Galaga

 Galaga: glorious past,

It started in 1981, when Namco company released one rather nice "shoot-em-up-with-your-spaceship" game. Technically, Galaga was a sequel to another space shooting arcade Galaxian (and we shouldn't forget of Space Invaders that gave a start to the whole thing). However, this game contained that little something that was enough for a revolution to begin. Was it the bonus stage introduced for the first time in the whole genre, or maybe enemies flying in formations, or bosses capturing your ship with tractor beam? I believe that the secret ingredient was the passion. A passion that gave birth to (and continue to nourish) the whole space-shooter genre.

Galaga has been ported to every single computer platform and re-released about ten times; original coin-op arcades were taken to pieces, re-assembled and taken to pieces again by collectors and fans in search for cheats, tricks and replacement parts; below ate two nice links for those who want to dive deeper.

• Great collection of screenshots from every single release/port/bootleg/hack.
• Box artwork (some pieces are just rule) from different releases.
• Everything you ever wanted to know about Galaga cabinet's inside.

And even now, 26 years later the game is far from being a history; it is more like

Original Galaga coin-op
(click for a large photo)

 Inspiration for the present,

Needless to say of numerous discarded Galaga cabinets having finally landed in classic arcade lovers' living rooms, lounges and garages (you may wanna find and buy one too). But now for something completely different: Patrick Laarhoven did a truly marvelous job building PocketGalaga, perfectly working Galaga cabinet scaled down to 1/6 of original upright. Yes, it took an HP iPAQ 2210 for the screen&heart (though iPAQ is still removable), a disassembled gamepad and a nail and a pair of microswitchers for the joystick, plenty of nous and 3 months of nontrivial work. But the result is very nice, and so is the construction essay (with lots of photos).

Patrick's cat next to
PocketGalaga

Moreover, Galaga's still inspiring at least one TV series writer, too: a Galaga submarine was first mentioned in the LOST series episode "Every Man for Himself" (season 3) and then appeared in "The Man from Tallahassee" episode. A former DHARMA Initiative submarine, it was appropriated by the Others, who used it as a means of recruiting personnel from the outside world. Current status: exploded and sunk with a little help of Locke and some C-4. What a pity.

Mentioned in numerous comics, given a name to numerous pets, servers and RPG characters, Galaga proved itself to be perpetual - and reincarnating in a remarkable number of re-releases and clones. I personally recommend to take a look at the PC game Warblade by Edgar M. Vigdal: though it seems like the project isn't developed anymore, the current version of the game features a nice fusion of original Galaga gameplay elements with modern graphics and special FX. However, if you're feeling ready for a step far beyond remakes and interpretations, it's time to find

"Game is played often in between writing episodes"

 Passion for the future.

Or just Alien Sky, a ming-blowing Galaga follower (oddly enough, made by our company). It's not easy to survive here when there's always someone to burst you with his weaponry or overcome with his tactics. However you have to. Cause you and your ultramodern spacefighter are the only chance to prevent alien invasion which is almost ready to start, turning your homeworld into ruins.

Play Alien Sky free for one hour (6.8 Mb)

Order full version ($19.95)

...and some more nice Screenshots