Mystery Release Dates for the Channel F

[mezrabad]

I'm trying to find and play all video games released prior to 1980.

While it's easy to lump some games into that time frame, I'm finding it much more difficult to discover their original release years.

For instance, for the Fairchild Channel F is there any "knowledge" of what its release schedule was? Do we know if the games came out in numerical order? Do the copyrights have anything to do with when they were released? Is it safe to say that if it is a Channel F game, it came out prior to 1980? (I don't know when Zircon released the "final five" during its revival.)

Could any historians out there chip in with the best they know about the release dates for this system's games? I'm googling a big 404.

[mezrabad]

Wow. The dearth of interest suprises me.

According to Phoenix, 3rd edition. Zircon rereleased all of the Channel F games in 1982 including four which hadn't been released by Fairchild before.

The Digital Press classic collector's guide lists four games released by Zircon:

Alien Invasion #26
Casino Poker #25
Checkers #19
Galactic Space Wars #23

Which tells me that the four Zircon released games didn't come out until 1982 AND that the later games, at least weren't released numerically.

Phoenix also describes Fairchild as dropping out of videogaming in 1977 so it's reasonable, based on these sources, to say that games #1-#18, #20-#22 and #24 all came out in either 1976 or 1977. The copyrights on the carts I have are no help, at least I wouldn't think that #3 (copyright 1976) came out prior to #1 (copyright #1977). #16-#18 and #21 have a copyright of 1978 (I don't have #15,#19,#20 or #22). Which would make sense if Fairchild released those at the very end of 1977. Maybe it only announced it was leaving the videogame business in 1977 and decided to sell the 1978 dated stuff as it left.

I have a Fairchild Catalog (year of publication? Dunno, there's no date on it) that says there are 10 carts currently available (with up to four games each) for the Channel F, but the only carts pictured on the brochure are carts #1 through #5. I would say that it is safe to say that At LEAST carts #1-5 came out in 1976, possibly 10.

I guess my now very specific question, to anyone who's listening and gives a remote care about this system:

Could ANYONE with carts #15,#19,#20 and #22 tell me what copyright dates are on them? Thanks in advance.