20 Arcade Games That Prove 1986 Was A Landmark Year For Gaming
30 years ago arcades ruled the roost, let's go back in time to that golden era.
The year was 1986, Top Gun and Aliens were lighting up the big screen, Madonna and the Pet Shop Boys were blasting out the airwaves and video game arcades were still a thing.
Back in those days the ultimate way to play video games was by visiting your local arcades with a bag of change. After all, it was state of the art technology that seemed light years ahead of the ZX Spectrum or Commodore 64 that was sitting under your TV at home.
Names like Sega, Atari, Konami, Taito and Namco became synonymous with gaming, largely due to their impact and legacy in the arcade world and, what's more, it's where many popular franchises started. Remember last years Darius Blast and Gauntlet on PS4? Have you heard about the new Rampage film starring Dwayne "The Rock" Johnson? Those wouldn't exist now if it wasn't for people feeding quarters into their machines way back when.
This is where true innovations took place and the genres that we know and love today were shaped and molded. All these games are true classics and play every bit as well today as they did back then. So jump in your DeLorean and let's take a trip...
20. Double Dribble – Konami
Sports games have always been a staple of arcade game companies everywhere; in fact it was a sports game that kick started the whole industry when Atari unleashed PONG on the world in 1972.
In 1986 Konami changed how we saw basketball games forever with the hugely successful Double Dribble. It offered realism like we had never seen before, full quotas of teams, stats, different dunks, cut scenes and even some incredibly limited commentary. Truly ground breaking stuff for the time.