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History of video game consoles (first generation)
Encyclopedia
The first generation of video game consoles lasted from 1972, with the release of the Magnavox Odyssey
, until 1977, when "pong"-style console manufacturers left the market en masse due to the introduction and success of microprocessor-based consoles.
engineer Ralph Baer conceived the idea of an interactive television while building a television set from scratch for Loral
in 1951 in the Bronx, New York
. He explored these ideas further in 1966 when he was the Chief Engineer and manager of the Equipment Design Division at Sanders Associates
. Baer created a simple two-player video game that could be displayed on a standard television
set called Chase, where two dots chased each other around the screen. After a demonstration to the company's director of R&D Herbert Campman, some funding was allotted and the project was made "official". In 1967 Bill Harrison
was brought on board, and a light gun
was constructed from a toy rifle that was aimed at a target moved by another player.
Bill Rusch joined the project to speed up development and soon a third machine-controlled dot was used to create a ping-pong
game. With more funding additional games were created, and Baer had the idea of selling the product to cable TV
companies, who could transmit static images as game backgrounds. A prototype was demonstrated in February 1968 to TelePrompTer
Vice President Hubert Schlafly
, who signed an agreement with Sanders. The Cable TV industry was in a slump during the late '60s and early '70s and a lack of funding meant other avenues had to be pursued. Development continued on the hardware and games resulting in the final "Brown Box" prototype, which had two controllers, a light gun and sixteen switches on the console that selected the game to be played. Baer approached various U.S. Television manufacturers and an agreement was eventually signed with Magnavox
in late 1969. Magnavox's main alterations to the Brown Box were to use plug-in circuits to change the games, and to remove the color graphics capabilities in favor of color overlays in order to reduce manufacturing costs. It was released in May 1972 as the Magnavox Odyssey
.
digital design component using discrete transistors and diodes. Likewise, Ralph Baer himself considers the system digital.
It was not a large success due to restrictive marketing, although other companies with similar products (including Atari) had to pay a licensing fee for some time. For a time it was Sanders' most profitable line, even though many in the company had been unsupportive of game development.
Many of the earliest games utilising digital electronics ran on university
mainframe computer
s in the United States
, developed by individual users who programmed them in their spare time.
In 1961, a group of students at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology
programmed a game called Spacewar! on a DEC
PDP-1
.
In 1970 Nolan Bushnell
saw Spacewar! for the first time at the University of Utah
. Deciding there was commercial potential in an arcade
version, he hand-wired a custom computer capable of playing it on a black and white television
. The resulting game, Computer Space
, did not fare well commercially and Bushnell started looking for new ideas. In 1971 he saw a demonstration of the Magnavox Odyssey
, and hired Al Alcorn
to produce an arcade version of the Odyssey's ping-pong game (using Transistor-transistor logic
), called Pong
.
Home video games achieved widespread popularity with the release of a home version of Pong in the Christmas of 1975. Its success sparked hundreds of clones, including the Coleco Telstar
, which went on to be a success in its own right, with over a dozen models.
The first generation of video games did not feature a microprocessor
, and were based on custom codeless state machine computers
consisting of discrete logic
circuits comprising each element of the game itself. Later consoles of this generation moved the bulk of the circuitry to custom "pong on a chip" IC's such as Atari's custom Pong chips and General Instruments' AY-3-8500
series.
(1) Colors could be obtained adding the AY-3-8515 chip
(2) Colors could be obtained adding the AY-3-8615 chip
(3) PAL version code is 7601
(4) Advanced chip compared to classic Pong-in-a-chip: incude a microcontroller and a little RAM
.
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....
, until 1977, when "pong"-style console manufacturers left the market en masse due to the introduction and success of microprocessor-based consoles.
