Gauntlet (Intro)
Ah yes, the ultimate party arcade game. Where else can fight your way out of a dungeon with three of your friends at your sides? Gauntlet, of course! This game evokes memories of hanging out in the arcade, and joining up with your friends to do battle on ghosts and barbarians. Anyone who played this game in the 80s seems to have “Warrior is about to die…!” engrained in their memories. I get the best kicks from this game watching others play it, or by playing it and shouting which direction to go. 
I got this game along with Tempest (the one that I trashed in transit). I was very fortunate to have the game in working condition, except that the joysticks didn’t have any spring action to them. With Gauntlet joysticks, abuse over time would break a little plastic collar inside the joystick which presses against a spring. The joystick would then be loose, and have no resistance to it. I had to replace all four joysticks; three I got from eBay. With the fourth joystick, I was able to have someone machine a new plastic collar, which works great.
I also washed the control panel with some citrus cleaner and a scouring sponge. Worked great. I also put some new t-moulding around the control panel, which I bought from t-moulding.com.
The marquee on Gauntlet doesn’t light up; I was suprised, being used to all these games with lighted marquees. I wish it did! From an operators point of view, this game is great… it records all the statistical data on coins, time played, etc. and can display histograms of the data. The interface for viewing the data and testing the game is very easy, too.
Arcade Stats:
Manufacturer: Atari
Year Released: 1985
Cabinet: Upright
Monitor: 19-inch Horizontal Color Raster
Coin Counter: 9278
Tony's First Quarter: Tons of Fun, Norwich, Connecticut
Tony's Arcade: Yes