Wow, that's really awesome. The first ever video game ad/promo... it's great how they carefully explain everything, because they invented all of the concepts including the console, removable games, controllers, how it connects to the TV, all of it. Great stuff, and it's fantastic that someone found this and put it up online!
That was 5 minutes long, so I suspect it wasn't a standard commercial to be found during regular TV show intermission.
Sure was interesting. It looked like the girl was having more fun than the boy though :D. Also, fun AND excitement?! I would have settled for one, but it has both!
I do have to say this. It is hard to see the Odyssey as a true console. It was the first home video game system, but it didn't have a CPU. All the cartridges did was slightly alter the behavior of the glowing dots. For the most part, those dots were done internally. I will give it credit for that light gun though. While it was still using the system's built in game code with a slight alteration, it actually was still a functional light gun. It is a piece of history, but it wasn't until the Atari 2600 that we got a true turing complete CPU that do any behavior the system had memory to support.
"On two occasions, I have been asked [by members of Parliament], 'Pray, Mr. Babbage, if you put into the machine wrong figures, will the right answers come out?' I am not able to rightly apprehend the kind of confusion of ideas that could provoke such a question." ~ Charles Babbage (1791-1871)
The video description says that the video was made for showing in stores, so yeah, it wasn't a TV ad. It's great stuff though!
Quote: I do have to say this. It is hard to see the Odyssey as a true console. It was the first home video game system, but it didn't have a CPU. All the cartridges did was slightly alter the behavior of the glowing dots. For the most part, those dots were done internally. I will give it credit for that light gun though. While it was still using the system's built in game code with a slight alteration, it actually was still a functional light gun. It is a piece of history, but it wasn't until the Atari 2600 that we got a true turing complete CPU that do any behavior the system had memory to support.
No, the Fairchild Channel F was actually the first console with removable rom cartridges. The 2600 released after it. And while you're right that you can debate whether the Oddysey "counts" as a true console, it is the first video game system, period, and it has different games which each use different cards. Yes, all they do is change the alignment of the internal hardware, they're just pins and not rom carts, but it's an obvious predecessor to rom cartridges, and it's something more than most systems between the O2 and 2600 had, all those home Pong machines which can just play the games that are built into the units and no others.
Ah yes the Fairchild. I forgot about that one. Did that one have a true CPU? I have to give credit to the Fairchild for having a name that sounds like the woods.
"On two occasions, I have been asked [by members of Parliament], 'Pray, Mr. Babbage, if you put into the machine wrong figures, will the right answers come out?' I am not able to rightly apprehend the kind of confusion of ideas that could provoke such a question." ~ Charles Babbage (1791-1871)
I consider the Odyssey a true console because, regardless of the internals, it was the first machine to, however basically, do most of the same things any video game console does. Modern video games, to this day, follow many of the basic concepts this machine established (multiplayer, individual game media, light guns, manipulation through the paleolithic equivalent of a controller), and no machine before ever attempted any of this stuff in such a way as we would describe a game console.
Dark Jaguar Wrote:Ah yes the Fairchild. I forgot about that one. Did that one have a true CPU? I have to give credit to the Fairchild for having a name that sounds like the woods.
A guy working for Fairchild (Robert Noyce; his wife went on to do a lot of philanthropy here in Maine) built the first working integrated circuit, you know. There was a pretty good documentary about the invention of the IC on PBS sometime last year. So yes, the Channel F has a CPU.
Weltall Wrote:I consider the Odyssey a true console because, regardless of the internals, it was the first machine to, however basically, do most of the same things any video game console does. Modern video games, to this day, follow many of the basic concepts this machine established (multiplayer, individual game media, light guns, manipulation through the paleolithic equivalent of a controller), and no machine before ever attempted any of this stuff in such a way as we would describe a game console.
I mostly agree, but it is true that the system doesn't actually have any data on its cards, just different connections for the internal hardware. I wouldn't make as much of a deal out of that it doesn't have a CPU; yes it doesn't have one, but it's simple enough that it didn't need it. I don't think that makes it not a videogame system, certainly. But is it a console, ie, a system with multiple interchangeable games? Yeah... and no, because of the unique nature of the cards. But yes, the system created the standards that the industry would follow. No question about that.
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