dtown8532
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- Apr 10, 2012
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Yea, it's got to be.
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Welcome Back to Digital Pinball Fans - please read this first
The Top 25 Video Game Villains of Every Subtype Imaginable
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Yea, it's got to be.
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- #42
That's it! Now, how can you link that to a video game? I'll give you a hint: the game you're looking for was a console exclusive.
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- #44
Yes, indeed! Now give me the name of the antagonist for full credit–I'll post my writeup in the early p.m. either way.
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- #46
That's right! Now here comes the writeup:
25. Zachary Graves (Haunted House)
Developed & Published By: Atari
Platform: Atari 2600
Year of Release: 1982
Haunted House had arguably the toughest act to follow in video game history. Three years prior, Atari had released Adventure, which is the sort of game that is so innovative as to retroactively become clichéd. Haunted House's debt to Adventure is obvious enough, with its treasure-seeking objectives, comparatively large world for its time and reuse of the bat from Adventure, but one difference casts the game in a whole new light. Throughout the game, you can collect candles that illuminate the items you seek (and possibly the house itself, if the difficulty is set high enough), but they only last so long and a monster in the same room as you will blow out the candle, leaving you quite literally in the dark. That's right–we're looking at one of the earliest ancestors of survival horror. One other touch I like is that your hero is only represented as a pair of eyes, which actually works very well with the atmosphere. Unfortunately, a poorly-received 2010 follow-up has probably put Mr. Graves to rest for the final time, but that can't change the influence the original had.
Next Time on The Top 25 Pre-1991 Western Arcade & Console Game Villains: Where's Ellen Ripley when you really need her?
P.S. Don't worry, DB–we're still way into the deeper cuts of this sector of gaming. Things should get a lot easier once we get into the top 15 or so...
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- #48
Not quite, but a certain game I have in mind drew heavily from that as inspiration. If you can tell me what game that is, you'll be halfway to the answer.
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- #50
That's exactly right! We have another entry coming right up:
24. The Xenos (Xenophobe)
Developed & Released By: Bally Midway
Platform: Arcade
Year of Release: 1987
Xenophobe occupies a strange place in retro gaming nostalgia. Many who played it in its time swear by it, but others believe that it hasn't aged very well. Its blatant ripping off of Alien probably doesn't help, either. Still, it does hint at where the future of gaming would lead, presaging the rise of the FPS in the early-to-mid-'90s, with alien-blasting adventures like Doom and Quake leading the way.
The gameplay is enjoyable, if somewhat standard, fare, playing much like a side-scrolling version of Gauntlet and bearing a striking resemblance to Skull & Crossbones, which would come out two years later. Your objective is to clear all Xenos from the base that they've infested, but there's a catch: not only do you have a very tight time limit before they overrun the base and you have to teleport out, but your health is constantly ticking down as well. You can set a self-destruct sequence so that you get some bonus points even if you fail, but to do that, you have to find the code and use it in the room that has the countdown timer in it. Other things you'll want to watch out for are guns (stronger ones have shorter range), grenades (they kill any Xeno in a single hit), food (which restores health) and the disc (which lets you teleport around the stage), among others. There's a surprising amount going on here, probably a reflection of how much harder arcades had to work to draw kids from their NESes and Master Systems. Also, this was one of the last games to bear the Bally Midway name prior to their acquisition by Williams, giving it a good amount of historical value. You can find the game on both Midway Arcade Treasures 2 and Midway Arcade Origins, so there's no reason not to give this one a go—even if you don't like it, the beauty of these retro compilations is that there will probably be something that catches your eye.
Next Time on The Top 25 Pre-1991 Western Arcade & Console Villains: Come on, you poor unfortunate soul!
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- #51
Wow, I thought I'd really given myself away with that first clue, but I guess not. In any event, here's your second clue: Take a chance! Make a bet! Press your luck—you might win yet!
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- #52
I feel really bad that nobody's even tried to guess this one—it makes me suspect that my clues are not that good. Anyway, here's a clarification of the previous clue: the quote comes from the BGM for Riverboat Gambler.
