1972 in video games

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1972 marked an important landmark in the history of the video game industry with the releases of Pong and the Odyssey home console. The profile of electronic games rose substantially and companies began exploring the distribution of video games on a larger scale. Important mainframe computer games were created in this period which became the basis for early microcomputer games.

Events

• May 3 – Magnavox initiates their “Magnavox Profit Caravan” series of traveling shows to demonstrate all of their 1972 product line to their dealers and public, including the Odyssey. The first showing occurs in Phoenix, Arizona. ^[1]
  • May 24 – At a showing in Burlingame, California, three representatives of Nutting Associates including Nolan Bushnell visit the showcase and play the Odyssey demonstration unit. Bushnell takes particular note of the Odyssey game Table Tennis. ^{[2] [3]}
• June 26 – Bally Manufacturing formalizes an agreement with Nolan Bushnell for the creation of one video game and one pinball table for Bally. Bushnell later describes the creation of a hockey game. ^[4] The term “video amusement game” is used by Bushnell – one of the earliest instances of the phrase “video game” in print. ^{[5] [6]}
• August – Atari Inc. tests a prototype of Pong at Andy Capp’s Tavern (later the Rooster T. Feathers Comedy Club) in Sunnyvale, California.
• August 13–15 – Chess 3.0 wins the U.S. American Computer Chess Championship in Boston, Massachusetts for the third consecutive year. ^[7]
• September 14–16 – The Music Operators of America show is held in Chicago, Illinois. Nutting Associates displays Computer Space for the second year and For-Play Manufacturing showcases Star Trek as the only two video games on the show floor.
• September 22 – Felipe Mor Pérez, head of research and development at Inter Electrónica, registered the trademark "Odyssey" in Spain, describing it as an "electronic toy." This led to the development of the Overkal, a Spanish clone of the Odyssey. ^[8]
• October 19 – The Intergalactic Spacewar Olympics competition is held at the Stanford Artificial Intelligence Project facilities in California. It is the first formal video game competition and is a central story of the article "Spacewar, Fanatic Life and Death Among Computer Bums" in the December 7, 1972 issue of Rolling Stone written by Stewart Brand. ^[9]
• November 24 – Nolan Bushnell files for US patent #3,793,483 relating to work developed for video game technology on Computer Space. The patent is issued in February 1974 and does not serve as an effective deterrent to video game copycats. ^{[10] [11]}

Financial performance

United States

Arcade

Title	Arcade cabinet units (Lifetime)	Manufacturer	Developer	Genre
Pong	8,000< [12] 8,000 [13] [Note 1]	Atari Inc.	Atari Inc.	Sports

Home consoles

Title	Game console units (1972)	Manufacturer	Developer
Odyssey	69,000* [14] 80,000 [15] [Note 2]	Magnavox Co.	Sanders Associates/Magnavox

(*) Indicates a sales number given by official company sources.

Notable releases

Publications

Magnavox Odyssey

• October – The date of the first issue of the People’s Computer Company newsletter by Dymax Inc. They print type-in listings of games and other demonstrations in the BASIC programming language, helping to spread games originally created on time-sharing networks.

Games

Arcade

• March – The second unit of Galaxy Game is placed at the Tresidder Student Union at Stanford University. This version features two fiberglass cabinets with two players each, which can be linked to create a four-player game. ^[16]
• October – Coin-operated games company For-Play Manufacturing in California releases Star Trek (1972) – a presumed clone of Nutting Associates’ Computer Space . ^[17]
• November – Atari Inc. releases their game Pong , shipping it to local distributors in the Northern California area. The game becomes a hit in the local area and launches Atari’s business.

