Throwback Thursday: Galaga

Happy Thursday Gamers! Today's throwback is the classic shooter, Galaga!

Galaga was developed by Namco in Japan and released to the United States in 1981. During the game, players control a spaceship set at the bottom of the screen. Aliens then arrive in formation and attack your ship by shooting or colliding into it. The stage ends once the player destroys all of of the enemy ships.

Galaga received critical praise upon it's release and has cemented its place in pop culture. Just a year after its release, it was already being seen in movies and comic books. (Its success even warranted the release of a sequel - Galaxian). Since then, it's been continually referenced in pop culture and you can even hear its sounds in one of Drake's songs.

Galaga has continued to be released for modern consoles including the Xbox 360 and Playstation 3. We remember playing this game and still love it today. Welcome to the vault Galaga - you're definitely overdue!

Galaga for Xbox 360

Throwback Thursday: Oregon Trail

Happy Thursday Gamers! Today's retro game is none other than the infamous Oregon Trail!

Players will always remember this frustrating event.

Oregon Trail originated as a teaching tool created by Don Rawitsch, Bill Heinemann, and Paul Dillenberger. Don was a middle school history teacher at the time and used Oregon Trail to teach his students about the difficulties faced by 19th century pioneers. After gaining notoriety for the game, it was expanded and used in numerous schools in the Minneapolis Public Schools' time-sharing service.

In 1974, the Minnesota Educational Computing Consortium hired Rawitsch to develop the game for classrooms across the state. He added events and consequences related to actual historical probabilities. In 1978, the game was adapted by John Cook for the Apple II, and the rest was history.

Oregon Trail and it's different versions and parodies has sold over 65 million copies as of 2011. It's been included in the book 1001 Video Games You Must Play Before You Die and remains infamous to this day. We remember playing this game in school, and still enjoy it to this day. Welcome to the vault, Oregon Trail!

If you've never seen or heard of Oregon Trail, check out this gameplay video from Shortmandesigner on Youtube.

Throwback Thursday: TMNT (arcade game)

Hope you gamers are having a great Thursday! Today's throwback is: TMNT, the arcade game.

TMNT is a side-scrolling "beat-'em-up" game released by Konami for arcades in 1989. It's based on the first TMNT animated series (which began in 1987). The original TMNT game was distributed to arcades in 2 forms: the standard 2-player version and the deluxe 4-player version. (Home versions were later released for different platforms.)

In TMNT, the player chooses from one of the four Ninja Turtles (Leonardo, Michelangelo, Donatello and Raphael. After Shredder captures the Turtles' friend April and their mentor Splinter, they must fight through waves and foot soldiers to defeat the evil Shredder. Donatello has slower attacks but a longer range, Michelangelo and Raphael have faster attacks but a shorter range, and Leonarder is a well-rounded Turtle with average range and speed.

Upon its release, TMNT received praise from critics and became a cornerstone of the franchise we all know and love today. This game is icon and needs no introduction. Welcome to the vault, TMNT!

Throwback Thursday: Shining Force

Happy Thursday Gamers! We hope you're having a great week, and if not, maybe our Throwback Thursday will cheer you up. This week's #TBT is Shining Force: The Legacy of Great Intention for Sega Mega Drive/Genesis!

Dark Dragon

Shining Force is a 1992 fantasy turn-based tactics role-playing video game made by Camelot and Climax Entertainment for the Mega Drive/Genesis console. Even though the game is primarily a traditional fantasy-themed game, it contains some science fiction elements.

The game opens in the Kingdom of Guardiana, in the land of Rune. Players control the protagonist Max, who is sent on a mission to prevent the evil Kane from opening the Shining Path and resurrection Dark Dragon. Throughout the game, Max recruits allies to join the Shining Force. They eventually discover that Kane and King Ramladu are under the control of Darksol. Darksol succeeds in reviving Dark Dragon, but Max seals the creature away with the power of the Chaos Breaker, a sword created by merging Kane's sword of darkness with the sword of light.

The game was well received and still remains a popular #retrogame to this day. And for that, we welcome Shining Force into the vault!

Gameplay

Throwback Thursday: Sinistar

Happy Thursday gamers! Today's retrogame comes from a suggestion on Twitter. Our throwback this week is Sinistar!

Sinistar is an arcade game released by Williams in 1982. It's classified as a twitch game, which tests players' reaction times. Throughout the game, players pilot a spacecraft, shoot down planetoids and collect the released crystals to create "Sinibombs". The Sinibombs are needed to defeat the game boss, Sinistar, a spacecraft with a demonic skull face. Sinistar does not exist at the beginning of the game. It's being constructed by enemy worker ships while the player works to collect crystals.

After reaching Sinistar, the player moves through 4 zones to defeat it: the Worker Zone, Warrior Zone, Planetoid Zone and Void Zone. Beginning with the first Worker Zone, a completed but damaged Sinistar can be repaired (or rebuilt) by the enemy ships, extending its "lifespan" if the player cannot kill it quickly.

Sinistar was not widely ported at the time of its release due to the video game crash of 1983. It wasn't until the mid 1990's that it began to appear on home gaming systems such as SNES, Sega Genesis and Dreamcast, Playstation and PC. Even though this game was released during a downfall in vide games, it still continues to influence gaming today. And for that, we welcome it into the vault!

Throwback Thursday: Metroid Prime

Today's Thursday, and you know what that means - retrogaming. Today's throwback is Metroid Prime for GameCube!

Metroid Prime was developed by Retro Studios and Nintendo for GameCube. It was released in North America on November 17, 2002, and in Japan and Europe the following year. As the 5th installment of the Metroid series, it was classified as a first-person adventure (not shooter) because exploration took precedent over combat.

Metroid Prime is the first of the three-part Prime storyline which takes place between Metroid Prime, Metroid and Metroid 11: Return of Samus. Throughout the game the players control Samus Aran, a bounty hunter who receives a distress signal from Space Pirate Frigate Orpheon and travels to Tallon IV to stop the Space Pirates from exploiting Phazon. (To read more about the plot, click here)

The game became one of the best selling games on GameCube and sold 250,000 units within the first week of its release. It was very well received and was praised by gaming review publications such as IGN, Game Informer, GameSpot, Edge and Nintendo Power. Metroid Prime pushed gameplay and graphics to the limit on the GameCube, and for that we welcome it into the vault!