So, you want to be an ARCADE champion?

Playing rules:

Difficulty: Factory Default. Start: 3 lives. Bonus: 1 life every 10,000 points.
Dip-switch:8 Toggle: 1-2=ON; 4-6=Coin Mech; 7=ON; 8=OFF. Dip-switch:4 Toggle: 1-2=ON; 3-4=OFF/Unused

Current Record holders

1st: 41,336,440 - Scott Safran - 1982
...
23rd: 1,137,050 - Ron Corcoran - 1981
24th: 313,780 - Donald Hayes - 2001


Ok, here it is – one of the daddies, but with it we now have a problem. See, any self respecting retro arcade “fan” feels obliged, nay compelled to be good at games that are the very pillars of gaming as we know it. That’s not to say you have to master all of the founding father games, just have a level of competence that you are happy with, a level of ability that will allow you to hold your head high and feel qualified on such matters. Bearing all that in mind, I have to wonder why I bothered with such a grandeur intro, because this is Asteroids, a game that I have never got with. Every attempt ends in tears as I play like a thumbless wonder, floundering all over the place crashing into this, missing that and generally making a mess of things. In short, I am complete dogshit at this game. – and it gets worse.

Asteroids is such a well know game that it also takes away the voyage of discovery that these rambling blog entries tend to enjoy at great length. You control a ship that rotates and shoot rocks, we know already. Balls. Hang on though, occasionally a flying saucer comes and…….oh, you know already. But but but, there is this hyperspace key that…….what’s that? shut up ya mook – we know already? Oh ok. So….what are we left with? Essentially we’re left with a game that everybody knows, with the added bonus that I’m proper pump at it. Looking at the records it is very clear that this will prove an embarrassment to all involved, so lets just skip it shall we? yeah? marvellous………..Don’t be soppy, of course we won’t skip it – come back! This quest may be about becoming an arcade champion, but we don’t have to be good at *every* game do we? No, of course we don’t  – I mean why start now eh? Alright alright, settle down now.

I haven’t seen an actual Asteroids arcade cab for many many years, in fact I can’t imagine that there are that many knocking about these days. So, when I wandered up to one at FUNSPOT earlier in the year it was a nice surprise. Most surprising was just how beautiful the vector graphics were – I seriously don’t remember them being that striking. You read and hear many things about Asteroids, but I bet you’d be hard pushed to hear much praise for the graphics, I mean its in crudely shaped black and white after all. Well that’s true to an extent, but you can’t ignore a certain romance with vector games – I mean just look at how popular the Vectrex is on the retro scene.

What clearly helped in this case is that the FUNSPOT arcade has just the right ambience about it, the sounds, the smells and just the right level of lighting (i.e quite low). Actually all that is missing is the small layer of cigarette smoke just above head height – for obvious reasons of course (although in a weird way, even as a non smoker I *miss* this small detail as well). Considering all of this, clean vector graphics are truly at their best and I strode towards the arcade cab with true admiration in my eyes. Not thirty seconds later and the bubble had popped, I called the game a “complete cunt” for hyperspacing me to death again and my 25cents was gone, never to be seen again. My score was something in the teens at best, maybe a few thousand – happy days.

So, here we are again – this time in the comfort of my own home and things don’t start well as sadly the graphics look dull and knackered without the sharp beam of light behind them. That and the fact that I felt the need to try and have the artwork switched on (after it being absolutely necessary for Armor Attack a few games back) – I soon remembered why I had it switched off in the first place.

Not only does it look like the screen now has haemorrhoids (or for the fainter of stomach imagine them as curry Nick Nack crisps perhaps) but it actually covers nearly a quarter of the playing screen! I mean, I’m all for making the emulation experience as authentic as possible, but this is just dopey surely? While the arcade cabinet did indeed have this artwork, it was printed a few inches in front of the actual gaming screen so you could see past the obstruction with little problem – not so here; It’s not as if I need more of a challenge either for goodness sakes. Oh and did I mention how dull the graphics looked? sob…..

Right that’s quite enough of that. Let’s get down to the nitty gritty, let’s look at the scores and get our professional head on. What we have here by the looks of it is what they call a “marathonable game”. This is another one of the small scoring games, so to even begin to get near the millions you surely have to start measuring the gameplay time in days rather than hours. Either that, or there is an exploit somewhere that has been deemed legal as far as scoring is concerned. My hunch is that it’s a little from pile A, a little from pile B. 

We’ll come back to that, let’s get straight into a game and get a benchmark score on the board.

