I first heard of "8-Bit Apocalypse" months before its release. As a huge fan of the classic era of arcades and video games, I was immediately excited for its eventual release. I did find myself wondering, however, "Is there really enough to write about Missile Command to fill a 250 page book?"
Turns out the answer is no, at least in the hands of Alex Rubens.
There are so many areas to criticize in this book that it's difficult to know where to start. Let's start with the beginning of the book :) The first third of the book is a shallow history of Atari and its culture. Other authors have covered this territory with far more depth and skill and its inclusion here is simply filler. Anyone reading a book on Missile Command is already familiar with the story of Atari and does not need a rehash.
Once we get into the actual development of Missile Command, the author shifts into page after page after page after page of overwrought Cold War imagery to try and link Missile Command to a greater narrative about the world in general. He does this through exaggerations and blatant falsehoods. Rubens describes the late 70s as a period when Americans were terrified of impending nuclear war to a point of almost being paralyzed and unable to function in our daily lives. This is simply not true. In the late 70s, Americans were more concerned with the perception of us being weak (Iran Hostage crisis) and an economy that was in the tank. Rubens then claims that Missile Command was inspired by the military rhetoric and actions of President Reagan and, further, his SDI/Star Wars system. That would be quite the feat, since Missile Command was released before Ronald Reagan was even elected. Much of this is described in a first-person fashion despite the author being clearly not old enough to have lived through this era.
The author's description of the game's actual development is a confused mess. He alternately describes Dave Theurer, the lead developer/engineer, as a veteran of the game industry and someone working on his first game. He describes events and timelines that lead to the conclusion that the development of Missile Command took 18 months or thereabouts while simultaneously implying a timeline of only a few months.
Precious little time is spent on the technical aspects of the game itself other than the fact it had a trackball and was in color. The author raves about the game's graphics as if they were a major step forward for the time (they weren't). He describes Missile Command's defensive nature as a first and somehow unique (it wasn't - Space Invaders, anyone?)
Instead we are treated to many, many repetitive pages attaching a narrative to Missile Command in a futile attempt to make it appear to be of greater depth than it is in reality. Yes, there's a bare bones story of unnamed cities being attacked with your job being to defend them. And...that's it. Dave Theurer, through his many hours developing the game, may have convinced himself there was something there but...there isn't. Even Rich Adam, the other developer on the game, doesn't buy into that concept.
Underlying the story of the game is the theme that its development essentially drove Dave Theurer crazy with nightmares of exploding cities and impending nuclear holocaust. That's undoubtedly terrible to have experienced. The author tries to lay that at the feet of the game itself but the connection is tenuous at best. Instead, the reality lies in the fact that Theurer was an insomniac who would work 96 hours straight and who once had an over-the-top reaction to a monster movie as a 10-year old.
The author also makes the claim that Missile Command's development was so rough and nightmarish that Theurer was driven out of the game development business. That's false. Theurer remained at Atari for a full decade after Missile Command, continuing to develop games the entire time, including all-time classic Tempest.
After the too-short middle section of the book covering the game's development, we are treated to a too-long section on the cultural impact of Missile Command and, again, a shallow history of Atari and the gaming industry. There's a highly detailed recap of an episode of the TV show "Chuck" that goes on for several pages. Then there's a detailed recap of the game Spec Ops: The Line (!?!?!?) with a very slight (at best) link to Missile Command. This, too, goes on for several pages. Multiple other cultural items are mentioned, such as the opening to the show, "The Americans". We also get a detailed, and fairly interesting, section on Tony Temple and Roy Schildt, high score champions of Missile Command, Yet, somehow with all those pages on all of that content, not a single mention of the movie documentary made about Missile Command ("High Score").
Finally, the author apparently spent many hours interviewing Dave Theurer but only two or three actual quotes from Theurer are included from those interviews. No stories, no personal reflections in Theurer's own words, nothing.
What we're left with is an incredibly shallow, overwrought, often factually incorrect, depiction of the development of a classic arcade game. The entire exercise is perhaps summed up by this passage at the end of the book. Rubens references Spec Ops' line "Do you feel like a hero now?" and then says about Dave Theurer, "I would say that such a word isn't strong enough to characterize Dave Theurer". Oof.
Do yourself a favor and do a Google search instead if you want to learn about Missile Command.
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Customer reviews
Fun read for a retro gamer and video game history buff. There are not a lot of books focusing on individual arcade games like Missile Command so I was excited about this book. It was good to read the untold story. I was only 12 when Missile Command came out and had no idea about the Cold War connection. It also wasn’t until a few years ago I heard of the stories from the actual developers. That being said, I find some of the writing to be a bit over the top and over dramatic. Appreciate the author for taking the time to research and write this book. Glad to have it in my retro library.
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Reviewed in the United States 🇺🇸 on February 23, 2019
Reviewed in the United States 🇺🇸 on March 12, 2019
Reviewed in the United States 🇺🇸 on December 29, 2020
Worth while retro read
By Jolt on December 29, 2020
Fun read for a retro gamer and video game history buff. There are not a lot of books focusing on individual arcade games like Missile Command so I was excited about this book. It was good to read the untold story. I was only 12 when Missile Command came out and had no idea about the Cold War connection. It also wasn’t until a few years ago I heard of the stories from the actual developers. That being said, I find some of the writing to be a bit over the top and over dramatic. Appreciate the author for taking the time to research and write this book. Glad to have it in my retro library.
By Jolt on December 29, 2020
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Top reviews from other countries
Jason R.
So much promise, but so, so boring.
Reviewed in Canada 🇨🇦 on February 19, 2019
