| Frogger | |
|---|---|
 North American arcade flyer | |
| Developer | Konami |
| Publishers | |
| Designer | Takahide Arima[15] |
| Series | Frogger |
| Platform | |
| Release | August 1981 |
| Genre | Action |
| Modes | Single-player,multiplayer |
Frogger[a] is a 1981action video game developed byKonami and published bySega forarcades.[14] It was released in North America bySega/Gremlin. The object of the game is to direct fivefrogs to their homes by dodging traffic on a busy road, then crossing a river by jumping on floating logs, turtles, and alligators.
Frogger was positively received by critics upon its release, and is considered one of thegreatest video games ever made. It was followed by numerous clones and several home-only sequels in theFrogger series. The 1982Atari 2600 version fromParker Brothers sold four million cartridges, making it one of thebest-selling Atari 2600 games. By 2005, 20 million copies of its various home video game incarnations had been sold worldwide.
The objective of the game is to guide a frog to each of the empty homes at the top of the screen. The game starts with three, five, or seven frogs, depending on the machine's settings.[16] Losing all frogs results in agame over. The player uses the four-directionjoystick to hop the frog once.Frogger is either single-player or two players alternating turns.
The frog starts at the bottom of the screen, which contains a horizontal road occupied by speeding vehicles such as race cars, dune buggies, trucks, and bulldozers. The player must guide the frog between opposing lanes of traffic to avoid becoming roadkill and losing a life. After crossing the road, amedian strip separates the two major parts of the screen. The upper half consists of a river with logs, alligators, and turtles, all moving horizontally across the screen in opposite directions. By jumping on swiftly moving logs and the backs of alligators and turtles, the player can guide the frog to safety. The player must avoid snakes, otters, and the open mouths of alligators. A brightly colored female frog is sometimes on a log and may be carried for bonus points. The very top of the screen contains five "frog homes", and at least one is always open and available. These sometimes contain bonus insects or deadly alligators.
When all five frogs are in their homes, the game progresses to the next level with increased difficulty. After five levels, the difficulty briefly eases and yet again progressively increases after each level. The timer gives 30 seconds to guide each frog into one of the homes, and resets back to 60 ticks whenever a life is lost or a frog reaches home safely.
In 1982,Softline stated that "Frogger has earned the ominous distinction of being 'the arcade game with the most ways to die'."[17] There are many different ways to lose a life (illustrated by askull and crossbones symbol where the frog was), including being run over by a road vehicle; jumping into the river; running into snakes, otters, or an alligator's jaws; sinking while on top of a diving turtle; riding a log, alligator, or turtle off the side of the screen; jumping into a home already occupied by a frog or alligator; jumping into the side of a home or the bush; or running out of time.
The opening tune is the first verse of a Japanese children's song called "Inu no Omawarisan" ("The Dog Policeman"). Other Japanese tunes include the themes to theanime seriesHana no Ko Lunlun andRascal the Raccoon. The American release has the same opening song plus "Yankee Doodle".
Forward steps score ten points, and every frog arriving safely home scores 50. Ten points are awarded per each unused ½ second of time. Guiding a lady frog home or eating a fly scores 200 each, and when all five frogs reach home to end the level the player earns 1,000 points. A single bonus frog is given at 20,000 points, while 99,990 points is the maximum high score that can be achieved on an originalarcade cabinet. Players may exceed this score, but the game "rolls over" and only keeps the last five digits.[18]
The game was developed byKonami. On July 22, 1981,Sega gained exclusive rights to manufacture the game worldwide.[14]
Sega/Gremlin was skeptical aboutFrogger's earning potential in North America, as no other company had licensed the game. Also, an earlier game calledFrogs that was developed there had flopped. It was believed thatEliminator would be the company's next big hit. Elizabeth Falconer, a market researcher at Sega/Gremlin, was tasked by Gremlin founder Frank Fogleman to check the company's library of video presentations to see if there was anything worth licensing, and she stumbled acrossFrogger.[19] Thinking the game deserved a chance in spite of being "cute", Falconer requested a licensing window for playtesting. She persuaded executives who denigratedFrogger as a "women and kids game" by reminding them ofPac-Man. Sega/Gremlin agreed to pay Konami $3,500 per day for a 60-day licensing window. A prototype was playtested at a San Diego bar and was so successful that distributors agreed to resell the game based on the test alone.[19]
Wanting to broaden the player base demographics,[20] Jack Gordon, director of video game sales at Sega/Gremlin, noted that women shied away from the "shoot 'em ups" on the market, and that games likeFrogger "filled the void".[21]
Frogger wasported to many contemporary home systems. Several platforms such as theCommodore 64 support bothROM cartridges andmagnetic media, so they received multiple versions of the game.[22]
Sierra On-Line gained the magnetic media rights and sublicensed them to developers who published for systems not normally supported by Sierra. Cornsoft published the officialTRS-80/Dragon 32,Timex Sinclair 1000, andTimex Sinclair 2068 ports. Because of that, even theAtari 2600 received multiple releases: a standard cartridge and a cassette for theStarpath Supercharger. Sierra released disk or tape versions for the Commodore 64,Apple II,original Macintosh, IBM PC and Supercharger-equipped 2600, and cartridge versions for theTRS-80 Color Computer.