Score: 5,900

Yes, that was quick wasn’t it? Promising though, now all I need to do is multiply that score by about TEN MILLION and I’m in record territory. If you weren’t aware of the job on our hands before, you are now.

Only one thing for it, I’m clearly playing it wrongly – time for Science to get involved, more specifically, Trial and Error science!

Let’s look at the cold hard facts first. You control a small ship which is able to rotate left and right using a key for each. As well as this you also are able to enable the thrusters and “boost” yourself about in the direction you are facing. Simple enough, no fuel gauge or overheating or any of that business – boost all day long if you like. To enable you to become the fighting machine that you so clearly are you also have a “fire” button. Again, no ammo limits here so a slow steady stream of bullets are constantly available if you so desire. Finally we have the desperation “hyperspace” button - theory here is to press this bugger when a collision would appear to be inevitable and randomly teleport somewhere else on the screen – not without risk mind you as you can be teleported into danger and die immediately.

Your opponents are the aforementioned asteroids themselves that float about, breaking into smaller and smaller parts when shot. You shoot all of the bits and its on to the next level where it all starts again only faster and stuff. Aside from the rocks themselves you’ll occasionally find a small flying saucer will float on the screen and try and rough you up a bit, just to keep the game fruity and flowing. That’s it! Sound simple? Good – cock on.

Technique 1: Stand the fuck still and shoot stuff
It makes sense to start with this one because this is my default way of playing the game. Thing is, what with all of these pieces of asteroid flying about, especially the smaller fast ones, I just can’t concentrate on shooting, steering AND thrusting all at the same time(careful there carry on fans). Steering and shooting? No problem. Steering and thrusting? Again, easy (although bloody useless). All three? forget it. Now before you all point it out, YES this is why I am shit at the game. Still maybe this is the secret that all the kids are talking about. let’s try a game where I don’t move at all and just concentrate on shooting.

Score: 8140 

That didn’t actually go as bad as I’d thought it would. What it did tell me though was that I obviously *do* move about a bit usually as it was really quite tricky to resist moving when a massive rock is on it’s way. There is definitely some advantage to solely concentrating on just shooting stuff though – although of one of the flying saucers manages to fling a shot your way then you’re shafted. Not a record breaking technique clearly.

Technique 2: Fly around like an idiot and try and shoot stuff on the move
So we’ve tried standing still, let’s try moving about like a loony and seeing how that works out. That’s not to say that the technique is all about moving and nothing else, but lets be a fully mobile killing machine, keep ‘em guessing and all that.

Score: 5100

Nadgers. That was really rather tricky. What really hinders you when you play this way are the wraparound nature of the screens. Everything, including your bullets, wraps around the screen whenever it reaches an edge, so if a rock leaves the right hand of the screen it re-appears almost immediately on the exact opposite side still travelling the way it was. With that in mind you soon find that anywhere but the central area of the screen is a bad place to be as it is really hard to know what is going to appear right on top of you if you stray near an edge. Of course, flying around like a spacker means that most of the time you find yourself being killed by something appearing pretty much right on top of you. While you have the advantage of your shots reaching across the screen, it just isn’t enough to be worthwhile in itself.

Technique 3: Stay in the middle pretty much and use the Hyperspace to your advantage
Ok, this could be the winner. Don’t limit yourself to staying in one spot, but don’t stray too far from the centre. If anything comes too close slap that hyperspace button to win and profit. Easy.

Score: 13,630

That’s more like it - although the hyperspace button was an absolute mess. Not only is it hard to keep poised over the button, being able to press it in time is pretty tricky. Many a time I pressed it in a panic when it was actually no danger at all. ITS COMING STRAIGHT FOR US! no it’s no…….ZZZZzzzap! Considering the dangers in hyperspacing this isn’t advisable if you can really help it – and OH, what danger! Several times I died immediately after coming out of hyperspace for what appeared to be no reason at all. Either it killed me for shits and giggles or there *was* a rock there but it blew up with me. I can’t be sure but I’m convinced it was more the former. The score was a lot better though, but I reckon that’s more to do with the moving subtlety thing. Sooooooo

Technique 4: Ignore the fucking hyperspace button and concentrate on staying away from danger without leaving the centre
It’s with the last attempt that I have an idea. With the rocks flowing on and off the screen you can sort of see their movement as “waves”. Rather than my usual focus on moving and shooting, maybe I should try spotting the next “wave” – making sure my ship isn’t on collision course with anything and then shooting all I can before the next “wave”. Does that make sense? Well I think it does to me, I suppose we’ll see.

