River Raid

River Raid is a vertically scrolling shooter originally released by Activision for the Atari 2600 in 1982 and later ported to numerous home computers and game consoles. River Raid was incredibly successful with the Atari 2600 version alone selling over 1 million copies. In the game players control a plane with the goal of destroying enemy bridges in a heavily guarded river.

Players control a plane located at the bottom of the screen which can only move left or right while the screen continuously scrolls forward (players may only speed up or slow down, but not completely stop). Points are earned by shooting the various enemies that appear which include tankers, jets, tanks, and hot air balloons. At the end of each level the river is blocked by a bridge that needs to be destroyed which signifies the completion of the level. Also located throughout the river are fuel depots; the player has a limited amount of fuel and flying over a depot will slowly replenish it. The fuel depots can also be destroyed for extra points. Players begin the game with a limited number of lives; a life is lost if the player runs out of fuel, crashes into the river bank, or comes in contact with any of the enemies or a bridge. As the game progresses fuel depots become more infrequent, enemies are more numerous and quicker, and the river becomes narrower.