Magic: The Gathering: Armageddon

November 1, 2012 7:21 AM

Magic: The Gathering: Armageddon was a 1997 prototype arcade game by Acclaim, of which there are between 4 and 5 known extant copies (Ctrl/⌘+F "arcade"). It is not currently emulated, and no footage of the gameplay existed until Halalah on the ASSEMblergames forums obtained a copy of the board and posted a video.
posted by griphus (17 comments total)

No sound in the video, too bad! One of the links explained why the game didn't make it: "Acclaim's Mountain View, California-based coin-op division went out of business shortly after creating this game, so it never went into full production".
posted by Nelson at 7:44 AM on November 1, 2012

You have no idea how happy this makes me. I've been wanting to see this in action for the longest time.
posted by LSK at 8:04 AM on November 1, 2012

This sort of looks like it was done with the War Gods engine.
posted by ShawnStruck at 8:07 AM on November 1, 2012

SLI 3dfx chips in 1996 ? Oh the memories.

Always amazed at how the MAME community pulls together to get ROM dumps and the sheer number of games (age, technology, etc) that are supported.
posted by k5.user at 8:16 AM on November 1, 2012 [3 favorites]

Those animations look sort of... um... well... I guess there's really no other way to say it: Masturbatory.
posted by Sys Rq at 8:21 AM on November 1, 2012 [3 favorites]

Those animations look sort of... um... well... I guess there's really no other way to say it: Masturbatory.

That's just in keeping with the style of the rest of Magic: The Gathering. Nyaah-ha-ha, the masked troll strikes again -- oh crap I forgot the mask! (flees)
posted by JHarris at 8:45 AM on November 1, 2012 [1 favorite]

Yeah, shooting globular energy balls from the hip in a ballistic arc while hunched over and holding a small magic wand probably looked a lot better on the storyboard.
posted by Slap*Happy at 8:46 AM on November 1, 2012 [5 favorites]

Can we please have one spellcasting thread that doesn't turn into Somaticism 101?
posted by griphus at 8:48 AM on November 1, 2012 [3 favorites]

PRESS TELEPORT FOR TUTORIAL
posted by oulipian at 9:03 AM on November 1, 2012 [4 favorites]

I played this at Sunnyvale Golfland. The trackball controls made precise targeting wonky, but otherwise it felt like what we might call a Tower Defense game today with a veneer of M:tG painted over it.
posted by persona at 9:59 AM on November 1, 2012 [2 favorites]

Was it any fun?
posted by griphus at 10:45 AM on November 1, 2012

oulipian, that reminds me of the little notice at the bottom of the screen in arcade Stargate's attract mode:

PRESS INVISO FOR SECRETS

When you did so, wow.
posted by JHarris at 11:18 AM on November 1, 2012 [1 favorite]

John Grigsby was the programmer on this game. He had previously done T-MEK at Atari, which was a hell of a lot of fun if you had a good group of players. Anyone know what he's doing now? Swell guy.
posted by JoeZydeco at 3:03 PM on November 1, 2012 [1 favorite]

Well, I doubt if anybody was ever murdered for playing the video game, unlike the card game...
posted by Metro Gnome at 4:32 PM on November 1, 2012

(ノ ゜Д゜)ノ ︵ ┻━┻
posted by Sys Rq at 6:29 PM on November 1, 2012 [1 favorite]

I played this game at Sunnyvale Golfland. It was in test there, and I probably put $100 into it over the course of a week.

As a tournament player of Magic and someone who loved Street Fighter, I think the game was aimed basically at me. I loved it. Though, honestly, the fact that the white mage could deal direct damage bothered the hell out of me. (But if I waited ten years I would have seen Sunlance, so what did I know?)

The closest thing to this game that ever commercially shipped was Magic the Gathering - Battlegrounds. I loved that too -- but it appears that I was one of the only ones who did.
posted by andreaazure at 7:11 PM on November 1, 2012 [1 favorite]

Having played semi-pro ball in the leagues, let me tell you, that is exactly what magic the gathering is like. I am a mighty plainswalker. Have no fear unless you have a plains in play.

You shoot weird hopping green circles at dudes and they die. What else do you need.
posted by OnTheLastCastle at 2:15 AM on November 2, 2012 [2 favorites]