Score: 24,400

Fuck my old boots, it actually worked. Although the “waves” I keep on going on about aren’t as distinct as they could be, what with some rocks having different speeds, I really could see the enemies in this way and it made me a hell of lot calmer. So much so that the game actually became a bit enjoyable (I know!) With the panic out of the way I actually had time to see some of the more subtle parts of the game.

One thing that became immediately apparent was the need to avoid having a screen full of small asteroid pieces. The natural instinct is to always go for the big ones (which explains why all the ladies try to get in my pants, but that’s another story) but that is actually the last thing you want to do! If you can keep a few of the bigguns on the screen while you clear the smaller debris it makes things a hell of a lot easier. Also, while the avoid then shoot plan works a treat most of the time, be careful not to shoot an Asteroid when it is too close to you as chances are it will split up in crazy ways and suddently you find yourself smashed before the next wave begins allowing you to adjust. The last thing to learn is that the flying saucers are fucks of the highest order. Pretty much every single death on this attempt was because of one of the smaller type that comes a bit later in the game. Bloody things.

What we can’t avoid here is the fact that I am getting absolutely nowhere near the records and I think I have worked out why that is (no it’s not just because I’m shit).

Technique 5: Leave a few asteroid pieces floating about harmlessly and “harvest” the high scoring flying saucers.
Here we come to the nitty gritty. See, the rocks are worth 20 points each shot so they can’t be used to build up much of a score. The flying saucers on the other hand, they’re worth thousands (especially the smaller ones with vicious “small saucer” syndrome). That’s fine I hear you say – but there isn’t actually any way that the game forces you on, as it were. Most games stop you hanging around on a single level by having either a time limit or an invincible baddie that comes on and ushers you along. – not this game, in fact it’s the opposite. If you leave just a single piece of rock floating about, then the game just keeps pouring flying saucers at you, one after the other without ever making you go to the next level. In other words, the big scores are coming from the clever management of the saucers and not the rocks at all. Let’s have a go.

Score: gave up at 42,000ish

Now we have a problem, albeit different to the one we alluded to at the beginning of this chapter. The problem with this game isn’t just that i’m rubbish at it – the problem is that getting a high score simply isn’t any fun and strictly not playing the game as it was intended. Playing the game in this way takes away pretty much everything the game stands for bar the shooting of the flying saucers. Ok, this isn’t actually the record holders’ problem, in fact I would agree that it should be allowed in the official rules as it isn’t strictly an exploit – it just isn’t for me. If I become world record holder at one of the games on this list, I want it to be something that I would proudly demonstrate to all that want to watch – to stand up in any arcade and show my skills. Watching someone sit there with an empty screen bar a couple of harmless rocks while they wait for a flying saucer every 10 seconds or so isn’t much fun – especially considering you will be doing it for HOURS and HOURS. To see what I mean and to contrast (not to gay him up or anything) watch the video of Tony Temple winning the record on Missile Command – even better watch him live at FUNSPOT one day. It’s bloody night and day I tell you.

So where did that all get us? Well I want to make it clear that I don’t de-value the record in any way, strictly speaking you are playing the machine at it’s own game, finding a weakness and taking advantage – that’s absolutely fine by me. Being such an old game, it clearly wasn’t tested against such playing techniques – If it were then I would expect either a time limit or invincible enemy hurry up as I’ve mentioned earlier. It’s just not for me that’s all. As I always say, and will keep saying I’m sure, the records aren’t actually that important to me compared to the experience and the opportunity to play these games again in anger.

So all that being said, I’m sticking to technique 4 in the future. Not only that, but I’m taking this as a victory. Yup that’s right you heard me – I started off being dogshit at this game, and now I’m merely poor. While I may not be able to walk into an Asteroid competition with my head held high, I at least now have a way of playing that not only makes it fun to play, but i reckon I could beat a few kids at it if I put my mind to it…..Toddlers maybe…….whatever, that’ll do me.�

Next game – Arm Wrestling (Nintendo, 1985)

Yeah that’s right – I’m skipping this one, wonder why. You know what that means though – one of my arch nemesis games is next, a game that is undeniably beautiful when seen on a real cab, but a game that I am absolutely pump at. I mean proper, proper rubbish……stay tuned batfans

Playing rules:

Difficulty: Factory Default. Start: 3 lives. Bonus: 1 life at end of stages 4 and 8.
Dipswitch Bank: 1=OFF; 2-3=ON; 4=OFF; 5=ON/OFF[Upright/Cocktail]; 6-8=OFF/UNUSED. Dipswitch:2=ON

Current Record holders

1st: 101,010 - Roger Isettsn - 1983
...
4th: 50,760 - Brian McLafferty - 1983


Get ready kids for another trip down surreal street – this game is another one of “those”, only this time with added pink!

