Moon Patrol

Moon Patrol had something nobody else did: the background moved in layers, distant mountains drifting by slowly while closer buildings whipped past, and that sense of depth blew people away in 1982. Plus that bouncy theme song got stuck in your head for the rest of the day.

It's not in our arcade yet, but it's on the UsuArcade wish list, and your votes can bring it in sooner.

History

Irem made it in 1982 and Williams distributed it in the U.S. It's one of the earliest well-known games to use parallax scrolling, with background layers moving at different speeds, a trick that later became standard in action games.

Its mix of jumping and shooting made it a big arcade hit, and it was ported to a ton of home computers and consoles of the day.

How to play

You drive a six-wheeled moon buggy that always rolls to the right. One button jumps and the other fires forward and straight up at the same time. Jump the craters, blast the boulders, dodge the mines and shoot down the UFOs bombing you from above.

The course is split into checkpoints marked with letters. Hit one and you see your time, and if you lose a life you restart from the last one you reached. There's a beginner course and a tougher championship course for once you know the first one by heart.

Fun facts

• It's one of the first famous games with multi-layer parallax scrolling.
• Williams distributed it in the U.S.
• Checkpoints are labeled with letters of the alphabet.

In the arcade

Moon Patrol is on the wish list: coming soon to UsuArcade. Vote with the “I Want to Play It” button to move it up the line.

Meanwhile, the lobby already has other classics from the same era: Kung-Fu Master, also from Irem, and for shooting at the sky, Phoenix or Space Invaders, all with spectators, chat and arcade high scores.

FAQ