VIDEO GAME HISTORY 1976-83
| * THE VIDEO GAME EXPERIMENT CONTINUES * |
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The Coleco's first video game system, The Telstar, is created. It played only three games with three difficulty levels and sold over a million units. |
1976 |
Telstar |
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First video game Controversy |
1976 |
Death Race, an arcade game in which a player aims to run-over zombie- pedestrians in an automobile, causes the first videogame controversey. The violent manner of the game causes it to do quite poorly. In the end, only 500 arcade games are sold. |
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Atari introduces its first cartridge-based home video game console. They called it the Video Computer System, although later it becomes known as the Atari 2600. It retailed for $249.95. |
1977 |
Atari 2600 |
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Video games help train the US Defense Department |
1978 |
Atari is commissioned to work on a combat simulator, based on the first-person tank game Battlezone, for the US Department of Defense. |
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Mattel's Intellivision debuts finally giving the Atari 2600 a true rival. It has better graphics than Atari's 2600, but a higher retail price ($299). |
1980 |
Intellivision |  |
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Pac-Man |
1980 |
Namco along with Midway, bring the game Pac-Man to the US. This hugely pouplar game is the first to have an animated main character with its own name. 300,000 units of Pac-Man are released worldwide by Namco. |
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Arnie Katz and Bill Kunkel find the first video-game magazine, Electronic Games. Later renamed to Electronic Gaming Monthly, which is still one of the most popular video game magazines today. |
1981 |
First video game magazine |
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First laser-disc video game |
1983 |
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