"And if you pull my card, you pull the ace And if you ask me turn up the bass And if you play defender I could be your hyperspace, so..." Body Movin' - Beastie Boys
I was either 12 or 13 yrs old when I mastered Defender. It's amazing how true your reflexes are when you are younger. I am 46 now and probably couldn't break 100,000 without a good bit of practice. The easiest game to master to me was Galaga which took about 3 months. Defender took about 1 1/2 years. Now you can play games at home every day. Back then, you only got to play when your parents would let you walk there or would drop you off and then pick you up later. Plus you needed plenty of quarters to get good at some of the games. It was weird, I knew a 19yr old that mastered Stargate but could not master Defender. Flip side is that I couldn't master Stargate. There was also this thirty yr old guy that mastered Star Wars but was not that good at any other game. There were hundreds of different Arcade games and yet I could only master 4. Defender, Galaga, Gauntlet, and Asteroids. I almost rolled Missile Command, got around 850,000 once and could play pac man until my pattern stopped working on the 7th key level. I was very good at Gyress, Devils Hollow and Xevious but never mastered them. I remember as a kid playing video games and turning around and there was 5 adults standing there watching me play. I sucked at Centipede, Qix, Asteroids 2, Galaxian, Moon Patrol, Scrambler, Phoenix,Crazy climber, Gorf,Tapper, Spiders and a hundred more. Overall, I was good at about a dozen or so of them, but that is out of a thousand or more so it's still a small percentage.
My four games to master and rollover (points/levels) were Asteroids, then Defender, followed by Robotron and then Gauntlet a few years later after trying it in 1987 (Gauntlet was the easiest to master, and a lot of fun). Robotron was, by far, the greatest video game I have ever played in my life... better than any other arcade game or home game. Pure adrenaline and workout while standing. Sometimes the odd arcade would have the settings a little too liberal making it too easy after mastering it. I liked it when the settings were either default mode at minimum or harder... one time I found a game where the owner played a prank or something and set all settings to the greatest difficulty - was the best practice ever! Went back to the default game setting at the main arcade downtown and crushed it over 10,000,000 with ease having probably 100 men saved and gave the game to one of the 10 people watching and crowding me, so i could go stretch my legs LOL They were pumped and also very stiff - a huge body and brain workout
loved those sounds from back then ,brings back memories. know you can play on your tv without shouting out a . coin, how good is that. what we have today mind blowing.
I was the Phoenix champ at my arcade, but I always looked up to the Defender champs. More buttons more skill. The king of games (on an arcade machine).
I used to love this game and always had a big audience watching when i played. Not being big headed but i was a god on this game,could play for hours on one credit (and often did), down Q’s the pool hall in Southend which also doubled as a place to sell all your hooky gear back in the day. The manageress was a modern day Fagin lol. Love the sound when near clocking the score and everything you hit gave you an extra ship and smart bomb. I used to have a fat callous on the outside of my thumb from the reverse button. This video has just rolled the years right back,thanks for posting 👍👍
Yea me too but notice this person does something I never did which was kill most of their humans at start of round. Maybe that was one reason why I was good cause I had plenty of practice killing mutants 😆
Yeah back then with dedication(and blisters) you could actually get to master a machine All the arcade games nowadays are programmed to eat your money in the fastest possible time. A lot of games you could actually get quite good at and be on it for quite a while. When i take my boy to the arcade now they all seem to be designed so that getting to this stage on a game is impossible and the games are all over within a few minutes. Sign of the times I think
Insane. I love how Williams games depend on having true arcade controls to play properly. The feel of the buttons and slamming that stick right and left was what made games like Defender and Robotron a kick-ass experience.
Maaaan happy days. I remember tripping my nuts off on mushrooms playing this at Essex Uni before going down to see a gig. I went round the clock with a crowd of students watching. Just told my gal I'm buying a machine (1200 new) and a giant bag of herb. Bring it on!
If you look at about 6 mins 20 seconds at the end it goes from attack wave 255 to attack wave 0 (which has no enemies and ends immediately). After that the waves start at wave one again. Notice that at the end its wave one, as only landers appear. 8 bit video games can only count to 255, so anything after that number it reverts back to 0 then 1 . Its the same for ships : if you have a marathon game and have 255 ships then your ship total will reset to 0 when you get your next free man.
damn good shooting cowboy. Stargate, Joust, Robotron, and Asteroids were all great fun. Except for the last one, enjoying these games with PC controls not easy. cheers
Nice one mate - here we have all the elements of a great Defender player. The firepower and Baiter fighting spirit ticks all my boxes! Agree with Mike, the ROMs seem green and I say that because there is harldy anything disappearing (or is that a MAME thing?). Perhaps I tend to carry humanoids a lot more and that causes it... will look into that... anyhow, bloody good vid.
The guy is right regarding getting the free ship between 990K to a million, and this did not ever change. Where he is wrong however is saying the game reset to level one at this point. It doesnt. All 8 bit computer games cannot count above the number 255, so when you get to wave 256 it then resets, as under 8 bit binary 255=0. Most people get to the million at about wave 70. The waves continue unaffected until 256.
Those Baiters are buggers in the later waves, not to mention all the landers being mutants when you go into space. I was a complete hound on Defender, Pac-Man, Galaga and Xevious. I did once manage to roll over back to 1 on Defender, but ended up with serious button-cramp and lost all my lives shortly after.
csrcjr is correct I also used to score more than a million points and that's exactly what happens when you score 990,000 or more. Perhaps in future revisions of the game this was changed. I dont know ..not sure...thanks
did all you guys develop a callus on the inside of your left middle finger from the joystick from playing this or was it just my technique of gripping it? my gosh, I can feel that spot twitching right now just watching... LOL
Rolling over the game was at 999,999. Everything you hit between 990,000 and that gave you a free ship for everything you hit. It reset to level one after that, hence how you could play all day on one quarter.....if you could get there!