Interactive television
TelevisionTelevision
Television is a telecommunication medium for transmitting and receiving moving images that can be monochrome or colored, with accompanying sound...
engineer Ralph Baer conceived the idea of an interactive television while building a television set from scratch for Loral
Loral Corporation
Loral Corporation was a defense contractor founded in 1948 in New York by William Lorenz and Leon Alpert as Loral Electronics Corporation. The company's name was taken from the first letters of each founder's surname....
in 1951 in the Bronx, New York
New York City
New York is the most populous city in the United States and the center of the New York Metropolitan Area, one of the most populous metropolitan areas in the world. New York exerts a significant impact upon global commerce, finance, media, art, fashion, research, technology, education, and...
. He explored these ideas further in 1966 when he was the Chief Engineer and manager of the Equipment Design Division at Sanders Associates
Sanders Associates
Sanders Associates was a defense contractor in Nashua, New Hampshire, USA, from 1951 until it was sold in 1986. It is now part of BAE Systems Electronics & Integrated Solutions, a subsidiary of BAE Systems. It concentrated on developing and manufacturing electronic systems, notably aircraft...
. Baer created a simple two-player video game that could be displayed on a standard television
Television
Television is a telecommunication medium for transmitting and receiving moving images that can be monochrome or colored, with accompanying sound...
set called Chase, where two dots chased each other around the screen. After a demonstration to the company's director of R&D Herbert Campman, some funding was allotted and the project was made "official". In 1967 Bill Harrison
William Harrison
William Harrison may refer to:* William Harrison , author of "Roller Ball Murder" and the screenplay for Rollerball* William Harrison , saddlemaker, historian and reeve of Richmond Hill, Ontario...
was brought on board, and a light gun
Light gun
A light gun is a pointing device for computers and a control device for arcade and video games.Modern screen-based light guns work by building a sensor into the gun itself, and the on-screen target emit light rather than the gun...
was constructed from a toy rifle that was aimed at a target moved by another player.
Bill Rusch joined the project to speed up development and soon a third machine-controlled dot was used to create a ping-pong
Table tennis
Table tennis, also known as ping-pong, is a sport in which two or four players hit a lightweight, hollow ball back and forth using table tennis rackets. The game takes place on a hard table divided by a net...
game. With more funding additional games were created, and Baer had the idea of selling the product to cable TV
Cable television
Cable television is a system of providing television programs to consumers via radio frequency signals transmitted to televisions through coaxial cables or digital light pulses through fixed optical fibers located on the subscriber's property, much like the over-the-air method used in traditional...
companies, who could transmit static images as game backgrounds. A prototype was demonstrated in February 1968 to TelePrompTer
Teleprompter
An autocue is a display device that prompts the person speaking with an electronic visual text of a speech or script. Using a teleprompter is similar to the practice of using cue cards...
Vice President Hubert Schlafly
Hubert Schlafly
Hubert Joseph "Hub" Schlafly Jr. was an American electrical engineer who co-invented the teleprompter. Schlafly is also credited with spearheading the movement towards satellite television within the industry....
, who signed an agreement with Sanders. The Cable TV industry was in a slump during the late '60s and early '70s and a lack of funding meant other avenues had to be pursued. Development continued on the hardware and games resulting in the final "Brown Box" prototype, which had two controllers, a light gun and sixteen switches on the console that selected the game to be played. Baer approached various U.S. Television manufacturers and an agreement was eventually signed with Magnavox
Magnavox
Magnavox is a US electronics company founded by Edwin Pridham and Peter L. Jensen, who invented the moving-coil loudspeaker in 1915 at their lab in Napa, California. They formed Magnavox in 1917 in order to market their inventions....
in late 1969. Magnavox's main alterations to the Brown Box were to use plug-in circuits to change the games, and to remove the color graphics capabilities in favor of color overlays in order to reduce manufacturing costs. It was released in May 1972 as 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....
.
Digital electronics
The Odyssey was built using a combination of analog (for the output, game control) and digital circuitry. Many collectors confuse the use of discrete components to mean the system is analog. However, the games and logic itself are implemented in DTL, a common pre-TTLTransistor-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...
digital design component using discrete transistors and diodes. Likewise, Ralph Baer himself considers the system digital.
