1982 in video games

none August 2014 March 2016 1982 video games 1982 was the peak year for the golden age of arcade video games as well as the second generation of video game consoles. Many games were released that would spawn franchises, or at least sequels, including Dig Dug, Pole Position, Microsoft Flight Simulator, Mr. Do!, Zaxxon, Q*bert, Time Pilot and Pitfall! The year's highest-grossing video game was Namco's arcade game Pac-Man, for the third year in a row, while the year's best-selling home system was the Atari 2600 (Atari VCS). Additional video game consoles added to a crowded market, notably the ColecoVision and Atari 5200. Troubles at Atari later in the year triggered the video game crash of 1983. Financial performance The US arcade video game market is worth $4.3 billion,Video Game Myth Busters - Did the "Crash" of 1983/84 Affect Arcades?, The Golden Age Arcade Historian (December 27, 2013) equivalent to $US 4300000000 1982 0 adjusted for inflation. The US home video game market is worth $3.8 billion,Silicon Valley fever: growth of high-technology culture Everett M. Rogers & Judith K. Larsen Basic Books 1984 0-465-07821-4 https://books.google.com/books?id=frYrAAAAYAAJ 263 Video game machines have an average weekly take of $109 per machine. The video arcade industry took in $8 billion in quarters in 1982, surpassing pop music (at $4 billion in sales per year) and Hollywood films ($3 billion). Those 32 billion arcade games played translate to 143 games for every man, woman, and child in America. A recent Atari survey showed that 86 percent of the US population from 13 to 20 has played some kind of video game and an estimated 8 million US homes have video games hooked up to the television set. Sales of home video games were $3.8 billion in 1982, approximately half that of video game arcades. equivalent to $US 3800000000 1982 0 adjusted for inflation. The Japanese home video game market is approaching ¥300 billion,The Home Video-Game Industry (1983-1996) - Competitive Strategy Revolving around Industry Standards http://www.gbrc.jp/content/old/PDF/GameCase.PDF#page=43 gbrc.jp 43 equivalent to $US JP 300000000000 1982 2012 0 JPN 2012 adjusted for inflation. Japan In Japan, the following titles were the highest-grossing arcade video games of 1982, according to the annual Game Machine chart."Pole Position" No. 1 Video Game: Game Machines "The Year's Best Three AM Machines" Survey Results Game Machine 207 Amusement Press, Inc. 1 March 1983 30 https://onitama.tv/gamemachine/pdf/19830301p.pdf#page=16 Rank Title Genre Manufacturer 1 Pole Position Racing Namco 2 Dig Dug Maze 3 Galaga Fixed shooter 4 Pengo Maze Sega 5 Time Pilot Shoot 'em up Konami 6 Donkey Kong Platform Nintendo 7 Front Line Shoot 'em up Taito 8 Donkey Kong Jr. Platform Nintendo 9 Burnin' Rubber (Bump 'n' Jump) Vehicular combat Data East 10 Mr. Do! Maze Universal United States In the United States, the following titles were the highest-grossing arcade games of 1982, according to RePlay and Cash Box magazines and the Amusement & Music Operators Association (AMOA). Rank RePlay Cash Box1982 Jukebox / Games Route Survey Cash Box 20 November 1982 53 https://archive.org/details/cashbox44unse_23/page/53 Cash Box Pub. Co. AMOAAMOA Announces Jukebox and Games Awards Winners Cash Box 30 October 1982 37 https://archive.org/details/cashbox44unse_20/page/36/mode/2up Cash Box Pub. Co. Play Meter1982 Play Meter December 1994 20 13 68 https://archive.org/details/play-meter-volume-20-number-13-december-1994/Play%20Meter%20-%20Volume%2020%2C%20Number%2013%20-%20December%201994/page/68 1 Donkey KongTop Hits of Last 5 Years RePlay March 1987 Ms. Pac-Man 2 rowspan="5" Pac-Man Pac-Man, Centipede, Donkey Kong, Defender, Zaxxon rowspan="5" 3 Donkey Kong, Centipede 4 5 rowspan="2" 6 The following table lists the top-grossing titles of each month in 1982, according to the RePlay and Play Meter charts. MonthRePlay Play MeterRef Reference(s) Upright cabinet Cocktail cabinet January Pac-Man rowspan="3" RePlay: The Players' Choice RePlay January 1982 February