Star Raiders is a video game for the Atari 8-bit family of computers, released in 1979 and programmed by Doug Neubauer. It was also later ported to other Atari computer and game platforms. It was distinctive for its graphics, which (under most conditions) represented an out-the-cockpit, first-person view from a fictional combat spaceship traveling through a streaming 3D starfield in pursuit of enemy fighters called "Zylons". While there had already been simple target-shooting games using this perspective, Star Raiders had considerably higher quality graphics and more complex game play. As a result, it was inspirational to other developers throughout the 1980s and it's influence can be seen in later-generation "space combat simulation" games such as the Wing Commander and Star Wars: X-Wing series. It is one of the games that inspired the seminal title Elite. It is also one in a series of first person space shooters (including 1977's Starhawk (Vectrex/Arcade) and 1979's Star Fire (1979)) that appeared in the late-1970s and were arguably predecessors of the later seen first-person shooter genre. The game's attract mode, a simple streaming star field, was a common sight in computer stores of the early-1980s to show off the Atari computers' graphics capabilities.
The 2600 console version of the game came packed with part 3 of the Atari Force comic series as done by DC Comics. The series would finish with Star Raiders, DC's first Graphic Novel.
Source: Wikipedia, "Star_Raiders," available under the CC-BY-SA License.
