Shark Jaws: “Exciting Underwater Video Terror”

Atari sets the bait for a lawsuit: shark JAWS

After they release Tank under the Kee label in 1974, on Sept. 25th, 1975 Atari produces another game under a pseudonymous company name, this one called Shark Jaws. The first game featuring animated characters, its electronic guts are converted Tank hardware. It is also manufacturer Horror Games’ first and last outing, a company created by Atari to avoid any possible legal hassles over the game from the producers of its obvious inspiration: Universal Studio’s 1975 smash-hit movie Jaws, directed by Steven Spielberg. Even flyers for the arcade game, sent out to prospective buyers, prod them to “cash in on the popularity, interest and profits associated with sharks”. What’s a few maimed swimmers between profit margins, right? The ability to eliminate any affiliation between the two isn’t helped by the fact that the cabinet artwork features the word shark in tiny letters with JAWS looming large next to it. In the game, the player controls a SCUBA diver trying to spear a small fish swimming around the screen. On his tail is a bigger fish to fry, a shark intent on finishing him off. Bushnell and Atari swim through the bloodied waters of copyright infringement unscathed: Universal doesn’t bite. One wonders if Spielberg protégé Joe Dante is having a laugh about IP floating about in the waters when he features Shark Jaws in an early scene of his Jaws-like movie Piranha (1978), being feverishly played by female lead Heather Menzies-Urich.

Small fish in a big Pong. Shark Jaws in Joe Dante’s Piranha, 1978

Shark Jaws is just one of a few arcade games riding the sizeable wake of Spielberg’s fishy fiend, including Shark by U.S. Billiards, Blue Shark by Midway, and Shark Attack by Pacific Novelty. One other arcade game I have to single out is the wonderfully cabineted Maneater by Project Support Engineering, released in 1975. Arcade goers still shivering from being terrorized by Jaws must have swam straight through the schools of games to Maneater‘s striking fiberglass cabinet, molded into the the head of a great white shark. Toothy mouth agape, head stretching upwards, with monitor mounted in the back of the jaws and game controls to the bottom, one cannot help but be reminded of the monster rushing mouth wide to the unsuspecting swimmer on the surface of the movie’s iconic poster. So arresting is the appearance of Maneater, that Steven Spielberg himself picks one up in December of 1975 for his office at Universal studios.

The bigger fish: Poster for the 1975 film

The best arcade video game cabinet ever? Maneater, by Project Support Engineering 1975

Steven Spielberg and fishy friend, the arresting 1975 arcade game Maneater by PSE, in his Universal studios office in Dec.1975

Games by Apollo, a producer of video games for Atari’s later home game machine the VCS, comes under the steely gaze of Universal Pictures’ lawyers in 1982. The cartridge maker is persuaded to change the name of one of their products, Lochjaw.  Company president Pat Roper isn’t happy about the forced change, insisting that the original title does not infringe on Universal’s Jaws properties, but feels it is just easier to avoid litigation and rename the game to Shark Attack. Universal fails to protest the new name, apparently not attracted by such chum.

Just when you thought it was safe to return to the arcade, Atari Games revisits the bloodied waters in 1990 with ThunderJaws, a run-and-gun arcade game similar to the Namco hit Rolling Thunder, that also sees release across a number of home game platforms. This time around, gamers must face off against a cybernetic shark. Smile, you metal-toothed son-of-a-bitch!