Chris Furlough a lot of firsts. Also the first usage of the Yamaha YM2151 FM synth chip that ended up in the Yamaha DX series of keyboards that pretty much defined the sound of 80’s pop music. Maybe the first game with stereo sound. Also one of the rare games that you can actually complete. I was kinda blown away by this game as a kid in ‘84. Ended up buying a machine about 20 years ago. Still got it and still fun to play!
Great video Sir, There's actually TWO completely different ports of Marble Madness for the Genesis, one made by EA as seen in your video, and a Japanese exclusive made by Tengen. Also, there's only three levels in the GBA version as they were only given six weeks to port it, Klax is also cut in half for the same reason.
@@blopat Atari, Sente and Tengen (along with "Hanne") are all terms found in the board game Go, which Nolan Bushnell had a fascination with. Each of these, except for Hanne, would surround different companies Bushnell had founded: Atari was actually Bushnell's second pick for the name of his video game company; he originally wanted to call it Sente, a name he would later use for another arcade games division (originally called Videa until being acquired by Chuck E. Cheese's) which he would sell later to Bally Midway (who in turn renamed it Bally Sente).
This game had many standout features and there was never anything like it, before or since, but its music is probably what people remember about it most. The composers were clearly music aficionados-in the "Intermediate" stage music, for example, one can hear the influences of Stravinsky's Rite of Spring. And yes, the Amiga version of this game was legendary, despite being a very early release; a visually arcade-perfect game just a year after the arcade release. 15 years before such a phenomenon would be commonplace. With a little more care, the music could also have been a very close match, as the Amiga would go on to prove, but in truth, games made for home computers, even beasts like the Amiga with capabilities five years too early, rarely aimed for perfection.
@@jessesilverman4088 If you mean the original arcade release of Gauntlet, then, yes, Hal Canon and Earl Vickers (but without Brad Fuller) also worked on the music for that.
I remember playing Marble Madness back in the mid-1980s in an arcade. It was such a cool game back then and seemed really unique. The music used on the different levels was also pretty cool and futuristic. Somewhere I have a PS1 or PS2 disc that has a bunch of these old arcade games on it, and it includes Marble Madness. Might have to dig that out one of these days and give it a whirl. Great video! Nice to hear the history behind such a creative game.
I recall the arrival of Marble Madness in our local Oostende (BE) arcade. The scrolling of the playfield was as smooth as crystal, and the sound effects and music tracks were of a quality not seen before in lesser games. I managed to get the arcade owner to let me have a look inside the cabinet.. where I found the complete schematics of the hardware. I was in heaven.. I quickly spent hard cash photocopying all the schematics. Not that long after (maybe within a year) I bought one of the first Amigas to be sold in Belgium. And within one more year, the Amiga version of Marble Madness was released on the Amiga, proving that the Amiga too, had amazing hardware. The port was a very good copy of the original, with especially the sound being faithfully recreated.
That's awesome that you were able to copy the schematics back then. I never knew arcade owners had a tendency to put the manuals inside the cabinet until recently. Thanks for sharing your story :-)
The song when you finshed the Ultimate Race was awesome; I always wished they had just released it as a CD and was thrilled when someone posted it to RU-vid.
I remember during gameplay at random intervals, a fairy wand would land on your marble adding ten seconds to your overall time to beat the coarse. This was a blessing and a curse at the same time depending on where your marble was/is. For instance, if you're riding the wave in Intermediate race and the wand appears, you run the risk of falling over the edge. If you're on the catapult on Aerial race, the catapult will engage, but your marble will remain stationary due to the fairy wand and you're literally STUCK! You can't move at all and the only way it will end is when you run out of time. The plus side is while you're in the air, your score increasing by 10's moves faster due to a unique mechanic. You see, you are indeed stuck but the game thinks your marble is still in the air from the catapult throw. Weird, huh? Depending on how much time remains on the Aerial race should this freak accident arise, it will add at least 1,000 points to your overall score before the OUT OF TIME GAME OVER box down at the bottom appears before going back to the title screen/High Rollers board. Thanks for the upload, PatmanQC. I have this for the original NES at it still works and is alot of fun despite being so short :P
I had this on the Amiga. Using a mouse was still new to me, but I had a lot of fun with it (the visuals and music are etched into my brain). I came upon it in the arcade a year or two later and gave it a try, but was not used to the trackball and died pretty quickly. I focused my quarters elsewhere, since the Amiga version was so near perfect.
I had bought the Amiga version in France and brought it to Germany. Unlike arcade it could accelerate the marble by pressing the mouse button. I completely resoldered for it an Atari 8-bit Trakball (using mouse parts and switches) to support Amiga mouse, PC serial mouse, VCS2600, Megadrive (some buttons missing) and still the Atari.
Nice video thank you! I know you say it's a bit too short but I have never been able to complete it. I used to play it regularly in the arcade and then later on my Commodore 64 I could get quite a long ways but never to the end. What a great nostalgic game this is.
