Dig Dug is a maze arcade game developed by Namco in 1981 and released in 1982, distributed in North America by Atari, Inc The player controls Dig Dug to defeat all enemies per stage, by either inflating them to bursting or crushing them underneath rocks.
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Dig Dug was planned and designed by Masahisa Ikegami, with help from Galaga creator Shigeru Yokoyama.
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The player controls protagonist Dig Dug to eliminate each screen's enemies: Pookas, red creatures with comically large goggles, and Fygars, fire-breathing green dragons.
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In 1981, Dig Dug was planned and designed by Masahisa Ikegami, with help from Shigeru Yokoyama, the creator of Galaga.
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Dig Dug was a critical and commercial success upon release, and was praised for its gameplay and layered strategy.
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Dig Dug prompted a long series of sequels for several platforms.
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The first of these, Dig Dug II, was released in Japan in 1985 to less success, opting for an overhead perspective; instead of digging through earth, Dig Dug drills along fault lines to sink pieces of an island into the ocean.
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Dig Dug is a main character in the ShiftyLook webseries Mappy: The Beat.
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Character Dig Dug was renamed to Taizo Hori, a play on the Japanese phrase "horitai zo", meaning "I want to dig".
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Dig Dug became a prominent character in Namco's own Mr Driller series, where he is revealed to be the father of Susumu Hori and being married to Baraduke protagonist Masuyo Tobi, who would divorce for unknown reasons.
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