Interestingly a lot of the games so far through our journey of the letter “A” are from the same crazy infant 80′s era, this particular beauty from 1981. As we all know (Well I say *all* if you don’t, take a peek at the yearly filters in MAME32) 1981 was a cracking year for video games with classics such as Donkey Kong, Frogger, Scramble and Galaxians all coming out in the same year. However, it was also a year for crazytown games – two of which we have already covered: 005 and Amidar. The scars from those two alone are yet to heal, yet as is the rich tapestry of life we have to take the rough with the smooth, the fucked up with the classics. Which brings us to this baby, Armored Car.

Now, what I didn’t realise was that a very similar game, New Rally X was actually released in the same year – which sort of makes sense when you see the two games running side by side. Obviously the developers of this game had a problem on their hands, the new improved Rally X was a very similar idea, a car driving about a maze picking up stuff and avoiding other cars, how could they make their game stand out? Well believe me, they managed it alright.

Without further ado I present to you Exhibit A:

Look at that little fella go! Through some sort of computer magic I have managed to get him animated for you as well, which I think is important as it allows you to see him in his full beauty. Now – what do you reckon that is? Pop quiz:

a) A crazy egg whisk sort of thing on its side
b) The latest gadget from fuckingmachines.com (it does exist, if you go there, make sure you wash your hands before coming back here!)
c) A car of course, stupid
d) A tank or something?
e) A road sweeper jobby
f) I give up tell us already!

Well I’m sorry, but I don’t have an answer for you. What I *do* know however that it moves only in a straight line and loves nothing more than to gobble up ever changing arrows and sawhorses. What? You heard me.

Perhaps we are a little ahead of ourselves here, let’s have a look at the game itself. You control the armoured (i’m going with the UK spelling now so keep up) car in the title and your job is to drive about a grid collecting all of the money and take it to the bank. Makes sense, sounds exactly the sort of thing you’d expect from such a role. But of course this being a game, it’s not that easy. For one, all of the money is lying about IN THE ROAD. That’s right just lying there as little dollar signs in the middle of the road. Of course the game makes no attempt to explain how it came to be that all of the money is scattered about, but whatever the reason happens to be, it’s your job to pick it up – so get on with it and stop bloody complaining already.

If it wasn’t hard enough already you also have baddies roaming about looking to smash you up good. Now apparently these chaps are robbers, but if that were the case then surely they would just wander about picking up the money from the street, not chasing around trying to catch a big armoured car that has probably only picked up a couple of quid itself anyway. Besides, the “robbers” are also driving faster cars than you so they could probably scoot about and clean up before you even had a sniff. Pffft, all I ask for is a bit of realism and what do I get?

Anyway, as well as avoiding the robbers you also have those crazy pink things, which I’m still convinced are sexual in some way, who move in a simple destructive line as I mentioned. Which brings us to to the arrows and the sawhorses. Dotted about the grid you have a handful of arrows on the road, pointing either horizontally or vertically that basically stop you dead in your tracks unless you are moving in the same direction as them. To make matters funky these arrows also change direction every few seconds or so, as arrows of course tend to do. All rather interesting, especially as in a rare fit of fairness the robbers have to obey the same rules! Hail Jebus some fairness. In all seriousness, it’s actually a nice little touch and it does add a little extra tactical skill into the mix, which is helpful because generally I’m absolutely pump at maze games.

Finally on our lengthier than usual synopsis, we come to the sawhorses. I have to admit I didn’t even know what a sawhorse was, I had to look it up – I was about to call them wooden barrier thingies or something. Whatever they are called they are your only line of defence against those pesky robbers, who “don’t like it up ‘em” and crash in a ball of flame if they hit one that you happen to drop in their path. That’ll learn ‘em.

So, onto the records. As is sometimes the way, the scores don’t seem all that threatening if I’m honest. 100,000 being the record with a mere 50,000 being the price of getting on the board – all sounds rather achievable, but then I’ve said that many a time already and have been completely wrong more often than not. What doesn’t bode well is that the records are all from the early 80′s, so again either no bugger can find the machine to play or they’re actually decent scores. We’ll see!

Within the first few seconds this theory again starts to dissipate – despite earning 10 points a second for simply moving, picking up the $ signs only yields 100 measly points. Never mind, at least there are plenty of $s dotted about, I’m sure they’ll be a nice juicy bonus once I get to the bank. So off I toddle, sometimes getting a bit mixed up on the arrows but aside from that it’s rather good fun. It’s unavoidably a maze game though as those pesky robbers really do come after you with some vigour and before too long my lack of skill leads me to run straight into one of the buggers. Who is clearly made of some sort of super metal as he just carries on regardless, not even slowing down – just drives straight through my explosion and on his merry way. I know it doesn’t matter as I’m dead anyway but that sort of thing really does get on my tits.