I loved the Amiga version of this. I'd actually gotten pretty good at clearing the game. When I was a kid, I loved the green marble-eating slinky monsters. They were super cute! I would have liked to have played the sequel.
Your content just starting showing up on my RU-vid feed yesterday. You have been doing history on nothing but games that are favorites of mine. Learning things about these games that I never knew is really fun. You have yourself a new subscriber
Good video, I just heard of Marble Madness a few years ago when my wife showed it to me on her old Amiga. I would have got this game for my Genesis if I knew about it!
Thanks, I first learned to play it on the Amiga and Commodore 64 but only sought in the arcades once and hated it due to the trackball. It's definitely a great game all way too short
Thanks Pat! I was always fascinated by the level layouts as a kid, but as I got older the game's tunes took the top spot thanks to that unique Atari/Williams/Midway sound.
The best Marble Madness clone I ever saw was an indie game by Raptisoft called Hamsterball back in 2004. It had stunning level design and very fitting music by demo-scene legend Skaven. There's a sequel in the works, can't wait to see it.
4:55 oh it defenantly would appeal to the younger audience!! I'm a 14 year old gamers and I want my hands on that prototype so bad!!! 😤 can't wait till we get a rom!!
There is to be a game similar to this games stages where you were some sort of space cadet looking guy hopping around the different marble madness looking stages. There was also stage bosses every few levels. I just can't remember the name of it 😢😢😢😢😢
I found a natural arcade doing onceAfter playing it on the Commodore 64 in the Amiga and did not like it at all. Perhaps the trackball I used was malfunctioned?
Mark Cerny, current design of the PS4 and PS5. Cool that he designed Marble Madness and other games, thanks for the details. I have the faithful Amiga 2000 version which I also only won one time.
It is basically a isometric rendering system, so I wonder how the paint in front of moving objects worked and the collision detection. I had the amiga version, but have the 'rolling madness' on the PC.
Loved the arcade version of marble madness but not so much the home conversion on my Amstrad. I always much preferred Gyroscope by Melbourne House, obviously a homage but also a better game...another great video by the way!!
Great video with some good insight to a stone-cold Atari classic. Wondering why you didn't include the controls as a factor though. The Amiga version would still pip the Megadrive version because mouse > pad for trackball feel.
Me and a cousin sunk so many hours into the NES port. That sound effect for the falling marble is forever etched into our brains. There should have been a level where your marble has to run over Indiana Jones. Just sayin'!
Merge Escher art + bizarre electronic music (+ relaxing electronic practice level music + heavy metal hi score music) + marbles mazes and you got "Masterpiece"
I owned this on the Atari ST so the music on that never bothered me (as I didn't know any better!). Something you didn't mention is the secret hidden level - there was a magazine competition in the UK to find it with a prize for the first person to send instructions. I actually found it and sent a letter! However I was never sent the prize and there was no mention in the magazine ever again. I can't remember what the secret level was like, but I recall it being super hard. I still know how to get to it though.....
I wasn't aware of any secret level on the Atari ST version. I knew there is an extra level on the Commodore 64 but I thought that was the only one. Thanks for the info
@@PatmanQC-Arcade-Documentaries it's accessed in much the same way - jump to the left hand side at the start of the first level and wait for the timer to run out. The floor will drop down just about where there is a random extra pixel on the floor grid.
Great vid! I was a little kid when I first encountered this game in the arcades. I was obsessed with the level 2 music track. I later played the crap out of it on the Amiga and then again on an arcade compilation disc for the Playstation that was the full arcade game. BTW do you only games that originated as an Arcade machine? It could be interesting to also include some games that started on computers/consoles.
Fir the C64 there was a clone called gyroscope. It did handle/controlled just like a gyroscope. It was a miracle the joystic never broke forcing the gyroscope one way or another.
Ahhh, that Atari system 1 Yamaha sound chip! Best audio you'll hear in an arcade. Although the spectrum version was poor (thou i enjoyed the construction kit) there were some really good games inspired by it in particular Spindizzy and Bobby Bearing.
Excellent Video! But you forgot the Japan only TENGEN version for the Megadrive. It's nearly Arcade perfect, even for today's standards. (I know that we said that about the Amiga version too in the late 80s, but it absolutely isn't).
There's a marble madness arcade machine in a neon arcade i go to sometimes. It used to be 2 player, but as you might expect, the track ball did not function. At least the last time I went there. Before that, it was working fine. There was a smash TV as well, but im not sure where they put it.
This was the very first game I ever played, on a Tandy 1000 that my family had. I’m surprised this version did not make it in as it was in vibrant color with smooth animation - however I do remember the hit/collision detection was awful. Great video!
