Inventor: James C. Asher
Patent number: 4349708
Filing date: Aug 22, 1979
Issue date: Sep 14, 1982

Back in the day it was fun but simple. The mighty Atari 2600, myself and my brother played ours so much we destroyed the joystick! After the stick snapped off we ripped out the chipboard, used it like a joypad and went right on playing; Centipede, Yars’ Revenge and Ms. Pacman. Yars’ Revenge, the most popular original-concept Atari game ever, was insane! A droning industrial soundtrack grates in the background while a swirling symbol is fired at you. One word comes to mind when I play it now; evil! Oddly enough the killer swirl looks not unlike a Nazi Swastika, so much so that eBay refuses to list the game fearing it contains Nazi Propaganda. Atari games had great playability but you needed a good imagination to fill in the graphics; In a distant galaxy the civilization known as the Yars were attacked by the fierce Qotiles. Though badly damaged, the Yars’ fought back using their mechanical ships that look like giant metal insects. Years later I managed to complete Centipede, game just starts again!