Video Game History

---

Back to Golden Era Index

P o n g


Pong - The First Mass Produced Game


Pong Picture

Video games first big debut came about with the invention of [Pong]
in 1974. Nolan Bushnell, later the President of Atari, signed the 
visitors’ guest book and attended that product line demonstration.
There he played an Odyssey unit hands-on, including, of course,
its Ping-Pong game. 

Shortly after that demo, Nolan Bushnell hired a young engineer, Alan
Alcorn from Ampex, where Bushnell had worked some years earlier.
He put Alan to work on a coin-operated arcade Ping-Pong game, which
he named "PONG.” 

When you trace the history of home computing back to its roots, you
arrive at a surprising place. You arrive at Pong. Introduced in 1972
by Atari, this primitive electronic version of table tennis was in many
ways the progenitor of the PC. After all, it was while designing new 
versions of Pong at Atari that Steve Jobs and Steve Wozniak honed their
skills that would result in the Apple II. More importantly, Pong was the 
first time people saw computers as friendly and approachable. It launched
a video game boom that made thousands of kids want to become computer 
programmers, and prepared an entire generation for interaction with a
blinking and buzzing computer screen. 

[Select Game]


P a c m a n

Males and Females Alike Loved Playing Pacman



click here for: [1979-2004] Coin-Op Video Game And Home Console Progression


[Pacman Pacman Memorabilia]


In the 1980's the Manufacturer Midway/Bally produced a new game called
pacman.  It was different than any other game out there.  Instead of 
shooting at things from a space ship, you were a cute animated character
who collected fruit and gobbled up the ghosts chasing you.

[Pac Man Picture]

The object was to stay away from the Ghosts while eating all the Dots in
the maze. after the distinctive theme music plays, players find themselves
guiding 'puckman' around a single maze eating dots, while avoiding the
four ghosts 'blinky', 'pinky', 'inky' and 'clyde' (each with varying levels
of hunting skills), who escape from a cage in the middle of the screen and
will end our little yellow friend's life if they touch him. in each corner 
of the square playfield is a large dot that when eaten will turn the ghosts
blue for a brief period, during which time the tables turn and 'puck' can
eat the ghosts, leaving only the apparently indigestible eyes which make
their way back to the cage for reincarnation into another ghost.

The game is deceptively simple, with only a four-position joystick needed
to guide 'pac-man' around the maze, but with each successive screen
the ghosts get faster and their time of blue-invulneribility less.


Pac-man is a big hit in Japan.   it's the first videogame to spawn a massive
merchandising bonanza, with t-shirts, jackets, sweaters, coffee cups,
stuffed dolls, bed sheets, cereal, board-games, books, towels...

MS PAC-MAN

The reason they made was to lure women into the arcade to play ms. Pac-man. 
her identity confirmed by the red bow and lipstick.  

The best players were able to group the ghosts which rendered them
harmless. This game was very addictive because everyone wanted to get the
high score. The best players had learned patterns which would put them in
the higher levels were the ghosts became invensible.


S p y     H u n t e r

Spy Hunter 1983 / [Peter Gunn Music]

[By Midway Company]
 
[Spy Hunter Graphic] 








In 1983 Spy Hunter was by far the best game produced at that time.
It was a driving simulation game in which you are basically James
Bond 007, with several different weapons in your vehicle to kill 
bad guys and it is  your job to stay alive while other vehiles: 
cars, boats, helicopters, Limozines and others are trying to make
you crash. 


The name James Bond never appeared in Bally Midways Spy Hunter, but 
the 007 influence was unmistakable in this 1983 arcade classic. Game
designer George Gomez was an avowed fan of the British secret agent 
with a license to kill, and Spy Hunter allowed him (and the rest of
the world) to live out a dangerous, Bond-esque mission over land and
sea.

Spy Hunter was actually a fusion of two popular genres: driving and
shooting. The secret agents car came equipped with grill-mounted
machine guns, the better to blow away the nasty vehicles that
cluttered the road. Switch Blades were the most common bad carsblack
sedans with tire-puncturing knives that extended out from their 
tires. These baddies could either be blown away or forced off the
road, but other cars wouldnt go down so easily. Road Lords were
impervious to your guns, and their bulky size made it difficult
to run them into the side of the road. As the game went on, players
also ran across The Enforcer, a black limo with a gun-toting passenger.

