If the player shoots the fuel tanks, more points are earned. There are fuel tanks strewn about the aircraft’s path. There are enemies scattered over the river, and the player must destroy them to gain that era’s most precious resource: points.Īctually, there is one more resource more precious than points in River Raid, and that’s fuel.
The aircraft is only able to fly in through a river and must stay inside the river’s flying area. The player pilots an attack aircraft and flies over an enemy base. The game is widely seen as one of the first – if not THE first – top-down scrolling shooters. Her first game while in their employ was the aforementioned River Raid, one of the Atari 2600’s best games. In 1982, Carol was reportedly called by Alan Miller ( Tennis, Starmaster), one of the founders of Activision, and joined his troupe. She left Atari in 1980 to work for Tandem Computers, an outfit focused on systems for ATMs and stock exchanges. She worked on a few other titles while at Atari, including one of my early favorites, Super Breakout.
The first game she is credited with programming was Atari’s 1978 milquetoast title, 3-D Tic-Tac-Toe. In 1982, another name would join them: Carol Shaw, creator of River Raid.Ĭarol Shaw was a developer well before she was brought into Activision. By 1982, Activision programmers like Larry Kaplan ( Kaboom!), Steve Cartwright ( Megamania), and David Crane ( Pitfall!) were virtual rock stars in video game development. In fact, Activision was made up of former Atari developers who were tired of remaining anonymous while their creations became million-sellers. It’s not entirely their fault prior to 1980, a hardcore gamer would be pressed to name ANY developer. Most so-called video game “historians” flub that answer. But who is credited as the first female game developer of note? When asked who the first third-party publisher of video games was, the video game cognoscenti rapidly point to Activision. When discussing the first commercially successful video game console, most readily mention the Atari Video Computer System, aka the Atari VCS or 2600.
0 kommentar(er)
