1001 VG Book #02 - PONG

-  1970's
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#2 = Pong (1972)
- review by MK (Michael Kittymycack)
- Arcade

  - This entry was awful. First, I really hate it when they describe Pong as having "english". If you've ever played any actual racquet sport, or even Billiards, you'll understand that "english" is spin you purposely place on a ball to affect trajectory and bounce. Ping Pong, especially at high levels of play, has huge amounts of spin... and there is no equivalent in PONG. The only thing happening here is the angle the ball rebounds is affected by the location it hits the paddle.

  - Then there's the story about the game breaking shortly after it was installed due to a completely stuffed coin tray. It wasn't "shortly after" Pong was placed that Andy Capp's Tavern called… it actually took a couple weeks to fill the coin slot by all accounts. Still, it was doing high coin drop in short order. 

  - Sayng that as soon as Pong was a hit “an industry was born” is also inaccurate.  The coin-op industry had other hits going strong… Pong was an attempt at a new and novel variation of coin-op - a "video" coin-op amusement if you will, the industry shortly after adopting the term "videos" to describe this new category of game.  Pong clones went uber popular for a couple or three years there.. but the big switch to video games industry wide really only took off with Space Invaders in 1978+

  - Finally, the most egregious mistake is they describe PONG as having a computer AI opponent. What!?! Obviously they were not playing the original 1972 game, but some kind of port if they were playing against a computer opponent. Honestly, not needing an opponent to play against was at least one major factor in the success of future games like Breakout in 1976! This is the kind of error that prompts a project like the one you're reading right now.

VIDEO:

1001 VG Book #01 - Oregon Trail

-  1970's  -

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So, in the section titled "1970's"… they talk about Asteroids and Space Invaders both being released in 1979… which SI is usually given a 1978 release date (its Japanese release.) Fine, that's close enough… but in the same section they also mention arcade hits like Pac-Man, Centipede and "other" arcade hits being put onto the TRS-80. Really guys? Pac-Man was 1980, Centipede 1981… how are they going to put future arcade releases on the TRS-80 in the 1970's?

#1 = OREGON TRAIL (1971)
- review by JT (John Teti)
- Apple II

- They put this in the book first, with a release date of 1971. That's just plain dumb, and many people were surprised by this first entry. The game they're describing in this review (and the one most people think of for "Oregon Trail") is the 1985 Apple II release (see below).

- The skeleton of a game in 1971 was nothing like the 1985 version which truly defined "The Oregon Trail" in the minds of school children everywhere. The picture in the article is from a version circa 1978 or so. Back then, if you could play the game at all -- it was likely through a terminal and teletype machine - hardly a video game.

- No doubt "The Oregon Trail" should be in the list... but place it in 1985, and discuss some of the earlier games as merely developmental steps!

- Also, I beg to differ that "students learned almost nothing about the actual Oregon Trail". Awareness is a big part of learning, actually. And the 1985 game had actual cities along the way, the fact you started in Independence, Missouri… had to make it to various Fort's, the danger of fording rivers, etc. There's a lot of great eduational material worked into the "play" factor beautifully. The game was built to spark the imagination - and on that front, it clearly delivered. Dysentery as a death is legendary in gaming circles because of Oregon Trail.

VIDEOS:

 

(This is 1975 version... as close of an approximation to the original 1971 version of Oregon Trail they've been able to find)

 

 

(here's the 1985 Apple IIe version, which is much more what the article was talking about)