Some news about Ralph Baer
Here what just appear on the RGVC newsgroups
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First Video Game Prototypes Live Again
- The Father of Video Games Rebuilds Legacy Systems -
Document originally written by Jayson Hill.
Additional changes by David Winter
Manchester, NH (June 5, 2003)-The early prototypes of the first practical
video game device are getting a second chance on life thanks to
documentation recently uncovered by Ralph Baer-the inventor of video
games*-and David Winter, a well-known French retro-game collector and
video-game-history researcher. Baer and Winter are using the newly
discovered information to replicate the prototypes to chronicle in a
tangible way how the concept of playing games on a home television set
evolved from a 4-page disclosure document written by Baer in September 1966
to a prototype for the first commercial home video game system, the 1972
Magnavox Odyssey.
"A multi-billion-dollar industry grew out of these prototypes," said Baer.
"By recreating them, we can preserve video gaming history and show how video
games started. Ultimately I would like the replicas to be exhibited and
inspire other inventors."
Long thought lost, design details of Baer's innovative work in the 1960s
were discovered when Winter searched hundreds of boxes of files from Sanders
Associates, the firm Baer was working for when he developed his
industry-creating invention. The stored files were part of more than 20
years of video game patent litigation. Baer and Winter made a first trip to
the storage location but retrieved very few of the original documents
written by Baer and his collegues at Sanders Associates. A disappointment
which did not last forever, as Winter travelled again to the United States
and retrieved most of the original documents just before they be destroyed.
Among the discoveries was a 1992 deposition video tape that documents
prototype design evolution. The tape shows Baer holding and discussing the
eight game units he and two Sanders coworkers built between 1966 and 1969,
including Unit No.7 or the "Brown Box" as it was affectionately called. The
Brown Box was completed in January 1969 and was the prototype for Magnavox's
Odyssey game, the world's first commercial home TV gaming system. Also in
the video was footage of Unit No. 8 which was capable of an advanced form of
ball and paddle dynamics when plugged to the Brown Box.
Baer and Winter are using the information from the video tape, along with
existing technical documentation-schematics and parts lists-to replicate
missing TV/Video Game units. Reconstruction of Unit No.6 was recently
completed.
Unit No.6 was the first video game device featuring interactive sports
games. It allowed two players to engage in a ping-pong game, i.e. a game in
which player symbols on the screen were controlled both by the players (the
"paddles") and by the machine (the "ball"). The system had a
machine-generated central, vertical line representing the net in the
ping-pong game and a vertical line at the left of the screen which served as
the wall for the game's handball game. In addition to ping-pong (or tennis),
the unit could be switched to play a two-player handball game as well as a
chase game. TV Game No.6 was designed to be rotary-switch-programmable
system; a photoelectric "gun" could be plugged into the game unit and used
to play a target-shooting game.
The light gun and hand controllers of Unit No.6 were duplicated in the Brown
Box. Another interesting element of Unit No.6 is that the game's hand
controllers sport a dark, wood-grain exterior. This exterior was used again
with Unit No.7 and is the reason that prototype was called the Brown Box, a
small detail that had been forgotten until the discovery of the video tape.
Winter is currently working on Unit No.3, which played a Chase Game, the
first playable video game designed at Sanders Associates. This game
consisted of two spots (the players) which chased each other. Collision
detection was implemented and allowed the chased player to disappear when
hit by the other. Unit No.3 was a cut-down version of Unit No.2 (also known
as "Pump Unit").
For more information about all these units, their development and games,
visit the Sanders Associates page at
www.pong-story.com/sanders.htm, Winter's web site about the history of early
video games.
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*Baer is considered the inventor of video games; he was first to patent the
method of using a home TV set for playing games and to define the technology
that makes it possible to play games on ordinary TV sets utilizing
raster-scan technology. Early computer games were displayed on oscilloscopes
not video monitors. Baer's novel concept of playing games using the home TV
set laid the foundation for the video game industry.
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