I loved Defender and Stargate, I couldn't get enough of them (Asteroids too) back in the day as a teenager. Haven't seen any of those games in like 35 years, and then a month or so ago I finally found a company that makes a Defender. I got a partycade (tabletop) Defender with authentic control layout and an Asteroids that has Asteroids Deluxe. Only paid about $400 for the both of them, and the experience is authentic. Now the quality isn't going to at be at a commercial level like the real thing, but if you want to play Defender like it's really played the Arcade 1 up Defender is the only real Defender today. I hope someday they'll produce a Stargate proper, I'll spend whatever they want for a Stargate. Anyway if you remember Defender and want to play, it's on QVC, they'll split the 2 hundred into like 5 payments to make it easy. Cheers.
About 20 miles away then - small world. Once watched BOF clock a machine in the Kard bar and remeber those initials all over Whitley Bay's Defender machines.
Defender was the original (Flash pinball was the original for sounds), but Robotron seemed to have it all mesh the best, along with the playability... it was so rapid! The Robotron sounds were superior overall, I believe, and still one of the greatest up to this day.
Love the sound fx of this game! I wasted far too much of my parents money trying to last more than a few seconds on it on my holidays...many many years ago!
My four games to master and rollover (points/levels) were Asteroids, then Defender, followed by Robotron and then Gauntlet a few years later after trying it in 1987 (Gauntlet was the easiest to master, and a lot of fun). Robotron was, by far, the greatest video game I have ever played in my life... better than any other arcade game or home game. Pure adrenaline and workout while standing. Sometimes the odd arcade would have the settings a little too liberal making it very easy after mastering it. I liked it when the settings were either default mode at minimum, or harder... one time I found a game (where the owner played a prank, or something) and placed all settings to the greatest difficulty - it was the BEST practice ever! Went back to the default game setting at the main arcade downtown and crushed it over 10,000,000 with ease, having probably 100 men saved, and then gave the remainder of the game to one of the 10 people watching and crowding me, so i could go stretch my legs because they were pumped and also very stiff - LOL - a huge body and brain workout!!
Great to see you play some max difficulty Defender. And this was certainly not the red roms. Green? Space is evil - as soon as you turn to mow down a bunch of Mutants, they go the other way - as if the "Dateline" is following you everywhere you go. And the Mutant/Swarmer combo is impossible - you have to keep away from the Mutants, and do away with the Swarmers first. And the wave 256 roll: very cool, haven't seen it since the 80's. But I wasn't aware of the slowdown on 255. Explanation?
I first played this game during lunch break at a nearby restaurant in the 9th grade (1982) and loved it. I was pretty good at it but not as good as you. I had the Atari 5200 version of this game (which sucked). They had this game at the bowling alley of the college I went to and it was on an easy setting. I was able to flip that one and learn about the 990,000 thing. I think that was the last time I ever played the actual arcade game. My favorite game of all time.
I first played this back when it was first released in the early 80s australia and i literally hardly played another game since.It was always Defender ,constantly for years ..I still have never found another game that i think is better .Call me an addict . I want to actually buy a stand up when i can afford it,its a bucket list .I could get the hang of the cocktail versions ,the game gets you too hyped to take a seat
@@MegaSpriggsy I recognize your name now Paul. it felt familiar ..You actually sent me a cd rom to australia with defender on it for a pc when i was building one. You posted it free too mate..I havnt finished it ,not to say i wont.Its just getting the time to do it between work ,my hands are full with multiple projects ..I ended up with a pc for it ,decals and buttons for a cab ,got a screen but needed to make a cab..Even though i think it must have been 3 or so years ago now..not sure..Absolute gentleman cheers The original version arcade stand up is more so as an antique thing i want in the house plus play it too.But i will end up getting around to finishing the build my own project when i'm not playing with everything else ...
I remember this. His strategy is not optimum. Once in a while used to get bored and blow up just to use some bombs. Never saw the point to do that. Used to slow the game down to almost to a stop by creating a cloud of 40+ green saucers and pull them around. 6 to 8 hours for one quarter was cheap entertainment. What did I get in return ?
Hi Paul Ooops sorry that I misread it...that is correct...just out of curiosity you are playing very well and I was wondering if you have a recreation of Defender's control panel layout or similar? I'm trying to play to score at least 100,000 and I suck because a gamepad doesnt make it for the great controllers the game has.
I loved Phoenix, too. But never got good at it. Kind of like Centipede or Joust for me. I loved them too, but I was too engrossed with Missile Command, Defender, and Battlezone in the arcades to give enough time to Phoenix and other deserving games. :)
Other games do this. Pac-man, for example, actually crashes at the 256th board rather than resets and its game over. Nobody has cleared board 256 on pacman ever. Williams games reset back to wave one though.
Are you referring to the point when you reach 990,000 pts? The only other weird thing that can happen in this game is usually done on stage 1. You collect all 10 humanoids and wait until your ship isn't thrusting forward anymore. Then start shooting while laying all your humanoids down to land. Not sure if you need to fire though, but need to make sure your ship is completely still when laying them down. If done properly, the game will freeze up. I heard it's a hit or miss, whether or not it will work, but when it does, you can unfreeze the game by just hitting the thrust button again. All you're able to do if I remember is move your ship up and down. Oh one last cool thing that's not a big deal, but nice to see it happen and don't know if you can actually do it on purpose or not. But when shooting a pod, no baiters will come out at all. I believe the most is 10, so it's cool when you shoot it and none of the buggers come out to attack you. :)
Mind blowing skills! I play Defender every evening and still barely clear the first few waves. When i do get a good score i think its more luck than skill. Hats off to you mate, you are beyond incredible at Defender. You own that shit! I only play racing games/sims now. The only other game i play outside of racing games is Defender. I was a big fan of Berzerk back in the day as well.
Paul Spriggs No worries mate. I'm picking up some tips from watching your vids. Thanks for uploading. Obviously you play Defender a lot but are there any other games you love?
