Akka Arrh was a never released arcade game developed in the 80’s by the ever-wacky Llamasoft/Jeff Minter for Atari. A few cabinets were made, but only 3 are known to exist. None of the cabinet owners were willing to copy and share the roms. However, that all changed in 2019 and you can now play the old version via emulation.

As the story of the controversy goes on the MAMEWorld Forums, one of those collectors had a technician come to his home to repair some other game. In the process, the technician allegedly went into the Akka Arrh cabinet, copied the ROMS, and then anonymously posted them online. This generated a lot of controversy in the collector and retro gaming controversy.

Jeff Minter was hired to re-build the game in 2023. He said the original game’s design was “interesting but flawed” and lacked a compelling design to draw players back in when they lost. The much improved version is now available on PS4, PS5, Xbox, Switch, and PC.

I think the interesting part is the gameplay. It plays like a multi-level Missile Command in which you start zoomed out and as attackers break through your defenses you zoom in and back out again. I think that kind of mechanic is pretty difficult, and makes me ponder how that kind of mechanic could either be done differently or applied to very different kinds of games…