DrainoBraino
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- Apr 11, 2012
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River Raid?
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- #54
No, but that is a very good guess. Here's another hint, this time clarifying my first clue: What was I referring to with 'Come on, you poor unfortunate soul'? I'm almost certain that you've watched it at some point...
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- #55
OK, I'll tip my hand a little bit here: the game I have in mind has to do with inner tubing. That's all you're getting from me this round, though—this is the fifth clue I've given, for Pete's sake!
DrainoBraino
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- Apr 11, 2012
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IS the arcade paddling game called Toobin? I don't think it has villians though....
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- #57
It is indeed Toobin'. I actually meant the CPU opponent (the purplish dude who replaces Bif or Jet in single-player games). Do you want to guess at his name or should I simply go on to his entry on the list?
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DrainoBraino
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- Apr 11, 2012
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Yea these clues are riddles, wrapped in a mystery, inside an enigma.
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- #60
I'll admit I was probably a little too arcane for my own good on this one; I have a tendency to get a little too wrapped up in my own cleverness when I do things like this. That clue was actually supposed to lead you to the name of the villain, though—you'll see why momentarily:
23. Flotsam (Toobin')
Developed & Published By: Atari Games
Platform: Arcade
Year of Release: 1988
Toobin' is a perfect snapshot of American arcade gaming in the late '80s. The broader pop culture's infestation of grimdark had not yet infected video gaming and innovation was still much less the exception than it is today, but sales and the number of arcades out there were both dropping, thanks mainly to the all-conquering NES. This desperation is reflected in T-shirt contests held in both Toobin' and fellow 1988 Atari Games release Vindicators. Even though I desperately hope somebody has an XXL Vindicators T-shirt and is willing to part with it, those contests were still blatantly obvious attempts at using macrogaming to grab a dwindling player base's attentions (something you saw in pinball around the same time, appropriately enough, in the form of progressive jackpots—BK2K, Dr. Dude & EATPM all used this sort of macrogame in an attempt to lure players in with promises of the big score).
The design also exudes a similar desperation. The gameplay could easily have been handled with a trackball for movement and one button for projectiles, but Atari Games wanted this game to stand out, so they made a more...esoteric control scheme. Instead of a trackball, you have four diagonal movement buttons, which can prove a steep learning curve for those used to more conventional layouts. To move forward, you have to press both bottom buttons simultaneously, which I still sometimes have trouble wrapping my head around.
For all its faults, however, Toobin' radiates charm. The tunes are catchy, the graphics are bright & colorful, the decision to make a video game about inner tubing certainly required some outside-the box thinking and the whole game has an almost Nordman-esque sense of goofy humor that makes everything go down that much easier. In addition, Flotsam can prove quite a formidable opponent—he always seems to cross through the point-rich narrow flags right before you and you can never quite seem to shake him (although he'll go away for a long while once his three lives are spent).
Before we wrap up, there is also an interesting little bit of Toobin' trivia that I would be remiss in leaving out of this entry. Toobin' actually has a pinball pedigree—the gameplay is basically the video section of the minorly infamous Granny & the Gators in reverse with the pinball parts removed. It just goes to show how ideas getting reused isn't a bad thing unless that's all you can find out there.
Next Time on The Top 25 Pre-1991 Western Arcade & Console Game Villains: Boingy, boingy, boingy!
P.S. Don't worry, DrainoBraino—I'll give you credit for this guess even if my post gets on here before your next one.
P.P.S. In case you still couldn't parse my first clue, it was meant to be a reference to Disney's The Little Mermaid. Specifically, it's a lyric from Ursula's big number, "Poor Unfortunate Souls". You'll recall that Ursula has two electric eel assistants, one of whom is named Flotsam (the other is Jetsam, in case you ever find yourself answering Disney trivia questions). At the time, I thought that clue was clever, with its reference to the target game being aquatic and sideways reference to the name of the game's antagonist, but in hindsight, I should have gone with something a little less inscrutable.
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