ddahlstrom

I guess I can't disagree with you in terms of new games that were released in that period. I just took a little time to look and remind myself that many of the titles I enjoy today and play somewhat regularly on my home arcade machine were actually released in the late 80s and early 90s, and you are genuinely correct that many of these are certainly more advanced than home consoles of the time could have achieved, and that PCs were still catching up and could not have replicated them at the time either. I think the differing perspective comes from what I actually encountered in the local arcades. Had I actually found many of these games at my local arcade, I think I almost surely would have played them and come back for more; but I just don't remember even seeing the vast majority in the wild, especially when they were first released. So perhaps some of this perspective comes from what one actually encountered at their local arcade, many of which were probably too strapped to afford the latest.

I was very careful to use the phrase "typical arcade game" here, because there were, of course exceptions (and still are even to this day...think of VR/Simulator type experiences, or holographic games). Its just that these were the occasional exception, and not in sufficient quantity to reboot arcades back to their former glory.

Well, I wouldn't quite say that--though it kind of depends on which computer you mean and what time period. I still went to the arcade after getting my VIC-20, my Coleco Adam, and my Atari 800XL; and so did my friends. At those times, contemporaneous games at arcades still offered technology that home consoles and computers just couldn't match--so you were still getting a novel experience for your quarter, from higher res graphics, to color vector graphics, laser disc games, optimized controllers, etc. Basically, arcades still offered many of the the "gold standard" games, and like movie theaters were the place where you would experience great games first and at their best. The thing that stopped me from going to arcades was when that generally stopped being true. The two home systems that did that were the Nintendo NES in the console world and PC in the computer world (especially after EGA/VGA graphics and soundcard-based sound went mainstream). By this time, the typical arcade game was no longer even trying to be generationally ahead of their home counterparts (and getting increasingly behind); and conversion kits in battered cabinets, continue-play, and arcade machines that thought "bringing the home experience to the arcade" was a good thing, were fast replacing cool tech as the bait for your quarter. Arcades hung on for a while, but were no longer populated by tech nerds who were there to get their geek fix and career inspirations, but by those who just liked midway experiences--which wasn't enough of a draw to sustain them at the local mall.

The right time period, but the cockpit here is sharply different than Star Raiders, so I wouldn't have mistaken this one for SR. With that said, since I never heard of this before, I just pulled this up in MAME and gave it a spin. Definitely kind of a Star Raiders lite.

Yeah, I totally agree and consider that to be the main problem with my recollection of this. However, my working theory on this is that if it were possible to just slap any game into one of these Max-A-Flex systems it seems possible that this could have been done by someone purely as bait to attract quarters by putting something in the cabinet that looked new/different to the average passerby without regard for actual gameplay.

No, it was definitely a conventional stand-up arcade machine in the lobby of a department (or possibly grocery) store. I think there were actually two machines there, but can't at all remember what the other was. I also have a vague recollection of not giving it a try because I didn't have any quarters on me.

Very good supposition as they are, indeed, similar in many respects, but Star Fire had been an early arcade favorite of mine from years before I saw this machine and knew it very well. So it is very unlikely that I would have mistaken the two.

I have an odd memory, from back-in-the-day, of seeing the 8-bit Atari computer version of Star Raiders running on an arcade machine. I'm quite sure it really was Star Raiders because I had Star Raiders on my home computer and was a bit of an arcade nerd at the time and pretty familiar with all the latest games. I'm also pretty sure the marquee read "Star Raiders", though this memory is fuzzy. The machine was not in an arcade, but in a department store lobby as I recall. It was also a bit after the early arcade heyday, I'm thinking around 1985. I never tried playing it though. I was just surprised to see it. Only much more recently did I discover that there actually was an arcade machine based on the Atari 600XL called the Max-a-Flex, but Star Raiders was not one of its official titles (which were Boulder Dash, Flip & Flop, Bristles, and Astro Chase). According to the article at the link below it seems though that one could run other Atari computer cartridges on it. So I'm pretty sure that what I saw back then must have been one of these machines, but it leaves me with two questions. (1) Would Star Raiders, which used a lot of keyboard commands, even be playable on these machines; and (2) Does anyone recall seeing these machines in the wild...and, most especially, running either Star Raiders or some other unofficial game? https://www.classicarcademuseum.org/exidy-max-a-flex-system