Pastfinder Atari 8-bit PAL Screenshot
   HOME
*





Pastfinder Atari 8-bit PAL Screenshot
''Pastfinder'' is a vertically scrolling shooter designed by David Lubar and published by Activision in 1984 for the Atari 8-bit, Commodore 64 and MSX home computers. Plot The year is 8878, and the player is a member of an elite legion of planetary explorers known as The Pastfinders. His job is to collect artifacts from a mysterious, irradiated planet and deliver them to bases distributed across the lifeless area. Searing radiation and a deadly, mechanized landscape defense are the player's obstacles: the only remnants of an extinct civilization. Gameplay The goal of the ''Pastfinder'' is to collect historical artifacts and deliver them to bases scattered around the planet. Two major obstacles stand in the way of this mission. The first is the planet's automated defense system, consisting of multiple hovering barriers, rising and falling columns, opening and closing doors, fixed obstacles, and drones. Some of these can be destroyed, others simply bypassed or jumped over. The ...
[...More Info...]      
[...Related Items...]     OR:     [Wikipedia]   [Google]   [Baidu]  


David Lubar
David Lubar (born March 16, 1954) is an author of numerous books for teens. He is also a video game programmer, who programmed ''Super Breakout'' for the Game Boy and ''Frogger'' for both the Super Nintendo Entertainment System and Game Boy. He designed '' Frogger 2: Swampy's Revenge'' for the Nintendo Game Boy Color. Biography Lubar was born and raised in Morristown, New Jersey. As a boy he frequented the school library where his mother worked, as well as the town library and county library. He attended Rutgers University and received a degree in philosophy. After graduating, he tried to write full-time, but a low income forced him to pursue more lucrative options. David married his wife around this time in 1977. He began writing for '' Creative Computing'' in 1980. In 1982, Lubar was offered a job designing and programming video games in California. There he designed and translated video games for Atari, Nintendo Game Boy, Apple 2 and the Nintendo Entertainment System. ...
[...More Info...]      
[...Related Items...]     OR:     [Wikipedia]   [Google]   [Baidu]  


Antic (magazine)
''Antic'' () was a print magazine devoted to the Atari 8-bit family of home computers and later the Atari ST. It was named after the ANTIC chip in the 8-bit line which, in concert with CTIA or GTIA, generates the display. The magazine was published from April 1982 until June/July 1990. ''Antic'' printed type-in programs (usually in BASIC), reviews, and tutorials, among other articles. Each issue contained one type-in game as "Game of the Month." In 1986, ''STart'' magazine was spun off to exclusively cover the Atari ST line. Its main rival in the United States was ''ANALOG Computing'', another long-lived magazine devoted to the Atari 8-bit line. Multi-system magazines ''COMPUTE!'' and ''Family Computing'' also served Atari 8-bit owners with type-in programs. Starting in 1984, the catalog for Antic Software was bound into issues of ''Antic''. History NASA programmer Jim Capparell was an early Atari 8-bit owner. He quit his job on 15 January 1982 to found a magazine for the comp ...
[...More Info...]      
[...Related Items...]     OR:     [Wikipedia]   [Google]   [Baidu]  


picture info

Video Games Set In The Future
Video is an electronic medium for the recording, copying, playback, broadcasting, and display of moving visual media. Video was first developed for mechanical television systems, which were quickly replaced by cathode-ray tube (CRT) systems which, in turn, were replaced by flat panel displays of several types. Video systems vary in display resolution, aspect ratio, refresh rate, color capabilities and other qualities. Analog and digital variants exist and can be carried on a variety of media, including radio broadcast, magnetic tape, optical discs, computer files, and network streaming. History Analog video Video technology was first developed for mechanical television systems, which were quickly replaced by cathode-ray tube (CRT) television systems, but several new technologies for video display devices have since been invented. Video was originally exclusively a live technology. Charles Ginsburg led an Ampex research team developing one of the first practical vide ...
[...More Info...]      
[...Related Items...]     OR:     [Wikipedia]   [Google]   [Baidu]  


