I had a Texas Instrument game console back when I was 6. We graduated to an Atari 800 shortly thereafter, and resisted all temptations and blandishments to upgrade to the sexy new generation of game consoles ala Nintendo. By the time Nintendo came out, my uncle (only a few years older) and myself had accumlated well over 300 pirated Atari games, and somehow Nintendo’s offering paled in comparision. And there I stayed on that Atari until the Macintosh came out. Which is all a really long way of justifying, why I’ve never gotten over being hung up on arcarde games.

Snood is my all time favorite game, followed in quick succession by PuyoPuyo (difficult to find sometims as Sony owns the copyright), Maniac (which also disappeared for a while, but is back), and now, Airbust! They are all old school style arcade games, that revel in no longer having to fit everyting in 8k slots, and for my money more fun then any game written in one of the more modern genres.

Airbust is sort of like pong except there are 4+ players, and instead of being affixed to the walls, they float on clouds of bubbles. Fast, fun, simple, and challenging, its has a colorful anime inspired feel, a strong thumping sound track, highly varied play, and aspects both cooperative and competive. I knew I had to send in my $5 the first time I played.