A selection of Coin-Op/Arcade Machine “Marquees” beaming gloriously in brash 80′s technicolor… Marquees (in case you didn’t know) are used to illuminate the name of an arcade game at the top of its cabinet.
Stopping with a friend recently I was reminded with just how amazing this art is as he has a small selection of these marquees as fridge magnets! and I haven’t featured any Coin Op / Pinball design for a while, so figured it was about time to run an update…
So what makes this Art so cool? for me it’s the punchy low palettes & comic-type colouring, mix this up with super striking Logotypes and the fact of course that the whole thing is designed to be backlit! It’s actually worth pointing out that I worked in a seaside arcade as a 16 year old, in retrospect it’s obviously mcuh more than just the game themselves that made a major impact me… My Favourite ever Coin-Op’s ? Turbo Out Run, Aliens, Rolling Thunder and Special Criminal Investigation aaah, things were simpler back then!
So a bit more more about the samples collected here:
Top: “Alien Syndrome” – A top down Commando/Gauntlet-esque shooter dating from 1986, designed and manufactured by Sega, it’s one I missed in the Arcade, though played it on the 8-bit home systems of the day, decent game! Here’s a video http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=MsZ0g6HE684
2nd Top: “Sinistar” – By Williams in 1982, this an evolution of Asteroids, and is similar to Bosconion http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=xcyBtVwAsfg embarrassingly I’d never even heard of Sinistar before researching this post! I’m still not sure how I’ve missed it! Check the freaky Sinistar Sample too: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=S-XEINagmaU
3rd Top: “Commando” – From Nihon Bussan/AV Japan released 1985. Another genre-defining rock solid classic, I’m more familiar with the Speccy version where you had to rotate the joystick 360 degrees to lob a grenade (very difficult). http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1qctKI_t5eY
4th Top: “Asteroids” – By Atari 1979. One of the most popular arcade games of all time, this marquee featuring an obvious Battlestar Galactica reference. You must of seen Asteroids, so here’s a clip of Atari’s lesser known 1987 sequal “Blasteroids” http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=zFmhK3VM3Ng
5th Top: “Tempest” – By Atari, released 1987. The wireframe vector graphic legend that’s been recyclced many times, http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=vxIquJIRZHU&feature=related
6th Top: “Crystal Castles” – Another Atari title, this time from 1983 – this is an Isometric platform/maze/puzzler which utilises a bizarre collection of sprites, a game I loved as a kid, and like most games I’m still completely useless at it… http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=f01M2l9oGJI
7th Top:”Zaxxon” – More isometric viewpoint action, this one from Sega and dating from 1982. Supremely ambitious for it’s time, in many ways this still looks great http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=cHORFz6ZCC0&feature=related
8th / 9th Top: “Galaga” and “Galaxian” – These classic precursor’s to the Vertical Shoot-em-up both hail released from the Namco stable, appearing 1979 and 1981 respectively. Just in case you forgot how Galaxian plays: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=GzitZv8Enmc
10th Top: “Bosconian” – The original 8 way shooter from Midway, released 1981. Again this is one I remember from the 8-bit systems rather than in the arcade itself, here’s a video: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=nC5_RYXmfsc
Bottom: “Rastan” – A left scrolling fantasy platform fighter from Taito released in 1987. If the throttled Lizard-Man hasn’t jogged your memory, here’s a clip: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=dvn2pPsaE4I
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All games referenced via KLOV “The Killer List of Video Games” AKA http://www.arcade-museum.com
a superb reference site…
Images collected from various sources via The Google.
These are great. I think Asteroids will always be my favorite one.
Nice post on these lovely 80s backlit logotypes. It’s interesting to think of these as direct and highly focused descendants of backlit pinball panels. There are some interesting evolutionary intermediate forms from the 70s like Exidy’s Death Race, etc.
really really cool post my friend!
cheers…
Franco
Cheers for the comments
they really look great together…. And yeah I thinknext I’ll go back and have a look at the Pinball Art again – thanks for reminding me Bob!
i loved alien syndrome! i forgot what the cabinet art looked like
the galaxian logo always reminds me of roger dean
i love your blog .. thanks for one of the joys in my day!
Cheers for the comment Travis
yeah I’ve just been playing Alien Syndrome on Mame, cool game – pretty hard though! Yeah the Galaxian Logo is very Roger Dean I agree
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A much better collection can be seen here. all high resolution re-touched vector graphics as well as originals.
more concerned with the design side of things.
http://artofthearcade.tumblr.com/
cheers for the link… nice site
I had totally forgotten about Sinistar! That game was awesome, but hard as hell. Once the Sinistar dude started after you, your ass was toast! And he yelled.
fantastic post, makes my mind travel
lovely
great post, makes me want to get some quarters and find an arcade…
[...] a continuation of one of the more popular features I ran last year ‘The Art of the Arcade Marque‘ with a further selection of 12 primary coloured beauties. First of all a quick refresh on [...]
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