Kaboom!

Kaboom! was pure distilled adrenaline: the Mad Bomber atop the screen dropped bombs ever faster and you had to catch them with three rows of paddle-controlled buckets. At maximum speed, bombs fell so rapidly players entered a trance state where hands moved before the brain. The paddle controller was essential — the joystick too imprecise. Activision's Larry Kaplan created one of the purest, most immediate games ever: no story, no complications, just reflexes against accelerating gravity.