Computer Space

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Computer Space
Developer(s)	Nutting Associates
Publisher(s)	Nutting Associates
Designer(s)	Nolan Bushnell, Ted Dabney
Platform(s)	Arcade
Release date(s)	November, 1971
Genre(s)	Multi-directional shooter
Mode(s)	Single player or 2 player
Input methods	4 buttons
Cabinet	Unique design
Display	Horizontal, raster, standard resolution, 15 inches

Computer Space is a video arcade game released in November 1971 by Nutting Associates. Created by Nolan Bushnell and Ted Dabney, who would both later found Atari, it is generally accepted that it was the world's first commercially sold coin-operated video game — and indeed, the first commercially sold video game of any kind, predating the Magnavox Odyssey by six months, and Atari's Pong by one year. Though not commercially sold, the coin operated minicomputer driven Galaxy Game preceded it by two months, located solely at Stanford University.

History

Previous efforts in bringing the experience of Spacewar! to a mass market were centered on the minicomputer paradigm of the college campuses where it originated - that of a central computer distributing software to various remote terminals. Computer Space was innovative for establishing the basic form of all arcade games to come - that of a dedicated computing device built to play only that one game.^[1]

Computer Space was the first widely available video and arcade game, although it was not a success. For many, the gameplay was too complicated to grasp quickly. While it fared well on college campuses, it was not very popular in bars and other venues. Bushnell later recruited Al Alcorn and created a sensation with the much easier to grasp Pong arcade game modeled on Ralph Baer's Magnavox Odyssey home system's Tennis game.

Separate cabinets were produced for either single player games or two player games in the colors blue, green, red, white, and yellow.

Gameplay

Computer Space screenshot

The player controls a rocket ship using a thruster and a pair of rotational buttons. During game play, the player must evade enemy fire from a pair of flying saucers moving in tandem. The player fires back to destroy the flying saucers by firing missiles at them from the rocket ship. Today, the game would be considered a multi-directional shooter.

If the player's score is higher than that of the saucers at the end of 90 seconds, the player will get another 90 seconds of play, and the colors of the screen would switch in "Hyperspace" (it would switch like a photo negative, from black to white and white to black). If at the end of this 90 seconds the player's score is still higher than that of the saucers, the player received another 90 seconds and the colors will revert to normal. This sequence is repeated indefinitely.

Scoring

Score is kept as a single digit ranging from zero to nine; once a score of nine is reached, the next hit will return the score to 0.

Technical

Computer Space uses no microprocessor, RAM or ROM. The entire computer system is a state machine made of 74 series TTL chips. Graphic elements are held in diode arrays. Physical configuration is made up of 3 PCBs interconnected through a common bus. Display is rendered on a General Electric 15" black-and-white portable television vacuum tube set specially modified for Computer Space.^[2]

Clones

Star Trek
by For-Play

• Computer Space was cloned/bootlegged in 1972 by a game company called For-Play as Star Trek^[3][4].

Computer Space in popular culture

• A blue Computer Space arcade unit was seen in the original set for the television program The Electric Playground, and was featured in a story they did about the formation of Atari.^[5]

• Computer Space was shown in the 1973 film Soylent Green.

References

External links

• Computerspacefan.com - large archive of Computer Space info, including historical and technical information.
• Computer Space at the Killer List of Videogames
• Computer Space Info
• Videotopia exhibit
• The Dot Eaters article on the development of Computer Space.