Eugene Jarvis : King of the Arcade / Matthew Thomas Payne.

Format:

Book

Author/Creator:

Payne, Matthew Thomas, author.

Series:

Influential Video Game Designers.

Influential Video Game Designers

Language:

English

Subjects (All):

Jarvis, Eugene.

Video game designers--United States.

Video game designers.

Video games--Design--Biographies.

Video games.

Physical Description:

1 online resource (248 pages)

Edition:

1st ed.

Distribution:

New York : Bloomsbury Publishing (US), 2024.

Place of Publication:

New York : Bloomsbury Academic, 2025.

System Details:

text file HTML

Summary:

This book explores the influential work of Eugene Jarvis, designer of the wildly-successful arcade games Defender, Robotron: 2084, NARC, Smash TV, and Cruis'n USA, among others. Embracing a variety of genres across decades, the video games of Eugene Jarvis offer a series of design lessons in how to craft coin-operated game machines that can survive and thrive even as the arcade was disappearing from the American landscape. In particular, his titles demonstrate the enduring appeal of gameplay challenges, taboo content, and possessing a larger-than-life form factor and accessible gameplay. Drawing upon multiple interviews with Jarvis and his collaborators, as well as scholarly reflections on game design, historic industry data, and archival documents, this book makes the case that Jarvis is the unparalleled "King of the Arcade" for his ability to craft gameplay experiences that cannot be replicated on home consoles or personal computers.

Contents:

Preface Foreword Acknowledgements 1. Introduction: Sex, Drugs, and Arcade-sploitation 2. Challenging Design: The Making of Defender 3. Designing Challenges: Post-Defender Difficulty and the Rise of the Arcader 4. Coin-Op Carnivalesque and Digitized Dystopias 5. Coin-opted Attractions in the Post-Arcade Era 6. In His Own Words: A Conversation with Eugene Jarvis 7. Conclusion: King of the Arcade Gameography References Index

ISBN:

9798765113530

OCLC:

1452507896