Review by Mike Wilkens

Arcade's Greatest Hits
Digital Eclipse
Williams Entertainment


Back in 1980, when video games fit in 100 KB and "megs" was a radio
term for megahertz, Williams released Defender.  Initial response
seemed bad.  At the AMOA, no one wanted to play it.  In test locations
at the arcade, players didn't realize they could reverse and thrust,
and died miserably.  None of the game's programmers thought that
anyone would ever get past level five.  The game, William's first video
game, sold 60,000 units within 6 months, and Eugene Jarvis, lead
programmer, knew of at least one guy who quit work to play Defender
full time.  Luckily for players who played for days at a time on
one quarter, every million points (the game rolls over at
one million), between 990000 and 1000000, there was a period in the
game where spare ships could be easily racked up, allowing players
to leave the game for a few minutes, and attend to essential
buisiness.

AGH consists of six Williams arcade games from 1980 to 1983 or so.
Each game runs under emulation, which means that all the special
features of each game are preserved.

The problem with this product is that in Joust and Defender,
every 10th raster line is removed from the screen image.
They had trouble fitting the games on TV screens, so instead of
lopping off the bottom or top lines, they deleted every 10th one.
This creates distracting effects when sprites move vertically, because the
sprite deforms around the missing horizontal raster line.  It
makes the games ugly and distracting to play.  Joust is the most
affected, Defender second, Stargate (renamed Defender II after
manufacturing of the original game stopped) third, and Robotron is
a distant fourth, having detectable deletions that don't make
much difference when you play.

As mentioned, the raster lines were deleted in order to fit the games
on television screens, but unfortunately, they forget to include an
option to turn it off so you can play the actual pixel-perfect game.
They also didn't include an option to adjust the vertical offset for
the game (as was done with Raiden Project), so that the user can
maximize the usage of screen space.  But they should have at least
included an option to show the full image, so that those of us who
can adjust the overscan on our TVs don't have to put up with this
flaw.

Bubbles does not seem to have any rasters missing, as far as I can tell.

Sinistar, a vertical game in the arcade, is emulated extremely well.
Interlace mode is used to get 480 or so scan lines so you play at
the correct aspect ratio, with the full resolution, without having
to turn your TV on its side.  This works really well, and Sinistar
keeps a 60 field-per-second interlaced screen update.

All the controls in all the games are completely configurable, and
your configuration can be saved to a memory card.  Your configuration
(hi scores and controls) is loaded automatically when the emulator
for each game boots.


The games:

Defender - Williams's first video game, a horizontal scrolling
	shooter.  Save your humans and prevent them from becoming
	mutants.  The manual doesn't explicitly mention it, but
	you can use the original Defender controls - reverse and
	thrust - in the Controls option screen.  Left and right
	movement controls were not present on the arcade game,
	just reverse and thrust (with the up-down stick).

	This game's graphics are marred by missing raster lines
	in both the scanner and playfield.  See above.

	The manual explains how to get the secret operator's screen
	with L2 + SELECT, but doesn't explain how to change entries,
	which is done with L2 + START.  Press L2 + SELECT to select
	an option and eventually get back to the attract mode.  Press
	L2 + START to cycle through the values for the option.

	It'll probably take a while to get the hang of the control,
	during which time the game will be frustrating to play.
	But it's worth it.


Robotron - Third after Stargate if I remember correctly, Robotron
	is a fast-paced overhead shooter, with large numbers
	of enemies coming from all sides.  Save the last human
	family.  You owe it to yourself to build a two-joystick
	controller for this one.  On the control pad, diagonal
	shooting is accomplished by holding down two buttons
	at once.

	This game is immediately enjoyable but it probably will
	be a bit hard to play in the upper levels without a real
	two-joystick controller.


Stargate - (Defender II) More enemies, more buttons.  Warp through
	the stargate when carrying humans.  Inviso shields you
	temporarily.  Missing raster lines cause bits of your ship
	and bits of landers to disappear (landers are most
	noticeable because they tend to move horizontally right
	over a missing raster).

	Like Defender, this game should be* played with the original
	controls, but it'll take a bit of time to get used to them.

	*Just my opinion


Joust - Fly your ostrich.  Missing rasters just destroy this game.
	The pterodactyl still sounds frightening.  Very interesting
	sound effects when you get a top score.


Sinistar - Mine crystals to make bombs, used to destroy the large
	juggernaut enemy.  Excellent conversion of the vertical
	game, using interlace mode.  Correct aspect ratio is achieved
	without turning the TV on its side.


Bubbles - Scoot around in a sink, avoiding baddies.  An interesting
	change of pace after Robotron...


All game emulators are set for free play, which means no coin insertion
is necessary.  You can still insert coins* however, just to hear the
nifty sound effects that result.

*Not for real but there's a button

Using the operator's screen, you can change difficulty settings and
features of the various games.  Use L2 + START (on Defender at least)
to change settings.

There are text articles about each game, which are well written and
interesting.  There are also video clips with the various game designers.

Mike W.