Gun Fight
1975 - Midway - Shooting
This was an attempt to evolve the Pong concept, by introducing horizontal moves and selecting the shooting direction. The plot is simple: two cowboys challenge themselves in a duel. The first one to hit the opponent is (quite obviously I say) wins. There's no particular reason to consider this game a milestone... But this is the most ancient emulated game (it was released in 1975), and it brings us an idea of what people used to play in the mid Seventies. This was a 2-players time-game. This game-mode was widely used in early coin-ops.

Amazing Maze
1976 - Midway - Maze
This is a pure maze game. You must find the exit before the opponent (computer or human) does. Easy? Not at all: computer never fails (according to the reputation of computer from the Seventies). You can play three mazes or as long as you win. Maze games are a wide genre in arcades history. It lives today in other forms (Camel Try for example) and this is the first expression of an ancient classic.

Blockade
1976 - Gremlin - Maze
This is a milestone due to many reasons. You can still play it nowadays in Nokia's mobile phones, Disney used the same game concept in the Tron movie, Microsoft used it to show the incredible power of their GWBasic, and so on... As for Gun Fight, this is a 2-player only game, and game ended after round six (6 rounds? ...so you could end 3-3). Graphics was a mixture of text and drawn images, and the game was really slow. I guess you could play it drinking beer and smoking pipe at the same time...

Night Driver
1976 - Atari - Racing
Young videogames company Atari (founded in 1972) released this driving game in 1976. Arcades were studded of driving games, but this was a real innovating one, also having a wonderful cabinet. There weer 4-gear lever, pedal and wheel. You drove in the darkness (it reminds me of some Italian roads...), and the only things you can see are... milestones standing at the edge of the road. Nobodyelse is as brave as you to drive in such darkness, so you can accelerate to maximum speed and run on your supercar. There is a time limit and you have to use all your skill in order to drive avoiding milestones. This videogame introduces the "first person sight" concept, and it's quite funny too! About graphics: the title is due to the primitive hardware: I guess that this game would have been "Day city Driver" or "Early Morning Driver" if only the graphics hardware was better...

Sea Wolf
1976 - Midway - Shooting
Midway released another shooting videogame (oh warmongers...). I consider this game a prelude to the Space-Invaders era. Ok the location is different, but the concept is the same. You are, presumedly, a submarine captain and must shoot torpedoes to ships sailing the surface, within a limited time. Ships have various shapes and speeds. An odd thing is: randomly when you hit a mine, the word "Zap" is written... This is enough to consider it a milestone...

Sprint
1976 - Atari/Kee Games - Racing
Another racing game from Atari - they probably bet much on this genre. Cabinets had the same features as the one for Night Driver. You race on a circuit, against other players (computer or human) and time. Before beginning the race you can select the track (Suzuka, Montecarlo, Monza... Ehr...). This concept will be reprised from Atari in other racing games (Super Sprint, Sprint Championship, Badlands). Other versions of this game are in existance, allowing 2, 4 or 8 players to play simultanously. The 8-player version cabinet was really impressive due to the controllers layout.

Canyon Bomber
1977 - Atari - Shooting
You fly on a Zeppelin (then you'll also get an airplane) and your mission is to drop bombs in order to destroy the highest possible number of targets on the bottom of a canyon. There's an opponent (computer or human) who's the same mission as you. You can make three mistakes only. The concept of this videogame gave birth to another genre to become a classic: it starded a vein that had many variations and portings on almost all Home and Personal Computers. A new limit is introduced (three mistakes) to make game more interesting than timed games.

Car Polo
1977 - Exidy - Misc.
I'm unsure, though I think this the first full-colour game (the first emulated one, at least...). Well, colour palette is really poor - though better than many old CGA applications... It's a computer version of a not so common sport in Europe: Car polo. That's a mixture of powerful cars and old traditions. Your mission is to operate a car in order to "kick" the ball into the opponent's door. Game concept is really simple: you play in co-op with a computer player against human or computer players in a limited time game. Player with highest goals score wins. Game is quite hard to play because of the uncommon kind of controllers, also your car moves slowly and making goals is almost impossible... But it's worth a try.

Circus
1977 - Exidy - Misc.
This is probably the first circus-oriented game. It features a quite popular game concept which will then invade the following decade. You role an acrobat who attempts to pop three rows of baloons moving around the top part of the screen. You have to make him jump from a platform and bounce on a moveable springboard standing in the bottom part of the screen. Something like a deja-vu? Circus is the real ancestor of "Plump Pop" (take a look at Zzap!Raine issue #6)... So the concept wasn't that bad, was it?

Desert Gun
1977 - Midway - Shooting
Another concept, innovative in 1977 and really abused nowadays: an "aim-and-shoot" game. This first-person game could be considered the first game of this genre (I'm unsure but the original cabinet probably had a light gun instead of joystick - KLOV doesn't mention that... but emulation is very similar to the one of games having light guns). You must shoot the highest possible number of... of... well what are those creatures? There are also bottles on the bottom part of the screen but I'm unsure about the real reason of those being there. I marked this game as the first of this genre, nothing else...

