Demon Attack

Article summary

Demon Attack is a fixed shooter video game created by Rob Fulop for the Atari 2600 and published by Imagic in 1982. The game involves the player controlling a laser cannon from the surface of a planet, shooting winged demons that fly down and attack in different sets of patterns. Fulop designed the game after leaving Atari, saying he was not properly reimbursed for his work on a port of Space Invaders. He co-founded the company Imagic in 1981 and began developing Demon Attack. It was the first game he developed that had a graphic artist, Michael Becker, who created eight-phase animations for the demons. Upon the game's release in 1982, it received positive critical attention for its graphics and gameplay and became one of the best-selling Atari 2600 games, and the best-selling game developed by Imagic. Programmer Gary Kato created a port of Demon Attack for the Intellivision console which added a final boss mothership. The boss was similar in gameplay to the final boss in Phoenix (1980), a game Atari had exclusive console rights to. This led to Atari filing a suit against Imagic. A settlement was reached in January 1983, with Imagic being allowed to release Demon Attack for several video game consoles and home computers in the 1980s.

Key claims

1. date of foundation: 1981 — source: Wikipedia · confidence 0.95
2. date of foundation: 1981-07-17 — source: Wikipedia · confidence 0.95
3. publication date: 1982 — source: Wikipedia · confidence 0.95
4. release date: 1982 — source: Wikipedia · confidence 0.95
5. release date: 1982 — source: Wikipedia · confidence 0.95
6. release date: 1983 — source: Wikipedia · confidence 0.95

Discussion questions

1. Summarise the article in your own words. Which single claim would you verify first, and why?
2. The record states that the date of foundation is "1981". What evidence would count against this claim?
3. The record states that the date of foundation is "1981-07-17". What evidence would count against this claim?
4. The record states that the publication date is "1982". What evidence would count against this claim?
5. The record states that the release date is "1982". What evidence would count against this claim?
6. The record states that the release date is "1982". What evidence would count against this claim?
7. The record states that the release date is "1983". What evidence would count against this claim?
8. Which claim in this article is most likely to be revised as the sources update? How would you check its current status?
9. If two sources disagreed about one of these facts, what would you need in order to trust one over the other?

Bibliography

1. Wikipedia https://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?oldid=1369484702