80s Video Games

Posted by Admin

November 23, 2009

Favorite 80s Video Games

The best things that happened in any field happened only in the 80s. The best music, the best movies, the best clothes, the best shoes, the best sports matches and the best of everything were only in the 80s. Well, the above sentences will sound true if you’re in your late 30s or early 40s now. Present day teens and kids will hold contrasting views to the opinions expressed here, but if you were a teen or a pre-teen in the 80s, you’ll agree with everything that’s expressed here. While the debate on best music, best matches, and all other things can be kept aside, for now; gamers, young and old, will agree that the best video games belong only to the 80s. Here’s a small recap of the good old gaming times of the 80s.

A lot of people think that the technology related to video games were invented at the dawn of the 80s, but the precursor to the video gaming technology of the 80s were actually the missile defense systems(cathode ray based) of the late 40s. The same principles were applied to gaming to bring out the video games of the 80s. Starting with arcade games, consoles and PCs based games to the hand held games of today, most modern video games owe their gaming origins to the games of the 80s. If you remember well, you’d recall playing some games that were hugely popular in the 80s; so much so that many of us have been caught playing with one in the classroom and most schools even banned the games from the campuses. Some games that put us into a lot of trouble with school authorities and parents alike were Centipede, Donkey Kong, Super Mario Bros, PacMan, Zelda and Duck Hunt.

Even today many of us download games like PacMan etc, which was introduced in1980 and is considered ‘the’ video game that changed the face of the gaming industry. Developed by Namco in Japan and released in the US market by Midway, PacMan perhaps symbolized the game culture of the 80s best. Along with PacMan, two other games that were very popular were Defender and Battlezone. Centipede, developed by Atari, was introduced in 1981 and catered to the arcade gaming segment. A simple game, the idea was to eliminate the centipede that winds down the field after thwarting the repeated attacks of swarms of insects. Behind Centipede’s creation were Ed Long and Dona Bailey, the only female game programmer around at that time. Along with Centipede, another popular game that was introduced was Donkey Kong. An arcade game, Donkey Kong was pretty simple but engrossing. More of an obstacle game, the player had to dodge a lot of obstacles across many platforms.

The journey to the 6^th generation of gaming consoles of today, such as Sony Playstation 3 and Xbox 360 was a long one. Starting from the infant stages of the 40s, the video gaming industry passed through the most exciting stages of the 80s, survived the crash of 1983 and still continues to keep the young and the young at heart thoroughly interested in the developments. We have 3 dimensional, multi-interactive, motion sensing and realistic games today, and we do not know for sure how the video games of the future would be; but, one thing is for sure; there are no games that are present now and will be available in the future, which can bring some of us more joy than the simple PacMan, Donkey Kong, and Duck Hunt video games of the 80s.

Guest Article by Clark Bell

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TOP 80s Video Games Product Reviews

Guitar Hero Encore: Rocks the 80's...	Customer Review: After Guitar Hero revolutionized the video game industry and Guitar Hero II made it even better, an 80s edition should have been a blast.<br /><br />The first clue is that the game wasn't labeled Guitar Hero III - it was "Encore." Okay, s... Read More	(97)
Classic 80s Home Video Games: Identification &...	Customer Review: I really liked the large color photos in this book. The actual prices listed are something to be debated, but overall this book delivers. It does not include alot of lesser known 80s systems like the Vectrex... Read More	(8)
The 80's Game with Martha Quinn...	Customer Review: Generally anything that has to do with trivia I go crazy for, anything from Jeopardy to Trivial Pursuit, etc., so when I saw the 80's game I knew I had to try it. The trivia is excellent; it's fun, and not too easy that anyone can get it, and not s... Read More	(3)
Name That Tune 80's Edition...	Customer Review: I grew up in the 80s and love the music of those years, however unless you are from the UK or Australia you will not do well with this game. It repeats itself several times and has obscure groups such as Ultravox and Wa Wa Nee as answers...I swear Mi... Read More	$29.99 (17)
PlayStation 3 80 GB...	Customer Review: I bougth a playstation three 80GB in radioshack for his birthday,he loved it so i recomented to buy this because it's nicer than the slim,it's got it when it was 399.99 but it's worth it so i recomented buying it from amazon.com because they have bet... Read More	(416)