Vertically Scrolling Shooters
A vertically scrolling video game or vertical scroller is a video game in which the player views the field of play principally from a top-down perspective, while the background scrolls from the top of the screen to the bottom (or, less often, from the bottom to the top) to create the illusion that the player character is moving in the game world. Continuous vertical scrolling is designed to suggest the appearance of constant forward motion, such as driving. The game sets a pace for play, and the player must react quickly to the changing environment. History In the 1970s, most vertically scrolling games involved driving. The first vertically scrolling video game was Taito's ''Speed Race'', released in November 1974. Atari's ''Hi-way'' was released eleven months later in 1975. Rapidly there were driving games that combined vertical, horizontal, and even diagonal scrolling, making the vertical-only distinction less important. Both Atari's '' Super Bug'' (1977) and ''Fire Truck'' (1978 ...
[...More Info...]      
[...Related Items...]     OR:     [Wikipedia]   [Google]   [Baidu]  


picture info

Post-apocalyptic Video Games
Apocalyptic and post-apocalyptic fiction is a Genre, subgenre of speculative fiction in which the Earth's (or another planet's) civilization is collapsing or has collapsed. The Global catastrophic risk, apocalypse event may be climatic, such as runaway climate change; astronomical, such as an impact event; destructive, such as nuclear holocaust or resource depletion; medical, such as a pandemic, whether natural or human-caused; Eschatology, end time, such as the Last Judgment, Second Coming or Ragnarök; or more imaginative, such as a zombie apocalypse, AI takeover, cybernetic revolt, technological singularity, dysgenics or alien invasion. The story may involve attempts to prevent an apocalypse event, deal with the impact and consequences of the event itself, or it may be post-apocalyptic, set after the event. The time may be directly after the catastrophe, focusing on the psychology of survivors, the way to keep the human race alive and together as one, or considerably later, ...
[...More Info...]      
[...Related Items...]     OR:     [Wikipedia]   [Google]   [Baidu]  




MSX Games
The following is an incomplete list of video games for the MSX, MSX2, MSX2+, and MSX turbo R home computers. Here are listed games released for the system. The total number of games published for this platform is over 2000. (Please see external links) See also * Konami Game Master (1988) *List of Konami games The following is a list of games either developed, published or licensed by Konami. Arcade 1977–1989 ; 1977 :*''Block Yard'' (released by Leijac) ; 1978 :*''Block Invader'' (released by Leijac) :*''Destroyer'' (released by Leijac) :*''Super ... Notes References External links * {{Video game lists by platform # MSX games ...
[...More Info...]      
[...Related Items...]     OR:     [Wikipedia]   [Google]   [Baidu]  


Commodore 64 Games
{{short description, None This is a list of games for the Commodore 64 personal computer system, sorted alphabetically. See Lists of video games for other platforms. Because of the length of the list, it has been broken down to two parts: *List of Commodore 64 games (A–M) *List of Commodore 64 games (N–Z) See also * Commodore 64 Games System * Commodore 64 The Commodore 64, also known as the C64, is an 8-bit home computer introduced in January 1982 by Commodore International (first shown at the Consumer Electronics Show, January 7–10, 1982, in Las Vegas). It has been listed in the Guinness ...
...
[...More Info...]      
[...Related Items...]     OR:     [Wikipedia]   [Google]   [Baidu]  


picture info

Atari 8-bit Family Games
Atari () is a brand name that has been owned by several entities since its inception in 1972. It is currently owned by French publisher Atari SA through a subsidiary named Atari Interactive. The original Atari, Inc., founded in Sunnyvale, California, in 1972 by Nolan Bushnell and Ted Dabney, was a pioneer in arcade games, home video game consoles and home computers. The company's products, such as ''Pong'' and the Atari 2600, helped define the electronic entertainment industry from the 1970s to the mid-1980s. In 1984, as a result of the video game crash of 1983, the home console and computer divisions of the original Atari Inc. were sold off, and the company was renamed Atari Games Inc. Atari Games received the rights to use the logo and brand name with appended text "Games" on arcade games, as well as the derivative coin-operated arcade rights to the original 1972–1984 arcade hardware properties. The Atari Consumer Electronics Division properties were in turn sold to Jack ...
[...More Info...]      
[...Related Items...]     OR:     [Wikipedia]   [Google]   [Baidu]  