It was not a large success due to restrictive marketing, although other companies with similar products (including Atari) had to pay a licensing fee for some time. For a time it was Sanders' most profitable line, even though many in the company had been unsupportive of game development.
University
A university is an institution of higher education and research, which grants academic degrees in a variety of subjects. A university is an organisation that provides both undergraduate education and postgraduate education...
mainframe computer
Mainframe computer
Mainframes are powerful computers used primarily by corporate and governmental organizations for critical applications, bulk data processing such as census, industry and consumer statistics, enterprise resource planning, and financial transaction processing.The term originally referred to the...
s in the United States
United States
The United States of America is a federal constitutional republic comprising fifty states and a federal district...
, developed by individual users who programmed them in their spare time.
In 1961, a group of students at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology
Massachusetts Institute of Technology
The Massachusetts Institute of Technology is a private research university located in Cambridge, Massachusetts. MIT has five schools and one college, containing a total of 32 academic departments, with a strong emphasis on scientific and technological education and research.Founded in 1861 in...
programmed a game called Spacewar! on a DEC
Digital Equipment Corporation
Digital Equipment Corporation was a major American company in the computer industry and a leading vendor of computer systems, software and peripherals from the 1960s to the 1990s...
PDP-1
PDP-1
The PDP-1 was the first computer in Digital Equipment Corporation's PDP series and was first produced in 1960. It is famous for being the computer most important in the creation of hacker culture at MIT, BBN and elsewhere...
.
In 1970 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...
saw Spacewar! for the first time at the University of Utah
University of Utah
The University of Utah, also known as the U or the U of U, is a public, coeducational research university in Salt Lake City, Utah, United States. The university was established in 1850 as the University of Deseret by the General Assembly of the provisional State of Deseret, making it Utah's oldest...
. Deciding there was commercial potential in an arcade
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...
version, he hand-wired a custom computer capable of playing it on a black and white television
Television
Television is a telecommunication medium for transmitting and receiving moving images that can be monochrome or colored, with accompanying sound...
. The resulting game, Computer Space
Computer Space
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...
, did not fare well commercially and Bushnell started looking for new ideas. In 1971 he saw a demonstration of 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....
, and hired 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...
to produce an arcade version of the Odyssey's ping-pong game (using Transistor-transistor logic
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...
), called 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...
.
Home video games achieved widespread popularity with the release of a home version of Pong in the Christmas of 1975. Its success sparked hundreds of clones, including the Coleco Telstar
Coleco Telstar
The Telstar is a series of video game consoles produced by Coleco from 1976 to 1978. Starting with Telstar Pong clone based on General Instrument's AY-3-8500 chip in 1976, there were 14 consoles released in the Telstar branded series.-Models:...
, which went on to be a success in its own right, with over a dozen models.
The first generation of video games did not feature a microprocessor
Microprocessor
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...
, and were based on custom codeless state machine computers
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...
consisting of discrete logic
Logic gate
A logic gate is an idealized or physical device implementing a Boolean function, that is, it performs a logical operation on one or more logic inputs and produces a single logic output. Depending on the context, the term may refer to an ideal logic gate, one that has for instance zero rise time and...
circuits comprising each element of the game itself. Later consoles of this generation moved the bulk of the circuitry to custom "pong on a chip" IC's such as Atari's custom Pong chips and General Instruments' AY-3-8500
AY-3-8500
The AY-3-8500 "Ball & Paddle" integrated circuit was the first in a series of ICs from General Instrument designed for the consumer video game market. These chips were designed to output video to an RF modulator which would then display the game on a domestic TV set. The AY-3-8500 contained six...
series.
