Galaga

Galaga

Arcade - Marquee - USA.

Developer Namco Publisher Namco, Midway Manufacturing Published 1981-09-?? Platforms Arcade, Atari 7800, BlackBerry, BREW, Casio PV-2000, CD-i, FM-7, Game Boy, Game Boy Advance, J2ME, Master System, MSX, NES, Palm OS, PC-9800, Sega SG-1000, Sharp MZ, Sharp X1, Sord M5, Windows Mobile Genres Action, Fixed shooter, Shooter, Single-screen Themes Science Fiction Series Galaxian Multiplayer Alternating versus Distribution Commercial

Galaga is a fixed shooter developed and published by Namco for the Arcade and first released in Japan in September, 1981. It was published in the USA by Midway Manufacturing in October, 1981, and then ported to a large number of systems. The game is part of the Galaxian series, the sequel to Galaxian and was followed up by Gaplus.

In the game, you control a spaceship who must shoot at endless waves of insect-like alien ships. Every three stages is a challenge round where you can rack up bonus points for good accuracy.

Personal

Own?	No.
Won?	No. This game doesn't have a win condition.

I first saw Galaga in the arcade and thought it looked like a lot of fun, though I never played it. One time at the Lakeland Ice Arena, I tried using a metal washer on a Galaga machine, which didn't work, and the machine was out of order anyway, which I think is why I had the guts to try it. I have a memory around 1990 when my brother and step-brother had this game on the NES. They were playing it with a Game Genie code which made them invincible, and they lied to me saying it was a special ability. Although I liked the game at first, I very quickly became bored of it since it's just an old fashioned high score game.

When I was in my 20s, my boss told me he was a wiz at the game, and I didn't initially believe him, but then he played the game for about an hour without dying and I was very impressed, even if it was the fast bullet hack.

My high score on the NES port is only 88,640, but I've never tried to get good at it.

Review

5	4	4	3	2

Best Version: Arcade

— This section contains spoilers! —

Good

• The insect-like appearance of the alien ships, especially those in the challenge stages, look great. As do the little medals for stages. Hiroshi Ono did a great job on these.
• The challenge stages change things up a bit and are a nice breather, as are the occasional stages where the aliens don't drop bombs as they arrive.
• Seeing the evolution from Space Invaders to Galaxian to Galaga shows a nice solid improvement with each step.
• The swooping movements of the alien ships as they enter the area are interesting and change up across several stages. They become pretty frantic as the stages increase.
• The mechanic of getting a ship captured and getting it back for double fire-power, but a larger target is a nice risk/reward system.
• The the jingles by Nobuyuki Onogi are pretty catchy.
• Although the goal of amassing points is pretty dull, the game offers a variety of different ways to achieve bonus points by rewarding skilled play.
• The NES port has a pretty interesting way of handling the maximum high score. After you surpass 999,999, the score loops to zero, but you get a little ship beneath you score. The next time you elapse the score, you get a second ship, then, after your sixth ship, it switches to "Hero 7," then "Hero 8," then the letters, with some being glitched, then symbols, then various glitched graphics.

Bad

• Although the game never becomes a bullet hell, it still has a lot of ships and bullets flying around which I don't find enjoyable. It's enjoyable to those with the reflexes capable of handling it, but most players cannot.
• There is a kill screen bug at level 256. This is fixed in some ports.

Ugly

• Even though it's better than its predecessors, and was a marvel of technology at the time, the game gets boring pretty quickly. Excluding the eight challenge stages, you'll see almost everything the game has to offer in the second stage. Sure, there are 13 different attack patterns, and several bonus ships, but they're all variations on a theme, and some are even skipped if the arcade machine is set to the harder difficulty settings. Also, upon reaching stage 22, the game just repeats the same three patterns over and over again.

Media

Box Art

• 

  Arcade - Cabinet - USA.

• 

  Arcade - Marquee - USA.

• 

  Arcade - Bezel - USA.

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  Arcade - Side Art - USA.

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  Arcade - Side Art - USA (Alternate).

• 

  Arcade - Control Panel - USA.

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  Arcade - Kick Plate - USA.

• 

  Arcade - Logo - USA.

• 

  Atari 7800 - USA. My favorite cover.

• 

  Atari 7800 - full art.

• 

  Casio PV-2000 - Japan.

• 

  Famicom - Japan.

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  Famicom (Re-release) - Japan.

• 

  FM-7, PC-9800, Sharp X1 - Japan.

• 

  MSX - Japan.

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  MSX - UK.

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  NES - Europe.

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  NES - USA.

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  Sega SG-1000 - Japan.

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  Sord M5 - Japan.

Documentation

• 

  Manual - Arcade - USA.

• 

  Manual - Atari 7800 - USA.

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  Manual - Game Boy - USA.

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  Manual - Famicom - Japan (Digital)

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  Manual - NES - USA.

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  Manual - NES - USA (Digital).

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  Manual - Sega SG-1000 - Japan.

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  Arcade flyer - Japan.

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  How to Win At Video Games: Complete Strategies for Top Arcade Games.

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  Strategy guide - The Winners' Book of Video Games.

Screenshots

• 

  Arcade - Extra lives.

• 

  NES - Dual fighters.

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  NES - How lives are displayed when you have a lot.

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  NES - Elapsing the score.

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  NES - Glitching the score.

Graphics

• 

  Arcade - Sprites.

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  Arcade - Layouts.

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  GBA - Namco Museum.

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  GBA - Namco Museum - 50th Anniversary.

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  GBC.

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  NES.

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  Sega SG-1000.

Fan Art

• 

  Fan art.

Videos

Port comparison.

Arcade - Game play.

Atari 7800 - Game play.

Casio PV-2000 - Game play.

CD-i - Game play.

FM-7 - Game play.

Game Boy - Game play.

Game Boy Advance (Namco Museum) - Game play.

Master System - Game play.

MSX - Game play.

NES - Game play.

PC-9800 - Game play.

Sega SG-1000 - Game play.

Sharp MZ - Game play.

Sharp X1 - Game play.

Sord M5 - Game play.

Play Online

Arcade (Japan), Arcade (USA), Atari 7800, Famicom, Game Boy (Europe), Game Boy (Japan), Game Boy (USA), MSX, NES (Europe), NES (USA)

Representation

Strong female character?	Fail	There are no characters.
Bechdel test?	Fail	There are no characters.
Strong person of color character?	Fail	There are no characters.
Queer character?	Fail	There are no characters.

Credits

Although the arcade original doesn't feature credits, dedicated gamers have discovered much of the original staff.

Role	Staff
Producer	Masaya Nakamura (uncredited)
Game Design	Shigeru Yokoyama (uncredited)
Hardware	Toru Ogawa (uncredited)
Programming	Toru Ogawa (uncredited)
Graphics	Hiroshi Ono (uncredited)
Music and Sound	Nobuyuki Onogi (uncredited)

Titles

Language	Native	Transliteration	Translation
English	Galaga
English (NES)	Galaga: Demons of Death
Japanese	ギャラガ	Gyaraga	Galaga
Japanese (SG-1000)	Sega-Galaga
Japanese (Sord M5)	Galax

Links