The History of Spy Hunter - Arcade documentary

I remember playing Spy Hunter at 7-11 for the first time. My friends and I went thru $5 playing it the first day. When I got home, the song was stuck in my head, so I started bum-bum-bumming the riff and humming the melody. My Mom overheard me and asked me if they were showing reruns of that or something. I said "reruns of what?" - "That's the Peter Gunn Theme." - "No, that's the Spy Hunter song. It's a new video game at 7-11." Then she just shook her head and got her old record collection and played her Duane Eddy record. I then proceeded to play the hell out of that record all Summer.

As a kid, I never understood that those were civilian cars. I just mowed everybody down and wondered why I never accumulated points.

This is one of the most iconic arcade games back then. RIP Sean Connery.

I used to play this for hours. Last phase was going into a arena to free hostages guarded by a huge robot. Never made it. Got me everytime.

One of the most iconic theme tunes in arcade history

I honestly think its super cool to get video game history from fans who actually lived it! I'm too young to remember the early 80s, so I look up to fans like you❤

Thanks for the history! When I was a young computer nerd in 4-5th grade the bowling alley had a spy hunter machine and my friends and I were so obsessed we ported the game for the apple //. We were young and silly and had our own 'software company'. IWe made a port and tried to offer it for sale to Midway and Atari (we heard they were going to release one). We pumped all our allowance into that game laying graph paper over the screen at the alley and mapping the graphics. Putting our tape recorders up to record the sound. The poor performance caused me to learn machine language/ assembler to speed it up. We even added a few features like stealing weapons from other enemies temporarily if you made the right moves. The first few levels we completed were quite good and playable yet needing polish.. We sent it to midway and atari for consideration and they send back nice thank you but no thanks letters. 2 months later the apple // version came out and we were gutted by how bad it was compared to our little fan fic version. Wish i could find the copies we had and the graph paper. We did a similar endless scroll style graph paper for ours that the creators did. The car s all vehicles looked good to great. The foliage not so much and more sparse. getting the music to play and sound ok -ish was a one-or-the-other problem we never really solved. So much fun though. Taught me a lot. Since one of my friends had a ti-994a we tried to apply it to that with terrible results. Anyway.. thanks!

This game was ahead of its time, IMO; having so many weapons at your disposal made it so much fun to play. Sadly, I lacked the hand / eye coordination required to play effectively, and sooner than I'd like to admit, the game would be over. So essentially, I played the beginning of the game and not much further. Years later I picked up the Midway compilation DVD for PS2 and found that I hadn't improved at all LOL.

I remember playing this at Nathan's arcade on Long Island. The cool part was that when you were on a good run in the game, the second high pitched verse of the music would kick in and it would be so loud the whole arcade could hear it. Made me feel like a true badass spy!!

One of the first games I ever played. I loved the music, and the car. Finally got the Nintendo version and played the heck out it.

I always found it funny that (referring to the arcade version) the car illustrated on the side decals & marquee of the game cabinets looked like a Lotus , the T-topped car used in the advertising flyers is obviously a red 1980s Camaro Z-28 but the actual top down seen car you use in the game resembles a Porsche 944

Ahhh, this game was the first programming hack I ever released for the Commodore 64 so the joystick mimiced the arcade back in 1984 I believe it was. I never understood why the company didn't make it exactly like the arcade for the controls since I did it and people loved the mod I did. Funny thing is 30 years later I saw my mod mentioned as something that needed to be.

I used to play this at a bowling alley in the 1980s and man, the manager must have loved that music because he would crank up the volume. Deep in the game, when you're playing well, the organ would start to rock out with kick ass riffs! Good times!!

Pat! One of my all-time favorite memories from childhood involves this arcade game. The year was 1986 (I think), during February, and my dad and I flew down to Florida for our one-and-only trip to Disney World. The night we got off the plane it was incredibly warm compared to the nasty Winter we were having in Indiana. Once we got to our hotel during check-in I heard that unmistakable (these days) sound of an arcade game. From my memories it seems that the small arcade stuffed into an alcove only held a machine or two, but that music kept drawing me towards what I came to know as Spy Hunter. The music and branching paths of this game just fascinated me beyond description, and without fail I always remember my first trip to Florida anytime I hear that iconic tune.

I remember my mom taking my sister to piano lessons at the mall. I tagged along and went to the arcade. This game got all 4 quarters I got every week.

Oh man did I love Spy Hunter as a kid. Especially the sit down cabinet.

I really did enjoy this video, however I'm kind of shocked there was no mention of the NES game "Super Spy Hunter" as it's a true mega hyped up sequel to the original. It pushes the NES to it's limits and is an incredible game!!

there's a local retro-arcade that has this game and it's super fun; it's held up extremely well

This game needs a reboot I play this for hours skipped school to just to kill the super truck and literally poured hundreds into those machines I truly love this game

This was one of my Top 3 all-time favorite video games of the 80s (along with "Gauntlet" and "Sinistar") Beware, I live!