Favorite Game Play & Control

I apologize in advance for the heightened passion that will be spewing from underneath and in between the following words of this blog.  It's my favorite game because of the special times we've shared.  Just me and it.  And everybody else in the arcade.  It's "Centipede", or, as it's better known by kids nowadays, "The One With the Ball Thing".

Since we're just talking about the game play and control, I won't delve into the reasons why this is my favorite game.  The internet's not big enough for a blog that long.  And shockingly intimate.  So, here we go:

Input:  You input da' quarter into da' slot and press the raised red button for "One Player".  That's the first step.  If you can't manage that, you've just embarrassed your ancestors.  Great job.  Once the game begins, you're off.  It should take you about half a millisecond to realize that if you roll the ball, your little shooter fella at the bottom moves around.  

The trackball is the white circle on the right.  

The button in middle of the circle of white dashes fires.

Response:  My response at this point is usually "Ha!  Get outta my garden, centipede!" as I shoot the sucker to shreds.  Naw, the response is immediate.  I recently played a faulty machine that would let me move all the way up, but it would stagger and stick on the way down.  This enraged me so much that, after playing it with that crappy hazard and sucking, I strolled on up to the arcade counter and demanded that it be fixed.  "We'll, get around to it", the guy replied.  "Okay", I said, "today, maybe?"  He looked at me like I'd just recited the recipe for buttermilk pancakes in Swahili.

Context:  Your character isn't clearly defined.  You can tell the thing that's coming to get you IS DEFINITELY A MAD CENTIPEDE.  There's no doubt about that.  There are also spiders, fleas, and scorpions doing stuff.  How a trackball is supposed to fit into the insect/dangerous garden theme, I don't know.  It kinda resembles the thick, armoured shell of a beetle.

Polish: Yeah, these things probably require a lot.  Nothing worse than a dull ball.  It's a little slow and jumpy sometimes, but that's easily forgiven.  It also doesn't help that every time I die, I spin the ball as hard as possible.  If everyone else has done the same thing for the last 30 years, i'm surprised they all haven't popped out like glass eyes by now.

Metaphor:  I'm not sure why they used a trackball instead of a joystick in this game.  Oddly enough, the game was co-created by one of the only female programmers back in 1981.  Her name was Dona Bailey.  Maybe she had a thing about balls.  Not those kind, you old dirty chap.  TRACK-balls!

Rules:  Shoot the things that are coming at you.  Shoot away the mushrooms that alter the course of the out-of-control centipede.  You only have a very limited area in which to move around.  Really, just the lower third of the screen is all yours.  Simple.  Hard and frustrating, fun and ignored by most all modern game players.  That's fine with me.