Computer Space
Encyclopedia
Computer Space is a video arcade game
released in November 1971 by Nutting Associates
. Created by Nolan Bushnell
and Ted Dabney
, who would both later found Atari, Inc., it is generally accepted that it was the world's first commercially sold coin-operated video game — and indeed, the first commercially sold video game of any kind, predating the Magnavox Odyssey
's release by six months, and Atari
's Pong
by one year. Though not commercially sold, the coin operated minicomputer
-driven Galaxy Game
preceded it by two months, located solely at Stanford University
.
were centered on the minicomputer
paradigm of the college campuses where it originated - that of a central computer distributing software to various remote terminals. Computer Space was innovative for establishing the basic form of all arcade games to come - that of a dedicated computing device built to play only that one game.
Computer Space was the first widely available video and arcade game, although it was not a success. For many, the gameplay
was too complicated to grasp quickly. While it fared well on college campuses, it was not very popular in bars
and other venues. Bushnell later recruited Al Alcorn
and created a sensation with the much easier to grasp Pong
arcade game modeled on Ralph Baer's Magnavox Odyssey
home system's Tennis game.
Fiberglass cabinets
were produced for single player games in the colors blue metalflake, red metalflake, white, and yellow. The two player cabinet was only available in a slightly different green metalflake fiberglass cabinet with a wider control panel.
The player controls a rocket ship
using a thruster and a pair of rotational buttons. During game play, the player must evade enemy fire from a pair of flying saucer
s moving in tandem. The player fires back to destroy the flying saucers by firing missiles at them from the rocket ship. Today, the game would be considered a multi-directional shooter.
If the player's score is higher than that of the saucers at the end of 90 seconds, the player will get another 90 seconds of play, and the colors of the screen would switch to "Hyperspace" (it would switch like a photo negative, from black to white and white to black). If at the end of this 90 seconds the player's score is still higher than that of the saucers, the player received another 90 seconds and the colors will revert to normal. This sequence is repeated indefinitely.
, RAM or ROM
. The entire computer system is a state machine
made of 74-series
TTL
chips
. Graphic elements are held in diode
arrays. Physical configuration is made up of 3 PCBs interconnected through a common bus. Display is rendered on a General Electric
15" black-and-white portable television
vacuum tube
set specially modified for Computer Space.
. In the GSN documentary Video Game Invasion: The History of a Global Obsession, Bushnell explained, "Sure, I loved it, and all my friends loved it, but all my friends were engineer
s. It was a little too complicated for the guy with the beer in the bar
."
". The game bore almost no resemblance to the TV Show itself
, and the cabinet graphics of the U.S.S. Enterprise
were only generally similar to the official design by Matt Jeffries.
, and was featured in a story they did about the formation of Atari.
Computer Space was shown in the 1973 film Soylent Green
, and the 1975 film Jaws
.
Arcade game
An arcade game is a coin-operated entertainment machine, usually installed in public businesses such as restaurants, bars, and amusement arcades. Most arcade games are video games, pinball machines, electro-mechanical games, redemption games, and merchandisers...
released in November 1971 by Nutting Associates
Nutting Associates
Nutting Associates was an early arcade game manufacturer from Mountain View, California, formed in 1968 by Bill Nutting. They introduced a number of mechanical coin-operated games, starting with a quiz game known as Computer Quiz, and moving on to more common fare like shooting games.In August...
. Created by Nolan Bushnell
Nolan Bushnell
Nolan K. Bushnell is an American engineer and entrepreneur who founded both Atari, Inc and the Chuck E. Cheese's Pizza-Time Theaters chain...
and Ted Dabney
Ted Dabney
Ted Dabney is the often uncredited co-founder of Syzygy and Atari. While working at Ampex Ted met Nolan Bushnell and the two jointly created Syzygy with their first product being Computer Space which was manufactured and sold by Nutting Associates...
, who would both later found Atari, Inc., it is generally accepted that it was the world's first commercially sold coin-operated video game — and indeed, the first commercially sold video game of any kind, predating the Magnavox Odyssey
Magnavox Odyssey
The Magnavox Odyssey is the world's first home video game console. It was first demonstrated on May 24, 1972 and released in August of that year, predating the Atari Pong home consoles by three years....
's release by six months, and Atari
Atari
Atari is a corporate and brand name owned by several entities since its inception in 1972. It is currently owned by Atari Interactive, a wholly owned subsidiary of the French publisher Atari, SA . The original Atari, Inc. was founded in 1972 by Nolan Bushnell and Ted Dabney. It was a pioneer in...
's Pong
Pong
Pong is one of the earliest arcade video games, and is a tennis sports game featuring simple two-dimensional graphics. While other arcade video games such as Computer Space came before it, Pong was one of the first video games to reach mainstream popularity...
by one year. Though not commercially sold, the coin operated minicomputer
Minicomputer
A minicomputer is a class of multi-user computers that lies in the middle range of the computing spectrum, in between the largest multi-user systems and the smallest single-user systems...
