I am pleased to offer readers of Arcade Blogger, signed copies of my book Missile Commander.

So what’s it all about?

Missile Commander has been a 7-year creative project. If you’ve not figured it out by the title, the book takes a deep dive into the creation of Atari’s arcade game Missile Command, from its initial concept, through to the release across the world’s arcades during the summer of 1980. It also tells the tale of how I got the Guinness World Record on the game – from playing as a kid in local arcades back in the day, through to achieving the world record in 2006, with stories and anecdotes along the way.

So why should you buy it?

Well, the good news here is that there’s no waiting around for a Kickstarter – the book is done and printed! Second, it’s not the usual glossy coffee-table type retro book with pretty pictures and stuff that you already know – it’s a full-length, detailed hardback book printed on quality 104 gsm paper – 77,000 words spanning 267 pages. There are 57 colour images to support the dialogue, many previously unpublished, including a few surprises for the collectors and gaming historians out there. In short, if you enjoy this blog and classic arcade gaming in general, and “old” Atari coin op history, then this will be right up your street. Lots of previously unknown detail about the game’s development is revealed.

What I’ve produced here is a deeply-researched, well-written, quality product that people with an interest in arcade video game history are going to enjoy – I guarantee you will learn things you did not know previously! I’ve always felt that the story of the development of Missile Command has never been properly told and I wanted to address that. The icing on the cake (well, for me at least), is that Dave Theurer, the creator of Missile Command was good enough to write the foreword; and this year marks the 40th anniversary of the release of the original arcade game.

If you enjoy my blog and the podcast, this is going to be something you’ll love! Feedback from initial recipients of the book has been very positive in terms of the detailed content, the actual physical quality of the book (it really is a thing of beauty to hold) and shipping.

As arcade enthusiasts, you will all be particularly interested in a couple of the “reveals” in the book. I won’t spoil it for you, but previously unseen photographs of the infamous Missile Command prototype cabinet, early concept sketches and original hand drawn artwork are included, along with a very detailed account of how that prototype cabinet came about, and why it was changed to the design that we are familiar with just before the final release of the game.

How to order?

Simple! Click here, choose your location, then check out using the appropriate ordering page – PayPal or credit cards are accepted. Please note that all USA and Canadian orders will ship in batches (this allows me to keep shipping costs at a minimum for you). All other orders will usually ship as they come in, so please bear with me. If you are outside the EU, UK, USA or Canada, do contact me for a quote.

I’m really excited for you all to get your hands on the book – feedback has been very positive so far. This is a quality product and I’m sure you won’t be disappointed.

Thank you so much for your support – if you could please spread the word on social media, I’d be very grateful.

To order your copy, click here.

For those of you who prefer to read your books on digital devices, you should now be able to find Missile Commander on every eBook platform across the globe, including Amazon Kindle, Apple Books, Kobo etc. Simply search for “Missile Commander” in your usual eBook store, and you should be good to go.

Happy holidays!

Tony