I played these games to death from 1980-1984 in arcades. Ive had them on emulators since 1995, so i pretty much never really stopped playing them. I havent actually played much in the last 6 weeks funnily enough. Must get back on the saddle :)
Those landers are like blue jays when they find something to eat on the ground. Nice playing. I want to play. How do I join this club? This video is three years old. - Probably too late.
I am developing one now as i am now using a proper defender controller, but when I was playing the game on the video I was using a sony playstation arcade stick, which has a lower base that didnt cause the friction necessary to cause the callus! Sad or what!
I cant get the green roms to work on mame. When i run green roms Mame puts the bezel artwork around the screen making the play area only half the size. The bezel artwork option is unticked but i still cant get rid of it. This version played is labelled "White" Roms although we all know that mames white roms arent really the prototype white ones. Still no idea why the game slows at wave 255 though. I will upload some red rom play shortly. I will soon upload some red rom play for you guys.
Someone please help this old man remember - back in the day I played this at the Pick Wick on Cleveland in Clearwater FL but it's dip switches were set at a 12,000 point free man instead of the standard 10,000 points and I would get up in the hundreds of thousands. Then I played it at Mind Games (HWY 60 Clearwater) where it was set at the standard 10,000 point free man and before long I started turning them both over but I can't remember - what was it I use to have to do before hitting the 1,000,000 iterations? Didn't I have to drop most of the smart bombs or something and throttle back on how many extra men I had or something or when I would turn it over I would lose like all the smart bombs or most all of the men? It's been so long!! I have to get a controller or a faster responding keyboard for Mame!! I think a game room locally may have a stand up. I Must check after seeing this!! Great memories man!!
You get an advance of 35-45 free ships, as between 990,000 and a million you get a free ship and bomb for every point scored. that means you stockpile ships and bombs and you dont get your next bonus until 350-450,000 after clocking it.
the best arcade game ever Defender i have not played for 35 years but i use to be great like you are doing i am trying to find a defender game and stargate maybe soon i can go again great game play Defender
@@MegaSpriggsy i do not know how to i looked on a thing called play store but i have no idea what i am doing i am trying to find someone who can make me a smaller version like a partycade is that how you play?
@@timmarshall2062 i play on a windows pc. mame is free . i can post u usb stick with all games on if u gimme address . you can play initially with keyboard but joysticks cost about 30 bucks
@@MegaSpriggsy i only have a Chromebook laptop i am just really bad with computers i thank you i have two different guys telling me they can make me a Defender counter cabinet with Defender and stargate and a 19 in one game thing i am trying to get that and i want to button layout to be just like Defender that is important to me i have not played in 35 years its a different world now
hello guys iam "jcc" from Canberra , where I had top 2 to 3 hiscores at 999975 on every machine in the city at the same time in the early eighties {around 8 machines), I too used to end up with crowds watching and well you feel like a celebrity of sorts and your confidence builds and you play even more magically ..... I should also let everyone know that I accidently discovered the freeze glitch on the first wave at a game in 1981 , with several surprised other players. this game has shaped my life to some degree , as iam currently the owner of capital pinball in Canberra , one of the largest amusement machine business in Australia . I d like to join that facebook page , additionally I should mention ive met eugeb twice iin states during the course of 2 shows on my travels my name is jose Ciminelli .iam 48 yo.
The founder of the defender group is also an Oz! Look out on facebook for "williams defender players unite" and ask to join. I will let you in bud. See you soon!
I was going to start saving up, but I'm working on a novel now and this will be my treat if I make money. Any chance of telling me where I can get the game for PC?
Richard Fairbairn Good man. I can email you stargate rom and other defender roms. I love green! If you do facebook try and join williams defender players unite facebook page. We have 1000 defender nuts 😀
When you get to 990,000 everything that you shoot gives you an extra man and smart bomb. After passing 999,995 it stops giving you anymore extra men or smart bombs. The score goes back to zero and I mean 0. The highest score you can get is 999,995. So after finding that out, I would just let all of my men die right before it rolled over. Hey, it's the only way to get your initials up there. When it rolls your score is 0. They fixed this problem with Stargate.
The hardest part was making sure to hit objects to reach that score without messing up LOL I hated all that work and then sometimes screwing up and having the score rollover
Been there and done that. :) Played a game 2 months ago after not playing it in years and managed to reach 999,975 and put my initials on a private collectors machine at a trade show (now he has to look at my score and initials every day he plays the game in his house! lol). Great to see I still have it after almost 40 years since I mastering it back in '81 at 13. :)
Every time you score points, your score is compared to the "next extra life" score. If it is that high or greater, the "next extra life" score is increased by 10,000. When you reach 990,000 the next extra life score wraps to zero. Every extra life you get increases it by 10,000. If you were to get 100 extra lives before reaching 1,000,000 points, the next extra lift score would wrap around again, allowing you to collect more lives after that.
Trey Roberson They didnt fix it on stargate. The game simply rolls at 100 mill, not one million. Ive put up a 100 million stargate game on UA-cam to show the bug happening. Larry demar told me it would happen!
You're very good. I think highest score I reached was 600k to 650k. It just got boring and my thumb would start to cramp up. I liked Stargate better. The warping and the yllabian dogfight every other 5th attack wave tested my reflexes. When I got past a million. I considered myself a master.
No it didnt? Where did you get that from? The free ship thing is an advance, not a gift. If you get 40 free ships between 990-1 million then you dont get another free ship for 400,000 points, so you dont get "extra", just early. The waves dont reset at all until wave 256. The waves continue as normal after 1 million. The score does not affect the wave count in any way, shape or form
Porky Ca The original arcade game has 255 levels before it rolls back to 0. it only displays up to 100 waves but it holds the first 255 in memory. This is identical to arcade as it uses identical code from the original cabinet. check out mame on UA-cam. thousands of vids of pacman defender and God knows what
I live in Newcastle mate. I have been reading your UA-cam threads and if you were around the arcades around the same time as BOF then i may know you, or at least recognise you from way back when. Kevin (BOF) was my best mate at the time. I also note you have a Defender machine. Do not give me your address or i will steal your machine ! (lol)
my game was joust I remember rolling over 150k on it once pretty good at I just started playing Defender like yesterday right now my score is only like 20k but I do remember seeing it a couple times back in the arcade I'm also good at robotron and tapper
Did anyone get the highest score possible? I managed it once! I recall it was quite tricky because you actually get 25 points even for dying so you had to get near 999,950 then keep killing yourself by hyperspacing then die once more I think.