Maybe it is this sense of injustice that makes me remember my one and only weapon option, the ever trusty sawhorses! My next life is completely different as I basically try and goad the robbers to follow me so that I can block their path and laugh as I shoot off into the sunset, probably with a martini in my hand or something. Soon enough I have my victim all lined up, that’s it, a little closer….NOW!

*BOOM*

That’s not right – that BOOM was me dying as I try to drop the bugger as he closes in only for nothing to happen….COCKS!

Puzzled and annoyed my last life begins with me putting down one of these pesky sawhorses straight away. Ah! I realise the error of my ways immediately – the sawhorse can only be placed on a junction, not in the middle of block – even if you press the button before then it simply waits for the next junction and puts it there. Which is exactly what it did on my last life just that I was caught before I got there. RIGHT.

Here comes another one, little closer, NOW!

*BOOM*

The written word “boom” isn’t particularly helpful, but this was a different boom. Almost as suprised as I was when I died, this time I watched as the robber drove straight into the sawhorse and exploded. That’s right – the *wooden* sawhorse. Smashing into an armoured car? no problem. A wooden version of a clotheshorse? fuck-me-nuclear-explosion. Of course. Still, realism’s loss is my gain and now my confidence is up – I may be wrong, but I also sensed that the other robbers sat ever so slightly uneasy in their seats; that’s right shitbags I’ve got your number.

Just a shame then that you are only given 4 deadly sawhorses and I’d spunked 3 of them away trying to work out how to put them down.

Score: 7,420

Not great. Still, it was the virgin voyage after all – now I’m ready! Playing the game properly now and things are racking up quite nicely. Although it’s quite tricky avoiding the robbers and the pink things, grabbing the dollars and heading towards the bank is easy enough. This time round however, without the red mist appearing whenever a robber comes near I notice a few extra things. First of all, this game LOVES a bit of pink. Pretty much everything is either pink or has some pink in it. What’s with that? If I mentioned to you that there was a game called “Armored car” and then asked you to name a colour that would be most dominant in said game, you wouldn’t come up with pink would you? Military green, deep blue, grey even – not pink. Not these boys, Armoured car itself? PINK. Colours the arrows flash when they change? PINK. Colour the bank flashes? PINK. It’s all very gay pride I have to say and all in all rather odd.

Listed right up there with pink in “things this game fucking LOVES” is the direction “right”. Where’s the bank? RIGHT. When do I go next? RIGHT. Almost everywhere you look there are signs with big arrows on urging you to go right. So much so does this game love the direction right that if you want to back-track a little, maybe you missed a few $ signs that you want to go back for, forget it. As soon as the screen scrolls right, any sort of attempt to move left and a screen FULL of arrows meets you as it scrolls back. Oh, it *lets* you go left, no problem at all sir – but if you do get ready for a world of arrows. Not only do you enter arrow hell, but everything in it’s path has been removed, so no $ signs either. Blimey.

Anyway, back to the game. I’ve actually neglected to mention another little subtlety and that is the fuel gauge. You see, you have limited fuel in this game and the PINK bar at the bottom of the screen slowly depleats, eventually running out entirely unless you can get to one of the frequently found GAS stations dotted about. Again some sort of crazyworld logic applies here as rather than grounding to a standstill once the fuel is gone you actually carry on, just a lot slower. What exactly is the car running on now then? Another cross in the realism box (are you keeping count?). As before though I have to again concede that it’s a nice little touch as it really makes the persuit of $ signs and the lock and key a more tactical affair. Hold on, Lock and key? Ah yes – I didn’t mention those as it just doesn’t make any sense. As well as the dollars laying about you also come across a rather large key (flashes PINK of course) and then further down the road a much smaller lock. What are they for? Fuck knows. What I do know though is that you get a paltry 10 points for the key, but then a massive 1000 points for then getting to the lock. Miss the key and get to the lock? nowt. Want to go back to get the key? forget it, that means going left into arrow hell and besides it’s gone anyway.

