Eamon

Who said everything should be handed to you on a plate? You want graphics with your fantasy adventure games? Better start imagining them...

Source // Wikipedia

"That's probably a pretty impressive hand drawn dragon for the time, actually". It's such a strong image to represent Eamon in fact, that this is what 1001 Video Games You Must Play Before Your Die chose to represent the game too. Perhaps a picture of text based gaming above a block of text about text based gaming is too much text. Whatever the case, my only expectation from this game is that there will be a lot of text.

But my first impression was actually one of 'oh, wow, what?', as I discover that Eamon was designed to be built upon by any Tom, Dick and Harry that wanted to create role playing adventures for people to play on their apple ]['s, with a list of hundreds of offerings from the community to pick and choose from.

Not only that, but I find that the platform is still being developed for, and that you can freely download a deluxe edition, which includes all the bells and whistles that decades of fan innovation and interest has brought.

There is, then, no excuse to not dive right in.

Defender

Yet another 'Save the World' situation that you wouldn't want me involved in...

Source // Martoon.org

Like many recent entries on this list (too many, personally), my first experience with Defender was one of utter failure to get running. Thankfully though, YouTube saves the day with an upload from Old Classic Retro Gaming. A solid 42 minutes of gameplay, no less, so that should get me started (insert joke about the state of video game reviews here).

Shoot aliens, save astronauts, it's that simple. But it's not. Of course it's not. Above the screen sits a minimap with a white highlight in its center. That's you, and there are the enemies, and that's the floor... but why are is that highlight in the middle? Why would I need to know what's behind me as much as what's in front of me?

Yes, you can fly right to left as well as left to right in Defender. Alright, we aren't talking Earth-shattering technology here, but some game had to show this thing off, why not a game where you're skimming across the surface of a planet in your spacecraft, firing projectiles made of every colour of the rainbow, illuminating the screen like nothing else you've seen before?

Feels like... Luftrausers vs Asteroids

I have a PS Vita game collection that really needs to be sifted through. Waded through, in fact. Playing them would be nice too, but I've got to see what I've got first.

One of the offerings from PlayStation Plus was Luftrausers by Vlambeer, a shoot 'em up from the skies with a unique look, at least in terms of what I've seen and remembered over the years, but at the time I downloaded it and left it alone. I'd come back to it at some point, I know I would. Why would I get a game and then not play it?

Finally, the time has come to pick it up, and for a good while I couldn't put it down. It's controls are dead simple and its physics - while not thoroughly obvious to me in the heat of battle, in terms of where I'd end up after a given input - have this floaty weight to them that reminded me of something I wish I had the chance to play properly...

Luftrausers feels like Asteroids.

Source // Wikipedia, Hardcore Gamer

Battlezone

A striking example of just how far games have come in 30 years, and just how much more forgiving they are in this modern era.

Battlezone (1980)
Source // Giant Bomb

Battlefield 3 (2011)
Source // YouTube

Battlezone sounds like a great little game. A few years prior, Combat was all that was available, with its top down tank gameplay and all the strategy that came with trying to outthink Player 2. Enter Vector graphics and a change in perspective and you've got Battlezone, a first person tank combat challenge that, once I remembered a certain Battlefield 3 mission, I was eager to play in order to see how far we had come.

Lunar Lander

Fate has ordained that the boys who went to the arcade to play in peace will stay at the arcade to play with the pieces.

Source // Wikipedia

I know I've played this game, somewhere. It might have been under the name Jupiter Lander, but somehow I've played Lunar Lander, I just know I have. I know because I was looking forward to replaying it. Land a lunar module on the lunar surface. Simple. And a demonstration of spacecraft physics to boot. What more could you ask for?

Galaxian

WE ARE THE GALAXIANS
MISSION: REVIEW GALAXIAN

Source // Wikipedia

I've not got a Scooby what Galaxian is, so it's a good job I've been told by a book that I absolutely must play it. Like all media, Galaxian is built upon what has come before it, and it doesn't take a genius to work out that Space Invaders was the game that laid the foundations here. Namco have taken what works and added more to it, in a colourful shooter that shows off the early days of the video game remix culture, if you will.