Check out a pro at the game. He has a rough start but after he warms up he kicks ass. I used to be an intermediate player. In the town where I lived I had a few friends who were as good as this guy in the video :) ua-cam.com/video/yrkx6vuiMrE/v-deo.html
Paul Spriggs I tried to leave message at the hangout because ofc I don't want to leave my email here XD If I remember correctly my first computer used the same MPU as Defender. I loved writing assembly code on that machine. :)
Ok Dan : If you like retrogaming then you must check out a program called MAME. It stands for Multiple arcade machine Emulator. It is a program that fools your PC into thinking its a genuine arcade machine. The games are lifted from original cabinet ROM chips from the 80s bit for bit, byte for byte. As MAME uses original code then the games play identical to an original cabinet. I currently have 6000 games on my Mame setup although i tend to play mainly shootem ups, and mainly the williams ones, such as defender/stargate/robotron
Yes. You racked up a hell of a lot of ships and tore up those high level space waves. It's either my rustiness or lack of wisdom, but I never had enough ships to go the distance. My ship count never got too high and once it started depleting over time, it's one of the things that killed me. Anyway, that's not what's important. Your play on here is top level. It even looks faster than my machine, but that could be because I'm not playing and trying to keep up with someone else's style / speed is throwing it off for me. That's awesome play. No questions.
***** Its Green Roms bud, not Red. Red were common in america but the harder green rom was more prevalent in the UK. What fries people noodle is that this 99/99 game i recorded was played with a playstation controller!
@@jimspencer5746 defender has difficulty settings. default is starting difficulty 5 and progressive difficulty is 15. progressive difficulty dictates how hard game gets. 99 99 is 99 difficulty start and 99 progressive. fast as hell after wave 3.
Excellent video. My favorite arcade game of all time. I still play this and Stargate with mame.
Hi Frank. U do facebook? We have a williams defender fanpage, and we also have the creators of the game on board! Let me know if interested in joining
"And if you pull my card, you pull the ace
And if you ask me turn up the bass
And if you play defender
I could be your hyperspace, so..."
Body Movin' - Beastie Boys
I was either 12 or 13 yrs old when I mastered Defender. It's amazing how true your reflexes are when you are younger. I am 46 now and probably couldn't break 100,000 without a good bit of practice. The easiest game to master to me was Galaga which took about 3 months. Defender took about 1 1/2 years. Now you can play games at home every day. Back then, you only got to play when your parents would let you walk there or would drop you off and then pick you up later. Plus you needed plenty of quarters to get good at some of the games. It was weird, I knew a 19yr old that mastered Stargate but could not master Defender. Flip side is that I couldn't master Stargate. There was also this thirty yr old guy that mastered Star Wars but was not that good at any other game. There were hundreds of different Arcade games and yet I could only master 4. Defender, Galaga, Gauntlet, and Asteroids. I almost rolled Missile Command, got around 850,000 once and could play pac man until my pattern stopped working on the 7th key level. I was very good at Gyress, Devils Hollow and Xevious but never mastered them. I remember as a kid playing video games and turning around and there was 5 adults standing there watching me play. I sucked at Centipede, Qix, Asteroids 2, Galaxian, Moon Patrol, Scrambler, Phoenix,Crazy climber, Gorf,Tapper, Spiders and a hundred more. Overall, I was good at about a dozen or so of them, but that is out of a thousand or more so it's still a small percentage.
My neighbor had the high score on defender and the news showed up at the arcade and my teacher let's us out of class to go watch. Insane but true.
My four games to master and rollover (points/levels) were Asteroids, then Defender, followed by Robotron and then Gauntlet a few years later after trying it in 1987 (Gauntlet was the easiest to master, and a lot of fun). Robotron was, by far, the greatest video game I have ever played in my life... better than any other arcade game or home game. Pure adrenaline and workout while standing. Sometimes the odd arcade would have the settings a little too liberal making it too easy after mastering it. I liked it when the settings were either default mode at minimum or harder... one time I found a game where the owner played a prank or something and set all settings to the greatest difficulty - was the best practice ever! Went back to the default game setting at the main arcade downtown and crushed it over 10,000,000 with ease having probably 100 men saved and gave the game to one of the 10 people watching and crowding me, so i could go stretch my legs LOL They were pumped and also very stiff - a huge body and brain workout
loved those sounds from back then ,brings back memories. know you can play on your tv without shouting out a . coin, how good is that. what we have today mind blowing.
Was really good on defender, ok on scrambler and space invaders and rubbish at everything else 😁
You would be surprised. I am 55 and I roll over no problem. It takes about 100 hours of play to get your skill back unless you wrecked your body LOL!
I was the Phoenix champ at my arcade, but I always looked up to the Defender champs. More buttons more skill. The king of games (on an arcade machine).
+Nautilus1972 Thank you sir!
+Paul Spriggs I loved phoenix, but i couldnt get much over 140-150K. Never did suss out that score bug either!
I used to love this game and always had a big audience watching when i played. Not being big headed but i was a god on this game,could play for hours on one credit (and often did), down Q’s the pool hall in Southend which also doubled as a place to sell all your hooky gear back in the day. The manageress was a modern day Fagin lol. Love the sound when near clocking the score and everything you hit gave you an extra ship and smart bomb. I used to have a fat callous on the outside of my thumb from the reverse button. This video has just rolled the years right back,thanks for posting 👍👍
Yea me too but notice this person does something I never did which was kill most of their humans at start of round. Maybe that was one reason why I was good cause I had plenty of practice killing mutants 😆
Yeah back then with dedication(and blisters) you could actually get to master a machine
All the arcade games nowadays are programmed to eat your money in the fastest possible
time. A lot of games you could actually get quite good at and be on it for quite a while.