Right enough explanation, this is starting to read like a school lesson – I tootle along having a gay old time and eventually get to the bank unscathed. Short break for a bonus screen (with the nicely translated “1 Sawhorse for 4 moneys”) and then straght back in to do the same again, just this time the robbers are considerably faster. Doesn’t take long for that advantage to really tell and I’m knackered before too long

Score: 15,140

Not bad, but still pump compared to the records mind. Interestingly before my 3rd go I happen to let the game start to go through it’s attract sequence – and by jove what an enlightening minute that was. So much to learn, so much I had missed! The first screen alone epitomises everything I have said about this game – check this beauty out:

Told you this game liked the direction RIGHT and PINK didn’t I?

The following screens however, juicy info all the way:

- There is another button! A boost button no less. What a revelation that could prove to be!
- You can place sawhorses on top of the arrows and it will allow you to go through
- Each of the dollar signs you are desperately fighting to pick up is worth ONE dollar. A single bloody dollar! In it’s current sorry state that’s less than 50 pence in real money. You don’t need an armoured car for that, you need a wino with his pissed-in, dirty trouser pockets.
- There are a couple of other types of enemy: Ambulance, TNT truck – doubt I’ll be seeing either of those soon.

Motivation issues aside (50p each ffs), armed with the new info the 3rd play is a completely different story. With the added boost ability the game completely opens up and becomes loads better in the bargain. Sure it uses the fuel up a bit quicker when you boost, but it’s exactly what you need to avoid some of the more persistant robbers (robbing me of 50ps! They’d do better checking the bottom of water fountains). This is especially true on the second wave as the faster robbers were really rather tricky before, but now with the boost you at least have a chance!

Score: 19,300

You and I both know that isn’t a great score, but it’s about more than the score this time. This game is actually really really good fun, with loads and loads of subtleties and tactics to ensure that trying to grab a good score is neither a chore nor a slog. The boost especially takes the game to a whole new level and I think this baby will be one that I’m going to add to my list of “keepers”.

Also, and most surprisingly of all, there were another few ticks in the reality box that I noticed - for example despite me having a go at the robbers for being stupid, they DO actually pick up any money that they pass over! Who would have thunk it? As for the pink thing that we have puzzled about – there is an attract sequence screen that tells you what that is as well! The mystery is solved, and now I come to think of it – it *does* look like one them after all! What was the answer? well it was e) of course and it makes complete sense as the main thing it does is sweep up things in its path. Nobody need know that I actually went back and added that option *after* seeing the screen telling me what it was as originally it wasn’t even one of my guesses. See the way I’ve covered my tracks though by not making it the last one on the list? Genius that is, no-one will ever suspect a thing. Hoorah!

 What? You’re still here – next post will be

THAT WAY —>

Seeing as I just don’t have the time to create a dedicated webpage just yet for the “easy to read” version of the blog, I’ve found a second best solution – hoorah!
All of the games so far are listed in proper order and everything over there on the right, have fun.

(oh and don’t worry if you thought this was a new post, there is one just around the corner – check again on Thursday and it shall be there as I’ve nearly finished it)

Playing rules: Difficulty: Factory Default. Start: 3 lives. Bonus: 1 life for every five copters destroyed. This game accomodates both 1-player and 2-player games.

Current Record holders

Single Player:
1st: 2,009,000 - Tom Larkin - 1982
2nd: 319,670 - John Hooper - 1982
3rd: 130,800 - James Carter - 2000

Doubles:
2,257,850 - P.Hall / D.Davis - 1982

Some games, especially those from the 80s for some reason, really hate you. No no, I’m not talking about the enemies in the game or the storyline or anything – the actual machine itself hates your fucking guts. This game hates you – yes YOU. Why? who knows, but playing this game for any period of time will reduce you to a snivelling baby huddled in the corner, trust me. How does it do this, I mean it’s only a game right? Well, I’ll tell you.

First signs aren’t promising. At my first attempt of loading this baby up in MAME I became rather confused. All I could see was a small green vector shape in the middle of a fully black empty screen. Not much of an attract sequence that, not likely to pull me towards the machine in the crowded arcade that one. Hang on, 1980? Ok, well that arcade has to be pretty bare so it probably wouldn’t take much to get me playing. But wait, I stick my money in and the screen *stays* blank, just now some other tank like shapes are moving towards me. Better get moving then right? Well I would but the poxy jeep only moves a little bit and then stops for no reason at all, what the hell? Oh nice – invisible walls, this just keeps getting better. Shit, now my shots are hitting seemingly random invisible walls instead of smashing into the mighty tanks. Fuck that – switch off, go and make a cup of tea.

