame camera would later find a use behind developer's doors. Real people and objects were digitized to use as sprites in games; such as [[gameid:100 Journey]]. Later the Gameboy camera would be invented, and just as quickly abused. Still later the EyeToy would be sold for use in peoples homes, behind closed doors, where they can use it however they like.

# 2006