Parker Brothers received the license from Sega for cartridge versions which it released for the Atari 2600,Intellivision,Atari 5200,ColecoVision,Odyssey²,Atari 8-bit computers,TI-99/4A,VIC-20 andCommodore 64. Parker Brothers spent $10 million on advertisingFrogger.[23] The Atari 2600 version was programmed by Ed English.[24]
Coleco released stand-aloneMini-Arcade tabletop versions ofFrogger, which, along withPac-Man,Galaxian, andDonkey Kong, had three million sales combined.[25]
The game was ported to systems such as thePC-6001 andGame Boy[26] (with two separate releases for the Game Boy andGame Boy Color in 1998).[27]Frogger is one of the 6launch games for the 1983Gakken Compact Vision TV Boy.
| Publication | Score | |||
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Arcade | Atari 2600 | ColecoVision | PC | |
| AllGame |  [28] |  [29] | ||
| Computer and Video Games | Positive[30] | |||
| Arcade Express | 9/10[31] | |||
| Computer Games | Classic[32] | Classic[32] | ||
| Creative Computing | Positive[33] | |||
| Electronic Fun with Computers & Games | A[34] | |||
| The Space Gamer | Positive[35] | |||
Reporting on Gordon's claim thatFrogger's appeal lacked barriers of age or sex,Cashbox in October 1981 said "watch for it".[36] Distributors reportedly found that Gordon's statement was accurate, with women enjoying its "non-aggressive yet challenging" gameplay.Frogger's success increased production, becoming one of the top-grossing arcade games in North America during 1981.[37] The arcade game earned over$135 million (equivalent to $467 million in 2024) for Sega/Gremlin in US cabinet sales, becoming the most successful Sega/Gremlin release.[19] In Japan,Frogger was the 12th highest-grossing arcade game of 1981.[38]
Home versions ofFrogger had high sales. The 1982 Atari 2600 version earned its publisherParker Brothers$40 million in orders upon launch.[39] By the end of the year,4 million Atari 2600 cartridges were sold with$80,000,000 (equivalent to $261,000,000 in 2024) inwholesale revenue.[24] It became the company's most successful first-year product, beating the sales and revenues of its previous best-seller,Merlin.[40] By 2005,20 million copies of the various home versions had been sold worldwide, including5 million in the United States.[41]
In 1981,Computer and Video Games reviewed the arcade game as "one of the popular new generation of arcade games which are getting way from space themes".[30] In his 1982 bookVideo Invaders, Steve Bloom describedFrogger as a "climbing game" along withSpace Panic (1980) andNintendo'sDonkey Kong (1981). He said it was one of the "most exciting variations" onPac-Man'smaze theme along withDonkey Kong due to how players need to "scale from the bottom of the screen to the top" which make them "more like obstacle courses than mazes" since "you always know where you're going—up."[42] Brett Alan Weiss ofAllGame later reviewed the arcade game, calling it one of "the most beloved videogames ever created" and "pure, undiluted gaming at its finest". He said the "graphics are cute and detailed, the sound effects are crisp and clear, and the controls are sharp and responsive".[28]
Arcade Express reviewed the Atari VCS version in 1982, calling it "a highly authentic translation of the coin-op hit" that combines "great graphics with sophisticated play action".[31] Ed Driscoll reviewed the Atari VCS version inThe Space Gamer, commenting: "All in all, if you liked the arcade version, this should save you a lot of quarters. The price is in line with most cartridges. It also proves that Atari isn't the only one making home versions of the major arcade games for the VCS."[35]Danny Goodman ofCreative Computing Video & Arcade Games wrote in 1983 that the Atari 2600 version "is one of the most detailed translations I have seen", noting the addition of the wraparound screen.[33]InfoWorld's Essential Guide to Atari Computers cited the Sierra version as an entertaining arcade game.[43]Ahoy! said that both the Sierra disk version and Parker Brothers cartridge version for the Commodore 64 "are excellent, with little to choose between them".[22]
In 2013,Entertainment Weekly namedFrogger one of the top ten games for the Atari 2600.[44]
In 1997,Hasbro Interactive releasedFrogger, a vastly expanded remake of the original forWindows and thePlayStation developed bySony Computer Entertainment Europe'sCambridgedivision. Unlike the original, it consists of multiple different levels. It was a commercial success, with Windows sales alone at nearly one million units in less than four months.[45] In 1998, Hasbro released a series of versions of the game for theSega Genesis,Super NES,Game.com,Game Boy, andGame Boy Color. Each version has different graphics, with the Genesis version having the same as the original arcade game. The Genesis and SNES versions are the last games released for those consoles in North America.[46] Though using the same box art, they are otherwise unrelated to the 1997 remake.
