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Astro Wars
''Astro Wars'' is an electronic table top game made in Great Britain in 1981 by Grandstand under licence from Epoch Co., who sold the game in Japan as ''Super Galaxian'' (スーパーギャラクシアン), and in the United States as ''Galaxy II''. The game originally used a red logo on the housing; it was later switched to white. Overview Astro Wars was a shoot 'em up, with play involving four phases of dodging enemy missiles and firing back at the squadrons of alien command ships, warships and attacking fighters as well as a docking challenge for additional bonus points. Hardware The ''Astro Wars'' game runs on six volts DC and can be powered by four 'C' type batteries or alternatively via a low voltage mains adapter (not supplied with the game). As the display is based on VFD technology, it allows bright, multicoloured in-game elements to be rendered but at the cost of a relatively small screen size. The VFD display is manufactured with the pre-formed, immutable in-game obj ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Handheld Electronic Game
Handheld electronic games are very small, portable devices for playing interactive electronic games, often miniaturized versions of video games. The controls, display and speakers are all part of a single unit. Rather than a general-purpose screen made up of a grid of small pixels, they usually have custom displays designed to play one game. This simplicity means they can be made as small as a smartwatch, and sometimes are. The visual output of these games can range from a few small light bulbs or LED lights to calculator-like alphanumerical screens; later these were mostly displaced by liquid crystal and vacuum fluorescent display screens with detailed images and in the case of VFD games, color. Handhelds' popularity was at its peak from the late 1970s into the early 1990s before declining. They are the precursors to the handheld game console. History Early handheld games used simple mechanisms to interact with players, often limited to illuminated buttons and sound effec ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Grandstand (game Manufacturer)
Grandstand (also known as Grandstand Leisure Products) is a video game console and electronic game manufacturer and distributor. It was based in the United Kingdom and New Zealand and was active in the 1970s and 1980s. Overview The company initially behind the ''Grandstand'' label was Adam Imports Ltd., (from 1980 Adam Leisure Group Ltd. and by 1983 Adam Leisure Group PLC) founded in 1973 by Chris Rycroft and Les Kenyon of Harrogate, UK. The company initially started as a mail order company and was the single largest supplier of calculators in the UK by 1974. By August 1978, George Bassett had acquired a 75% holding in the capital of Adam Imports for £750,000 cash, plus 60p in the pound of profits before tax in excess of £500,000 for year to December 31, 1978. Adam Imports was re-acquired from George Bassett by Chris Rycroft in 1980. It chiefly imported electronic products from other manufacturers such as VTech, Epoch, Tomy & Entex, selling them in the UK re-branded under t ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Epoch Co
In chronology and periodization, an epoch or reference epoch is an instant in time chosen as the origin of a particular calendar era. The "epoch" serves as a reference point from which time is measured. The moment of epoch is usually decided by congruity, or by following conventions understood from the epoch in question. The epoch moment or date is usually defined from a specific, clear event of change, an ''epoch event''. In a more gradual change, a deciding moment is chosen when the ''epoch criterion'' was reached. Calendar eras Pre-modern eras * The Yoruba calendar (''Kọ́jọ́dá'') uses 8042 BC as the epoch, regarded as the year of the creation of Ile-Ife by the god Obatala, also regarded as the creation of the earth. * ''Anno Mundi'' (years since the creation of the world) is used in the Byzantine calendar (5509 BC). * ''Anno Mundi'' (years since the creation of the world) as used in the Hebrew calendar (3761 BC). * Olympiads, the ancient Greek era of four-year ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Galaxian
is a 1979 fixed shooter arcade video game developed and published by Namco. The player assumes control of the Galaxip starfighter in its mission to protect Earth from waves of aliens. Gameplay involves destroying each formation of aliens, who dive down towards the player in an attempt to hit them. Designed by company engineer Kazunori Sawano, ''Galaxian'' was Namco's answer to ''Space Invaders'', a similar space shooter released the previous year by rival developer Taito. ''Space Invaders'' was a sensation in Japan, and Namco wanted a game that could compete against it. Sawano strove to make the game simplistic and easy to understand. He was inspired by the cinematic space combat scenes in ''Star Wars'', with enemies originally being in the shape of the film's TIE Fighters. ''Galaxian'' is one of the first video games to feature RGB color graphics and the first ever to use a tile-based hardware system, which was capable of animated multi-color sprites as well as scrolling, th ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Shoot 'em Up
