<span class="SFPTagline"> From SCIFIPEDIA </span>

This article is about the game. For the space objects, see Asteroid. Asteroids

Asteroids was an arcade game created by Atari and released in 1979 to instant success. The game was so popular that some arcade owners installed larger coin boxes in their machines so they could hold more quarters. It eventually sold more than 70,000 units and dethroned Space Invaders as the best-selling arcade game of the time.

Gameplay was straightforward by today’s standards but revolutionary for the time: Players controlled a small ship in an asteroid field and earned points by shooting the asteroids and breaking them into smaller chunks until they were gone, dodging debris and occasionally contending with hostile alien saucers that flew in from off screen. Like many Atari games of the time it used vector graphics, where all graphics were drawn only with lines.

Asteroids is notable for being the first game to let players enter their initials when they earned a high score. It was followed by three sequels: Asteroids Deluxe, Space Duel and Blasteroids. The game was also ported into many different formats, from the Atari 2600 to the PlayStation.