Retro Gaming Australia

With a CRT that big, the kid is probably being vapourised by radiation.

Pole Position was originally developed by Namco, but was brought home by Atari for the 2600 and 5200. There’s actually a cartoon spin-off with the same name that has very little to do with the game.

The Star Wars saga hits Blu Ray next week, good excuse for a theme week, no?

The Star Wars arcade game didn’t come out until some five years after the first film, but it was arguably worth the wait. The Atari 2600 port was an admirable effort, even though most of the visual and audio fidelity was lost in the transition.

Ask a stupid question…

Battlezone was a popular vector-based arcade game released by Atari in 1980. Atari brought the game to a variety of home console and computer game formats, but had to redesign the game with raster graphics in mind. This ad is for that particular version.

A little insight into what might have caused the 1983 crash in North America.

Q*Bert was a smash hit in the arcades, so it was only a matter of time before it headed to home consoles and computers. As you can see in the ad, it came to absolutely everything. Ad fails to mention that Q*Bert has a mouth like a sailor.

Search for Q*Bert on eBay

Everybody knows Breakout, the 1976 puzzler which took Pong, turned it on its side and put you up against a brick wall. It was even worked on, briefly, by Apple founders Steve Jobs and Steve Wozniak. However, did you know that Atari had a hell of a time trying to copyright it?

In 1989, Atari brought legal action against the Register of Copyrights Ralph Oman to challenge his refusal to grant them copyright over the game. Oman wrote in a letter that Breakout was not copyrightable due to the fact its “wall, ball, and paddle were ‘simple geometric shapes and coloring'” and that not enough “authorship” went into its production.

The case went back and forth, the district court granting a motion in the register’s favour, which was reversed on appeal. Then the process was repeated.

In the end, Atari got its way. Future Supreme Court judge Ruth Bader Ginsburg ruled that “the ball’s path in BREAKOUT varies depending on which of four sections of the paddle it hits. Its trajectory does not follow from the laws of physics.” This proved enough for the work to be considered “creative” and the case was remanded back to the register for renewed consideration.

Source: Patent Arcade