I hadn’t seen this 1989 arcade game from Atari Games before, until I played it recently, and even then I found it on the Commodore 64 first, then realised that it was an arcade conversion.
Skull & Crossbones has all the ingredients of a classic arcade action game, but – having played it extensively now – I can see why it failed…
The Sprint series began in 1976 with Sprint 1 and Sprint 2 – not, as you may think, a first game and a sequel, but the “1” and “2” denotes the number of players who can play the game.
Sprint 1 had a single steering wheel, and Sprint 2 had a pair of steering wheels, and in each game players control their vehicles through a variety of overhead, black and white race tracks.
This obscure 1987 arcade game from Data East was a big influence on many games that came after it, in particular Manfred Trenz‘s Turrican series. It is obviously itself influenced by Nintendo‘s 1986 game, Metroid.
It also displays some similarities to Karnov, another Data East arcade game released the same year.
And, while you may have never heard of this game, it’s safe to say that it’s a bit of a ‘hidden gem’ in terms of old arcade games still worth playing today.
SegaSonic the Hedgehog is an arcade game from 1993 starring Sega‘s famous blue mascot, Sonic the Hedgehog. It features beautiful isometric graphics and trackball-based multiplayer gameplay.
Puzznic is a one or two-player, puzzle-based, tile-matching arcade game, released by Taito in 1989.
And, while it might not look like much, it is actually a very clever and compelling game.
Atomic Robo-Kid is a horizontally-scrolling, progressive weapons shooter, designed by Tsutomu Fujisawa and manufactured by UPL in 1988.
It’s not a very well-known arcade game, but does have its fans. It also managed to get converted to a number of home systems too (including for the Sega Megadrive, but it never appeared on the SNES).
Xenon 1 by IJK Software is a very early shoot ’em up for the Oric 1 home computer. It shows off what the Oric is capable of, which is: not very much… 😉
Taito‘s American division developed this vertical screen base defence game in 1981. Colony 7 owes quite a bit to Missile Command, if the truth be known, and was also probably the very first video game to feature “rip-off” micro-transactions too…
Released only in North America on the Atari 7800 in 1990, Midnight Mutants is a free-roaming, scrolling action adventure with isometric graphics. It was developed by Radioactive Software and the box art features a likeness of Al Lewis, dressed as Grandpa Munster, who plays the role of “Grampa” in this game.
Written by Siegfried Kurtz and published exclusively for the ZX Spectrum in 1986 by Addictive Games, Kirel is a simple but playable isometric platform/puzzle game with attractive graphics and presentation.
The King of Grabs 