@@PatmanQC-Arcade-Documentaries Yeah it probably was that version since the Tandy we had was IBM PC compatible. I remember the Electronic Arts "record style" package too with that image of the three large marbles converging. We had this and Starflight. The inside of Starflight sleeve had an image of the game designers all wearing space-suit type jumpers. I thought it was so cool.
Good retrospective. They really should release the sequel. I can understand why the Amiga version is rated so well since it used more direct control for the marble.
If EA used the original source code for their Sega Genesis version, I suppose they used it for the Amiga version as well because it plays very similar, and I'm pretty sure the Genesis version is somewhat based on their Amiga version... the other home versions they put out at that time though (C-64, Atari ST, Atari 8-bit, MS-DOS) all were based on the same somewhat watered down design by Will Harvey and probably used none of the original code and data... and they all seem to have some physics flaws as well. I'm not talking about the console versions which came out later and were mostly better than that. I'm also not talking about the Spectrum and Amstrad versions which were made in the UK by Melbourne House and probably based on their earlier inofficial Marble Madness clone called Gyroscope.
One thing I've always wondered about the game is if they intentionally made the screen scroll like that, only starting to move upon reaching the bottom (or top) third of it in order to make it harder to react to oncoming dangers and thus suck in more quarters? You could have easily chopped the screen to half its height and have minimal impact on gameplay.
I know you limited reviews of the ports, but you did Apple II and not the pretty excellent Apple IIgs port. It was a signature release for that platform and quite important, compared to the lackluster and already outdate 8-bit Apple II version.
An old classmate of mine made a replication of the Intermediate level into a woodshop project in middle school eons ago. We used to test out the real marbles and they rolled great. I wonder to this day if he still has the piece of art laying around in his garage or storage room. somewhere.
never really liked the single player (prefered Lemmings) but the multi player Marble Madness was awesome..it added more skill since your opponent was trying to push you off also...
Nice vid but disappointed u didn't cover the two different versions for Genesis / Mega Drive (IIRC Japan got the better version, I think?). Also the Game Gear version is quite nice with bright colors, I wish you included it.
@@PatmanQC-Arcade-Documentaries fun fact! Marble madness 2 marble man would have been in midway arcade origins on xbox 360 because it actually talks about marble madness 2 marble man
There is one original Marble Madness machine in an arcade room in my city (probably one of the biggest arcade rooms in my country) I did know that this machine is so hard to find but didn't know it was that hard to find it that probably that is the only one that I will see in my entire life and probably the only one in my country and continent (I'm from Spain)
I wonder why, years later, _Marble Madness_ was re-released as part of the _Midway Arcade Treasures_ compilation when it was originally an Atari coin-op, not Midway. ???
there may have only been 6 levels to this but I was never able to beat this back in the day and we would get so frustrated with it we would normally switch to something else after to many failures
@@PatmanQC-Arcade-Documentaries I remember seeing that last level a hand full of times and it was so intimidating just the idea that it was upside down and don't talk about when the birds came out!
My brother has the cab, and restored it in and out to 100% new. It sux we're estranged he's got Toobin' also : ( Edit: if u wanna know about ppl underestimating the gbs ability to fuckin rock look up 'bitch ass niggas' in the slang dictionary of your choice
Never had a chance to play this one during it's original release. I'm hoping there's an emulator version somewhere out there, or I'll see if I can get my hands on a home console conversion.
The Sega Genesis version is really good and so is the Amiga port. He could always download mame and try it on that you can't find a real machine in the wild
The Apple II version may have been bad, but I loved the Apple IIgs version. I had a trackball (Logitech?) on my IIgs, and played that game all the time.
Marble Madness is an example of an arcade game that loses some appeal when literally converted to a home game (as it always was). In the arcade, it's OK the player doesn't run out of game quickly (Although clearly this was a problem here). At home, the game doesn't have enough levels so the gameplay must be greatly increased to keep the game from being immediately done, and players will inevitably left wanting more. It was a rental, not a purchase.
My nephew and I played this game countless times over the years and could never beat it. Will we were both playing two player and managed to complete the game at the same time. I don't think we ever went back to it after that.
@@PatmanQC-Arcade-Documentaries My friend Scott, this is his favorite arcade game. I lov the design very much, I just feel like when it came to home versions, they needed more.
Hey mate, someone finally dumped a copy of marble madness 2 on the internet archive, it should be easily accessible once next months mame build arrives
@@PatmanQC-Arcade-Documentaries Yes I saw, but imagine a sequel made for the new gen consoles, with better sound and graphics and more levels, while respecting the base material, especially the perspective view and the gameplay, it could be done
The c64 version has code for 4 players, but was released with max 2 players. The group n0stalgia found and enabled 4 plr mode. csdb.dk/release/?id=46566
@@PatmanQC-Arcade-Documentaries I did as well, but that second level is my favourite. I couldn't remember where it was from but it has periodically gotten stuck in my head years, and even decades after playing. I just recently downloaded an emulator and was pleasantly surprised when I started playing again. Still can only make it to level four.
