In 1972, Magnavox launched the first home video game console for televisions. Due to the technical limitations of that time, all this set-top box could do was display three white squares and one vertical stripe on the TV screen. Of course, this set was not enough to create an exciting gameplay. In this regard, the first games for home consoles were rather board games, one of the elements of which was the interface created by this console. Scoring, text support, complex rules – all this was implemented using paper media with game rules, dice, overlays on the TV screen, the presence of a presenter in the games and with the help of the imagination of the players.
A total of 28 games were created for the console, released on 11 cartridges. Some cartridges were sold complete with a set-top box. If you believe the advertising of those years, six cartridges were supplied with the console. The remaining cartridges were purchased separately. Most of them had the ability to include several games at once. The games that the manufacturers relied on were, apparently, “Shooting Gallery” and “Table Tennis”, i.e.To. they were released on separate cartridges. The first was a shooting gallery with a light gun, and the second was a classic “pong” game.
Let’s look at the contents of the cartridges in more detail:
1.The first cartridge included the simplest and most understandable game at the moment – “Table Tennis”. This game, in addition, did not require any additional devices and its analogue can be played now by running the emulator of this console. There is hardly any need to explain the essence of the game, but still. The screen was divided into two parts. To the left and right there were two large white squares symbolizing tennis players. Players controlled these squares using two wheels on opposite sides of the gamepad. One was responsible for moving the square horizontally, the second was responsible for moving the square vertically. A small square – a “ball” – began to move across the screen. The players’ task was not to let the ball go out of bounds from their side. At the same time, the console did not even know how to keep score, and therefore the counting of missed goals had to be done manually. Moreover, the game did not set restrictions on the movements of players, the game calculated the trajectory of the ball and the out zone, but you could hit the ball both on your side of the field and on the opponent’s side of the field. It was also possible to set the speed of the ball using the controller, thereby complicating or simplifying the game.
However, this game was a hit and most game consoles released before the end of the 70s copied this game in one form or another.
2. The second cartridge was able to include 4 games with much more complex rules. "Fun Zoo", "Percepts", "Simon Says", "Ski".
Let’s look at each in more detail:
Fun Zoo 1972
Here is the first of the games that quite clearly illustrates the features of the game on Magnavox. In addition to the gameplay of the console itself, it also includes elements of a board game. The point was that one of the players named an animal that was in the zoo (all animals are depicted on the corresponding screen overlay for this game.
The game involves a leader and two players. The game included cards with animals and other…attractions of the zoo (hotdog, popcorn, etc.).n.). The presenter pulled out a card with an animal, and the player’s task was to move his white dot to the corresponding enclosure on the overlay without touching others. Moreover, due to the fact that the game did not have a software interface, only the presenter could count the loss or not count it. T.e. There was no expectation of objectivity from these games; by and large, the players entertained themselves. Based on the results of the game, cards with animals had to be distributed among the players and the winner was the one who had more of them.
The second game on this cartridge was "Percepts". This was actually entertainment from the category “Make up the rules and entertain yourself”. The overlay looked like a field consisting of 5×3 rectangles. The game came with two decks of green and purple cards. The players’ task was to lay out these cards face down. Then one of the players turned over one of the cards laid out and if it matched the color he had chosen, he had to grab the controller and aim at this card before the opponent. In general, this game worked exactly according to the rules that you yourself could come up with for this TV overlay.
The third game was "Simon Says". The basis was, of course, as in most games for this console, in timely pointing of the white square to the right place on the screen. By and large, it was a parody of the children’s game of the same name. The presenter took out cards on which the corresponding body parts of the boy and girl were marked, and the players had to quickly point white squares at the corresponding parts of the body. The player who did this more accurately and faster won, and the corresponding card migrated to his collection.
And finally, the fourth game on the cartridge was the game Ski. It was already some semblance of… racing. In general, if you can apply such loud terms to this game – Ski was a simulator of a mountain skier. The overlay on the screen was a ski slope, on which the boundaries of the route and obstacles were more dense. The player’s task was to guide his skier along the track as quickly and accurately as possible.
Now the third cartridge:
This cartridge included the largest number of games. In a sense, it was a collection of sports games. Football, American football, tennis, baseball and two logic games for two players.
