Best Arcade Game of All Time!

In the before time, home computers were things belonging to the rich and the best you could hope for on a console system was the Atari 2600 (which sucked...stop typing your angry retort NOW...it sucked...admit it...you may have loved it but it sucked)

In those days we would travel to the downtown or the local shopping plaza to a place called the Arcade and there for a quarter a play you could try your hand at games of skill on machines so far in advance of anything at home that it would blow your mind!

Those of us with bad backs and arthritis remember these darkened dens of inequity that swallowed our meager allowances and/or large portions of those hard earned paychecks from part time jobs that payed $3.37 an hour (my actual starting pay at my first job) fondly.

So what was the best Arcade Game of All Time?

I submit these five for your condsideration:

1) Battlezone



This was one of the very first, if not the first, game to sport a totally 3D battlefield. With it's periscope sight and the promise that if you got far enough in the game you could reach the mountains (a lie a friend told me but that I believed) I could play this game for hours. And that ominous missile humm....

Loved it.

2) Star Wars



Another 3D rendered game but this time you were flying an X-wing and assaulting the death star...in 3D...for a quarter! I still remember the adrenalin rush after putting the shot right in the exhaust port and hearing Obi Wan say "May the Force be with you, always!"

3)Berserk



Robot Attack!!!

In a distopian future where man is ruled by machine, you make your bid for freedom! Armed only with a "pew pew" gun you dash through the maze looking for a way out blasting robots as you go....until Otto...he comes...he cannot die! Yah your rich-kid friend may have been able to play Wolfenstein at home but one coin a play got you Berserk.

4)Gauntlet



There were other games around that time that let you and a bunch of other people play at the same time but none were as good as Gauntlet. Sure you were all doomed to die eventually as the monsters spawned more and more rapidly but so what. You and your boys pushing each other and yelling for them to do this or that or not to steal the potion or the food on you....ahh good times.

And of course, 30 years later we all know "Warrior needs food, badly."

5)Commando



A bit of a cheat I suppose. Not necessarily the best game ever but I personally loved this top down scroller. What fun shooting the hell out of the enemy and then getting into a tank and really letting them have it! And when all else fails take out as many as you can with grenades.

Of those five I don't think it's even close. It's STAR WARS by a parsec. Do you remember the actual console in the arcades? You'd sit in a little pod-like cockpit to play it and the flight control stick thingie was really unique.

I wasted more money playing Gauntlet than any other video game. I couldn't stop playing it but I don't think it was nearly as good and tight as Star Wars.

SFII' CE

I spent much time playing SF2 and Star Wars. I played a lot of time playing Gauntlet too, but that game is a pile.

Here's a couple that I loved and spent way too many quarters on. I'm sure there are others I'm forgetting:

1) Tempest




2) Smash TV




3) Dragon's Lair



4) Super Punch Out

I don't know about the "best".... but these are some of my favorites, starting with my favorite videogame of all time, Legend of Kage.



Next is Double Dragon. This title set the tone for countless beat 'em ups.



Last Blade 2 - an underrated 2D fighter that most probably haven't even heard of.



Probably my favorite side scroller... Rastan



I could go on and on....

Rampage, both Dungeons & Dragons games, Black Tiger, Rygar, Cyberball, Mortal Kombat 2, Lucky & Wild. Tons of great memories.

I'm obligated to say Mortal Kombat II since I actually own a full sized arcade cabinet of it.

However, if I'm being objective...it's probably Robotron 2084 or Joust.

I feel like I'm a few years younger than y'all (I didn't get into arcades until 1990-ish), but some of the mid-90's sega games were awesome, I'm talking Die Hard Arcade, Star Wars Arcade, and House of the Dead 1/2. For sentimental favourites, WWF Superstars, TNMT, and X-Men are cool, but I don't think enter the conversation for king of the hill here.

Bull Nakano wrote: I feel like I'm a few years younger than y'all (I didn't get into arcades until 1990-ish), but some of the mid-90's sega games were awesome, I'm talking Die Hard Arcade, Star Wars Arcade, and House of the Dead 1/2. For sentimental favourites, WWF Superstars, TNMT, and X-Men are cool, but I don't think enter the conversation for king of the hill here.

That X-Men game was pretty insane. It might be the best multiplayer side scrolling 2D-beat-em-up.

The problem with Double Dragon was you could just elbow your way to the end. I once beat on 2 or 3 quarters using the reverse elbow thing. It had some weird effect that during the animation you were invulnerable (possibly invisible) to the AI, and you could just back away a certain amount and throw an elbow.

The X-Men game and iirc to a lesser extent TMNT had awesome teamwork. The graphics were pretty sick for the time too.

Tempest is the correct answer.

Egg Shen wrote:
However, if I'm being objective...it's probably Robotron 2084 or Joust.

I vote for Robotron 2084.

And Berserk.

Kudos to Elevator Action. And may others. Asteroids, Space Invaders, Dig Dug, Pac-Man, etc.