Talk:Blockade (video game)

Fair use rationale for Image:Blockade arcade.png
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BetacommandBot (talk) 04:41, 12 February 2008 (UTC)

pictures
http://www.picofactory.com/download/rom/arcade/mame/games/blockade http://www.atarihq.com/museum/coinops/games/blockade.gif      with automat ca1 (talk) 16:24, 24 June 2008 (UTC)

pictures + additional info
http://www.mameworld.net/maws/romset/hustle ca1 (talk) 16:34, 24 June 2008 (UTC)

Developer Info
User:Jagged 85 has now twice changed the developer of this game to UPL, a Japanese company established in the 1980s as a subsidiary of pachinko maker Universal, because of erroneous information on KLOV, so it seems best to go into a little more detail here. First of all, KLOV has seriously erred by confusing the aforementioned UPL with Universal Research Laboratories (URL), an American company established by ex-Seeburg engineers that created the Pong clone Paddle Battle for Allied Leisure and did several other contracting jobs for arcade companies and a couple of home systems before being purchased by Stern Electronics to serve as its solid-state game developer. This confusion on the part of KLOV is easily established by looking at the KLOV page for Video Action at http://www.arcade-museum.com/game_detail.php?game_id=10309, which credits UPL, and then looking at the flyer for the game at http://flyers.arcade-museum.com/?page=flyer&db=videodb&id=2635&image=1 which clearly shows it was created by URL. This only makes sense when one considers that the tribute site for UPL created by ex-employees states the company was established in the 1980s.

So that leaves one other question, and that is whether URL was responsible for any games released by Gremlin. The answer to that is, we cannot say for certain, but it is unlikely. The arcade history database (http://www.arcade-history.com/?n=blockade&page=detail&id=287) lists the designers of Blockade as Lane Hauck, Ago Kiss, and George Pecarero. These are not names that ring out in video game history, but an issue of Kilobaud Magazine at http://www.thecomputerarchive.com/archive/Magazines/Kilobaud%20Microcomputing/Kilobaud%20Microcomputing%201978/Kilobaud%201978-05%20pages%20001-049%20Medium.pdf (check out page 21) profiles Gremlin and its subsidiary Noval and states that Hauck was director of R&D for Noval and Kiss was its vice president and general manager. In other words, Gremlin people designed the game. If URL did work on the game, it was only in support capacity. Either way, the idea that UPL, a Japanese company that did not even exist yet, had anything to do with Blockade is just plain silly. Indrian (talk) 15:10, 28 September 2011 (UTC)


 * Several points I'd like to add: Firstly, UPL's parent company Universal was founded in 1969 and is also listed as a manufacturer of arcade video games at KLOV, so KLOV could just as easily be referring to its parent company Universal. Secondly, do you have a link to the site where UPL's ex-employees state the company was founded in the 1980s? And lastly, the site arcade-history.com is not listed as a reliable source at WP:VG/RS, so that isn't enough to conclude that the game was designed by Gremlin employees. Do you maybe have a more reliable source to establish that the three Gremlin employees you mentioned were indeed the designers? Jagged 85 (talk) 01:31, 29 September 2011 (UTC)
 * I am well aware that Universal was founded in 1969 by Kazuo Okuda, a poor child of World War II who went to a technical college, discovered his first jukebox at 20, and then made a living repairing them for several years before establishing Universal as a jukebox leasing company. The next year, he began making pachinko machines.  This info is not on Wikipedia, but I know this because I have researched the industry in some depth over the years.  For this reason, I also know that no other source in existence save KLOV credits UPL with making any Gremlin games, which is a ridiculous proposition as a U.S. arcade company in 1976 would not be using a Japanese contractor to create a game for them (note this is distinct from licensing a game from a Japanese publisher, which only Midway was doing at this point).  Heck, the Japanese could barely make video games at the time.  Tomohiro Nishikado was the only Taito employee who had the proper technical background until the company established a new video game unit at Pacific Industries in 1977, and Sega was so inept that David Rosen established Sega of America in 1975 specifically to hire engineers that could work with solid state technology.


 * I only post the above so you can appreciate a little of the historical situation on a personal level, however, not to argue against UPL as the maker of Gremlin. For that, all that is necessary is the irrefutable proof above that KLOV has misattributed at least one non-UPL game to the company and therefore is not reliable on this matter.  Combined with the fact that no other source in existence credits UPL for any Gremlin games, and there is clearly not enough evidence to include what is almost certainly an error.  Furthermore, I have never known arcade history to be unreliable in these matters, and I do not believe KLOV has any indicia of reliability that arcade history lacks.  In fact, according to KLOV's own site it is an amateur compilation created by arcade game enthusiasts on BBS boards in the 1980s and early 1990s, not a site put together or curated by professional researchers, archivists, or historians.  To dismiss that arcade history just happens to list two designers that just happen to be verifiable Gremlin employees when Gremlin just happened to at the very least manufacture and distribute Blockade reeks of some kind of strange bias, though I cannot think of any reason why you would so desperately want to prove that UPL created these games.  Even if we ultimately do not use arcade history as a source on wikipedia itself, the blatant contradiction combined with known errors on KLOV relating to UPL is more than enough to show that more evidence is needed if you want to prove UPL had anything to do with Gremlin.  If the most accurate and most well-respected World War II book ever written contained a typo stating that the Japanese bombed Pearl Harbor on December 7, 1942, Wikipedia would not include that information.  Being a reliable source does not mean every last fact is included without scrutiny; it just means that the source can be used without having to explain its worth first.  When evidence emerges that information in a reliable source is wrong (and the evidence is stacked against KLOV in this case) then that information is subject to challenge just like everything else.  I have shown excellent reasons to doubt KLOV, now it is your turn to find supporting evidence in its favor. Indrian (talk) 03:19, 29 September 2011 (UTC)


 * I think you are taking this a bit too seriously. I wasn't trying to prove anything here, but was simply asking for more evidence. If you are suggesting that the source I was using is unreliable on a certain matter, then I'd like to see some more information on why that is. Your explanation sounds somewhat reasonable in this case, so I'll leave it at that for now. Regarding arcade-history, I often browse that site myself, but usually never reference it because it is not listed at WP:VG/RS. If you do believe it is just as reliable as KLOV, then why not try getting it included over at WP:VG/RS? Regards, Jagged 85 (talk) 05:33, 7 October 2011 (UTC)

Re-write
I've re-written this article with interviews with its developer, some release history, and the development of the game genre it helped form. I've removed the "stub" ranking here and will allow let any patroller give it a new ranking. Andrzejbanas (talk) 05:19, 12 February 2024 (UTC)