picture info

Activision Games
Activision Publishing, Inc. is an American video game publisher based in Santa Monica, California. It serves as the publishing business for its parent company, Activision Blizzard, and consists of several subsidiary studios. Activision is one of the largest third-party video game publishers in the world and was the top United States publisher in 2016. The company was founded as Activision, Inc. on October 1, 1979 in Sunnyvale, California, by former Atari game developers upset at their treatment by Atari in order to develop their own games for the popular Atari 2600 home video game console. Activision was the first independent, third-party, console video game developer. The video game crash of 1983, in part created by too many new companies trying to follow in Activision's footsteps without the expertise of Activision's founders, hurt Activision's position in console games and forced the company to diversify into games for home computers, including the acquisition of Infocom. Aft ...
[...More Info...]      
[...Related Items...]     OR:     [Wikipedia]   [Google]   [Baidu]  


picture info

1984 Video Games
Events January * January 1 – The Bornean Sultanate of Brunei gains full independence from the United Kingdom, having become a British protectorate in 1888. * January 7 – Brunei becomes the sixth member of the Association of Southeast Asian Nations (ASEAN). * January 10 ** The United States and the Vatican City, Vatican (Holy See) restore full diplomatic relations. ** The Victoria, Seychelles, Victoria Agreement is signed, institutionalising the Indian Ocean Commission. *January 24 – Steve Jobs launches the Macintosh 128K, Macintosh personal computer in the United States. February * February 3 ** Dr. John Buster and the research team at Harbor–UCLA Medical Center announce history's first embryo transfer from one woman to another, resulting in a live birth. ** STS-41-B: Space Shuttle Challenger, Space Shuttle ''Challenger'' is launched on the 10th Space Shuttle mission. * February 7 – Astronauts Bruce McCandless II and Robert L. Stewart make the first untethered spac ...
[...More Info...]      
[...Related Items...]     OR:     [Wikipedia]   [Google]   [Baidu]  


picture info

Electronic Games
An electronic game is a game that uses electronics to create an interactive system with which a player can play. Video games are the most common form today, and for this reason the two terms are often used interchangeably. There are other common forms of electronic game including handheld electronic games, standalone systems (e.g. pinball, slot machines, or electro-mechanical arcade games), and exclusively non-visual products (e.g. audio games). Teletype games The earliest form of computer game to achieve any degree of mainstream use was the text-based Teletype game. Teletype games lack video display screens and instead present the game to the player by printing a series of characters on paper which the player reads as it emerges from the platen. Practically this means that each action taken will require a line of paper and thus a hard-copy record of the game remains after it has been played. This naturally tends to reduce the size of the gaming universe or alternatively to requi ...
[...More Info...]      
[...Related Items...]     OR:     [Wikipedia]   [Google]   [Baidu]  


picture info

Activision
Activision Publishing, Inc. is an American video game publisher based in Santa Monica, California. It serves as the publishing business for its parent company, Activision Blizzard, and consists of several subsidiary studios. Activision is one of the largest third-party video game publishers in the world and was the top United States publisher in 2016. The company was founded as Activision, Inc. on October 1, 1979 in Sunnyvale, California, by former Atari game developers upset at their treatment by Atari in order to develop their own games for the popular Atari 2600 home video game console. Activision was the first independent, third-party, console video game developer. The video game crash of 1983, in part created by too many new companies trying to follow in Activision's footsteps without the expertise of Activision's founders, hurt Activision's position in console games and forced the company to diversify into games for home computers, including the acquisition of Infocom. ...
[...More Info...]      
[...Related Items...]     OR:     [Wikipedia]   [Google]   [Baidu]