When i take my boy to the arcade now they all seem to be designed so that getting to this stage on a game is impossible
and the games are all over within a few minutes. Sign of the times I think
Galaga and Defender were my best games. I could put in a quarter and play as long as I felt like it.
Wow! You are incredible! I love Defender, but I never got very good at it.
Insane. I love how Williams games depend on having true arcade controls to play properly. The feel of the buttons and slamming that stick right and left was what made games like Defender and Robotron a kick-ass experience.
Right and left? You mean up and down.
Maaaan happy days. I remember tripping my nuts off on mushrooms playing this at Essex Uni before going down to see a gig. I went round the clock with a crowd of students watching. Just told my gal I'm buying a machine (1200 new) and a giant bag of herb. Bring it on!
Thanks billy joe. Praise from Caesar? You play the game on one credit for 35 hours and you reckon I am the monster! 🙋
If you look at about 6 mins 20 seconds at the end it goes from attack wave 255 to attack wave 0 (which has no enemies and ends immediately). After that the waves start at wave one again. Notice that at the end its wave one, as only landers appear. 8 bit video games can only count to 255, so anything after that number it reverts back to 0 then 1 . Its the same for ships : if you have a marathon game and have 255 ships then your ship total will reset to 0 when you get your next free man.
I bet seeing the free men going to zero is just a ton of fun to experience!
This game and Robotron are THE best arcade games ever produced.
Oh yea Sinistar was kick ass too.
@@ScottFichter you forgot stargate 😀 check out my 100 mill stargate vid
damn good shooting cowboy.
Stargate, Joust, Robotron, and Asteroids were all great fun.
Except for the last one, enjoying these games with PC controls not easy.
cheers
Nice one mate - here we have all the elements of a great Defender player. The firepower and Baiter fighting spirit ticks all my boxes! Agree with Mike, the ROMs seem green and I say that because there is harldy anything disappearing (or is that a MAME thing?). Perhaps I tend to carry humanoids a lot more and that causes it... will look into that... anyhow, bloody good vid.
The guy is right regarding getting the free ship between 990K to a million, and this did not ever change. Where he is wrong however is saying the game reset to level one at this point. It doesnt. All 8 bit computer games cannot count above the number 255, so when you get to wave 256 it then resets, as under 8 bit binary 255=0. Most people get to the million at about wave 70. The waves continue unaffected until 256.
Those Baiters are buggers in the later waves, not to mention all the landers being mutants when you go into space. I was a complete hound on Defender, Pac-Man, Galaga and Xevious. I did once manage to roll over back to 1 on Defender, but ended up with serious button-cramp and lost all my lives shortly after.
Pure and utter skill. This person is a legend.
csrcjr is correct I also used to score more than a million points and that's exactly what happens when you score 990,000 or more. Perhaps in future revisions of the game this was changed. I dont know ..not sure...thanks
did all you guys develop a callus on the inside of your left middle finger from the joystick from playing this or was it just my technique of gripping it? my gosh, I can feel that spot twitching right now just watching... LOL
And the outside of your thumb from the furious reversing for baiters etc, just felt my thumb and it seems to have gone but I had it for years.
Rolling over the game was at 999,999. Everything you hit between 990,000 and that gave you a free ship for everything you hit. It reset to level one after that, hence how you could play all day on one quarter.....if you could get there!
Never thought I would see you playing defender again, one of the greatest players Paul
got my own machine now. and robotron!
Loved this game as a kid. Showing nephews this they love the sounds and cheesy graphics
Man back in the day I was HOOKED on this game growing up in CA......... Thanks for the memorial to classic old school gaming.
Hey Porky. Get playing! This is on my PC
I loved Defender and Stargate, I couldn't get enough of them (Asteroids too) back in the day as a teenager. Haven't seen any of those games in like 35 years, and then a month or so ago I finally found a company that makes a Defender. I got a partycade (tabletop) Defender with authentic control layout and an Asteroids that has Asteroids Deluxe. Only paid about $400 for the both of them, and the experience is authentic. Now the quality isn't going to at be at a commercial level like the real thing, but if you want to play Defender like it's really played the Arcade 1 up Defender is the only real Defender today. I hope someday they'll produce a Stargate proper, I'll spend whatever they want for a Stargate. Anyway if you remember Defender and want to play, it's on QVC, they'll split the 2 hundred into like 5 payments to make it easy. Cheers.
been playing defender, stargate etc on my pc at home for years
About 20 miles away then - small world. Once watched BOF clock a machine in the Kard bar and remeber those initials all over Whitley Bay's Defender machines.
Great playing. Defender has the best sound effects of all the classic arcade games, IMHO.
Defender was the original (Flash pinball was the original for sounds), but Robotron seemed to have it all mesh the best, along with the playability... it was so rapid! The Robotron sounds were superior overall, I believe, and still one of the greatest up to this day.
I love this game but I suck at it. If I make it through a few waves I feel like I've achieved something.😂
Dam one the greatest games invented!
Excellent. You got lucky with those hyperspaces but it got you in the end. Yours, JPS. UK champion 83, 84, 85.
Love the sound fx of this game! I wasted far too much of my parents money trying to last more than a few seconds on it on my holidays...many many years ago!
My four games to master and rollover (points/levels) were Asteroids, then Defender, followed by Robotron and then Gauntlet a few years later after trying it in 1987 (Gauntlet was the easiest to master, and a lot of fun). Robotron was, by far, the greatest video game I have ever played in my life... better than any other arcade game or home game. Pure adrenaline and workout while standing. Sometimes the odd arcade would have the settings a little too liberal making it very easy after mastering it. I liked it when the settings were either default mode at minimum, or harder... one time I found a game (where the owner played a prank, or something) and placed all settings to the greatest difficulty - it was the BEST practice ever! Went back to the default game setting at the main arcade downtown and crushed it over 10,000,000 with ease, having probably 100 men saved, and then gave the remainder of the game to one of the 10 people watching and crowding me, so i could go stretch my legs because they were pumped and also very stiff - LOL - a huge body and brain workout!!