Shoot 'em ups (also known as shmups or STGs ) are a sub-genre of action games. There is no consensus as to which design elements compose a shoot 'em up; some restrict the definition to games featuring spacecraft and certain types of character movement, while others allow a broader definition including characters on foot and a variety of perspectives. The genre's roots can be traced back to earlier shooting games, including target shooting electro-mechanical games of the mid-20th-century and the early mainframe game '' Spacewar!'' (1962). The shoot 'em up genre was established by the hit arcade game ''Space Invaders'', which popularised and set the general template for the genre in 1978, and spawned many clones. The genre was then further developed by arcade hits such as ''Asteroids'' and ''Galaxian'' in 1979. Shoot 'em ups were popular throughout the 1980s to early 1990s, diversifying into a variety of subgenres such as scrolling shooters, run and gun games and rail shoote ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Vacuum Fluorescent Display
A vacuum fluorescent display (VFD) is a display device once commonly used on consumer electronics equipment such as video cassette recorders, car radios, and microwave ovens. A VFD operates on the principle of cathodoluminescence, roughly similar to a cathode ray tube, but operating at much lower voltages. Each tube in a VFD has a phosphor-coated carbon anode that is bombarded by electrons emitted from the cathode filament.Chen, J., Cranton, W., & Fihn, M. (Eds.). (2016). Handbook of Visual Display Technology. doi:10.1007/978-3-319-14346-0 page 1610 onwards In fact, each tube in a VFD is a triode vacuum tube because it also has a mesh control grid. Unlike liquid crystal displays, a VFD emits very bright light with high contrast and can support display elements of various colors. Standard illumination figures for VFDs are around 640 cd/m2 with high-brightness VFDs operating at 4,000 cd/m2, and experimental units as high as 35,000 cd/m2 depending on the drive vo ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Scramble (tabletop Electronic Game)
is a side-scrolling shooter game released for arcades in 1981. It was developed by Konami, and manufactured and distributed by Leijac in Japan and Stern in North America. It was the first side-scrolling shooter with forced scrolling and multiple distinct levels,Game Genres: Shmups Professor Jim Whitehead, January 29, 2007, Accessed June 17, 2008 serving as a foundation for later side-scrolling shooters. It was Konami's first major worldwide hit. In the United States, it sold 15,136 s within five months and became Stern's second best-selling game. ''Scramble'' was not ported to any major contemporary consoles or computers, but there were releases for the |
Galaxians
is a 1979 fixed shooter arcade video game developed and published by Namco. The player assumes control of the Galaxip starfighter in its mission to protect Earth from waves of aliens. Gameplay involves destroying each formation of aliens, who dive down towards the player in an attempt to hit them. Designed by company engineer Kazunori Sawano, ''Galaxian'' was Namco's answer to ''Space Invaders'', a similar space shooter released the previous year by rival developer Taito. ''Space Invaders'' was a sensation in Japan, and Namco wanted a game that could compete against it. Sawano strove to make the game simplistic and easy to understand. He was inspired by the cinematic space combat scenes in ''Star Wars'', with enemies originally being in the shape of the film's TIE Fighters. ''Galaxian'' is one of the first video games to feature RGB color graphics and the first ever to use a tile-based hardware system, which was capable of animated multi-color sprites as well as scrolling, th ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
Gorf
''Gorf'' is an arcade video game released in 1981 by Midway Manufacturing, whose name was advertised as an acronym for "Galactic Orbiting Robot Force". It is a fixed shooter with five distinct levels, the first of which is based on ''Space Invaders'' and another on ''Galaxian''. The game makes heavy use of synthesized speech for the Gorfian robot which teases the player, powered by the Votrax speech chip. ''Gorf'' allows the player to buy 2 additional lives per quarter before starting the game, for a maximum of 7 lives. The home ports omit the ''Galaxians'' stage for copyright reasons. Gameplay ''Gorf'' is a fixed shooter in which the players take control of an unnamed starship from the Interstellar Space Force, capable of moving freely on all directions around the lower third of the screen, in an attempt to prevent the Gorfian Empire from conquering Earth. Gameplay comprises five distinct missions; each mission presents its own distinct playstyle, but the central goal of e ... [...More Info...] [...Related Items...] OR: [Wikipedia] [Google] [Baidu] |
