As a spaceship moving left to right at the bottom of the screen, shoot up at enemies as they enter, assemble in formation and fly down at you. If you allowed an alien to capture one of your ships in its tractor beam, you could shoot the foe later and double your fire power!
Galaga was produced by Namco in 1981.
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 was produced include: Pac-Man, Navarone, SOS, Puck Man, Galaxian, King And Balloon, New Rally-X, Tank Battalion, Warp & Warp, and Batting Chance
Name | Galaga |
---|---|
Developer | Namco (Japan) |
Released by |
Namco - Japan (January 1981), Ireland (October 1981) Bally Midway - United States (October 01 1981) |
Year | 1981 |
Type | Videogame |
KLOV/MOG # | 7881 |
Class | Wide Release |
Genre | Space |
Monitor |
|
Conversion Class | Namco Galaga |
Dipswitch Settings |
Galaga (Namco rev. B) Dipswitch Settings (MAME) Galaga (Namco) Dipswitch Settings (MAME) Galaga (Midway set 1) Dipswitch Settings (MAME) Galaga (Midway set 2) Dipswitch Settings (MAME) Galaga (Midway set 1 with fast shoot hack) Dipswitch Settings (MAME) |
# Simultaneous Players | 1 |
# Maximum Players | 2 |
Game Play | Alternating |
Control Panel Layout | Single Player |
Controls |
|
Sound | Amplified Mono (one channel) |
Cabinet Styles |
|
Bezel | Galaga Bezel Image |
Control Panel | Galaga Control Panel Image |
PCB | Galaga PCB Image |
Moving along the bottom of the screen, you shoot at the enemies either in formation or as they fly about. Most enemies are destroyed by one hit, but the Galagas take two hits they turn blue when hit once. You must avoid being hit by enemies and their fire. You must also be aware of the Galaga's tractor beam, which can capture your ship a captured ship turns red. To free the captured ship, you must destroy the captor Galaga while it is attacking you, otherwise the captured ship will be destroyed. When you free a captured ship, it will dock alongside your current ship, thus creating a dual ship.
Ships are lost when you are hit by enemies. Dual ships are destroyed individually.
Overall Like |
4.48 |
---|---|
Fun (Social) | 3.91 |
Fun (Solo) | 4.33 |
Collector Desire | 4.26 |
Gameplay | 4.45 |
---|---|
Graphics | 4.20 |
Originality | 3.70 |
Sound/Music | 4.00 |
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.
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TRICK: If a Galaga's tractor beam starts pulling you in, you will spin about, but you will still be able to shoot at enemies. If you happen to end up shooting upward and destroy the Galaga before you are captured, you will just drop back into play.
TRICK: If you happen to lose a ship to a Galaga and then shoot the Galaga while it is still in formation, the captive ship will remain under enemy control. However, it will only make one attack at you before disappearing. If you allow it to escape, it will return in the next stage unless it's a Challenge Stage with another Galaga, giving you another shot at freeing the ship.
CHEAT: There is a well-known cheat that causes enemy units to stop firing. It works on most, but not all, machines.
Some people have reported that this trick also works with two bees from the RIGHT side of the screen. Note that in a two-player game, only one person has to do the cheat for both players to benefit.
TRICK: The "Player 1" score counter in Galaga is six digits, but the "Player 2" counter is seven digits. Therefore, most good players start a two-player game and play exclusively on the Player 2 side so their score will not "roll over" at 999990. Challenging stages are easier if the high score numbers are used to refine your aim.
TRICKS: These tips assume a six-digit high score:
BUG: A bug exists in Galaga and Ms. Pac-Man/Galaga Namco Galaga, some Midway Galaga, Gallag bootleg and Nebulous Bee bootleg - Class of '81 that allows a player to play during the Galaga demo screen and even reset the game. The demos are the same for both Galaga and Ms. Pac-Man/Galaga - Class of '81, and the bug works the same way, but the result is a little different between the two Galagas.
During the Galaga demo, the Galaga character comes down and tries to tractor-beam up the player's ship. As soon as that tractor-beam starts, the player can take control of the ship in the demo. The player has two choices here and this will effect how the game handles this bug:
One of the first games with a bonus stage.
Along with Pac-Man and Pong, this game shares the curse of being one of the most bootlegged games of all time.
This game can be seen being played in several scenes of the movie War Games by the character David Lightman (Matthew Broderick).
Namco also produced very small versions of these games, about the size of a 17-inch monitor, for buses and airplanes.
BOOTLEG: Gallag
BOOTLEG: Nebulous Bee
This game was licensed to Bally Midway for US manufacture and distribution.
There are 15,175 members of the Video Arcade Preservation Society / Vintage Arcade Preservation Society, 9,629 whom participate in our arcade census project of games owned, wanted, or for sale. Census data currently includes 166,346 machines (6,974 unique titles).
Very Common - There are 1,261 known instances of this machine owned by Galaga collectors who are active members. Of these, 990 of them are original dedicated machines. 70 of them are conversions in which game circuit boards (and possibly cabinet graphics) have been placed in (and on) another game cabinet. 191 of them are only circuit boards which a collector could put into a generic case if desired.
For Sale - There are 38 active VAPS members with a Galaga machines for sale. There are 9 active VAPS members with a Galaga circuit boards for sale.
Wanted - Very Popular - There are 84 active VAPS members currently looking for Galaga. There are 2 active VAPS members looking for Galaga boards sets.
This game ranks a 96 on a scale out of 100 (100 = most often seen, 1=least common) in popularity based on census ownership records.
This game ranks a 88 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]
The game uses three Z80 microprocessors and a Namco 3-channel PSG for sounds.
Our members have reported that Galaga is playable at 7 locations:
Name | Location | State | Country | Details | Check-ins |
---|---|---|---|---|---|
8-Bit Beans | 100 Brock St South, Whitby | Ontario | Canada | Unknown | 0 |
Bartari | 101 Adams Ave, Scranton | Pennsylvania | United States | Bar | 0 |
Level One Bar + Arcade | 130 Hutchinson Ave, Columbus | Ohio | United States | Unknown | 0 |
Museum of the Game (HQ) - Test Entry | 530 S. Lake Ave, Pasadena | California | United States | Museum – Arcade/Game/Coin-Op | 1 |
PinBar | 501 17 Ave SW, Calgary | AB | Canada | Arcade | 2 |
Sting Rays Bar And Grill | 3112 East State Road 60, Valrico | Florida | United States | Unknown | 0 |
Upstate Pinball & Arcade Museum | 109A West Trade St, Simpsonville | South Carolina | United States | Arcade | 2 |
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Year | Count | Median $ | Average $ |
---|---|---|---|
2016 | 12 | 575.00 | 551.04 |
2017 | 9 | 354.00 | 523.78 |
2018 | 2 | 1,003.00 | 1,003.00 |
All Years | 23 | 575.00 | 579.67 |