Periscope-1968

In the mid 60's, Service Games and Rosen Enterprises, two American run companies based in Japan, merged to form Sega Enterprises. A few years later, they would release their first hit game, a submarine themed target shooter called Periscope. Like many arcade machines of the era, Periscope relied on an eye-catching interactive cabinet design. The player used a realistic replica of an actual submarine periscope to aim the game's torpedoes at the moving ship targets.

Duck Hunt-1969

The truth finally comes out. All these years we thought that Nintendo was the originator of Duck Hunt. Now we see that Sega had them beat by many years! The Sega version not only loses the tiny plastic light gun for a life sized rifle, it also ditches that annoying dog that mocks you when you miss a shot. Even better, at the end of your game, the Duck Hunt machine will actually print out a little scorecard showing how well you did.

(On second thought, the laughing dog eventually goes away. If you royally screw up, the Duck Hunt scorecard will remain with you forever, a permanent memento of your failure.)

Gun Fight-1970

A really cool two player light gun game. Two cowboys faced off across a desert landscape littered with cacti in an old fashioned wild west duel! The players used revolver style controllers to move their cowboys across the playfield and blast away at their opponent. The best part of the game was the destructible scenery. If a player shot a cactus by mistake, the offending spiny plant will drop to the ground, allowing a clearer shot at the enemy. When a cowboy is shot, he falls to the ground as well, and a few seconds later pops up along with any downed cacti.

Heavyweight Champ-1976

An old arcade game that didn't involve shooting? Amazing! Sega ditched the old reliable gun game in favor of a different violent pastime, boxing. In Heavyweight Champ, two players use boxing glove shaped controllers to bash their opponent's brains out. The gloves are moved up and down to aim the punch, and are pushed in to throw it. The players' characters were shown on screen in what was surprisingly high detail at the time. Over a decade later, Sega would revisit the concept with the release of another arcade game with the name Heavyweight Champ, with the same general control style and much improved graphics.