Difference between revisions of "Zaxxon"

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Revision as of 09:16, 19 October 2014

n/a

Zaxxon Arcade Title.png

Zaxxon
System(s): Sega Zaxxon hardware, Apple II, Atari 2600, Atari 5200, Atari 8-bit family, ColecoVision, Commodore 64, DOS, Dragon 32, Intellivision, MSX, SG-1000, TRS-80, TRS-80 CoCo, Virtual Console, ZX Spectrum
Publisher: Sega
Atari 2600
Coleco
Apple II
Atari 8-bit Family
Dragon 32/64
TRS-80
TRS-80 Color Computer
Datasoft
MSX
Philips (EU) Pony Canyon (JP)
Commodore 64
TRS-80
Cogito
ZX Spectrum
U.S. Gold
Developer:
Genre: Shoot-'em-Up

















Release Date RRP Code
ColecoVision
US
1982 $? ?
ColecoVision
EU
1983 £? ?
Intellivision
US
1983 $? ?
Intellivision
EU
1983 £? ?

Zaxxon (ザクソン) is an arcade shoot 'em up video game released by Sega. It is named after its groundbreaking use of axonometric projection (though more specifically, it uses isometric projection) and was released for bespoke arcade hardware in 1982. Zaxxon was the first video game to use an isometric perspective, a graphical style which would see widespread use in the years which followed.

Zaxxon stands as one of Sega's earliest video game successes, and is also notable for being the first arcade game to be advertised on US television, with a commercial being produced by Paramount Pictures for $150,000.

Gameplay

In Zaxxon, the player controls a starship which continuously moves towards the top right of the screen - a "diagonal" sidescroller, as opposed to the horizontal or vertical shooters more commonly seen. The basic idea is to shoot at and destroy enemies within a space fortress to rank up points, while avoiding obstacles and enemy fire.

What made Zaxxon unique at the time was the ability for the player to adjust the ship's height as well as move the craft left and right, essentially creating one of the first three-dimensional shooters (though the player can still only move in two dimensions, as he/she cannot stop the ship from moving forward). With this comes the task of navigating scenery - Zaxxon has levels which take part in space stations, and the player must duck and dive to avoid crashing into objects. Furthermore missiles can be launched upwards from the ground (similar to Scramble by Konami), and the player must obtain fuel to stay airbourne.

Sequels and Re-releases

Zaxxon stands as one of Sega's first big successes in the arcade video game market, and was subsequently brought to a plethora of home systems during the early 1980s, being one of the most widely ported Sega games in history. The hardware behind the game also went in to fuel other isometric arcade games, such as Congo Bongo and Future Spy.

The Atari 2600 and Intellivision versions of the game (published by Coleco) are the most radically different, opting for a third-person "behind the ship" view rather than an isometric one, presumably due to hardware limitations. It has been suggested, however, that Coleco purposely dumbed down these versions for competition purposes - their ColecoVision port was for many years the most accurate home copy of the game, however skipped a few levels due to cartridge restrictions (something later fixed with Zaxxon Super Game for Coleco's Adam computer).

For a while, Datasoft had the rights to computer cassette and disk versions of the game in North America and Europe, producing ports to the Apple II, Atari 8-bit computer line, Commodore 64 Dragon 32, TRS-80 and TRS-80 CoCo. Zaxxon was among the first licensed TRS-80 (and TRS-CoCo) video games to be released - up until this point few major video game developers supported either of Tandy's machines, so it was more common to see unofficial clones (and indeed many clones of Zaxxon would emerge in the following years, such as Zaksund and Z-89).

As well as Datasoft's version, another official port of Zaxxon produced for the Commodore 64 and released on cartridge. The cartridge version has more accurate visuals but is generally regarded as less playable. U.S. Gold also published versions of Zaxxon for the ZX Spectrum, while an MSX version was published by Pony Canyon (on cartridge) in Japan and by Philips (on cassette) in Europe. Also released was an IBM PC version in the "PC Booter" format. An Atari 5200 version similar to the Atari computers copy was also released.

Sega produced their own home port of the game for Japanese SG-1000s in 1985, however held back from bringing the game to more modern Sega platforms. Zaxxon was not seen again until a surprise appearance in the Sega Mega Drive Collection and Sega Mega Drive Ultimate Collection compilations, and in more recent times, the arcade version has been made available through the Wii's Virtual Console service.

