The Hall Of Fame is exclusively reserved for character studies. But we’re willing to make an exception. You can’t really describe the space invader as a character. It never speaks, it doesn’t move through a story and barely interacts with those around it other than to mindlessly advance, in formation, towards its inevitable demise. However, there are two factors that make the space invader as significant as any number of Marios, Sonics or Laras. First, he has infinitely more personality than the player avatar, a faceless unnamed cannon. Second, this anonymous, mass-produced monster is still, 40-odd years after its creation, more synonymous with games than any of the above characters.
From T-shirts to skyscraper windows lit up like pixels and street-corner graffiti, the invader is the ultimate go-to guy for…
