Also known as display mode or show mode, attract mode is a pre-recorded demonstration of a video game that is displayed when the game is not being played.
[1] Originally built into
arcade games, the main purpose of the attract mode is to entice passers-by to play the game.
[1] It usually displays the game's
title screen, the game's story (if it has one), its
high score list, sweepstakes (on some games) and the message "
Game Over" or "Insert Coin" over or in addition to a computer-controlled demonstration of
gameplay. In
Atari home
video games of the 1970s and 1980s, the term
attract mode was sometimes used to denote a simple
screensaver that slowly cycled the display colors to prevent
phosphor burn-in while the game was not being played. Attract modes demonstrating gameplay are common in current home video games.
Attract mode is not only found in arcade games, but in most coin-operated games like
pinball machines,
stacker machines and lots of other games.
Cocktail arcade machines on which the screen flips its orientation for each player's turn in two-player games traditionally have the screen's orientation in player 1's favour for the attract mode.
.