-driven Galaxy Game
Galaxy Game
Galaxy Game is the earliest known coin-operated computer or video game. It was installed at the Tresidder Union at Stanford University in September, 1971, two months before the release of Computer Space, the first mass-produced video game...
preceded it by two months, located solely at Stanford University
Stanford University
The Leland Stanford Junior University, commonly referred to as Stanford University or Stanford, is a private research university on an campus located near Palo Alto, California. It is situated in the northwestern Santa Clara Valley on the San Francisco Peninsula, approximately northwest of San...
.
History
Previous efforts in bringing the experience of Spacewar! to a mass marketMass marketing
Mass marketing is a market coverage strategy in which a firm decides to ignore market segment differences and go after the whole market with one offer. It is type of marketing of a product to a wide audience. The idea is to broadcast a message that will reach the largest number of people possible...
were centered on the minicomputer
Minicomputer
A minicomputer is a class of multi-user computers that lies in the middle range of the computing spectrum, in between the largest multi-user systems and the smallest single-user systems...
paradigm of the college campuses where it originated - that of a central computer distributing software to various remote terminals. Computer Space was innovative for establishing the basic form of all arcade games to come - that of a dedicated computing device built to play only that one game.
Computer Space was the first widely available video and arcade game, although it was not a success. For many, the gameplay
Gameplay
Gameplay is the specific way in which players interact with a game, and in particular with video games. Gameplay is the pattern defined through the game rules, connection between player and the game, challenges and overcoming them, plot and player's connection with it...
was too complicated to grasp quickly. While it fared well on college campuses, it was not very popular in bars
Bar (establishment)
A bar is a business establishment that serves alcoholic drinks — beer, wine, liquor, and cocktails — for consumption on the premises.Bars provide stools or chairs that are placed at tables or counters for their patrons. Some bars have entertainment on a stage, such as a live band, comedians, go-go...
and other venues. Bushnell later recruited Al Alcorn
Al Alcorn
Allan Alcorn is an American pioneering engineer and computer scientist. He grew up in San Francisco, California, and attended the University of California, Berkeley, graduating with a Bachelor of Science degree in Electrical Engineering and Computer Sciences in 1971.- Atari and Pong :He worked for...
and created a sensation with the much easier to grasp Pong
Pong
Pong is one of the earliest arcade video games, and is a tennis sports game featuring simple two-dimensional graphics. While other arcade video games such as Computer Space came before it, Pong was one of the first video games to reach mainstream popularity...
arcade game modeled on Ralph Baer's Magnavox Odyssey
Magnavox Odyssey
The Magnavox Odyssey is the world's first home video game console. It was first demonstrated on May 24, 1972 and released in August of that year, predating the Atari Pong home consoles by three years....
home system's Tennis game.
Fiberglass cabinets
Arcade cabinet
A video game arcade cabinet, also known as a video arcade machine or video coin-op, is the housing within which a video arcade game's hardware resides. Most cabinets designed since the mid-1980s conform to the JAMMA wiring standard...
were produced for single player games in the colors blue metalflake, red metalflake, white, and yellow. The two player cabinet was only available in a slightly different green metalflake fiberglass cabinet with a wider control panel.
Gameplay
Spacecraft
A spacecraft or spaceship is a craft or machine designed for spaceflight. Spacecraft are used for a variety of purposes, including communications, earth observation, meteorology, navigation, planetary exploration and transportation of humans and cargo....
using a thruster and a pair of rotational buttons. During game play, the player must evade enemy fire from a pair of flying saucer
Unidentified flying object
A term originally coined by the military, an unidentified flying object is an unusual apparent anomaly in the sky that is not readily identifiable to the observer as any known object...
s moving in tandem. The player fires back to destroy the flying saucers by firing missiles at them from the rocket ship. Today, the game would be considered a multi-directional shooter.
If the player's score is higher than that of the saucers at the end of 90 seconds, the player will get another 90 seconds of play, and the colors of the screen would switch to "Hyperspace" (it would switch like a photo negative, from black to white and white to black). If at the end of this 90 seconds the player's score is still higher than that of the saucers, the player received another 90 seconds and the colors will revert to normal. This sequence is repeated indefinitely.
Scoring
Score is kept as a single digit ranging from zero to nine; for scores ten to fifteen odd looking characters would be displayed; once a score of fifteen is reached, the next hit will return the score to 0.Technical
Computer Space uses no microprocessorMicroprocessor
A microprocessor incorporates the functions of a computer's central processing unit on a single integrated circuit, or at most a few integrated circuits. It is a multipurpose, programmable device that accepts digital data as input, processes it according to instructions stored in its memory, and...
, RAM or ROM
Read-only memory
Read-only memory is a class of storage medium used in computers and other electronic devices. Data stored in ROM cannot be modified, or can be modified only slowly or with difficulty, so it is mainly used to distribute firmware .In its strictest sense, ROM refers only...
