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International Arcade Museum® — Killer List of Videogames®

Galaga '88

Description

The player's ship moves from side to side and the player attempts to shoot all advancing enemy ships. Enemy ships are in formation above, and also individual enemy ships come at the player to attack his ship. There are items to collect as they fall, and bombs to avoid from the attacking enemy ships.

Galaga '88 was produced by Namco in 1987.

Namco released 310 machines in our database under this trade name, starting in 1977. Namco was based in Japan.

Other machines made by Namco during the time period Galaga '88 was produced include: Vs. Super Xevious, Toy Pop, Thunder Ceptor II, Thunder Ceptor, Super Sky Kid, Blazer, Dragon Spirit, Final Lap, Pac-Mania, and Quester

Specs

Name	Galaga '88
Developer	Namco (Japan)
Year	1987
Type	Videogame
KLOV/MOG #	7883
Class	Wide Release
Genre	Space
Monitor	Orientation: Vertical Type: Raster: Standard Resolution Color: Color
Conversion Class	Namco System 1 - JAMMA
# Simultaneous Players	1
# Maximum Players	2
Game Play	Alternating
Control Panel Layout	Single Player Ambidextrous
Controls	Joystick: 2-way (left, right) Buttons: 1 - Fire
Sound	Amplified Stereo (two channel)
Cabinet Styles	Upright/Standard

Video Clips

Galaga 88 (Namco 1988)

Game Introduction

This game was a sequel to the popular Galaga game. It had similar gameplay, but incorporated new "cute" sprites for the game, with some new features: triple ship, choice of starting mode, warps and other tricks discovered through gameplay. The game also supports a continue feature.

Game Play

The game plays much like the original, but at the beginning you have a choice of heading out with a single or dual ship (choosing dual means having one less ship as a spare). In either case, enemies fly into their formation and you can attack them as they enter. Some waves will have escorts that can be destroyed and some have extra enemies that will fly at you instead of heading into formation.

There are other new types of enemies that will appear, based on where you are. In addition to escorts, loopers, divers, and (of course) the Galagas, you may encounter balloon-like enemies, puffers that burst into numerous smaller versions of themselves, enemies with shot-proof armor, and more. The loopers are still able to mutate into small enemy formations while the divers can now merge two-to-one and create giant versions of themselves.

The Galagas will attempt to capture your ships as before, and this time they can capture duals! If you free the dual, all three ships combine to create a super fighter that shoots three big shots at a time.

You lose ships as you are hit by enemies. Triples will become duals, duals become singles, and singles just blow up. You can also lose singles and duals to the Galagas, and to free them you must destroy the captor Galaga during its attack flight, otherwise the captured ship(s) will be destroyed.

In later stages, obstacles will block your shots at enemies. Destroying them releases warp capsules that can be used to eventually warp your ship to newer, tougher dimensions.

In stage three and during every fourth space stage after that (do not count the ice planet stages), you enter the Galactic Dancin' Challenge Stage. Like in the original, you attempt to shoot waves of enemies (including a number of Galagas) that fly in a variety of tricky formations that make them hard to hit. After each Challenge Stage, if you had collected two Warp Capsules earlier, they will be used to blow a dimensional rift to let you into a tougher dimension.

Galaga '88 KLOV/IAM 5 Point User Score: 3.40 (6 votes)

Fun Factor: 3.21

Overall Like	3.50
Fun (Social)	3.00
Fun (Solo)	3.17
Collector Desire	4.00

Technical Rating: 3.58

Gameplay	4.00
Graphics	3.67
Originality	3.00
Sound/Music	3.83

Personal Impressions and Technical Impressions each account for half of the total score. Within the Personal Impressions category, Like carries a little more weight than the other factors.

Cheats, Tricks, Bugs, and Easter Eggs

If you do not touch any controls in the levels where the enemies dance, then you get a 10000 point Mystery Bonus.

Though obstacles provide warp capsules, the other way to get them is to destroy big enemies formed from two smaller ones. As there are no obstacles in the first leg of the game, this is the only way to warp after the first Challenge Stage.

Collecting blue capsules not only gives you power needed to warp, but you also become briefly invincible.

In certain stages, starting at about Stage 15, the last enemy will try to get away. Get it before it does, and it may drop a red capsule. Collecting this capsule instantly transforms whatever ship you have into a triple ship.

Images

Miscellaneous

The copyrights on the US cabinet indicate that the game was manufactured by Atari Games and that Namco has the copyright for engineering and design.

VAPS Arcade/Coin-Op Galaga '88 Census

There are 15,256 members of the Video Arcade Preservation Society / Vintage Arcade Preservation Society, 9,665 whom participate in our arcade census project of games owned, wanted, or for sale. Census data currently includes 166,931 machines (6,995 unique titles).

Very Common - There are 136 known instances of this machine owned by Galaga '88 collectors who are active members. Of these, 49 of them are original dedicated machines. 15 of them are conversions in which game circuit boards (and possibly cabinet graphics) have been placed in (and on) another game cabinet. 72 of them are only circuit boards which a collector could put into a generic case if desired.

For Sale - There are 4 active VAPS members with a Galaga '88 machines for sale. There are 3 active VAPS members with a Galaga '88 circuit boards for sale.

Wanted - There are 10 active VAPS members currently looking for Galaga '88. There are 3 active VAPS members looking for Galaga '88 boards sets.

This game ranks a 32 on a scale out of 100 (100 = most often seen, 1=least common) in popularity based on census ownership records.

This game ranks a 22 on a scale out of 100 (100 = most often seen, 1=least common) in popularity based on census want list records.

Rarity and Popularity independently are not necessarily indications of value. [More Information]

Flyers

Technical

The game's hardware is a Namco System 1 board. It uses a three 6809 processors, a 63701 MCU, and many custom ICs. For sound it uses a Namco 8 channel stereo wavedata PSG, a YM3012 DAC, and a YM2151 FM sound chip.

Legacy

Manuals

Namco Manual - Galaga '88 Manual — **Namco Manual**
(11 pages, 1.8 MB File)

Operator's Manual - Galaga '88 Manual — **Operator's Manual**
(32 pages, 2.3 MB File)

Foto-Finder® (Books)

The Encyclopedia of Arcade Video Games Kurtz (ISBN 0764319256) Page: 204; Color photo Price guide: No
Encyclopedia of Arcade Video Games Kurtz (ISBN 0764319256) Page: 204; Color photo

Additional References (logged in members often see more)

3D Model (External): Upright (8ef5a296334489d715000ab5e56184f5)

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