Thanks to the kind generosity of H.R. Kauffman, founder of Exidy and later president of the holding company Xidy, Inc., the original ROM images for Circus have been made available for free, non-commercial use.
Before downloading, you must acknowledge that you understand these images are to be used only for non-commercial purposes. Do this by checking the box below the download button.
Circus was one of the first games produced by Exidy that used a CPU (6502) to control the game logic instead of hand-crafted hard-coded logic circuits. It ran on a black and white monitor with a color overlay that gave each row of balloons at the top of the screen a different color. It was designed and programmed by Edward Valeau and Howell Ivey of Exidy in 1977.
Circus came in an upright dedicated cabinet, and may have also been available in a cocktail configuration. Circus machines had white sides with red-painted side art of several balloons in flight. The front of the machine was decorated with a large, ornate monitor bezel that doubled as a marquee (or nameplate). This bezel showed several clowns in a circus scene and had the game title spelled out with multi-colored balloons. The control panel was unadorned, save for an analog spinner and a start button. The whole machine was finished off in black T-molding.
At least 13,000 units, possibly as many as 20,000, were produced.
| Circus Scoring | |
|---|---|
| Successful jump | 10 points |
| Popping Yellow Balloon | 20 points |
| Popping Green Balloon | 50 points |
| Popping Blue Balloon | 100 points |
| Bonus for Clearing Yellow Row | 200 points |
| Bonus for Clearing Green Row | 500 points |
| Bonus for Clearing Blue Row | 1,000 points plus free jump |