. The entire computer system is a state machine
Finite state machine
A finite-state machine or finite-state automaton , or simply a state machine, is a mathematical model used to design computer programs and digital logic circuits. It is conceived as an abstract machine that can be in one of a finite number of states...
made of 74-series
7400 series
The 7400 series of transistor-transistor logic integrated circuits are historically important as the first widespread family of TTL integrated circuit logic. It was used to build the mini and mainframe computers of the 1960s and 1970s...
TTL
Transistor-transistor logic
Transistor–transistor logic is a class of digital circuits built from bipolar junction transistors and resistors. It is called transistor–transistor logic because both the logic gating function and the amplifying function are performed by transistors .TTL is notable for being a widespread...
chips
Integrated circuit
An integrated circuit or monolithic integrated circuit is an electronic circuit manufactured by the patterned diffusion of trace elements into the surface of a thin substrate of semiconductor material...
. Graphic elements are held in diode
Diode
In electronics, a diode is a type of two-terminal electronic component with a nonlinear current–voltage characteristic. A semiconductor diode, the most common type today, is a crystalline piece of semiconductor material connected to two electrical terminals...
arrays. Physical configuration is made up of 3 PCBs interconnected through a common bus. Display is rendered on a General Electric
General Electric
General Electric Company , or GE, is an American multinational conglomerate corporation incorporated in Schenectady, New York and headquartered in Fairfield, Connecticut, United States...
15" black-and-white portable television
Television
Television is a telecommunication medium for transmitting and receiving moving images that can be monochrome or colored, with accompanying sound...
vacuum tube
Vacuum tube
In electronics, a vacuum tube, electron tube , or thermionic valve , reduced to simply "tube" or "valve" in everyday parlance, is a device that relies on the flow of electric current through a vacuum...
set specially modified for Computer Space.
Reception
Computer Space was considered a failure by Nolan Bushnell, due to its learning curveLearning curve
A learning curve is a graphical representation of the changing rate of learning for a given activity or tool. Typically, the increase in retention of information is sharpest after the initial attempts, and then gradually evens out, meaning that less and less new information is retained after each...
. In the GSN documentary Video Game Invasion: The History of a Global Obsession, Bushnell explained, "Sure, I loved it, and all my friends loved it, but all my friends were engineer
Engineer
An engineer is a professional practitioner of engineering, concerned with applying scientific knowledge, mathematics and ingenuity to develop solutions for technical problems. Engineers design materials, structures, machines and systems while considering the limitations imposed by practicality,...
s. It was a little too complicated for the guy with the beer in the bar
Average Joe
Average Joe is an American reality television show broadcast on the NBC beginning in 2003. There were a total of four seasons, the first two following the original show premise, and the last two bringing back contestants from prior seasons.-Show Premise:...
."
Clones
Computer Space was cloned/bootlegged in 1972 by a game company called For-Play as "Star TrekStar Trek
Star Trek is an American science fiction entertainment franchise created by Gene Roddenberry. The core of Star Trek is its six television series: The Original Series, The Animated Series, The Next Generation, Deep Space Nine, Voyager, and Enterprise...
". The game bore almost no resemblance to the TV Show itself
Star Trek: The Original Series
Star Trek is an American science fiction television series created by Gene Roddenberry, produced by Desilu Productions . Star Trek was telecast on NBC from September 8, 1966, through June 3, 1969...
, and the cabinet graphics of the U.S.S. Enterprise
USS Enterprise (NCC-1701)
The USS Enterprise, NCC-1701, is a fictional starship in the Star Trek media franchise. The original Star Trek series depicts her crew's mission "to explore strange new worlds; to seek out new life and new civilizations; to boldly go where no man has gone before" under the command of Captain James...
were only generally similar to the official design by Matt Jeffries.
Computer Space in popular culture
A blue Computer Space arcade unit was seen in the original set for the television program The Electric PlaygroundThe Electric Playground
The Electric Playground is a daily news television show on the cable TV network G4 that covers movies, TV shows, comic books, collectibles and gadgets...
, and was featured in a story they did about the formation of Atari.
Computer Space was shown in the 1973 film Soylent Green
Soylent Green
Soylent Green is a 1973 American science fiction film directed by Richard Fleischer. Starring Charlton Heston, the film overlays the police procedural and science fiction genres as it depicts the investigation into the murder of a wealthy businessman in a dystopian future suffering from pollution,...
, and the 1975 film Jaws
Jaws (film)
Jaws is a 1975 American horror-thriller film directed by Steven Spielberg and based on Peter Benchley's novel of the same name. In the story, the police chief of Amity Island, a fictional summer resort town, tries to protect beachgoers from a giant man-eating great white shark by closing the beach,...
.
External links
- Computerspacefan.com - large archive of Computer Space info, including historical and technical information.
- Computer Space Info
- Videotopia exhibit
- The Dot Eaters article on the development of Computer Space.
- Interview with co-designer Ted Dabney on the RetroGaming Roundup Show