Pong on a chip
The table lists only the most known consoles and relative used chip.| Chip code/name | Year | Manufacturer | Colors | Games | Consoles |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| AY-3-8500 AY-3-8500 The AY-3-8500 "Ball & Paddle" integrated circuit was the first in a series of ICs from General Instrument designed for the consumer video game market. These chips were designed to output video to an RF modulator which would then display the game on a domestic TV set. The AY-3-8500 contained six... |
1976 | General Instrument General Instrument General Instrument was an electronics manufacturer based in Horsham, PA specializing in semiconductors and cable television equipment. The company was active until 1997, when it split into which was later acquired by Vishay Intertechnology in 2001, CommScope and NextLevel Systems General... |
No (1) | Tennis, soccer, squash, practice, 2 rifle games | Telstar Coleco Telstar The Telstar is a series of video game consoles produced by Coleco from 1976 to 1978. Starting with Telstar Pong clone based on General Instrument's AY-3-8500 chip in 1976, there were 14 consoles released in the Telstar branded series.-Models:... (Telstar, Classic, Deluxe, Ranger, Alpha, Colormatic, Regent, Sportsman) Odyssey Magnavox Odyssey Series The Magnavox Odyssey was a general brand name of the company's complete line of home video game consoles released from 1972 through 1978. The line includes the original Magnavox Odyssey console, both Magnavox and Philips versions of the Odyssey series of dedicated video game consoles, and the... (300,2000,3000) Radio Shack TV Scoreboard Tv Scoreboard The TV Scoreboard is a Pong-like game console manufactured from 1976 through the early '80s and made by Tandy. Distribution was handled exclusively by Radio Shack. The machines were constructed in Hong Kong. The TV Scoreboard consisted of a left and right player, with dials or paddles on the... Unisonic Sportsman/Tournament Philips Tele-Spiel ES2203 and ES2204 Zanussi/Seleco Play-O-Tronic Videomaster (Strika, Strika 2,ColourScore 2, SuperScore) APF TV Fun APF TV Fun The APF TV Fun is a series of early Pong clone consoles manufactured by APF Electronics Inc. and built in Japan starting in 1976. The systems were among the first built on the General Instruments 'Pong on a chip', the AY-3-8500, that allowed many manufacturers to compete against the Atari home... (Model 401) BSS 01 |
| AY-3-8510 AY-3-8500 The AY-3-8500 "Ball & Paddle" integrated circuit was the first in a series of ICs from General Instrument designed for the consumer video game market. These chips were designed to output video to an RF modulator which would then display the game on a domestic TV set. The AY-3-8500 contained six... |
1978? | General Instrument General Instrument General Instrument was an electronics manufacturer based in Horsham, PA specializing in semiconductors and cable television equipment. The company was active until 1997, when it split into which was later acquired by Vishay Intertechnology in 2001, CommScope and NextLevel Systems General... |
Yes | Tennis, hockey, squash, jai alai Jai alai Jai alai is a sport involving a ball bounced off a walled space. It is a variety of Basque Pelota. The term, coined by Serafin Baroja in 1875, is also often loosely applied to the fronton where the sport is played... |
Telstar Colortron Coleco Telstar The Telstar is a series of video game consoles produced by Coleco from 1976 to 1978. Starting with Telstar Pong clone based on General Instrument's AY-3-8500 chip in 1976, there were 14 consoles released in the Telstar branded series.-Models:... |
| AY-3-8512 AY-3-8500 The AY-3-8500 "Ball & Paddle" integrated circuit was the first in a series of ICs from General Instrument designed for the consumer video game market. These chips were designed to output video to an RF modulator which would then display the game on a domestic TV set. The AY-3-8500 contained six... |
1978? | General Instrument General Instrument General Instrument was an electronics manufacturer based in Horsham, PA specializing in semiconductors and cable television equipment. The company was active until 1997, when it split into which was later acquired by Vishay Intertechnology in 2001, CommScope and NextLevel Systems General... |