I have at least five for ya. Galaga, Defender, Robotron, Dig Dug and Joust.
Great to see you play some max difficulty Defender. And this was certainly not the red roms. Green?
Space is evil - as soon as you turn to mow down a bunch of Mutants, they go the other way - as if the "Dateline" is following you everywhere you go. And the Mutant/Swarmer combo is impossible - you have to keep away from the Mutants, and do away with the Swarmers first.
And the wave 256 roll: very cool, haven't seen it since the 80's. But I wasn't aware of the slowdown on 255. Explanation?
I first played this game during lunch break at a nearby restaurant in the 9th grade (1982) and loved it. I was pretty good at it but not as good as you. I had the Atari 5200 version of this game (which sucked). They had this game at the bowling alley of the college I went to and it was on an easy setting. I was able to flip that one and learn about the 990,000 thing. I think that was the last time I ever played the actual arcade game. My favorite game of all time.
I first played this back when it was first released in the early 80s australia and i literally hardly played another game since.It was always Defender ,constantly for years ..I still have never found another game that i think is better .Call me an addict . I want to actually buy a stand up when i can afford it,its a bucket list .I could get the hang of the cocktail versions ,the game gets you too hyped to take a seat
i played this on my pc. cant afford an upright! you could build one and use a pc etc for a fraction of the cost of a real cab. more reliable too
@@MegaSpriggsy I recognize your name now Paul. it felt familiar ..You actually sent me a cd rom to australia with defender on it for a pc when i was building one. You posted it free too mate..I havnt finished it ,not to say i wont.Its just getting the time to do it between work ,my hands are full with multiple projects ..I ended up with a pc for it ,decals and buttons for a cab ,got a screen but needed to make a cab..Even though i think it must have been 3 or so years ago now..not sure..Absolute gentleman cheers
The original version arcade stand up is more so as an antique thing i want in the house plus play it too.But i will end up getting around to finishing the build my own project when i'm not playing with everything else ...
@@jeffries1232 its how i roll. Gotta keep people playing these great games sir 😀
I remember this. His strategy is not optimum. Once in a while used to get bored and blow up just to use some bombs. Never saw the point to do that. Used to slow the game down to almost to a stop by creating a cloud of 40+ green saucers and pull them around. 6 to 8 hours for one quarter was cheap entertainment. What did I get in return ?
Hi Paul Ooops sorry that I misread it...that is correct...just out of curiosity you are playing very well and I was wondering if you have a recreation of Defender's control panel layout or similar? I'm trying to play to score at least 100,000 and I suck because a gamepad doesnt make it for the great controllers the game has.
thats frickin insane!
thanks 😀
I loved Phoenix, too. But never got good at it. Kind of like Centipede or Joust for me. I loved them too, but I was too engrossed with Missile Command, Defender, and Battlezone in the arcades to give enough time to Phoenix and other deserving games. :)
Other games do this. Pac-man, for example, actually crashes at the 256th board rather than resets and its game over. Nobody has cleared board 256 on pacman ever. Williams games reset back to wave one though.
Cool, I never noticed it saying attack wave 0 when I used to play it back in the 1980's. The Defender that I played did something really weird.
Are you referring to the point when you reach 990,000 pts? The only other weird thing that can happen in this game is usually done on stage 1. You collect all 10 humanoids and wait until your ship isn't thrusting forward anymore. Then start shooting while laying all your humanoids down to land. Not sure if you need to fire though, but need to make sure your ship is completely still when laying them down. If done properly, the game will freeze up. I heard it's a hit or miss, whether or not it will work, but when it does, you can unfreeze the game by just hitting the thrust button again. All you're able to do if I remember is move your ship up and down. Oh one last cool thing that's not a big deal, but nice to see it happen and don't know if you can actually do it on purpose or not. But when shooting a pod, no baiters will come out at all. I believe the most is 10, so it's cool when you shoot it and none of the buggers come out to attack you. :)
Mind blowing skills!
I play Defender every evening and still barely clear the first few waves. When i do get a good score i think its more luck than skill. Hats off to you mate, you are beyond incredible at Defender. You own that shit!
I only play racing games/sims now. The only other game i play outside of racing games is Defender.
I was a big fan of Berzerk back in the day as well.
Cheers bud.
Paul Spriggs No worries mate. I'm picking up some tips from watching your vids. Thanks for uploading.
Obviously you play Defender a lot but are there any other games you love?
Check out my Robotron videos. And my worlds first recorded game that shows the score bug at 100 million. 100 hours play!
+Paul Spriggs
AWESOME!, How many hours do you put in on these games a week Paul?
Robotron is a damned hard game. Have you ever played Gravitar ?
I played these games to death from 1980-1984 in arcades. Ive had them on emulators since 1995, so i pretty much never really stopped playing them. I havent actually played much in the last 6 weeks funnily enough. Must get back on the saddle :)
Those landers are like blue jays when they find something to eat on the ground.
Nice playing. I want to play.
How do I join this club? This video is three years old. - Probably too late.
You are way better than I ever was! The best score I ever got was 10000! It was over 30 years ago in an arcade though!
I am developing one now as i am now using a proper defender controller, but when I was playing the game on the video I was using a sony playstation arcade stick, which has a lower base that didnt cause the friction necessary to cause the callus! Sad or what!
I cant get the green roms to work on mame. When i run green roms Mame puts the bezel artwork around the screen making the play area only half the size. The bezel artwork option is unticked but i still cant get rid of it. This version played is labelled "White" Roms although we all know that mames white roms arent really the prototype white ones. Still no idea why the game slows at wave 255 though. I will upload some red rom play shortly. I will soon upload some red rom play for you guys.
Ah my... Well played sir. I miss this game so much!
