Asteroids is a video arcade game released in November 1979 by Atari Inc.

Asteroids Hyper 64 is an update to the 1979 arcade shooter Asteroids released for the Nintendo 64 on December 14, 1999.

While Asteroids ( 1979 ) allowed the player to rotate the game's spacecraft, 1982's highly acclaimed Robotron 2084 was most influential on subsequent multi-directional shooters.

Arcades catering to video games began to gain momentum in the late 1970s with games such as Space Invaders ( 1978 ), Asteroids ( 1979 ), and Galaxian ( 1979 ), and became widespread in 1980 with Pac-Man, Missile Command, Berzerk, Defender, and others.