I don’t think I’ve heard of that Treasure Island game. It looks rather fun!
I wonder why it has never been re-released. Here’s hoping it’ll be added to the ever-growing list of obscure Arcade Archives titles soon!
Supposedly the first 3D racing game where you can move your car left and right. Apparently it’s hard to fully emulate and find working cabinets, but someone named “MrF4brice” got a cabinet to work (Speed Freak, 1979).
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That looks pretty cool for such an old game.
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By first 3D racing game I guess you mean with 3D display of cars, cause without that there is Nürburgring 1 from 76, which seems to inspire Night Driver and Datsun 280 ZZZAP released the same year.
I played Datsun as a kid, it was very hard not to crash, not very enjoyable unfortunately.
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Very hard to emulate and looks very hard to play. Fascinating game though. Would’vebeen pretty mind blowing I suspect
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I’m pretty sure I played that back in the 80’s. There might also be a working one at Funspot in NH.
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Yeah, there were previous games which attempted to pull off similar things like Night Driver I recall. You couldn’t see and steer the car like in Speed Freak though.
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Star Rider (1983), the first LaserDisc game with 3D graphics.
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Speaking of games with “Star” in the title, Exidy’s Star Fire (1978) is not only the first arcade video game to use a sit-down cockpit cabinet, but also the first to allow a player to enter their initials on the high score table.
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Oh wow that’s an amazing first! Imagine a world without initialled scores.
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I know. Its an expected part of Arcade gaming. I remember in my mind, the ultimate prize of playing a game was being able to have your initials or name is some cases on display for all to see.
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Played and loved Hunter at the time on my Atari ST. So much freedom. You can play it today in an overclocked emulator for a nicer experience.
I’d argue Mercenary did open world 3D earlier (1985) and also it’s sequel Damocles (1990) but they used a first-person view. There were many first-person, open-world games like them at the time.
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Lovely game, Mercenary. I had the C64 version and while I never got very far, the sense of freedom was quite remarkable.
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Also, we can’t leave out Elite (1984) when we’re discussing 3D open world games. It might even be the very first one! It certainly was hugely influential.
But that’s not all! The Dark Wheel is a story that was bundled with Elite and apparently it was the very first novella to be included for distribution with a video game!
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Stumbled upon a gaming first while browsing the internet today!
Apparently, the world’s first sports video games franchise is Mattel’s Sports Network series of games for the Intellivision.
https://history.blueskyrangers.com/mattelelectronics/sportsnetwork.html
As a bonus, here’s a video of Sports Network games playing a role in the, uh, let’s call it The Silver Age of Console Wars:
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I’m sure people can go back and forth on early open world a lot, but as for open world in a city, Vette is a classic example:
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Back in 2018 I bought a big Intellivision package with 55 CIB games and console. It also included a really nice Vader Atari 2600. For $150 I still think I got one hell of a deal.
Lots of sports games, that’s for sure!
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Wow, that’s a great deal indeed!
Amazing.
You should pick up the amazing Chip Shot: Super Pro Golf