So download and play! This game was on my PC. Download mame and there you go
+Paul Spriggs I did try that some years ago but I found that I could not meld with Defendery in the zone goodness on a PC keyboard.
i think i was quite good... than see this... and now i know i suck !!! :)
respect
;)
i played this at my school youth club in aronu 85'86'. i still remember my high score, a dismal 177000 thou. great stuff
Frank. Do you wanna join facebook Williams defender players unite group? We even have the games creators in it!
you must be from another dimension!!!!!
This game was why we played video games
Someone please help this old man remember - back in the day I played this at the Pick Wick on Cleveland in Clearwater FL but it's dip switches were set at a 12,000 point free man instead of the standard 10,000 points and I would get up in the hundreds of thousands. Then I played it at Mind Games (HWY 60 Clearwater) where it was set at the standard 10,000 point free man and before long I started turning them both over but I can't remember - what was it I use to have to do before hitting the 1,000,000 iterations? Didn't I have to drop most of the smart bombs or something and throttle back on how many extra men I had or something or when I would turn it over I would lose like all the smart bombs or most all of the men? It's been so long!! I have to get a controller or a faster responding keyboard for Mame!! I think a game room locally may have a stand up. I Must check after seeing this!! Great memories man!!
You get an advance of 35-45 free ships, as between 990,000 and a million you get a free ship and bomb for every point scored. that means you stockpile ships and bombs and you dont get your next bonus until 350-450,000 after clocking it.
Paul Spriggs Thanks!!
TSBII I found this after searching for Mind Games. Great Arcade! Trying to find pix.
***** Im sure they were still open in 1982. I was going there in 8th grade, which was 84
@@MegaSpriggsy That was bathroom break time, LOL!
the best arcade game ever Defender i have not played for 35 years but i use to be great like you are doing i am trying to find a defender game and stargate maybe soon i can go again great game play Defender
you can play it free on a pc using mame arcade simulator
@@MegaSpriggsy i do not know how to i looked on a thing called play store but i have no idea what i am doing i am trying to find someone who can make me a smaller version like a partycade is that how you play?
@@timmarshall2062 i play on a windows pc. mame is free . i can post u usb stick with all games on if u gimme address . you can play initially with keyboard but joysticks cost about 30 bucks
@@MegaSpriggsy i only have a Chromebook laptop i am just really bad with computers i thank you i have two different guys telling me they can make me a Defender counter cabinet with Defender and stargate and a 19 in one game thing i am trying to get that and i want to button layout to be just like Defender that is important to me i have not played in 35 years its a different world now
@@timmarshall2062 pleased you have folk who can help. ive not stopped playing since 1981. 40 years!
Love It!!!!!
Nevermind Paul I read the comments below mine...I guess I have an usb adapter...I will have to check...thanks
I don't think they ever expected a human to ever get that far. The average life expectancy in that game is 7 seconds.
if I recall correctly everything you shoot and hit after a million score is a free ship and smart bomb.
on stargate it happens at 100 mill
Make Defender and Stargate a.k.a. Defender 2 *GREAT AGAIN* !
123456RaulMorales check out my 100 hour 100 million stargate video 😀
hello guys iam "jcc" from Canberra , where I had top 2 to 3 hiscores at 999975 on every machine in the city at the same time in the early eighties {around 8 machines),
I too used to end up with crowds watching and well you feel like a celebrity of sorts and your confidence builds and you play even more magically .....
I should also let everyone know that I accidently discovered the freeze glitch on the first wave at a game in 1981 , with several surprised other players. this game has shaped my life to some degree , as iam currently the owner of capital pinball in Canberra , one of the largest amusement machine business in Australia .
I d like to join that facebook page , additionally I should mention ive met eugeb twice iin states during the course of 2 shows on my travels
my name is jose Ciminelli .iam 48 yo.
The founder of the defender group is also an Oz! Look out on facebook for "williams defender players unite" and ask to join. I will let you in bud. See you soon!
Ok, I see you used the same strategy! Cool!
I have promised myself one of these machines when my novels eventually hit.
Richard Fairbairn This was on my pc. No way i can pull over a grand to buy a real cab mate
I was going to start saving up, but I'm working on a novel now and this will be my treat if I make money. Any chance of telling me where I can get the game for PC?
Mame emulator sir. Do you live in uk?
I got it. Just played red label. Beautiful. Thumbs up from me!
Richard Fairbairn Good man. I can email you stargate rom and other defender roms. I love green! If you do facebook try and join williams defender players unite facebook page. We have 1000 defender nuts 😀
When you get to 990,000 everything that you shoot gives you an extra man and smart bomb. After passing 999,995 it stops giving you anymore extra men or smart bombs. The score goes back to zero and I mean 0. The highest score you can get is 999,995. So after finding that out, I would just let all of my men die right before it rolled over. Hey, it's the only way to get your initials up there. When it rolls your score is 0. They fixed this problem with Stargate.
typo correction: 999975
The hardest part was making sure to hit objects to reach that score without messing up LOL I hated all that work and then sometimes screwing up and having the score rollover
Been there and done that. :) Played a game 2 months ago after not playing it in years and managed to reach 999,975 and put my initials on a private collectors machine at a trade show (now he has to look at my score and initials every day he plays the game in his house! lol). Great to see I still have it after almost 40 years since I mastering it back in '81 at 13. :)
Every time you score points, your score is compared to the "next extra life" score. If it is that high or greater, the "next extra life" score is increased by 10,000. When you reach 990,000 the next extra life score wraps to zero. Every extra life you get increases it by 10,000. If you were to get 100 extra lives before reaching 1,000,000 points, the next extra lift score would wrap around again, allowing you to collect more lives after that.
Trey Roberson They didnt fix it on stargate. The game simply rolls at 100 mill, not one million. Ive put up a 100 million stargate game on UA-cam to show the bug happening. Larry demar told me it would happen!
You're very good. I think highest score I reached was 600k to 650k. It just got boring and my thumb would start to cramp up. I liked Stargate better. The warping and the yllabian dogfight every other 5th attack wave tested my reflexes. When I got past a million. I considered myself a master.
i got 100 mill on stargate. 100 hour game spread over 6 weeks.