Tea in hand I return with a sense of determination and off to trusty klov.com it is, I mean I know it was 1980 but that can’t be right. Immediately it all becomes clear. This is one of those fancy games where the majority of the graphics are actually a stick-on bezel on the actual machine and in this case it really is the majority of the graphics i.e the bloody walls and everything. Now see, MAME does include all of that stuff, but usually I simply find it annoying so by default I have it all turned off - not an option for this game it seems. Back in MAME and I start to switch on the artwork and bezels like a madman before booting the game up again, and lo and behold, the arcade jesus has performed a miracle - I was blind and now i can see! Looks rather good as well I have to say, game on!

Now, I know what you’re thinking. That isn’t the game hating you for goodness sakes, you’re being overly harsh – after all the original machine wouldn’t have any of these problems. Well, you’d be right. In fact this isn’t even one of the hate filled episodes I spoke of, this is simply me being a tit. Glad to clear that one up.

So anyway, onto the game. I don’t know if any of you remember a game on the Atari 2600 called “combat”. One of the best games on the little wooden breadbox for sure; it was essentially two tanks (and then later planes and stuff) that rolled about various mazes shooting the shit out of each other. I don’t know the dates, but I’d be surprised if it wasn’t at least in part influenced by this bugger (what? Atari “borrow” ideas from other games? NEVER!). The controls are the same pretty much, rather than controlling the four directions you rotate left and right and then have two other buttons accelerate and fire - easy enough.

Looking at the records briefly we see a very interesting story. Top score in 1982 of 2 million. Next score down, same year 300 thousand. Finally in the year 2000 someone felt the need to challenge for the top honours and got, ahem 120 thousand. That’s quite a difference that. Either this Tom Larkin has some mad skillz (see? I’m down with the kids. No no, not in that way officer) or everyone else is absolutely shit. This gives me hope in a funny sort of way, I mean I’m not getting anywhere near 2 million, but the rest has to be achievable right? right?

Straight into the first game and we’re off! Immediately a couple of tanks come creeping round the corner and i’m off like a whippet. This little “jeep” of yours is pretty nippy, certainly a lot quicker than I expected that’s for sure. Right come here tank, whizzzzz, booom! Take that!

HOLD IT RIGHT THE FUCK THERE.

Now, I may have been seeing things but I’m pretty sure that when the points flashed up there it said “20 points”. TWENTY POINTS? The record holder has 2 MILLION points for fucks sake. Am I playing the same game?? Takes me a while to calm down I have to tell you, and in that time another tank trundles over and shoots me dead. The score isn’t on the screen during the game, but when you lose a life it flashes up briefly. Shit, I read it right, no missing zeros – 20 points. Damn.

Ok, my only hope here is that despite the fact that this game was made nearly thirty years ago, there is actually a rather funky multiple bonus score system at play here and I don’t actually have to literally shoot 200,000 tanks to get the top score – And strike a light there is! A big noisy helicopter comes sweeping onto the screen and once shot down the message “tank score + 10″ pops up. Ok, that’s pretty bloody stingy – even though I don’t really know what it means, but it’s a start.

So, with my anger abating, I sweep about using my old “Combat” skills to find some crazy angles with which I can shoot the tanks before they get a chance to get me. It’s bloody tricky though I have to say – not being able to reverse is a complete pain in the arse and although you whip about at a decent pace your rotation speed isn’t anywhere near responsive enough. Nothing illustrates this better than the helicopters that seem to come along every few seconds or so – they are right buggers to shoot down as they strafe across the screen homing in on your position as they go, while you end up a sitting duck as you slowly rotate so that the angle is just right to knock them out of the air.

Before long I’m looking at the screen through my fingers as my last life goes. Boom, dead. MISSION COMPLETED.

Score: 750

Hold on there, wind the tape back a minute. No, not the score, before that.

MISSION COMPLETED?

What in shitting christ is that? You die for the last time, game over,  and the game then tells you mission completed? The cheeky fucker. Ok, we’re all realists here – arcade games are designed to make money, we know that – Hell, we don’t even begrudge them that. But to gloat in such a way once your hard earned money has been spent is taking the piss somewhat.

