you know what, I'm just going to disregard this games historical value and innovation and landmark influence because like 8 stages in it just becomes abundantly clear that those Namco's game designers are daring 80s kids to waste their quarters as dozens batshit virtual aliens try to kamikaze themselves into your ship to prove their dignity as gamers and 40 years later I'm fucking caught in the crossfire holy shit you have my money already. I realize I'm only now discovering the inextricable tie between difficulty and monetisation in arcade classics but goddamn even getting 100,000 points was brutal. am I a fake gamer? I don't know. I feel like I might get beheaded for saying very very few games from the 80s have aged well at all. Galaga is no exception. It's still pretty epic to wipe out a whole wave of aliens with double blasters with HD rumble. See? Shitty ass 1981 Galaga didn't even have rumble.