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Quiz about Arcade Nostalgia Asteroids
Quiz about Arcade Nostalgia Asteroids

Arcade Nostalgia: "Asteroids" Trivia Quiz


"Asteroids" came out in 1979, providing the video game arcade industry with a new space shooter to rival "Space Invaders". What do you remember of this game?

A multiple-choice quiz by reedy. Estimated time: 5 mins.
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Author
reedy
Time
5 mins
Type
Multiple Choice
Quiz #
370,707
Updated
Dec 03 21
# Qns
10
Difficulty
Average
Avg Score
7 / 10
Plays
378
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Question 1 of 10
1. "Asteroids" was conceived of by Lyle Rains and Ed Logg in April of 1979, and by November it was appearing in arcades across North America. Which American company, which also made "Pong", produced it? Hint


Question 2 of 10
2. "Asteroids" did not use the pixelated graphics of many other arcade video games. Instead, it used a system that projected images using an electron beam to draw points, lines, and curves. What is this style of graphics called? Hint


Question 3 of 10
3. As the name of the game suggests, there were asteroids. Your goal was to destroy all the asteroids on the screen, while avoiding getting hit by any of them in the process. What did you use to control your ship? Hint


Question 4 of 10
4. At the beginning of the game, four large asteroids began to drift in from the edges of the screen. If you shot one, it broke into two medium-sized asteroids, and those in turn broke down into small asteroids. If you cleared the screen, how many large asteroids appeared for round two? Hint


Question 5 of 10
5. In addition to the asteroids, occasionally a flying saucer would appear and begin shooting at you. There were two sizes of saucer, and if you shot them they earned you 200 points (big) or 1,000 points (small). Which size of spaceship shot more accurately back at you?

Answer: (One Word - Big or Small)
Question 6 of 10
6. Depending on the game settings, you began with either three or four ships (lives). After how many points would you earn a new ship? Hint


Question 7 of 10
7. "Asteroids" used a wrap-around screen, meaning that objects that moved off the screen would reappear on the opposite side. Which game object(s) did this NOT apply to? Hint


Question 8 of 10
8. If you used your thrust only briefly, your ship would continue to move in the direction you thrust indefinitely (or until you crashed).


Question 9 of 10
9. In an emergency situation, hitting your HYPERSPACE button would instantly jump your ship to another location on the screen. This was a safe option that would always land you in clear space.


Question 10 of 10
10. By the way, do you remember what your ship looked like? What was its basic shape? Hint



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Quiz Answer Key and Fun Facts
1. "Asteroids" was conceived of by Lyle Rains and Ed Logg in April of 1979, and by November it was appearing in arcades across North America. Which American company, which also made "Pong", produced it?

Answer: Atari

Atari, Inc. was founded in 1972 by Nolan Bushnell and Ted Dabney, who are also credited with creating the game "Computer Space" in 1971, which was the very first commercially sold coin-operated video game.

When Atari produced "Asteroids" in 1979, it soon surpassed Taito's "Space Invaders" as the most popular space shooter video game in North America.

Taito, Namco and Konami were all Japanese companies, and while the word 'atari' had Japanese origins, the company was American. Atari, Inc. was sold to Warner Communications in 1976. In 1984, Warner sold off the consumer electronics and home computer divisions to a company called Tramiel, and the arcade division to Namco in 1985.
2. "Asteroids" did not use the pixelated graphics of many other arcade video games. Instead, it used a system that projected images using an electron beam to draw points, lines, and curves. What is this style of graphics called?

Answer: Vector graphics

According to Wikipedia, developer Lyle Rains originally wanted to use raster graphics for "Asteroids", a system of graphics that uses dot matrix data representing a generally rectangular grid of pixels. Raster graphics are commonly used in such modern image formats as JPEG, GIF, and PNG.

However, Ed Logg argued for vector graphics, primarily because of the higher resolution (1,024 x 760 versus raster's 320 x 240).
3. As the name of the game suggests, there were asteroids. Your goal was to destroy all the asteroids on the screen, while avoiding getting hit by any of them in the process. What did you use to control your ship?