As one of Sega's first success stories, Zaxxon was also turned into a board game by Milton Bradley in 1982. Bandai and Coleco also released VFD and LCD versions of the game, in the form of a tabletop Zaxxon, FL Zaxxon and a handheld Zaxxon. Curiously, Sega of America, through its blog, has erroneously laid claim to several other versions of Zaxxon - a homebrew Commodore Amiga version from 1995, and a version for the Dragon 32/64 computer (based on the TRS-80 CoCo version), whose legitimacy has yet to be verified.

Zaxxon was followed in the arcades by Super Zaxxon, which despite offering similar gameplay, was far less successful. Also created was Zaxxon 3D for the Sega Master System and Zaxxon's Motherbase 2000 for the Sega 32X.

Prodcution Credits

Apple II Version

Game Programming by: John Garcia
Assisted by: Jim Ratcliff
Graphic Artist: Kelly Day
Documentation: Jean Stedman

Commodore 64 Version

C64 Version by Peter Adams

Promotional Material

Physical Scans

Arcade Version

Template:Scanflyer Template:Scanflyer

SG-1000 Version

SG-1000, JP
Zaxxon SG1000 JP Box Back.jpgNospine.pngZaxxon SG1000 JP Box Front.jpg
Cover
Zaxxon SG1000 JP Cart.jpg
Cart
ZaxxonSGJPManual.pdf
Manual

Apple II Version

Apple II, US

Zaxxon AppleII US Manual.pdf
Manual
Apple II, US (alt)
Zaxxon AppleII US Box Front.jpg
Cover

Atari 2600 Version

Sega Retro Average 
Publication Score Source
70 №32
Atari 2600
70
Based on
1 review
Sega Retro Average 
Publication Version Score
Complete Guide to Consoles (UK)
35
[1]
Computer & Video Games (UK)
63
[2]
Atari 2600
49
Based on
2 reviews

Zaxxon

Atari 2600, US
Zaxxon Atari2600 US Box Back.jpgNospine.pngZaxxon Atari2600 US Box Front.jpg
Cover
Zaxxon Atari2600 US Cart.jpg
Cart
Atari 2600, EU

Zaxxon Atari2600 EU CBS Cart.jpg
Cart
Atari 2600, UK
Zaxxon 2600 UK Box Front.jpg
Cover
Zaxxon Atari2600 UK CBS Cart.jpg
Cart
Atari 2600, FR
Zaxxon 2600 FR Box Back.jpgNospine.pngZaxxon 2600 FR Box Front.jpg
Cover
Zaxxon Atari2600 DE CBS Cart.jpg
Cart
Atari 2600, DE

Zaxxon Atari2600 DE CBS Cart.jpg
Cart
Atari 2600, DE (alt)

Atari 2600, CA
Zaxxon Atari2600 CA Coleco Box Back.jpgNospine.pngZaxxon Atari2600 CA Coleco Box Front.jpg
Cover
Zaxxon Atari2600 CA Coleco Cart1.jpg
Cart
Zaxxon Atari2600 CA Coleco Cart2.jpg
Alternative cart
Atari 2600, BR (Tron)

Zaxxon Atari2600 BR Tron Cart.jpg
Cart
Atari 2600, BR (Intellivision)

Zaxxon Atari2600 BR Intellivision Cart.jpg
Cart
Atari 2600, BR (Dynacom)

Zaxxon Atari2600 BR Dynacom Cart.jpg
Cart
Zaxxon Atari2600 BR Dynacom Cart Back.jpg
Cart (reverse)

Atari 5200 Version

Atari 5200, US
Zaxxon Atari5200 US Box Back.jpgNospine.pngZaxxon Atari5200 US Box Front.jpg
Cover
Zaxxon Atari5200 US Cart.jpg
Cart

Atari 8-bit Family Version

Atari 8-bit family, US (cartridge)
Zaxxon A8B US Box Front.jpg
Cover
Zaxxon Atari8bit US Cart.jpg
Cart
Atari 8-bit family, US (cassette)
Zaxxon Atari8bit US Datasoft Cassette Box Back.jpgNospine.pngZaxxon Atari8bit US Datasoft Cassette Box Front.jpg
Cover
Zaxxon Atari8bit US Datasoft Cassette.jpg
Cassette
Atari 8-bit family, US (cassette) (alt)
Zaxxon Atari8bit US Datasoft Alt Casette Box Back.jpgNospine.pngZaxxon Atari8bit US Datasoft Alt Cassette Box Front.jpg
Cover
Zaxxon Atari8bit US Datasoft Cassette.jpg
Cassette
Atari 8-bit family, US (disk)
Zaxxon A8B US Box Front Disk.jpg
Cover
Zaxxon A8B US Disk.jpg
Disk
Atari 8-bit family, UK (cassette)
Zaxxon Atari8bit UK Datasoft Box Back.jpgZaxxon Atari8bit UK Datasoft Box Front.jpg
Cover
Atari 8-bit family, FR (cassette)
Zaxxon A8B FR Box Cassette.jpg
Cover