Pac-Man RePlay: The Players' Choice RePlay February 1982 March Pac-Man / Ms. Pac-Man RePlay: The Players' Choice RePlay March 1982 April Ms. Pac-Man Donkey KongTop Videos Play Meter May 1, 1982Ten Years Ago Play Meter April 1992 18 5 52 https://archive.org/details/play-meter-volume-18-number-5-april-1992-600DPI/Play%20Meter%20-%20Volume%2018%2C%20Number%205%20-%20April%201992/page/n57 RePlay: The Players' Choice RePlay April 1982 May Turbo RePlay: The Players' Choice RePlay May 1982 June Zaxxon rowspan="6" RePlay: The Players' Choice RePlay June 1982 July Ms. Pac-Man Ms. Pac-Man RePlay: The Players' Choice RePlay July 1982 August Pac-Man / Ms. Pac-Man RePlay: The Players' Choice RePlay August 1982 September RePlay: The Players' Choice RePlay September 1982 October Jungle King RePlay: The Players' Choice RePlay October 1982 November Ms. Pac-Man RePlay: The Players' Choice RePlay November 1982 December Ms. Pac-Man RePlay: The Players' Choice RePlay December 1982Sullivan George Screen Play: The Story of Video Games 1983 F. Warne 978-0-7232-6251-0 46 https://books.google.com/books?id=kqb7C9YJVw8C Before the end of the year Ms. Pac-Man had climbed to the top of the Play Meter chart. 1982 Donkey Kong Best-selling home video games The following titles were 1982's best-selling home video games. Rank Title Platform(s) Developer Publisher(s) Release year Sales Revenue Inflation Ref Reference(s) 1 Pac-Man Atari 2600, Coleco Mini Arcade, Nelsonic Game Watch Namco Atari, Coleco, Nelsonic 1982 9,271,844 $200,000,000+ $US 200,000,000 1982 -7 c+ Atari VCS version sold 7,271,844 cartridges (200 million no).Green Mark J. Berry John Francis The Challenge of Hidden Profits: Reducing Corporate Bureaucracy and Waste 1985 W. Morrow 978-0-688-03986-8 35 https://books.google.com/books?id=iYa3AAAAIAAJ By 1981, Atari's sales grew to 1 billion no as it controlled about 75 percent of the fast-growing video game market. The dizzying climb continued into 1982, with Pac-Man alone bringing in over 200 million no. Coleco's Mini-Arcade version sold 1.5 million units.Coleco Mini-Arcades Go Gold Arcade Express August 15, 1982 1 1 4 http://www.digitpress.com/library/newsletters/arcadeexpress/arcade_express_v1n1.pdf#page=4 Nelsonic Game Watch version sold more than 500,000 units.Shea Tom Shrinking Pac-Man leads game-wristwatch market InfoWorld 20 December 1982 4 50 44–5 https://books.google.com/books?id=FTAEAAAAMBAJ&pg=PA44 InfoWorld Media Group, Inc. 0199-6649 2 Donkey Kong ColecoVision, Atari 2600 Nintendo Coleco 1982 4,550,000 $100,000,000+ $US 100,000,000 1982 -7 c+ ColecoVision version sold 550,000 cartridges. Atari VCS version sold 4 million cartridges (100 million no).Kitchen Garry E. Garry Kitchen Garry E. Kitchen Expert Report of Garry E. Kitchen March 5, 2010 United States District Court for the Southern District of Ohio 2 https://www.muddlawoffices.com/cases/allisonvwise/ohio/msj/064-12%20Exhibit%20M.pdf#page=27 Designed & programmed Atari 2600 adaptation of hit arcade game Donkey Kong, 1982 wholesale revenues in excess of $100 million on 4 million units. 3 Frogger Atari 2600 Konami Parker Brothers 1982 4,000,000 $80,000,000 $US 80,000,000 1982 -7 c Ed English: 2600 (Frogger, Mr. Do!, Roc 'n Rope) https://www.digitpress.com/library/newsletters/digitalpress/dp52.pdf#page=7 19 April 2021 Digital Press 52 May–June 2003 7 4 Defender Atari 2600 Williams Atari 1982 3,006,790 colspan="2" Cartridge Sales Since 1980 Atari Corp. Via The Agony & The Ecstasy Once Upon Atari August 10, 2003 4 23 Scott West Productions 5 E.T. the Extra-Terrestrial Atari 2600 Universal Atari 1982 2,637,985 colspan="2" 6 Berzerk Atari 2600 Atari Atari, Inc. 1982 1,798,773 colspan="2" 7 Space Invaders Atari 2600 Taito Atari 1980 1,373,033 colspan="2" 8 Asteroids Atari 2600 Atari Atari 1981 1,331,956 colspan="2" 9 Pitfall! Atari 2600 Activision Activision 1982 1,000,000+ colspan="2" Sigel Efrem Giglio Louis Guide to Software Publishing: An Industry Emerges 1984 Knowledge Industry Publications 978-0-86729-108-7 22 https://books.google.com/books?id=OnDgAAAAMAAJ Pitfall won the award from Electronic Games magazine as the best video game adventure of 1983, and in 1982 sold more than 1 million copies.Our games have birthdays, but they don't get old. Cash Box 8 October 1983 FS-5 https://archive.org/details/cashbox45unse_17/page/5 Cash Box Pub. Co. 10 Microsoft Flight Simulator IBM PC Sublogic Microsoft 1982 800,000+ colspan="2" Dennis Lynch https://www.newspapers.com/clip/95644572/chicago-tribune/ Games software moving from summer show to stores Chicago Tribune 162 July 1, 1988 February 20, 2022 Newspapers.com Best-selling home systems RankSystem(s) Manufacturer Type Generation Sales Ref Reference(s)1Atari 2600Atari, Inc.ConsoleSecond5,100,000Guins Raiford https://books.google.com/books?id=ijOkAgAAQBAJ&pg=PA324 Game After: A Cultural Study of Video Game Afterlife 2014-01-24 MIT Press 978-0-262-32018-4 3242Game & WatchNintendoHandheld4,600,000+https://books.google.com/books?id=PmyxAAAAIAAJ Japan Company Handbook 1982 Toyo Keizai 729 In Aug. '82 term, sales of "Game & Watch" will increase from 4.6 million to 7 million units3Coleco Mini-ArcadeColecoDedicated3,000,000More Mini-Arcades Coming From Coleco Arcade Express January 30, 1983 1 13 2 http://www.digitpress.com/library/newsletters/arcadeexpress/arcade_express_v1n13.pdf#page=24IntellivisionMattelConsoleSecond1,100,000Secretan Lance H. K. https://books.google.com/books?id=PVUOgovXuZAC Managerial Moxie: A Basic Strategy for the Corporate Trenches 1986 Holt, Rinehart and Winston 978-0-03-928852-5 49 Industry observers estimate that while Intellivision unit sales sank from 1.1 million units in 1982 to 550,000 in 1983, Coleco Vision unit sales rocketed from 550,000 to 1.2 million5Timex Sinclair 1000Timex SinclairComputer8-bit750,000Libes Sol April 1983 Bytelines: Market Share for the PC https://archive.org/details/byte-magazine-1983-04-rescan/page/n467/mode/2up BYTE 8 4 457–460 (458) 6 December 2021 Internet Archive6Atari 400 / Atari 800Atari, Inc.Computer8-bit600,000Reimer Jeremy 2005-12-15 Total share: 30 years of personal computer market share figures https://arstechnica.com/features/2005/12/total-share/ live 2021-11-27 Ars Technica en-us https://web.archive.org/web/20120607023023/http://arstechnica.com:80/features/2005/12/total-share/ June 7, 2012 Jeremy Reimer 2012-12-07 Total Share: Personal Computer Market Share 1975-2010 https://jeremyreimer.com/rockets-item.lsp?p=137 Jeremy ReimerCommodore 64 / VIC-20Commodore InternationalComputer8-bit600,000TI-99/4 / TI-99/4ATexas InstrumentsComputer16-bit600,0009ColecoVisionColecoConsoleSecond550,000Carlisle Rodney P. Encyclopedia of Play in Today's Society 2 April 2009 SAGE Publishing 978-1-4129-6670-2 143 https://books.google.com/books?id=jLqXM3U_pzEC&pg=PA14310Nelsonic Game WatchNelsonic IndustriesHandheld 500,000+Shea Tom 20 December 1982 Shrinking Pac-Man leads game-wristwatch market https://books.google.com/books?id=FTAEAAAAMBAJ&pg=PA44 InfoWorld InfoWorld Media Group, Inc. 4 50 44–5 0199-6649 Events September 25 - The first animated adaptation of a video game, Hanna-Barbera's Pac-Man cartoon, begins airing on ABC. December 27 – Starcade, a video game television game show, debuts on TBS in the United States. Major awards Electronic Games holds the third Arcade Awards, for games released during 1980–1981. Pac-Man wins the best arcade game award, Asteroids (Atari VCS) wins the best console game award, and Star Raiders (Atari 8-bit computers) wins the best computer game award. Pac-Man wins the Video Software Dealers Association's VSDA Award for Best Videogame.Pac-Man Scores! Electronic Games January 1983 1 11 https://archive.org/details/ElectronicGames/Electronic%20Games%20Issue%2011%20%28January%201983%29/page/n12 12 Business Eidansha Boshu Service Center shortens its name to Enix and in August establishes itself as a computer game publisher. New companies: Argonaut Artech Compile Cosmi Data Age Distinctive Software Dragon Data Electronic Arts English Software First Star Software Gamestar Imagine Software Llamasoft Lucasfilm Games Martech MicroProse Richard Shepherd