Computer

• Empire by Reed College student Peter Langston is created for the HP2000 computer. ^[18]
• Louis Bloomfield of University of Illinois Champaign-Urbana creates the game Moonwar for the PLATO IV mainframe system. It becomes the most popular “big board” game on the network. ^[19]

Hardware

Consoles

• September – Magnavox releases their Odyssey console in twenty-five major markets. It includes twelve games with the console. A light gun addon with additional games is sold separately. They manufacture 140,000 consoles their first year on the market. ^[20]

Business

• June 27 – Atari Inc. is founded by Nolan Bushnell and Ted Dabney in Sunnyvale, California. They absorb the assets of their prior partnership, Syzygy, though continue using the name Syzygy under a doing business as association. ^[21]
• Dymax Inc. establishes a location in Menlo Park, California. They invite interested individuals to visit the location to access time-sharing terminals at the location to create and use programs – many of which are published in the People's Computer Company newsletter.

Notes

1. Ralph Baer's numbers compiled in April 1976 are mostly estimates without direct access to sales figures.
2. Ralph Baer's numbers for Odyssey units sold per year contradict those of official figures disclosed by Magnavox in 1974.

See also

• 1972 in games

References

1. "Agreed Statement of Facts". Magnavox Company v. Chicago Dynamic Industries, et al. US District Court for the Northern District of Illinois, Eastern Division. November 3, 1976. p. 13. Retrieved March 22, 2024.
2. "Trial Transcript". Magnavox Company v. Chicago Dynamic Industries, et al. US District Court for the Northern District of Illinois, Eastern Division. January 5, 1977. pp. 1501–1505. Retrieved March 22, 2024.
3. Baer, Ralph H. (2005). Videogames: In the Beginning. Rolenta Press. pp. 76, 81. ISBN   978-0-9643848-1-1.
4. Bushnell, Nolan K. (July 10, 1972). ""Letter to John Britz"". Magnavox Company v. Chicago Dynamic Industries, et al. US District Court for the Northern District of Illinois, Eastern Division. Retrieved March 22, 2024.
5. Britz, John A. (June 26, 1972). "Royalty Agreement". Magnavox Company v. Chicago Dynamic Industries, et al. US District Court for the Northern District of Illinois, Eastern Division. Retrieved March 22, 2024.
6. Smith, Keith (April 3, 2015). "The Golden Age Arcade Historian: The etymology of "video game"". The Golden Age Arcade Historian. Retrieved December 21, 2024.
7. "Computer chess championship ends with '6400' winner". The Columbian. August 16, 1972. p. 14.
8. Martorell, Martin F. (April 18, 2024). "Overkal - The History of the Spanish Magnavox Odyssey clone". prehistoricgaming. Retrieved April 18, 2025.
9. Brand, Stewart (December 7, 1972). "Spacewar, Fanatic Life and Death Among Computer Bums". Rolling Stone .
10. US3793483A,Bushnell, Nolan,"Video image positioning control system for amusement device",issued February 19, 1974 
11. Mailland, Julien (2024). The game that never ends: how lawyers shape the videogame industry. Game Histories Series. Cambridge, Massachusetts: The MIT Press. pp. Chapter 3. ISBN   978-0-262-54939-4.
12. Smith, Alexander (November 27, 2019). They Create Worlds: The Story of the People and Companies That Shaped the Video Game Industry. Vol. 1: 1971 – 1982. CRC Press. p. 170. ISBN   978-1-138-38990-8.
13. Baer 2005, p. 10.
14. "Magnavox will drop". Weekly Television Digest with Consumer Electronics. 14 (19): 9. May 13, 1974.
15. Baer 2005, p. 82.
16. Smith 2019, p. 133-134.
17. Smith 2019, p. 155.
18. "Subject: The birthdate of Empire" (TXT). Wolfpackempire.com. Retrieved May 24, 2018.
19. Dear, Brian (2017). The Friendly Orange Glow: The Untold Story of the PLATO System and the Dawn of Cyberculture. New York: Pantheon Books. pp. 227–231. ISBN   978-1-101-87155-3.
20. Smith 2019, p. 153.
21. Smith 2019, p. 158.