Galaga Arcade

It's no tempest 

Dropped a lot of quarters into Galaga.

Tempest too. 

Tempest was all about the hiding spot.

Karate Master was my all time favorite. I liked Jungle Hunt too.

I was about the right age demographic to be a part of the Video Game evolution... as a customer,  not developer.

Ignoring earlier stuff like 'Pong' and those driving games,  'Space Invaders'  was the first really Coool one, then 'Asteroids' and 'BattleZone'.
BZ was the one where player is a tank driver with a periscope driving through a Green 3-D Wireframe landscape with pyramids & rocks. There were slow enemy tanks (easy targets) and fast, small ones that could easily kill you.

Those three were the forerunners of all the latter stuff with trackballs and waaaay more advanced graphics / sound.

Robot Ron would of been bigger if more readily available in the day or was it Robotron?

Space Harrier when playing single player.  

Supersprint when playing with friends.  Was just ebaying around looking at how much a Supersprint console would cost....

Good times....

We were that foosball group.

I could play a quarter on Asteroids for hours back in the day.

I remember when some arcade machine owners would put the rainbow Mylar overlay on the TV screen to make  'Asteroids' look colorized.

'Defender'  was a more sophisticated machine with actual multi-color graphics and a whole bunch more shiite happening.  It would gobble my Quarters waaay too quick for me to ever get good at it,  but I appreciated watching the more coordinated and Quarter-Wealthy kids play.

That one had a track-ball and invaders from outer space;  you had to lay down Plasma mine-fields to blow them all up while flying the Ultrasonic Jet across the screen.  As I type this I'm thinking that "Defender" and another one have merged into a dim recollection of 1981 arcade games.

I definitely remember 'Galaga' & 'Galaxian' but those were more on the theme of 'Space Invaders' with beautiful psychedelic graphics.  The player's cannon base would move left to right at screen bottom,  and as you shot the squirming creatures they would morph into different and more plentiful ones.  'Centipede' was in that genre.

'Pac-Man' & 'Ms. Pac-Man'  I never really got into,  but Chicks liked those because the player engulfs,  rather than shoots.  Waka waka waka waka.

where's mrs. howgoer when you need him?

went  into a resale shop recently and they frree games of Galaga and a couple of others.

>>>Dropped a lot of quarters into Galaga.

I still do.  They have a Galaga game at the local pizza shop I frequent (Flying Pie Pizza).  That's one game I am actually good at and can get a lot of bang for a single quarter.   The same pizza shop also has a Multi-Cade, which a single machine loaded with three dozen or so early 80's video games.

People wonder why I smack the keyboard so hard when I type and the answer is Galaga.  

I get to play Galaga now and then.  I'd like to play Asteroids or Missile Command but I haven't run across those in a long time.

Big fan of Galaga. Good value for your quarter. 

I used to put a quarter in Galaga at happy hour at the Sea Galley (best happy hour ever - twofer doubles for $1.95) and play for over an hour.