Answer: Five buttons (ROTATE LEFT and RIGHT , HYPERSPACE, THRUST, and FIRE)

The panel for "Asteroids" was quite colourful (red, white, blue, and black squares and rectangles) and the 'ONE PLAYER START' and 'TWO PLAYER START' buttons were at the top. Below those, five buttons were arrayed with two on the left together (ROTATE LEFT and ROTATE RIGHT), one in the centre (HYPERSPACE), and two on the right together (THRUST and FIRE).
4. At the beginning of the game, four large asteroids began to drift in from the edges of the screen. If you shot one, it broke into two medium-sized asteroids, and those in turn broke down into small asteroids. If you cleared the screen, how many large asteroids appeared for round two?

Answer: Six

The first round gave you four asteroids to begin, and if you managed to clear the screen, your difficulty increased by having two more asteroids added. This pattern continued until there were ten asteroids at the beginning of the level, at which point it remained at ten for all subsequent levels.

Hitting a large asteroid earned you 20 points, a medium asteroid was worth 50 points, and a small asteroid (which then disappeared) earned you 100 points. Thus, every large asteroid was worth 520 (20 + 2x50 + 4x100) points, if you managed to destroy it completely.
5. In addition to the asteroids, occasionally a flying saucer would appear and begin shooting at you. There were two sizes of saucer, and if you shot them they earned you 200 points (big) or 1,000 points (small). Which size of spaceship shot more accurately back at you?

Answer: Small

While the smaller flying saucer was more dangerous in terms of firing accuracy, it didn't move any faster than the big saucer. In the first level, the big saucer would appear three times before the small one showed up, after which point either could appear randomly. As the difficulty progressed in the game, the small saucer would appear more often, as well as shoot faster. Eventually, the small saucer was the only one to appear (after reaching 40,000 points).

One strategy for earning points with flying saucers became so prevalent with the game that the players who did it became known as 'Lurkers'. They would shoot all the asteroids until there was only one small asteroid left on the screen, then they would just hang around and wait for flying saucers to appear over and over again, earning big bonus points and prolonging the game. Arcade owners didn't like Lurkers very much, since longer games meant fewer quarters.
6. Depending on the game settings, you began with either three or four ships (lives). After how many points would you earn a new ship?

Answer: 10,000 points

You would actually earn a new life EVERY 10,000 points, and there was (theoretically) no limit to the number of lives one could win. However, if you managed to amass a store of fifty or more ships, the game would slow down to a crawl. According to designer Ed Logg, after earning 250+ lives, it was possible to lose the game because of a 'watchdog' circuit that rebooted the game if it thought it had been running for too long.
7. "Asteroids" used a wrap-around screen, meaning that objects that moved off the screen would reappear on the opposite side. Which game object(s) did this NOT apply to?

Answer: It applied to all objects

You had to be very careful in your observation of all the different things flying around the screen with the wrap-around display. Everything (including the shots you fired) would carry over to the opposite side of the screen, although your shots did have a limited distance before they disappeared of their own accord.

When the saucers fired, they would always fire towards you in direct line of sight, and not utilize the wrap-around feature, even if that technically put them closer to you.
8. If you used your thrust only briefly, your ship would continue to move in the direction you thrust indefinitely (or until you crashed).

Answer: False

Apparently the 'space' around your ship in "Asteroids" had some friction, because if you pushed the thrust button, let it go, and didn't push it again, your little ship would eventually drift to a stop.

You could only apply thrust in the direction you were pointing your ship, and any turning had to be done by rotating and reapplying your thrust.

That said, you could also halt (or mostly halt) your thrust by rotating your ship to face the opposite direction of your travel and pushing the thrust button again. Good control of your ship took time to master, and was key to longevity in the game.
9. In an emergency situation, hitting your HYPERSPACE button would instantly jump your ship to another location on the screen. This was a safe option that would always land you in clear space.

Answer: False

Using the HYPERSPACE button was a gamble, because it was entirely random. You could end up safe and sound, or you could land right in the path of an asteroid or flying saucer, or even right on top of one. Sometimes, though, the chance of death was better than the certainty of death.
10. By the way, do you remember what your ship looked like? What was its basic shape?

Answer: An isosceles triangle

Your ship was essentially a small isosceles triangle with two long sides (with narrow angle) and a short side that was curved inward. It was a little reminiscent of the "Star Trek" symbol, actually.

While you held down your THRUST button, a little gout of vector graphic flame would show from the rear of your ship.
Source: Author reedy

This quiz was reviewed by FunTrivia editor eburge before going online.
Any errors found in FunTrivia content are routinely corrected through our feedback system.
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