Anyone seen an obscure arcade game "Herpes" circa 1983, possibly running on A8 hardware

[lordfrito]

Stumbled upon an old video clip (from 1983) showing a coin operated game called “Herpes”, no joke.

 

          

 

Here’s a link to the video I found this in.

 

It’s in a coin op cabinet that looks pretty custom, and the graphics look similar to Atari 8-bit graphics. My gut says this is a bespoke game, with an Atari buried inside (like the Exidy Max-A-Flex system)

 

Can anyone provide any more information on this?

[Crimefighter]

I don't think it's an actual game.  Just a mock-up video for the movie like Superman 3 had.

[lordfrito]

13 hours ago, Crimefighter said:

I don't think it's an actual game.  Just a mock-up video for the movie like Superman 3 had.

Well the Superman 3 mock up cost $120,000 to make and was built "animation style" frame by frame on a Symbolics LM-2 system.

 

This definitely looks more like a real program running on an A8 machine. Makes no sense to fake it as a mock-up, when it would be semi-trivial (given a show's production budget) to build it on an existing computer.

 

So I'd suggest this is real, but maybe (as I think you're suggesting) it's really just a one-off bespoke thing made for the video?

 

Might explain why the machine was in what appears to be a public bathroom. Seems an odd place to put a machine, but then again maybe this is more common in the UK?

[zzip]

I think my local arcade had that.   One day I noticed a sign in the window "We Have Herpes!"  So I went home to get some quarters,  but then I came back and the place is shut down with men in white contamination suits outside hauling stuff out.   It was very strange....

[_The Doctor__]

BBC 1's Arena was a Documentary show. It's All True, was a segment that they did showing unbelievable stuff that is true (at the time) as something like street view seemed unbelievable, and google of course stole this but used digital snapshots instead of video streams.

It's not a mock up, Herpes is real. The DOD did such a video mapping project. It's a bit a of weird format, but it was meant to catch the surreal atmosphere, in typical oddly artsy fashion of video in those times.

Edited July 17, 2023 by _The Doctor__

[devwebcl]

It doesn't look to be Atari 8-bit graphics; anyway, great finding!

 

It looks more BBC Micro graphics.

Edited July 19, 2023 by devwebcl

[Cebus Capucinis]

I remember seeing it, but I never played it. All my quarters went into "Crabs."

[roots.genoa]

Yeah, it looks like the game was created at least for real even though it may not have existed outside this video. If it was CGI like in Superman III, sprites wouldn't blink like that.

[Cebus Capucinis]

The cabinet looks like a repurposed video poker machine, or one of those tabletop bar machines that they've tinkered with to make look more like a cabaret.

[lordfrito]

On 7/18/2023 at 8:42 PM, devwebcl said:

It doesn't look to be Atari 8-bit graphics; anyway, great finding!

 

It looks more BBC Micro graphics.

I think you're right... Being from the states I was unfamiliar with BBC Micro, but after checking I see the font is very similar to Atari 8-bit font.  There are small differences for sure, but to me it looks like BBC font is a better match.  Which makes sense considering the machine was in the UK.

[Tornadoboy]

I bet if it was a real game whomever had it still does, because once you've got herpes you can never get rid of it.