It happened in 1978

[Grand Torino]

Space Invaders is a Japanese shooting video game released in 1978 by Taito. It was developed by Tomohiro Nishikado, who was inspired by other media: Breakout, The War of the Worlds, and Star Wars. The games was one of the forerunners of modern video gaming and helped expand the video game industry from a novelty to a global industry.

The game Space Invaders became an immediate hit when it was released in 1978. In the original planning for the game, they had planned to have the aliens be human soldiers. Taito figured that they did not want to send the message that shooting humans was ok, so they changed it to aliens.

Shortly after being released, Space Invaders grew in popularity. In 1980, it was licensed for use in the United States. It was released in coin-operated arcades, the Atari 2600, and the Nintendo Entertainment System. Throughout its lifetime it has generated more than 500 million dollars in revenue.

Fun facts...

The game was so amazingly popular in Japan that it caused a coin shortage until the country's Yen supply was quadrupled. Entire arcades were opened in Japan specifically for this game.

Space Invaders, along with Pac-Man and Pong, shares the notorious distinction of being one of the most duplicated, bootleged and/or hacked arcade games.

[KahrMan]

I remember dad taking us to the arcade in Hickory Hollow mall on Friday nights to play video games.  Space Invaders was always one of my favorites.

[Quavodus]

My brother must've spent hundreds of dollars playing Space Invaders and Pac Man.

[deerslayer]

Ha ha, my daughter and I played Asteroids and Missile Command yesterday on a retro Atari machine we found at Kroger a couple years ago.  It has probably 75 games, but I don't remember if Space Invaders was one of them.  

Edited October 30, 2018 by deerslayer

[Chucktshoes]

 More importantly, you know what else made it debut in 1978? 

 

 

 

 

Me.