Galaxian ( ギ ャ ラ ク シ ア ン Gyarakushian ) is an arcade game developed by Namco in October 1979. It was published by Namco in Japan, and Midway was imported to North America in December of that year. The game was a fixed shooter, in which the player controlled a spaceship located at the bottom of the screen, shooting at enemies, going down from different directions. The game was supposed to compete with the earlier successful Space Invaders game.
| Galaxian | |
|---|---|
 Arcade machine with a Galaxian game on display at the mNACTEC Museum in Terrassa | |
| Developer | Namco |
| Publisher | JPN Namco NA Midway |
| Part of a series | |
| Date of issue |  October 1979  December 1979 |
| Genre | Shoot 'em up |
| Creators | |
| Game designers | Kazunori Savano (沢 野 和 則) - designer Koichi Tashiro (田 城 幸 一) - programmer Shigekazu Ishimura (石村 繁 一) - equipment developer |
| Technical details | |
| Platforms | Arcade , different |
| Game modes | single-user and two players (in turn) |
| Control | joystick (2 directions) and button |
| Type of shell | vertical , horizontal , mini |
| Display | vertical raster color ( RGB ) |
| Arcade platform | Namco galaxian |
The game became very popular right after release. Two sequels were released: Galaga in 1981 and the lesser-known Gaplus in 1984, as well as a large number of ports and adaptations. Like the sequel, the game was one of the most popular arcade video games during the golden age .
Content
Description
Galaxian used the same success formula as Space Invaders , expanding it. As in the earlier game, there was an armada of attacking aliens at Galaxian who exchanged shots with the player. Unlike Space Invaders , in Galaxian, aliens periodically turned into kamikazes diving onto a player’s ship (called Galaxip ) [1] . Thus, this game was the first in which the behavior of enemies had a certain personality [2] . The plot of the game consists of the main screen, which displays the message “ WE ARE THE GALAXIANS / MISSION: DESTROY ALIENS” [3] .
Galaxian was very successful and in many aspects became the first game of its kind. Although Galaxian was not the first color game, it used multi-color animated sprites and explosions, fonts of different colors for the number of points and highest achievement, a scrolling game field with stars and graphic icons that show the number of remaining ships and levels that the player completed. The game also has a rough musical theme and background music. The combination of these elements defined the standard that many arcade games of the 1980s followed, such as Pac-Man .
Gameplay
The gameplay is quite simple. Wave after wave of an army of aliens attack the player’s ship, which moves left and right at the bottom of the screen (while going beyond the screen border leads to the appearance of the ship on the other side of the screen). On the screen at the same time there can be only one shell fired by the ship. After the player defeats one wave, on the next screen it is replaced by a new, more aggressive and complex one. Against the background, a simple repeating starry sky scrolls.
Versions
Standard Arcade Games
- Galaga (1981)
- Gaplus (1984)
- Galaga '88 (1987)
- Galaga Arrangement (1995) - Released as part of the Namco Classic Collection Vol. one
Laser Disc Arcade Games
- Galaxian 3 (1990)
- Attack of the Zolgear (1994)
Ports
The original arcade version of Galaxian has been ported to a large number of platforms, including:
- Apple ii
- Atari 400/800
- Atari 2600
- Atari 5200
- Bally Astrocade ( Galactic Invasion )
- Coleco vfd
- Colecovision
- Commodore VIC-20
- Commodore 64
- Dreamcast
- Game Boy (along with Galaga )
- Ibm pc
- Java for mobile phones
- MSX (Europe and Japan only)
- NEC PC-8801
- Nintendo Famicom (Japan only)
- Sharp X1
- Virtual Console (Japan only)
- ZX Spectrum
Galaxian was also produced as part of the Namco Museum collection series on several platforms:
- Dreamcast ( Namco Museum )
- Game Boy Advance ( Namco Museum Advance )
- Nintendo 64 ( Namco Museum 64 )
- Nintendo DS ( Namco Museum DS )
- PlayStation (as part of Namco Museum Volume 3 )
- PlayStation 2 , Xbox , Nintendo GameCube and Microsoft Windows ( Namco Museum: 50th Anniversary Arcade Collection )
- PlayStation Portable ( Namco Museum Battle Collection )
- Wii ( Namco Museum Remix )
Galaxian was also released on the Microsoft Windows platform in 1995 as part of the Microsoft Return of Arcade suite.
Notes
- ↑ Galaxian on the Killer List of Videogames website
- ↑ Arcade Games (unknown) // Joystick. - 1982. - September ( t. 1 , No. 1 ). - S. 10 .
- ↑ Galaxian Screen Grab, Killer List of Videogames (Link unavailable - history ) (June 1, 2010). (inaccessible link)
Literature
- The Definitive .. Galaxian (Eng.) // Retro Gamer : journal. - Live Publishing, 2006 .-- No. 32 . - P. 67-75 .
Links
- Galaxian in the Arcade History database
- Galaxian Guide on StrategyWiki
- Galaxian High Score table at Twin Galaxies (unavailable link from 11/08/2013 [2213 days] - history , copy )
- An article about the history of Namco and Galaxian (inaccessible link from 11/08/2013 [2213 days] - history , copy )
- Galaxian in the Open Directory Project Link Directory (dmoz)