ColecoVision Version

Sega Retro Average 
Publication Score Source
90 №3
ColecoVision
90
Based on
1 review
Sega Retro Average 
Publication Version Score
Arcade Express (US)
89
[3]
Complete Guide to Consoles (UK)
55
[1]
TeleMatch (DE)
80
[4]
Tilt (FR)
100
[5]
ColecoVision
81
Based on
4 reviews

Zaxxon

ColecoVision, US
Zaxxon ColecoVision US Box Front.jpg
Cover
ColecoVision, EU
Zaxxon ColecoVision EU Box Front.jpg
Cover
ColecoVision, UK
Zaxxon ColecoVision UK Box Front.jpg
Cover
ColecoVision, FR
Zaxxon ColecoVision FR Box Back.jpgNospine.pngZaxxon ColecoVision FR Box.jpg
Cover
Zaxxon ColecoVision FR CBS Cart.jpg
Cart
ColecoVision, DE

ColecoVision, CA

ColecoVision, AU
Zaxxon ColecoVision AU Box.jpg
Cover

Commodore 64 Version

Sega Retro Average 
Publication Score Source
87 №33
Commodore 64
87
Based on
1 review
Sega Retro Average 
Publication Version Score
Commodore 64
N/A
Based on
0 reviews

Zaxxon

Commodore 64, US (cartridge)

Commodore 64, US (disk)
Zaxxon C64 US Box Back Disk.jpgNospine.pngZaxxon C64 US Box Front Disk.jpg
Cover
Commodore 64, US
(disk) (Thunder Mountain)
Zaxxon C64 US Box Back Disk TM.jpgNospine.pngZaxxon C64 US Box Front Disk TM.jpg
Cover
Commodore 64, UK (cassette)
Zaxxon C64 EU Box.jpg
Cover
Commodore 64, UK (disk)
Zaxxon C64 EU Box Back Disk.jpgNospine.pngZaxxon C64 EU Box Front Disk.jpg
Cover

DOS Version

DOS, US

Dragon 32 Version

Dragon 32, EU

Intellivision Version

Sega Retro Average 
Publication Score Source
20 №9
Intellivision
20
Based on
1 review
Sega Retro Average 
Publication Version Score
Intellivision
N/A
Based on
0 reviews

Zaxxon

Intellivision, US
Zaxxon Intellivision US Box Front.jpg
Cover
Zaxxon Intellivision US Cart.jpg
Cart
Intellivision, EU
Zaxxon Intellivision EU Box Front.jpg
Cover
Intellivision, UK

Zaxxon Intellivision UK CBS Cart.jpg
Cart
Intellivision, DE

MSX Version

Sega Retro Average 
Publication Score Source
97 №44
MSX
97
Based on
1 review
Sega Retro Average 
Publication Version Score
MSX
N/A
Based on
0 reviews

Zaxxon

MSX, EU
Zaxxon MSX Box.jpg
Cover
MSX, JP
Zaxxon MSX JP Box Front Cart.jpg
Cover

TRS-80 Version

TRS-80, US (cassette)

TRS-80, US (disk)
Zaxxon TRS80 US Box Back.jpgNospine.pngZaxxon TRS80 US Box.jpg
Cover

TRS-80 CoCo Version

TRS-80 CoCo, US
Zaxxon TRS80CoCo US Box.jpg
Cover

ZX Spectrum Version

ZX Spectrum, UK
Zaxxon Spectrum EU Box.jpg
Cover



Games in the Zaxxon Series
Zaxxon (1981) (home computers) | Super Zaxxon (1982) | Zaxxon Super Game (1984) | Zaxxon 3D (1987) | Zaxxon's Motherbase 2000 (1995) | Zaxxon Escape (2012)
Others
Zaxxon (LCD) (1982) | FL Zaxxon (1982) | Zaxxon (tabletop) (1982) | Zaxxon (board game) (1982)
Zaxxon related media
Book
The Official How to Win at Zaxxon (1982)