Trog (video game)
A four-player maze game featuring claymation dinosaurs and cavemen.
Trog is a maze arcade video game developed and published by Midway Manufacturing in 1990 in North America under the Bally/Midway label. Players control one of four dinosaurs being chased by cavemen, with gameplay that includes collecting items and using special power-ups. It was notable for its claymation graphics, advertised as Playmation, and for supporting up to four players simultaneously.
Quick Facts
- Developer
- Bally Midway
- Publisher
- Bally Midway (NA); Williams Electronics (EU)
- Designer
- George N. Petro
- Programmer
- Kurt Mahan
- Artist
- Jack E. Haeger
- Composer
- Chris Granner
- Platforms
- Arcade
- MS-DOS
- NES
- Released
- March 1990 (NA); February 1991 (EU)
Facts from the source article.
Gameplay
Trog is a maze game in which players control one of four Theropod-like dinosaurs with Styracosaurus-like heads: Rex, Bloop, Spike, or Gwen. The goal is to collect all colored eggs on each of 49 islands in the land of Og while avoiding one-eyed cavemen called Trogs. Power-ups appear randomly and include red flowers for speed, ice cubes that freeze Trogs, pineapples that turn the character into a full-grown T-Rex able to eat Trogs, and a firebrand granting temporary fire breath. Multiplayer mode supports two to four players on the same screen competing to collect their own colored eggs first; players may attack or protect each other, but power-ups affect anyone in the way. Some stages have no walls, allowing characters to fall off the grid into the sea. Trogs are subject to the same hazards as players and can be knocked into the sea with a single punch. Three difficulty levels exist: Easy, Advanced, and Expert, with Advanced rewarding a 200,000 level bonus and Expert a 400,000 level bonus. As levels progress, Trogs invent fire pits, wheels, and springs, while catapults and transportation chambers appear for evasion, usable by both sides.
Development
Trog was co-designed by George N. Petro and Jack E. Haeger, who had worked on earlier Midway titles such as NARC. Haeger created the artwork and Playmation graphics using clay animation. George Petro and Kurt Mahan programmed the game, and Chris Granner composed the soundtrack and sound effects. The original concept, Revision 4.00, was a puzzle/strategy game where players controlled a hand laying bones to guide a dinosaur, but testers panned it; one allegedly added an R to the bone button label. Midway considered canceling the project but proceeded because Haeger had already spent much of the budget on clay animation and because a tester suggested turning it into a Pac-Man clone.
Release
Trog was first released in arcades by Midway in North America in March 1990 and in Europe by Williams in February 1991. A DOS conversion by Software Creations in 1990 supported two players with Bloop and Rex. The Nintendo Entertainment System version, ported by Visual Concepts and published by Acclaim in North America in October 1991 and later in Europe, also supported two players, featuring Bloop and Spike, with altered visuals and sound.
Legacy
The Trog arcade cabinet appears briefly in the 1991 film Terminator 2: Judgment Day. Characters from the game appear in later Midway titles: a Trog appears as a shootable easter egg in Revolution X, and in CarnEvil a Trog is frozen in ice in the Freak Show while dinosaur characters appear as enemies in the Rickety Town level. CarnEvil was conceptualized and directed by Haeger.
More in Nintendo Entertainment System Game Library
Spotted an error? Know more?
Reader corrections go straight into our review queue. Suggest an edit · How this site is sourced