Yes | Tennis, hockey, squash, jai alai Jai alai Jai alai is a sport involving a ball bounced off a walled space. It is a variety of Basque Pelota. The term, coined by Serafin Baroja in 1875, is also often loosely applied to the fronton where the sport is played... , skeet, target |
Telstar Marksman Coleco Telstar The Telstar is a series of video game consoles produced by Coleco from 1976 to 1978. Starting with Telstar Pong clone based on General Instrument's AY-3-8500 chip in 1976, there were 14 consoles released in the Telstar branded series.-Models:... |
| AY-3-8600 | 1977 | General Instrument General Instrument General Instrument was an electronics manufacturer based in Horsham, PA specializing in semiconductors and cable television equipment. The company was active until 1997, when it split into which was later acquired by Vishay Intertechnology in 2001, CommScope and NextLevel Systems General... |
No(2) | 8 games with balls and paddles | Telstar Galaxy Coleco Telstar The Telstar is a series of video game consoles produced by Coleco from 1976 to 1978. Starting with Telstar Pong clone based on General Instrument's AY-3-8500 chip in 1976, there were 14 consoles released in the Telstar branded series.-Models:... Odyssey 4000 Magnavox Odyssey Series The Magnavox Odyssey was a general brand name of the company's complete line of home video game consoles released from 1972 through 1978. The line includes the original Magnavox Odyssey console, both Magnavox and Philips versions of the Odyssey series of dedicated video game consoles, and the... Philips Tele-Spiel ES2218 |
| AY-3-8610 | 1977 | General Instrument General Instrument General Instrument was an electronics manufacturer based in Horsham, PA specializing in semiconductors and cable television equipment. The company was active until 1997, when it split into which was later acquired by Vishay Intertechnology in 2001, CommScope and NextLevel Systems General... |
No(2) | 8 games with balls and paddles + 2 rifle games | Videomaster Sportsworld Philco/Ford Telejogo II |
| AY-3-8550 | 1976? | General Instrument General Instrument General Instrument was an electronics manufacturer based in Horsham, PA specializing in semiconductors and cable television equipment. The company was active until 1997, when it split into which was later acquired by Vishay Intertechnology in 2001, CommScope and NextLevel Systems General... |
No(1) | The same of 8500 but with the addition of horizontal movement of player | Philips Tele-Spiel ES2208 |
| AY-3-8700 | 1978? | General Instrument General Instrument General Instrument was an electronics manufacturer based in Horsham, PA specializing in semiconductors and cable television equipment. The company was active until 1997, when it split into which was later acquired by Vishay Intertechnology in 2001, CommScope and NextLevel Systems General... |
4 games with tanks | Telstar Combat! |
|
| MPS-7600-001,002,003,004 (3)(4) | 1977 | MOS Technology MOS Technology MOS Technology, Inc., also known as CSG , was a semiconductor design and fabrication company based in Norristown, Pennsylvania, in the United States. It is most famous for its 6502 microprocessor, and various designs for Commodore International's range of home computers.-History:MOS Technology, Inc... |
The four versions of chip usually support 4 games. | Telstar Gemini(only version 004). Telstar Arcade(all 4 versions). Commodore TV Game 2000K/3000H (only version 001). |
|
| MM-57100/MM-57105(PAL) | 1976 | National Semiconductor National Semiconductor National Semiconductor was an American semiconductor manufacturer, that specialized in analog devices and subsystems,formerly headquartered in Santa Clara, California, USA. The products of National Semiconductor included power management circuits, display drivers, audio and operational amplifiers,... |
Yes | Tennis, Hockey, Squash | National Adversary Philips Odyssey 2001 Magnavox Odyssey Series The Magnavox Odyssey was a general brand name of the company's complete line of home video game consoles released from 1972 through 1978. The line includes the original Magnavox Odyssey console, both Magnavox and Philips versions of the Odyssey series of dedicated video game consoles, and the... Videomaster (ColourScore, VisionScore, ColourShot) Philco/Ford Telejogo |