Destroyer
1977 - Atari - Shooting
This is the exact opposite of "Sea Wolf" (read above): here you are the captain of a cruiser and your mission is to destroy the highest posible number of submarines, within a limited time period. Graphics are nice and the game concept will be used in many other following games.

Double Play/Extra Innings
1977 - Midway - Sport
Maybe the first Baseball-related game. It had to be hard to convert such a complex sport into a videogame, but they did it: this early version is quite faithful to the actual sport. Graphics and AI were, naturally, poor and made this arcade a bit similar to those early Eighties handheld LED games... (Mattel and Conic produced them)

Laguna Racer
1977 - Midway - Racing
If you are tired of all the racing games and you find them too easy... well, try this one! No, I'm not the author of this game er... But I find it a real challenge. Figure it: even though you run on a straight, it's darn hard to avoid other cars when you shift to the highest gear. Simple graphics (black & white monitor with a coloured artwork glued to the screen glass) and game concept too.

Poolshark
1977 - Atari - Misc.
Another big vein in Arcade: the pool game. Nowadays we find plenty of sex-oriented pool videogames, but in this first version you just have to make the highest score in a limited time (a little bit boring, isn't it). Forget about inertia effects, strenght and angle: you simply move the white ball by joystick. Be aware not to throw white ball or ball #8 in a hole, or you'll have to start again. Nothing else. There is, sometime, an odd flat/curve pool table that makes the white ball move in an unforeseeable way...

Rip Cord
1977 - Exidy - Misc.
The funniest game of this era! You move an airplane and your mission is to launch a few paratroopers. Aftear launching a paratrooper, you control him by making parachute open and thn ttry making him land safely on the highest score platform. Easy? Not at all: just take a look at the massively-populated sky. There are lots of helicopters which make your mission much harder and dangerous. This game is very funny: you can play it in "original" or "killer" modes (making paratroopers splatting on the ground or driving them against helicopters).

Super Bug
1977 - Atari - Racing
A new concept for driving games. Top view, varying path, and you even get bonus fuel/time at every 160 points! This game concept then evolved in later racing videogames like "Trash Rally". It's quite hard to operate the car at highest speed, but since there weren't many chances to make game challenging, programmers failed the aim to balance difficulty better than that.

Space Invaders
1978 - Midway - Shooting
Yes it is: one of the mighty gods in arcade history. I think that all of you's know about this game. If not, please close the browser and aim your attention to collecting stamps or something else! ;-) Seroiusly, for all those people (one or two persons I think heh) who don't know this game: aliens are attacking Earth and you are the last defender pilot of the world. Enemies attack in waves and you have the destroy every single invader before they land. Each time you hit one, the others (maybe they're scared of your incredible power?), move faster. Nothing else. This is a cult arcade and you must have it!

Super Breakout
1978 - Atari - Breakout
First breakout-style coin-op. Breakout is a genre, not just a videogame! Your aim is to destroy a wall (top part of the screen) by using a bouncing ball and a paddle (bottom part of the screen). This genre still exists nowadays and survives in many "sequels" ("Puzzle Bobble/Bust a move" for example). The original game featured a paddle controller: it's not easy to play the emulated game by using the keyboard, but if you like the genre and you have a paddle (lucky one...), you must try it...

Sky Raider
1978 - Atari - Shooting
I mention this game because of its odd video routines. Substantially this is a shooting game: you must destroy some ground targets... but the screen scrolls in a circular way. A nice nausea effect is guaranteed...

Asteroids
1979 - Atari - Shooting
Another big hit and another arcade god. You're onboard of your starship and fly in a heavily crowded space corner. You must tackle and destroy asteroids around you before they destroy your starship. This is one of the first vectorial graphics videogames. One more time, we have clue that a simple concept is the secret to make a great arcade. The inertia system could make any actions become really dangerous: it's very hard to change direction while your ship is travelling fast...

Basketball
1979 - Atari - Sport
An one-on-one basket arcade. I think this was the first basketball game featuring nice graphics (a little bit static actually... but well it was 1979!). Game concept is based on the common rules of basketball. Controls had trackball and an action button. It's very hard to play the game by using a keyboard or joystick... I recommend it to basketball lovers only...

Galaxian
1979 - Namco - Shooting
This videogame directly comes from the "Space Invaders" genre, which evolved incredibly during the following years. Game concept is almost the same, with the addition of alien squadrons which could attack your ship by moving away from the other part of the wave. Well not really innovative, but this was enough to make the game a "son" of the "Space Invaders" era (I can also mention "Moon Cresta"...).

Lunar Lander
1979 - Atari - Misc.
Another big classic: you operate a lunar lander module and your mission is to land safely on one platforms among a few available ones. You must deal with inertia and fuel consumption. Game is little but really funny. You can still play its portings nowadays in some solitaires and desktop games collection. By the way the original coin-op is really better than all of those remakes.

Star Fire
1979 - Exidy - Shooting
I chose this game for two reasons. First the game puts you in first-person view, and you move around looking from the cockpit of your starship. Second reason is that your enemies look much like Star Wars's TIE Fighters... This is one of the very first Star Wars-derived videogames for sure!