The Arcade Superstars Of Saturday Supercade
From 1983 to 1985 America's video game obsessed youth had a good reason to stay home on Saturday mornings- the Saturday Supercade, an animated series on CBS that featured many of our favorite video game characters.
The legends of the arcade and console were brought to life in colorful 2D animation segments, and when the Supercade hit the airwaves we realized the story behind our favorite arcade games didn't stop at the kill screen.
Characters like Donkey Kong and Frogger seemed fairly slim on storyline in the games, but when they appeared in their own 11-minute long animated episodes kids couldn't wait to watch...and play all the games afterwards!
Frogger-
Leaping in-between cars across a busy intersection was just the beginning for young Frogger, an intrepid reporter for the Swamp Gazette.
Frogger had a crime solving mystery kids vibe and a much deeper storyline than you'd expect given the simplicty of the game, and yet young Frogger still found time to play in traffic in almost every episode.
Donkey Kong-
Back before he went exploring the world with his son Diddy, the giant gorilla named Donkey had his own segment on the Supercade, featuring comedian Soupy Sales as the voice of Donkey Kong.
Donkey has escaped from the zoo, and it's up to Zookeeper Mario and his gal pal Pauline to bring him back, except criminals keep getting in their way!
Donkey always helps put the criminals behind bars, proving he's a good gorilla, but he can't resist kidnapping Pauline every chance he gets either!
Watching people play Space Ace in the arcade left a lot to be desired, but watching Space Ace's adventures on Saturday mornings made kids happy to know there was a whole universe of fun waiting to be explored.
Space Ace, his wimpy alter ego Dexter, and officer Kimberley battle the evil Borf to save Earth from a fullscale invasion, but can Space Ace save the day before he turns back into a wimpy teen? Generally yes, yes he can...
Pitfall!-
Pitfall was the kind of game that seemed like it had a rich story behind the 8-bit graphics, either that or it was just a straight ripoff of Indiana Jones.
Either way, it seemed like the perfect game to become an animated series, but the hoaky storylines and the forced inclusion of in-game elements like jumping over pits or swinging from vines just made the show seem like a good idea gone wrong.
Donkey Kong Jr.-
What's a barrel tossing gorilla without a pint sized son to look after him? Donkey Kong Jr. came to the small screen with an extra helping of "Monkey Muscle!"...okay, that just sounds wrong, now doesn't it?!
Jr. travels around looking for his fugitive father, and with a little help from a greaser named Bones and friends they meet along the way the kindler, gentler Kong was just too cute as a cartoon character!
Q*bert-
He's the little hopping weirdo who curses in some strange alien language and hates snakes, he's Q*bert the tube nosed alien critter, and he's the least likely of the bunch to have landed his own TV show.
Since he lacked a show worthy backstory Q*bert was transformed into a mild mannered high school student who is always being harassed by a gang of snakes.
Somehow the show's creators managed to sneak in the jumping on boxes element, Q*bert's flying disc and his alien swearing bubbles, but bert still prefers to walk around Q*Berg.
Kangaroo-
Remember that arcade game where you played as a boxing mama kangaroo who punched monkeys and tried to rescue her son?
You're not alone, as Kangaroo is definitely the most obscure arcade game reference in the bunch, but it was a big hit when it came out in 1982.
The TV show took place in a zoo instead of a tree, but there was still plenty of monkey punching to go around!
Saturday cartoons might be dead, but our fond memories of childhood in the totally radical 80s will live on well after we run out of quarters.
We hope you like this article!
Please help us grow by sharing:
Get Updates In Your Inbox
Free weekly emails, plus get access
to subscriber-only prizes.