| MM-57106/MM-57186(PAL) | 1977 | National Semiconductor National Semiconductor National Semiconductor was an American semiconductor manufacturer, that specialized in analog devices and subsystems,formerly headquartered in Santa Clara, California, USA. The products of National Semiconductor included power management circuits, display drivers, audio and operational amplifiers,... |
Yes | Tennis, Hockey, Squash, Breakout, Flipper e Football. | Philips N30 Philips Odyssey 2100 Magnavox Odyssey Series The Magnavox Odyssey was a general brand name of the company's complete line of home video game consoles released from 1972 through 1978. The line includes the original Magnavox Odyssey console, both Magnavox and Philips versions of the Odyssey series of dedicated video game consoles, and the... |
| F4301 | 1976 | Universal Research Labs | N/A | Two games with balls and paddles and two games of car racing | Indy 500 system (Video Action 4) Sears/Atari Speedway e Speedway IV Interton Video 2800 MBO Tele-Ball VIII |
| SN76410N | 197? | Texas Instruments Texas Instruments Texas Instruments Inc. , widely known as TI, is an American company based in Dallas, Texas, United States, which develops and commercializes semiconductor and computer technology... |
N/A | Six games of balls and paddles | Tele-Match 3300R Ricochet Super Pro (modello MT-4A) Venture Electronics Video Sports VS-5 |
| 3659-1C/C2566 | 1975 | 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... |
No | Pong | Atari 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... |
| 3659-3 | 1975 | 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... |
No | Pong | Atari PONG Doubles Sears PONG IV |
| C010073-3 | 1976 | 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... |
No | 4 Pong games | Atari/Sears Super PONG |
| C010073-01/C2607 | 1976 | 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... |
N/A | 10 Pong games | Atari Super PONG Ten |
| C010765 | 1977 | 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... |
N/A | 16 Pong games | Atari Ultra PONG Atari Ultra PONG Doubles |
| C011500-11/C011512-05 (4) | 1977 | 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... |
N/A | 7 games (example: Pinball, Basketball and Breakout) | Atari Video Pinball |
(1) Colors could be obtained adding the AY-3-8515 chip
(2) Colors could be obtained adding the AY-3-8615 chip
(3) PAL version code is 7601
(4) Advanced chip compared to classic Pong-in-a-chip: incude a microcontroller and a little RAM
Ram
-Animals:*Ram, an uncastrated male sheep*Ram cichlid, a species of freshwater fish endemic to Colombia and Venezuela-Military:*Battering ram*Ramming, a military tactic in which one vehicle runs into another...
.
Comparison
| Name | 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.... |
Magnavox Odyssey 200 | Atari/Sears Tele-Games 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... |
Coleco Telstar Coleco Telstar The Telstar is a series of video game consoles produced by Coleco from 1976 to 1978. Starting with Telstar Pong clone based on General Instrument's AY-3-8500 chip in 1976, there were 14 consoles released in the Telstar branded series.-Models:... |
Nintendo Color TV Game Color TV Game is a series of home dedicated consoles created by Nintendo. There were five different consoles in the series, all developed and released in Japan.-History:... |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Console |  |
 |
 |
 |
|
| Launch price | US$100 | US$100–230 | US$98.95 | US$50 | ¥8,300 - ¥48,000 (Roughly $101 – $594.8 USD Today) |
| Release date | |||||
| Media | Cartridge | n/a | Inbuilt Chip | Cartridge (Telstar Arcade) | n/a |
| Accessories (retail) | Light gun | n/a | n/a | Controller styles | n/a |
See also
- Home computerHome computerHome computers were a class of microcomputers entering the market in 1977, and becoming increasingly common during the 1980s. They were marketed to consumers as affordable and accessible computers that, for the first time, were intended for the use of a single nontechnical user...
- History of computing hardware (1960s–present)
- First video gameFirst video gameThere are numerous debates over who created the first video game, with the answer depending largely on how video games are defined. The evolution of video games represents a tangled web of several different industries, including scientific, computer, arcade, and consumer electronics.The "video" in...
Further reading
- How Video Games Invaded the Home TV Set by Ralph Baer by Michael Miller