<Arcade> The Unregarded.

[Ghostbiscuit]

My local swimming pool had a Vindicators cab next to Ghouls 'n' Ghosts back in the late 80s/early 90s, don't really remember seeing either of them getting much use, tbh.

[Deckard]

Mine had Missile Command and probably one of the first games I truly loved - love great controllers on games and that trackball rocked - nothing comes close which is why i just cant play it with a mouse Also loved the fact even if you sucked it would only wipe out 3 bases max per level - More games could benefit from not completely killing you in one level.....

[Foozwah]

From what little I've seen of "Vindicators" it doesn't seem like it'd be a particularly tricky one to convert (in terms of gameplay) to almost any format, including the Speccy, but I imagine the control scheme would be a stumbling block.

Bang on. The Amiga version looked good, but replicating the two-stick arcade controls was the issue - I played it in an arcade a few times and it was classic tank controls with two sticks, one each to control left/right treads. It actually felt really good to play, internal to the vibe that way, so all the ports were invariably disappointing.

[F-ZeroOne]

Apparently not overly rare, because for a LaserDisc game it was pretty successful, but I only encountered one once - "M.A.C.H. 3", from the people that bought you "Q-Bert". For some reason, though, it very rarely seems to pop up in discussions of such games:

[Deckard]

For some reason at our local arcade was a middle-aged lady who only came in to play one game - she ruled on Q Bert !

[F-ZeroOne]

Kim Justice recently looked at Konamis 90s arcade games and a couple of real obscurities stood out. First, "Surprise Attack", possibly best described as "Shinobi, but IN SPAAAAACE!":



And then "Gaiapolis". I'd be surprised if anyone encountered this in the wild as apparently it never left Japan, but its supposedly quite highly regarded by those that have played it:

[F-ZeroOne]

I expect most here are familiar with "Terra Cresta", but how many of you encountered "Terra Cresta"s giant robot cousin, "UFO Robo Dangar"?:



I was also recently reminded of "Alpha Mission", a vertically scrolling shoot 'em up that doesn't really stand out from the crowd except by being an "Unregarded":

[NorthWay]

I expect most here are familiar with "Terra Cresta", but how many of you encountered "Terra Cresta"s giant robot cousin, "UFO Robo Dangar"?:

I think you've found the arcade that horrified the publishing company after they checked out some of the stuff the Hybris guys left behind after they moved on.

[F-ZeroOne]

Er, sorry, I'm not sure of what you're referencing?

[NorthWay]

Er, sorry, I'm not sure of what you're referencing?

The story is that the Danes that made Hybris had left behind an arcade board which the publisher found, and when they checked it out they were horrified to see that Hybris was a near straight clone of that arcade.
Having seen UFO Robo Dangar now, Hybris is close - though limited to "inspired" IMO - but not enough to be reason for 'panicing' which was how the company was described as behaving.

[F-ZeroOne]

Ah, okay. Sorry, I'd never heard of "Hybris" before now.

[F-ZeroOne]

Whoops, going back through this I noticed I'd mentioned "UFO Robo Dangar" previously.

Time to introduce some... CULTURE... with "Super Space Fortress Macross", based on the popular anime series. This may not be the only "Macross" arcade game, I vaguely recall there was one based on "Macross Plus" possibly, and I definitely played a "Macross" arcade game once but I can't remember which. Even at the time, I had to wonder how such a uniquely Japanese piece of licenced media property made it to these shores. Thats the power of the Protoculture, I guess!

[F-ZeroOne]

So now that Keanu Reeves is by most accounts killing it as a gun-toting badass hedgehog (theres a perfectly normal human sentence), heres a couple "Sonic" arcade games of which there have been a surprising amount counting redemption games and the like. I've played one of these two, I think "Sonic the Fighters", at Tokyo Disneyland no less but memory may be playing tricks and it may have been "SegaSonic" despite them being completely different gameplay wise:

[F-ZeroOne]

Been a while. Its weird, but seeing an article about the PC Engine - i.e., not arcade - exclusive "Terra Cresta II" triggered a memory of when various companies tried to get simulation-type games into arcades. Ataris "Steel Talons" is probably the most famous, and some of you may recall the "BattleTech" gaming centres, but did you know there was an arcade version of Microproses "F-15 Strike Eagle"?

[F-ZeroOne]

And while we're on the simulation note, a game a little while back I got to try for myself - the grandfather of "Ace Combat", Namcos "Air Combat":