Picture the scene: A northern english family, 1980, struggling to get by. Money is tight, god it’s tight. The pits are closing down, can hardly afford to feed t’babies day in day out. Tell you what though little Jimmy, its your tenth birthday after all, me and Grandpa have saved up our wages for the past few years, take this 10 pence and spend it on whatever you like. Maybe get some new cardboard for the soles of your shoes, really splash out on something luxurious – Go’orn, treat yoursen lad. So, young Jimmy scampers down the street on his way to the butchers, maybe he can even afford to buy some food that hasn’t fallen onto the floor with his new found riches, maybe he can even afford a whole sausage. But then he sees it. In the local arcade window the faint glow of flashing lights grabs his attention. Jimmy has never seen such a sight and before he realises it he is in the arcade and in front of the machine. Family instinct kicks in and he first checks the coin return slot for any neglected money, but then without even thinking his 10 pence coin is in the slot and deep into the belly of the machine. His stomach rumbles, but he doesn’t care a jot, he’s in and deep in his heart he has never been happier. The next 37 seconds are a blur, Jimmy can’t even reach the buttons properly for goodness sakes, but he’s playing alright until his last life is gone. “MISSION COMPLETED”. The joy literally bursts out of Jimmy – he’s never achieved anything in his life that didn’t involve coal and now here he is, not only playing an arcade machine, but playing it so well that he’s completed a mission. What a feeling for little Jimmy. But then, what’s this? The buttons no longer seem to do anything, try as he might little Jimmy can’t get his jeep to move. It takes a while to realise, but the game is over. But what of the mission? With raw fear in his eyes Jimmy rushes to the arcade attendant and tugs him towards the machine pointing to the game as he goes. His confusion turns to despair as the man explains that, yes indeed the mission was completed, but not YOUR mission – the machine’s mission to take your money and then spit you out. In fact the man can barely hold back a laugh as he sees the score; “750 points? What sort of score is that you slag? Now piss off out of it”. Poor Jimmy. Poor poor Jimmy.

Now, in no way whatsoever was that a way to hide my wonderful score, although to tell the truth I can’t remember what it was – up there with the records though I’m sure. Ok, it was 750 points. Jesus.

Ok, longwinded and laboured story out of the way I approach the next turn with not only a spring in my step but a different tactic. Play to your strengths Mr Miyagi used to say (either that or “Wax on, Wax off” – I forget), and the biggest asset this little jeep has is speed. So, instead of sitting still trying subtle angles, I’m going to steam all over the place like a mentalist and see how I get on.

Oh and how I get on – at first at least. It’s certainly a better way to approach the tanks as their turret rotation speed is actually slower than yours, so a quick whip round the back as it were and you have a nice opportunity to get a shot away before they even take aim. The helicopters as well are pretty confused when confronted with a jeep thrashing its way directly towards it and I took a fair few out at close range without taking any hits. I’m actually starting to enjoy myself a little as well – surprisingly, for a game as old and primitive as this there are some nice little graphical touches, your shots cause a little ricochet like flash when they hit the walls and the tanks and helicopters don’t simply explode, but they sit there as wreckage for a while. The sound effects as well are really quite effective despite being very simple. The game starts with a string of morse code (fact fans: apparently this spells out “don’t register” in protest of the return of draft registration) and the sound effect for the tanks is especially nice, with a good squeakiness about it.

As ever with these things I am shaken out of my brief pleasure as I am shot dead by a tank I’ve already killed. That’s right, the wreckage that I was just singing the praises of but a paragraph ago bloody shot me! Now that my friends in NOT cricket. It’s true though, sometimes when you shoot a tank, it would appear that only the tank part dies and the turret stays alive, able to adjust its aim and everything! The cheeky bastards. This of course scuppers my new found tactic as again and again I swish up to a tank, shoot it to death, turn to whizz to the next one only to be shot by the newly formed wreckage. You can’t even re-shoot the fucker either, not only does it stay alive, but it becomes invincible. Slags.

MISSION COMPLETED 

Score: 1610

Ok, it’s clear that I’m simply not getting this game. That was a much better display yet my score is a paltry 1610. Compared to the 130,000 I took the piss of at the beginning that makes me out to be a complete mug. However, the show must go on, so a third and final go is on the cards. This time I shall use a combination of tactics – I shall strive to combine the speed method whilst retaining my role as king of the angles. This has to be the way forward, I’m sure of it.

MISSION COMPLETED 

Score: 940

fucksticks.

God only knows how such large scores are possible, as you can see I am so far off it isn’t even funny. I can only assume that there is a trick to basically playing for as long as you like that I haven’t even begun to discover. I did find that the extra lives are quite plentiful, essentially every 5th Helicopter you shoot gives you an extra jeep so you could in theory play for ages if you were good enough. Still, that being so, a score of two million must take hours and hours to rack up and frankly it would be a rather painful way of spending your time. It begins to make sense that nobody has challenged the big scores since 1982 actually now I think about it. Twin that with the fact that the game obviously hates the player’s guts and you have a right barrell of laughs on your hands. I’m sorry machine, little Jimmy may have fallen for your charms, but if I ever find myself in his situation I’ll simply walk on by and tuck into a nice cumberland instead. MISSION COMPLETED.