The first of the games was Analogic. The theme was a space simulator. The overlay lined the screen with many squares with numbers. In this field, in the extreme corners are the player planets. Everyone’s task was to get to the opponent’s planet, and depending on the choice of planet, the player could move either only on even numbers or only on odd ones. And the field was a labyrinth. In this case, each time the player must sum up the opponent’s previous move with the cell in which he moves and the sum must correspond to the player’s choice (either only an even number or only an odd one). Quite difficult to describe, but quite acceptable for understanding if you have a playing field in front of the gases.
The next game available on this cartridge was Baseball. By and large, it was the same pong, only in this case one player threw a ball at the second, and the second’s task was to hit the ball. If it weren’t for the presence of specific rules and scoring cards, the game would not be interesting at all. However, to get her interested, you probably need to grow up in an American environment with a love for baseball and its rules.
Brain Wave was a turn-based strategy game. The game came with a playing field and dice. The task was to build your own train of thought (it was built using squares in which there were straight lines, turns, etc.n.). Essentially, on the playing field, the players built a kind of water supply system to the other end of the field, which could be cut off by the opponent. And on the television overlay the “thought” itself moved.
Football, which was unexpectedly a turn-based game. A field was superimposed on the screen, the task of each player was to get to the end of the field. Depending on which player was currently in possession of the ball, one of the players chose the style of play (defense, attack, etc.).n.) the second had to guess the chosen style. If the second player guessed the style, the first one rolled back across the field; if not, he moved forward. Like all other games, it was essentially a board game, with cards, dice, etc., and the console was a visual aid.
Hockey. By and large, there is https://nogamstop-casinos.co.uk/review/love-casino/ nothing special to talk about all these sports games. Hockey was the same pong, but with a different overlay on the TV and slightly different rules indicated in the description of the game. There were gates on the left and right; accordingly, only the format for scoring goals was different.
Soccer also worked on the mechanics of "pong" games. It had some distinctive elements in the form of additional rules for scoring goals. In addition, when hitting his little man, the player could “pass” by changing the level of flight of the ball (carried out by pressing one of the control wheels.
Tennis. In this game, unlike Table Tennis, a different mechanism for dribbling the ball was implemented. If in Table Tennis the ball flew only in a straight line, then in Tennis it was possible to throw the ball in an arc, which diversified the gameplay.
Let’s move on to cartridge No. 4
The game Cat and Mouse was perhaps more interesting than all the previous ones in terms of implementation. It was a maze superimposed on the monitor screen. Two squares appeared on the screen, one large and one small, symbolizing a cat and a mouse, respectively. The mouse’s task was to get to the end of the maze, the cat’s task was to prevent it from doing so. In this case, if the “mouse” square touched the “cat” square, the first one disappeared from the playing field, and if any of the squares touched the edges of the maze, the touching player returned to his original position.
The second game on this cartridge was football, described earlier.
Haunted House. This game came with a tight pad on the TV in the form of a lock. Moving the white square around the castle created the impression of a lamp moving in the hands of a detective through an ominous house. One player in this case controlled a detective moving around the house, and the second a ghost trying to catch him. By and large, the gameplay duplicated “Cat and Mouse”, but in a different setting and adding non-digital additional conditions.
Invasion. It was more of a board game. It came with a fairly large paper playing field along which the players moved. The console in this game was needed to visualize the ongoing attacks of the castle. The overlay on the screen was made in the form of a castle within which the player squares moved, illustrating the battle. Overall it was a full-fledged big board game.
W.I.N. was a kind of lotto. The overlay, not the screen, was a field lined with squares containing letters, numbers and symbols. Each player took a card containing different symbols. The square was initially invisible and players had to randomly move the invisible square to the square that would help them cover their card. Afterwards the reset button was pressed and the square appeared in the place where the player pointed it. If the highlighted symbol matched a symbol on the player’s card, he would cover it. And so on until one of the players closes his card.
Cartridge #5 could run 4 games. Two of them have already been described earlier, these are “Invasion” and “Soccer”; we’ll tell you about the rest further.
Submarine. The playing field showed us a fleet of ships and one submarine. Each player respectively controlled either a fleet or a submarine. The task of the fleet was to get through the entire playing field to the exit, bypassing mines and being careful of enemy shells. The task of the submarine was, accordingly, not to allow the fleet to pass. To do this, the submarine had the opportunity to fire a projectile into the fleet and adjust its flight trajectory, just as, say, the flight trajectory of a ball in the game “Tennis” was adjusted.
Wipeout was the first racing game for the video game console. By and large, in terms of control, it was very reminiscent of Ski, but in this case, the passage of the track was carried out for a while. The second player monitored the completion time. Also, the rules of the game provided for various bonuses for completing various sections of the route.
