Space Invaders, owned and manufactured by Taito, is the best-selling video game and highest-grossing entertainment product of all time.
Tag Archives: shooter
Old Arcade Shooters Special
I have a fondness for old arcade shoot ’em ups. Particularly the first colour arcade shooters of the early Eighties. Just hearing the sound effects takes me back to my childhood… Playing Space Invaders at the local leisure centre. Galaxian at the video lending library. Phoenix at the seaside…
I’ve covered a few old arcade shooters already on here, but this ‘special’ is meant to fill in a few gaps. Particularly with regards to pioneering video games of the early ‘colour era’ of arcade machines.
Quake, PC
Doom was good, but Quake – for me – was where id Software really broke the First-Person Shooter mould, with a game far ahead of anything else at the time – even their own games…
Doom II, PC
Doom II: Hell On Earth (to give the game its full title) was released in 1994 and is the sequel to the infamous id Software blaster, Doom.
It uses the same engine as Doom (id Tech 1), but has more variety and is optimised to be more detailed and quicker.
Doom, PC
id Software‘s hit shooter, Doom, blew the roof off the gaming world when it was first released in 1993.
It was the first First-Person Shooter that moved really fast and smoothly, and gave you a real sense of ‘being there’ when you played it.
The Thing, PC
Taking place immediately after the events of the famous John Carpenter film of the same name, The Thing is a 3D survival horror game that aims to wallow in the sheer, dark, brilliance of Universal’s 1982 cult sci-fi hit.
F.E.A.R., PC
A classic first-person survival horror game from Monolith Productions and first released in 2005.
F.E.A.R. unfortunately came out not long after Half-Life 2, so was kind of drowned-out in the attention Valve‘s release was getting. It’s not as good as Half-Life 2 – to be quite frank – but is definitely up there with the best releases of that year.
Clive Barker’s Undying, PC
British author Clive Barker was a writer and creative consultant on this 2001 Windows/Mac release.
Clive Barker’s Undying is a survival horror, first-person shooter – with magic – and was developed by EA Los Angeles. The game sold poorly on release and a planned multiplayer patch and sequel were both canned.
R-Type, Arcade
Released into video game arcades in 1987, Irem‘s side-scrolling shoot ’em up, R-Type, is considered by many to be the best of its type (pun intended).
Bedlam, ZX Spectrum
Another classic ZX Spectrum game from Beam Software, Bedlam is a straightforward vertical-scroller, but done in an incredibly finessed manner.
The King of Grabs 