Asteroids

The probability of successfully navigating an asteroid field is approximately 3,720 to 1. About the same chance as me playing Asteroids in its original form...

Space. As cold and empty as...
Source // Wikipedia

Asteroids is awesome. It's simple to understand, tricky to master and addictive as anything. As with seemingly every Atari game on this list thus far, I've played Asteroids, I know I have, I just don't know where or how. I was looking forward to playing it again, which must mean I had good impressions of it from my distant past. Unless the nostalgia goggles have fused into my eyeballs.

Adventure

I wonder what could be in store when I load this mysteriously named game up...

Straight to the point titles have never been as fuzzy as they are here with Adventure, an open world text adventure with no text in sight. Supposedly home to the first video game Easter egg (which sees developer Warren Robinett credit himself for making the game - shocking, I know...), Adventure doesn't look like much, but then it doesn't have to look much in order to take you on an adventure. Assuming you stick with it and try to work out what it wants from you, of course.

Space Invaders

If the sole defender of Earth was to be me, say goodbye to the planet...

First Impression

Oh look, it's another classic that I couldn't tell you where I first encountered it and in what format. Left, right, shoot, it's Space Invaders, what more needs to be said? Lots of bad guys up top, not a lot of Earth down below, can you survive the looming hordes of aliens hell bent on invading?

Fun Times

There's nothing to Space Invaders, really, unless you want to invest the time into the tactics of sharpshooting and survival. You move your little turret shaped thing in and out of cover, firing back at the army marching down on you from the dark skies above.

Do you use the cover available to you to prolong your life, or do you shoot through it from your own side to open up some more channels of fire to keep the invaders at bay? Do you try and set yourself up for a well placed shot on the red mothership for more points, or do you fire with no purpose, hoping for a bit of luck to take over from what you lack in strategy? 

Both options are available to you in order to reach those high scores, but be warned...

Frustrations

... because you're not as good at Space Invaders as you think you are.

I saw this a lot, this red GAME OVER message. Was I rusty? Was I taking too many risks? Was I just not in the zone yet? Probably all of the above.

When you hop into a classic like this, you assume - especially if you've played it before - that you can slip right back into the frame of mind you were in when you last played it very well; when you were getting those high scores and making progress, when you were saving the Earth...

Not today. I didn't save the Earth. I failed it. I let you all down. Sorry about that.

Was Space Invaders as pick-up-and-play as Breakout, for example? I would have said it was. They need different approaches in order to succeed, but they're still from that time where games were easy to play and difficult to master. I thought I'd have more success from the start, but turns out I didn't.

Fond Memories

But who needs success, really? Games are about fun. High scores are all well and good, and if you have fun achieving a new score then good for you, but for me, a game will hold my attention for as long as I find it fun to play.

Space Invaders can have its ups and downs - you'll have your moments of stupidity and you'll have your successes when all seems lost - but you'll keep coming back for me because you remember it so well.

Final Word

Games are starting to get more and more detailed, even at this early stage. We've gone from a bat and a ball in Pong to early rocket physics in Combat to full on war in Space Invaders.

Well not quite, but we're getting there. Each stand out title is bringing something to the gaming landscape, trying to improve upon its successors, who themselves were sturdy platforms that can be used to reach new heights.

Today we're chained to the surface of Earth, tomorrow...?

Combat

Ever wondered what the Battlefield franchise looked like in the late '70s? No, neither have I, but one game has to kick vehicular combat into gear.

Atari's Combat does what it says on the cartridge, and does it pretty well. It doesn't look like much, and it takes a short while to figure out what you are and where you're going, but what you're doing is easy - shooting your opponent.

Like many a classic game from this era, it's so simple it's practically offensive. You vs me, no change in loadouts, no quirks, no perks, no faffing about.