In 2005,InfoSpace worked with Konami Digital Entertainment to create the mobile gameFrogger for Prizes,[47] in which players across the U.S. competed in multiplayer tournaments to win daily and weekly prizes. In 2006, themobile game version ofFrogger grossed over $10 million in the United States.[48] AJava version was released for compatiblemobile phones.
Frogger was released on theXbox Live Arcade for theXbox 360 on July 12, 2006. It was developed byDigital Eclipse and published byKonami. It has two new gameplay modes: versus speed mode and co-op play. Some of the music was replaced, including the familiarFrogger theme. This version is in the compilationKonami Classics Vol. 1.
Hamster Corporation released the game as part of theirArcade Archives series for theNintendo Switch andPlayStation 4 in 2019.[49][50]
Video game clones includeRibbit for theApple II (1981),Acornsoft'sHopper (1983) for theBBC Micro andAcorn Electron, A&F Software'sFrogger (1983) for BBC Micro andZX Spectrum, PSS's (Personal Software Services)Hopper for theOric-1 in the UK (1983) and a later release for the ORIC Atmos,Froggy for the ZX Spectrum released by DJL Software (1984), Solo Software'sFrogger for the Sharp MZ-700 (1984) in the UK, andLeap Frog for theNewBrain.
Several clones retain the basic gameplay ofFrogger and change the style or plot.Pacific Coast Highway (1982), for theAtari 8-bit computers, splits the gameplay into two alternating screens: one for the highway, one for the water.[51]Preppie! (1982), for the Atari 8-bit changes the frog to apreppy retrieving golf balls at a country club.Frostbite (1983), for the Atari 2600, uses theFrogger river gameplay with an arctic theme.Crossy Road (2014), for iOS, Android and Windows Phone, has a randomly generated series of road and river sections in one endless level, with only one life and a single point given for each forward hop.
Konami announced that aFrogger game show was in production forPeacock, produced byKonami Cross Media NY andEureka Productions. It debuted on September 9, 2021.[58][59]
On November 26, 1999, Rickey's World Famous Sauce offered $10,000 to the first person who could score 1,000,000 points onFrogger or $1,000 for a new world record prior to January 1, 2000.[60][61] On March 25, 2005, Robert Mruczek offered $1,000 for beating the fictitious world record of 860,630 as set byGeorge Costanza in an episode ofSeinfeld or $250 for a new world record by the end of that year.[62][63] On December 1, 2006, John Cunningham offered $250 for exceeding the same fictitious world record of 860,630 points by February 28, 2007.[64] These scores were surpassed only after the bounties had all expired.
The first score to have been verified as having beaten George Costanza's fictional score of 860,630 points was set by Pat Laffaye ofWestport, Connecticut on December 22, 2009, with 896,980 points.[65] This score was surpassed by Michael Smith ofDurham, North Carolina on September 21, 2024, scoring 1,404,570, becoming the first and only person verified byTwin Galaxies to break one million points on an original arcade machine.[66]
Just before the holidays, Hasbro Interactive introduced a PC version of Frogger; in less than four months, it has sold nearly one million units
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