Cartridge #6 included three games. One of them is the already familiar Invasion, the second is an analogue of the usual roulette “Roulette” and the board game “States”.
The mechanics of playing Roulette consisted of moving a square within the limits of a roulette pasted on the TV with your eyes closed. When the presenter stops a player moving the roulette wheel, the player receives any bonuses from the physical set for the game.
A game for educating the younger generation of patriots States. The overlay on the TV was made in the form of a map of the United States without the names signed. Each state was highlighted in a different color. The presenter pulled out a card with the name of the state, and the player had to indicate it correctly. As you might guess, after a certain number of repetitions the game completely loses its meaning… or, in any case, it discourages at least some interest.
Cartridge number 7 contained access to the game VolleyBall. This game was another variation of pong, football, baseball and other games. The peculiarity was that the vertical line covered only part of the screen, and the ball could be directed up and down the screen, flying around this “net” and deceiving the opponent.
Cartridge No. 8 added two new sports games to the console. Handball and basketball.
Handball didn’t live up to its name at all. It was basically a game of squash. Both players were on the same side of the screen in front of the wall and the task was to send the ball into the wall in such a way that the second player could not catch the bounced ball.
Basketball was another variation on the theme of pong. The only thing that makes this game interesting is that it contains the answer to the disappearance of cartridge 11. Initially, it was planned to use a separate cartridge for the basketball game, but apparently a decision was made to simplify the mechanics or the technical opportunity arose to place the game together with handball, and therefore the production of cartridge 11 was completely canceled.
Cartridges No. 9 and No. 10 were completely dedicated to games that require a light gun to operate.
Using the tenth cartridge, the game “Shooting Gallery” was turned on. It was a gaming shooting gallery. The player had to aim at the target, which currently contained a white square, and if it hit, the square moved to another target. Most likely, the technique from light pistols on the dandy worked with this gun, when a hit was counted every time the gun was pointed at a light source. However, given the simplicity of the game mechanics and the lack of rewards, cheating had not yet appeared at that time.
The ninth cartridge included three games using the light gun.
Dogfight was, in my opinion, a more interesting analogue of the game Shooting Gallery, since it required the participation of two players. One of the players controlled a plane flying across the screen, and the second player tried to shoot it with a gun. The task was complicated by the fact that the overlay on the screen was made in such a way that the plane could only be shot down in the cutouts specially provided for this in the overlay, since the rest of it did not transmit enough light. Thus, one player kept the plane at gunpoint all the time, waiting for it to fall into the firing zone.
Prehistoric Safari. This game also required two players who had to work in tandem. One player aimed the sight (white square) at the corresponding target, and the second player, holding it at the front sight, fired a shot at the right moment. There were 15 shots in total and after each one the aim was lost.
Shootout. This game is a kind of western. There are two players in the game, one with a gun plays the role of a sheriff, the second with a controller plays the role of a thief who roams around the house. The sheriff’s task is to shoot the thief in those moments when he passes through certain rooms. By and large, a complete analogue of Dogfight, which changed the surroundings and gave a little more freedom to the player controlling the square.
The 11th cartridge, as I mentioned above, was simply not released, because.To. originally intended for playing basketball.
Cart 12 included only one game – Interplanetary Voyage. This game essentially included two. The set included a screen overlay, game cards and a cardboard playing field. These sets allowed playing according to two different variations of the rules. In this game, the sun was in the center of the screen. The ships had a certain inertia, which added difficulty in moving. In one version of the rules, players pulled out cards with tasks that indicated where to move the ship. The task actually was to move the ship to the specified points.
So, having examined all the games for this game console, we can conclude that these were still not computer games in the full sense of the word. Rather, these were board games using a console as an auxiliary element. Many of the games could have their own rules. T.To. the game didn’t keep score. In some places the physics of the behavior of squares and the ball changed, in some places the conditions of interaction between squares changed, but in many ways there was no objectivity in these games, especially in the first games. Surely we can say that a shot from a gun hit the target if the square disappears. Surely you can say that the cat caught the mouse if it disappeared. But let’s say when playing Zoo, all touches and going beyond limits were recorded exclusively by the host’s trained (or not so trained) eye.
Therefore, this console was more of an entertainment for several people. Fun for a family party or children’s birthday party. However, it’s difficult to occupy yourself with this console when you’re alone. At least for modern man. But it’s an interesting experience. A kind of augmented reality from the 70s.