Top 50 Video Games: Number 49
#49: Gauntlet
System: Arcade
Publisher: Atari Games
Released: 1985
Players:4
Red Warrior has his work cut out for him.
Gautlet first appeared in arcades in 1985. Dungeons and Dragons was very popular around this time, and this only served to fuel the popularity for Gauntlet, which was the godfather of dungeon crawl video games. Gauntlet was immensely popular in arcades, offering nonstop hack and slash multiplayer action. And, in a stroke of genius, the characters' health would constantly be ticking down so the players would have to continuously feed quarters into the machine.
The premise of Gauntlet is simple: Kill everything that stands between you and the exit to the next level. Players could choose from 4 characters (each one corresponded to a joystick on the machine) a Red Warrior, Green Elf, Blue Valkyrie, or a Yellow Wizard. Warrior has best hand to hand combat, wizard has the best magic, elf has the fastest movement and valkyrie takes the least damage. Anyone who has played Diablo 2 with me could guess that I took the fast-moving Elf every time.
Each level has a swarm of monsters that are constantly being produced by little monster huts called generators. Littered around the boards are treasure, food, poison, and magic bottles. There is also a single (usually) exit on the map. I'm told there is in fact an end to Gauntlet. I can neither confirm nor deny this. I do know that as the game progresses it becomes quite hard, with transporters, mazes, multiple exits and the such.
A team of four players working together to battle evil. Honestly, I don't even know what they're doing down in the dungeon in the first place.
Anyone who ever played Gauntlet for any length of time recalls the narrator's voice in the game. The little sound bites are engrained deep within my memory:
"Valkyrie shot the food."
"Yellow Wizard is about to die."
"Red warrior, your life force is running out."
"Green elf needs food badly."
The game has had multiple incarnations on many gaming systems since it's orignal arcade release. The original game holds up pretty well today, partly due to nostalgic value. This is one of those franchises whose recent games have been declining in quality and should probably have been respectfully left for dead. Still, getting ahold of a remake of the original game is fairly easy, and that is no bad thing.
posted by
@ 12:01 AM
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2 Comments:
i never played the first one but i played the hell out of the 2nd one on my old nes. the two sayings i remember the most are "needs food badly" and "don't shoot the food"
ive heard storys that the game does have an end but i dont beleive them. they are just wives tales handed down thru generations. Hell, snopes.com probably even has a page about them.
I was always a fan of the Wizard. Decent speed, decent attack, ballbreaking bombs. However I think the worst Armor in the game. Anybody that has played Twisted Metal with me would know I prefer ballbreaking attack power to defense.
There is an end. There are areas of the map marked "?". These areas give a piece of a combonation which unlocks the guardian at the end.
I figured this out very late. Like on the 4th map or something. I went back through my password list and re-did the "?" maps until I got my full password. Sadly, the combonation is passed along in your password used to continue the game.
When my wizard stood at the guardian's door, it asked for the combonation. I told it an answer and it told me I was wrong.
My life and quest ended there, if any future adventurers make it to the guardian, save some food for the wizard that sits there with a broken combonation in his lap and a single bomb strapped to his chest.
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