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Rare 1974 arcade game archives discovered

Rare 1974 arcade game archives discovered

For many, Wild Gunman is a Nintendo classic released on NES. For others, it’s the arcade game that Mardi McPhee played when he landed in Back to the Future in 2015. But what many do not know is that before that, Wild Gunman was a full motion video arcade game released in 1974. A valuable discovery linked to this edition has just been made.


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In 1974, while Nintendo was developing electro-mechanical games for use in the arcade and other entertainment venues, Kyoto released a specific Wild Gunman in Japan. Behind this title hides a shooting game designed by Gunbe Yokoi (known as one of the creators of Game Boy), in which the player confronts the cowboys in a series.

This game was special for staging movie actors in real scenes. These images were stored on 16mm reels aired on the terminal during a game. The player had to shoot as fast as possible after the enemy’s eyes glazed over. Depending on how the user played, the course of the adventure varied.

In total, the game allowed to detect four scenes A, B, C and D. And each of these scenes took place on two reels. Most of these reels were considered lost as the game would soon turn 50 years old. But fortunately for Nintendo fans and those interested in video game history, two reels of Wild Gunman reappeared.

Archives save

When Chris Kohler aired Twitter, A particular Ben Solovi holds reels with Wild Gunman’s display D. He is currently digitizing them:

The hour these lines were written, we still do not know what Ben Solovi wants to do with these pictures once they are scanned. But the fact that they are will clearly support their security. In fact, a simple search on the Internet currently shows that images of this original version of Wild Gunman are inferior and substandard. Those interested can follow the progress of the process Ben Solovi’s Instagram account.

To conclude an event, when Wild Gunman attacked American arcades in 1976, it was imported into Uncle Sam’s country … Sega. Can’t find one.

Do you like this story? Do you plan to follow the progress of the project? Did you know this version of Wild Gunman? Tell us all in the comments below.