Space Invaders: The Instant Video Game
It’s one of the legends of the Atari era - the famous Coke Wins! cartridge for the 2600, originally designed as a premium, mail-in-your-proofs-of-purchase type item for the Coca-Cola Company. But for those who have actually seen the game, it’s very easy to see that it’s just a rip-off of Atari’s own Space Invaders cartridge, hacked to turn the rows of advancing invaders into the letters PEPSI.
There’s a reason why this cartridge never officially made it out the door. It wouldn’t have made money for anyone but Pepsi’s attorneys. To this very day, Pepsi’s early-80s legal team can be heard howling “Why? Why didn’t they release Coke Wins? My Maserati could’ve been paid for by now!”
Flash forward to 1998. I’m browsing the web, and discover a Star Trek web site with a Java version of Space Invaders which replaces usual barrage of alien critters with Romulan ships, Borg cubes, and so forth. Other than that, it’s exactly the same game.
Somewhere between Coca-Cola and a Star Trek fan with too much time on his hands lies the truth: Space Invaders is a universal game, almost a kind of quasi-meta-game. All you need is a protagonist, some antagonists, and voila - you’ve got a whole new game. No fancy cut-scenes which explain your motivation - just blast those little varmints outta the sky! I thought about ways that this formula could be applied to Space Invaders based on the plots of hit movies from the past several years…and quickly realized that Hollywood’s been missing the boat by turning every box-office blockbuster into a 3-D, Doom-style shooter. There is an easier way.
Twister: The Game - you drive a red truck back and forth along the bottom of the screen. Several rows of little tornadoes bear down on you, dropping hailstones from on high. You try to shoot them with reinforced oil drums full of Christmas ornaments - erm, ahem, scientific instruments - all in the name of science, of course, unlike those other guys who are doing it for the money.
Con Air: The Game - you are John Cusack, zipping along the bottom of the screen in Colm Meaney’s (stolen) car. An airplane (formerly Space Invaders‘ mothership) is dropping large numbers of dead bodies out of the sky. You must shoot each one down to prevent an old couple in Arizona from having a heart attack.
Wag The Dog: The Game - you are White House press secretary Joe Lockhart, attempting to shoot down row after row of reporters asking you to compare this whole Lewinsky mess with the movie Wag The Dog. Bonus points for shooting a floating blue dress (once again, formerly the mothership) out of the sky. (Based on a true story.)
Wild Wild West: The Game - you are mega-star Will Smith, trying to shoot down row after row of heads of producer Barry Sonnenfeld for giving you a big smelly dog of a movie instead of just going ahead and making Men In Black II. (Also based on a true story.)
Independence Day: The Game - hey, wait a minute…this wouldn’t need to be different from Space Invaders at all!
Waterworld: The Game - completely unrelated to Atari’s Swordquest: Waterworld, but roughly equivalent in entertainment value. You are Kevin Costner, trying to shoot down the brains of multitudes of moviegoers so they’ll actually be just unconscious enough to enjoy your next colossally-budgeted film flop. In place of the mothership is a Hollywood studio contract which, if shot ten times, will give you the green light to go ahead and make an even bigger bomb about post-apocalyptic postal workers as a follow-up.
I’m sure you get the idea. But if not, ask me for my idea about a really great game based on that family-friendly slice of celluloid called Eyes Wide Shut.
In retrospect, with a little bit of reflection on how many first-person or off-to-one-side-and-slightly-above-first-person shooters we’ve gotten out of various and sundry Hollywood franchises, would it actually be any worse if we got sixteen gazillion clones of Space Invaders?
This article appeared in Classic Gamer Magazine #4 (Autumn 2000). Special thanks to editor Chris Cavanaugh for giving me permission to reprint this as part of my portfolio.