Not every vehicle on the road was evil, and that only made the spy
hunters life trickier. With its two-speed shifter, your car could
move extremely fast, and swerving to avoid innocent cars and
motorcycles often meant a quick skid out to your doom. Luckily,
the game didnt end with crashes, because most gamers caused several.
Spy Hunter was a timed game, with points and extra time awarded 
for distance covered as well as for enemies killed. If your vehicle
crashed, a supply truck simply dropped off another one, and the game 
picked up where you left off.

The trucks served more purposes than simply dumping off new cars,
however. At certain points along the road, your car passed parked 
big rigs with special icons on the trailers. By pressing the Weapons
Van button on the front of your steering yoke, those trucks pulled
up in front of you, allowing you to drive right up into the trailer.

Once docked, your car was outfitted with one of three special 
weapons: smoke screens, oil slicks or missiles. The first two took
care of enemy vehicles on your tail, while the latter was needed
to take out The Mad Bomber, a helicopter that dropped pothole-making
bombs later in the game. Separate buttons controlled each weapon,
allowing skilled players to deck out their vehicles with a complete 
arsenal.

Every once in a while, Spy Hunters vertically-scrolling road
branched off in two directions, giving players a greater freedom
of choice than many driving games of the time. At some junctures,
separate paths actually gave your spy hunter a new vehicle. By
driving into a boathouse at the side of the road, your secret
agent emerged in a shiny speedboat, taking to the waterways. The 
Mad Bomber was still in hot pursuit, and evil Barrel Dumpers and
Dr. Torpedo menaced your watercraft as well. At a certain point,
the ship ran back to the ground, and your speedy car resumed its 
spy hunting.

The driving/action combination was a winner for Spy Hunter, one
of the most popular games of 1983. With its James Bond attitude 
and catchy [PETER GUNN] (the Bond music was too pricey), 
the game caught fire in arcades everywhere.

Bally Midway released a sequel, the little-seen Spy Hunter II, in
1987. The new version allowed two secret agents to play at once,
driving in a mock 3-D perspective from above and behind the car.
The sequel was a disappointment for the company, but that did 
nothing to dim the popularity of the original Spy Hunter, which
maintains a large fan following even today. 
Release History 

1983 - Spy Hunter Designers

	   Original Design Team:

	   George Gomez Tom Leon was the programmer and co-designer
	   with George Gomez.  Bob Libby created the algorithmic
	   jazz riffs that segue between the [Peter Gunn] excerpts. 
	   Lots of folks contributed that great video art, including
	   Steve Ulstad, Sharon Barr, Brian Colin, and Kevin O'Conner.  
	   Doug Watson and Tony Ramunni did the art for the cabinet.  


George Gomez, Biography Link

G u i n n e s s    B o o k


Twin Galaxies Scoreboard Collected High Scores For Guinness Book

     Because so many people were playing games and were interested in beating
these games, the [Guinness Book] of World Records started publishing High
Scores. Unfortunately, the craze of video games wore out and the Guinness
Book of World Records discontinued publishing High Scores after 1987.

Some high scores were published before the phasing out of the Guinness Book
Video Game High Scores, and my Spy Hunter high score is the last ever published
in the [Guinness Book] of World Records for Spy Hunter. These web pages 
basically revisit that past craze and special time when people would get 
together in Video Game Arcades and share ideas about how to beat the latest
video game. 

     Now in 2004, classic video games are hard to find, and they are not
working in prime condition. in 1982, America had more than 20,000 arcades.
Now, probably less than 100 of those arcades are still in existence. The 
Computers in today's homes are much faster and have higher technology than 
what the Arcade has to offer, and so the Video Game Arcades of Yesterday 
have just about completely disappeared.



[Guinness Book History]

[My Biography] [Questions/Answers] [Masters Tournament Article]



[Golden Years Index]





[Coin-Op World Records]