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Down Home Gamin' - Fun in the snow with Pengo


On 05/04/2026 at 05:48 PM by SanAndreas

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Pengo was one of my favorite arcade games from the Golden Age of Arcades, right up there with favorites such as Donkey Kong, Mario Bros, Centipede, and Joust. I also had the Atari 8-bit version of Pengo at home. 

 

Sadly, Pengo pretty much disappeared after the NES came out. The only Pengo game released after that was a Japan-only Game Gear version...until 2010.

Sega released a new version of Pengo for its RingWide arcade system in 2010. Titled as Pengo!, it was a widescreen, eight player competitive game that played somewhat differently from the original. This time, your fellow penguins were your primary adversaries rather than the Sno-Bees. Unfortunately, Pengo! was predictably only found in Japanese arcades. I actually first heard about tthis game from a 1UP blog posted by Noe V. 

In 2013, it was bundled with some simple shmup games in a compilation called Arcade Love Plus Pengo! and given a digital release on Xbox 360... also only in Japan. 

In 2019, however, Arcade Love Plus Pengo! got a physical Switch release, and PlayAsia naturally took advantage of the fact that it was region free to sell it in Western territories. And I bought a copy. The version I am playing is the Switch version.


 

Comments

Cary Woodham

05/05/2026 at 10:06 AM

Pengo is one of my favorite arcade games, too.  It was one of the few games that could pull me away from Pac-Man.  Others that could do this include Q*bert, Dig Dug, and BurgerTime.  I had Pengo on my Atari 5200 and it's one of the reasons why I didn't get a NES right away.

When I was a kid, I don't remember Pengo playing the popcorn song AT ALL.  I only knew about that once MAME had come out.  The versions I played all had the alternate song.  Including the 5200/Atari 8-bit version.

I hate it that I missed out on getting and playing that new widescreen multiplayer version of Pengo.  I'm not sure why I didn't import it.  Probably didn't have the funds at the time.  Importing games has gotten pricey.

So you mentioned the Game Gear Pengo game, but did you know about the Mega Drive version?  It only stayed in Japan, but I read somewhere it was also on the SEGA Channel like Mega Man: The Wily Wars.  It plays more like Bomberman than Pengo, though.  Here's a video:

Also, have you ever heard of the Japan only Dreamcast game Segagaga?  In the game, you ran a video game company through mini-games.  Had a lot of SEGA references.  The warehouse block pushing game clearly has Pengo references.  Take a look:

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