No it didnt? Where did you get that from? The free ship thing is an advance, not a gift. If you get 40 free ships between 990-1 million then you dont get another free ship for 400,000 points, so you dont get "extra", just early. The waves dont reset at all until wave 256. The waves continue as normal after 1 million. The score does not affect the wave count in any way, shape or form
Get yourself the Mame arcade emulator for your PC. 6000 original arcade perfect games including classics like this!
Thank you Ron
There was 100 attack waves on the coin op arcade version of this what happened to the rest of the attack waves LOL :)
Porky Ca The original arcade game has 255 levels before it rolls back to 0. it only displays up to 100 waves but it holds the first 255 in memory. This is identical to arcade as it uses identical code from the original cabinet. check out mame on UA-cam. thousands of vids of pacman defender and God knows what
I live in Newcastle mate. I have been reading your UA-cam threads and if you were around the arcades around the same time as BOF then i may know you, or at least recognise you from way back when. Kevin (BOF) was my best mate at the time. I also note you have a Defender machine. Do not give me your address or i will steal your machine ! (lol)
Cheers bud
¡ERES UN CHINGONOMETRICO!
Im in the middle of a remake of Defender for the PC. Here is a progress video ua-cam.com/video/mhXb0E0VhmE/v-deo.html
will be on steam soon.
Cool gameplay tactics.
my game was joust I remember rolling over 150k on it once pretty good at I just started playing Defender like yesterday right now my score is only like 20k but I do remember seeing it a couple times back in the arcade I'm also good at robotron and tapper
so do you play on it with Midway Arcade Origins because I do
Whereabouts in the north do you live. I am close to Durham.
Your that kid that the never gave anyone else a chance to play..lolol those were great times (the 80's)..lol
Ha ha 😀 Luckily most arcades had 2 or 3 of em back in the day.
@@MegaSpriggsy luv the vid..lol
@@ep1789 check the lander speed and how quick and often baiters arrive. ramped up game speed. check my stargate 100 million vid as well 😀
Dam dude your some good!
What site do you go to to get this game ???
Just re-sent it to your UA-cam inbox. Let me know if you aint got it mate.
Did you get the private message i sent you?
Isnt hyperspace concidered making the game easy
+Stephen Rodriguez no, because you die 50% of the time on average
+Paul Spriggs 👍
What do you use for the controls on the keyboard?
Steve Wozniak could roll the score over on this game.....
i never heard about wozniak playing a hundred hour stargate game? Thought he was a defender player?
@@MegaSpriggsy this is defender
Right??
@@UXSpecialist my bad. i was responding to some messages on a stargate video i had up and got mixed up. it certainly is defender 😀
@@MegaSpriggsy you almost had me worried, no worries, all faith is restored.:)
Did anyone get the highest score possible? I managed it once! I recall it was quite tricky because you actually get 25 points even for dying so you had to get near 999,950 then keep killing yourself by hyperspacing then die once more I think.
yep. over that score it rolls. nothing worse than being on 999975 and you land on a bomber and roll it
No dont think so
I know one of the creators his name is Eugene Jarvis
+Stephen Rodriguez Yeah. Eugene is a Gentleman, and his wife, sasha, is also awesome. great couple
I use a playstation fighting stick and a USB adaptor
How on earth do you teleport
+Stephen Rodriguez press hyperspace button......
Paul Spriggs oh ok
But this aint starwars
wow this kept me busy for hours....use to have to kill myself because I would get to the level where everything I hit gave me ships
Hello ARTHRITIS I'm a hand can we be friends:)
Dude.....
Bahahahahaha, Dude do you have the calluses on your joystick hand and can tap with music like a MF(firing buttons) !
That game was a bitch....
Check out a pro at the game. He has a rough start but after he warms up he kicks ass. I used to be an intermediate player. In the town where I lived I had a few friends who were as good as this guy in the video :)
ua-cam.com/video/yrkx6vuiMrE/v-deo.html
The guy is a FB friend of mine. he is called MIke Lindholm from sweden and is currently judged the best player on the planet
:) I would still play this game if I could find it.
It is so hard to find a Defender machine now.
Dan. Give me email address and i can get you playing again
Paul Spriggs I tried to leave message at the hangout because ofc I don't want to leave my email here XD
If I remember correctly my first computer used the same MPU as Defender.
I loved writing assembly code on that machine. :)
Ok Dan : If you like retrogaming then you must check out a program called MAME. It stands for Multiple arcade machine Emulator. It is a program that fools your PC into thinking its a genuine arcade machine. The games are lifted from original cabinet ROM chips from the 80s bit for bit, byte for byte. As MAME uses original code then the games play identical to an original cabinet. I currently have 6000 games on my Mame setup although i tend to play mainly shootem ups, and mainly the williams ones, such as defender/stargate/robotron
Thanks billy joe. Praise from Caesar? You play the game on one credit for 35 hours and you reckon I am the monster! 🙋
Yes. You racked up a hell of a lot of ships and tore up those high level space waves. It's either my rustiness or lack of wisdom, but I never had enough ships to go the distance. My ship count never got too high and once it started depleting over time, it's one of the things that killed me. Anyway, that's not what's important. Your play on here is top level. It even looks faster than my machine, but that could be because I'm not playing and trying to keep up with someone else's style / speed is throwing it off for me.
That's awesome play. No questions.
***** I also want to say that the fact this is on 99/99 makes me want to cry for the awesome.
***** Its Green Roms bud, not Red. Red were common in america but the harder green rom was more prevalent in the UK. What fries people noodle is that this 99/99 game i recorded was played with a playstation controller!
@@MegaSpriggsy 6 years later.. What does 99/99 mean?
@@jimspencer5746 defender has difficulty settings. default is starting difficulty 5 and progressive difficulty is 15. progressive difficulty dictates how hard game gets. 99 99 is 99 difficulty start and 99 progressive. fast as hell after wave 3.