Software System 3 Ultimate Play the Game U.S. Games Notable releases Games Arcade January – Sega releases Zaxxon, which introduces isometric graphics and looks far more 3D than any other raster game at the time. January 13 – Midway releases Ms. Pac-Man (despite it being copyrighted as 1981); it is (as the name suggests) the sequel to Pac-Man, but was created without Namco's authorization. They also release Baby Pac-Man and Pac-Man Plus without Namco's authorization later in the year; the former is a pinball/video game hybrid. February — Exidy releases Victory (video game) April 19 – Namco releases Dig Dug, manufactured by Atari in North America. August – Nintendo releases Donkey Kong Jr., the sequel to Donkey Kong. August – Taito releases parallax scroller Jungle Hunt. September 24 – Namco releases Pole Position, one of the first games with stereophonic and quadraphonic sound. Featuring a pseudo-3D, third-person, rear-view perspective, it becomes the most popular racing game of its time. September – Sega releases maze game Pengo, starring a cute penguin. October – Namco releases Super Pac-Man, the third title in the Pac-Man series. October – Universal releases Mr. Do! solely as a conversion kit, the first game in the series. October – Gottlieb releases Q*bert. November – Konami releases Time Pilot. Bally/Midway releases the Tron arcade game before the movie. Atari releases Gravitar which, though extraordinarily difficult, inspires a number of gravity-based home computer games. Williams Electronics releases Joust, Robotron: 2084, and the second game of the year with parallax scrolling, Irem's Moon Patrol. Robotron popularizes the twin-stick control scheme for fast action games. Data East releases BurgerTime. Taito releases Front Line, which creates the blueprint for mid-80s, vertically scrolling, commando games. Electro Sport releases Quarter Horse, the first Laserdisc video game. Kangaroo is one of the first Donkey Kong-inspired games to become popular in arcades. Gottlieb releases Reactor. Console February – Atari releases Haunted House for the 2600, which is later considered one of the first survival horror games. March – Atari's Atari 2600 version of Pac-Man hits stores. April – Activision releases Pitfall!, which goes on to sell 4 million copies. May – Atari releases Yars' Revenge. August – Overlooked arcade games are revitalized as ColecoVision launch titles, including Cosmic Avenger, Mouse Trap, Lady Bug, and Venture. October – Atari releases Swordquest: Earthworld, the first title in a planned four-game contest. December – Atari releases E.T. the Extra-Terrestrial. Written in five and a half weeks, it's one of the games that sparks the video game crash of 1983. Activision releases River Raid, Megamania, Barnstorming, Chopper Command, and Starmaster for the Atari 2600. River Raid becomes one of the all-time bestselling games for the system.Buchanan Levi Top 10 Best-Selling Atari 2600 Games https://www.ign.com/articles/2008/08/26/top-10-best-selling-atari-2600-games IGN August 26, 2008 Starpath releases Dragonstomper (the only RPG for the Atari 2600) and Escape From the Mindmaster. Parker Brothers releases Star Wars: The Empire Strikes Back for the Atari 2600, which is the first Star Wars video game. Imagic releases Demon Attack, Atlantis, Cosmic Ark, and Dragonfire for the 2600. Atlantis sells over a million copies while Demon Attack doubles that. Computer March – ASCII Corpation releases the first Japanese adventure game, Omotesandō Adventurehttps://www.gamebusiness.jp/article/2019/07/24/15991.html ビジュアルノベルはいつ成立し、そして現在に至るのか？ ストーリーゲーム研究家・福山幸司氏が解説する歴史 When Did Visual Novels First Appear and How Have They Evolved to the Present Day? Story Game Researcher Koji Fukuyama Explains Their History GameBusiness.jp IID (Japanese company) ja イード (企業) IID 24 July 2019 14 September 2026 Kasai Iwai https://web.archive.org/web/20201204162844/https://www.gamebusiness.jp/article/2019/07/24/15991.html 4 December 2020 livehttps://akiba-pc.watch.impress.co.jp/docs/column/retrosoft/1311012.html https://web.archive.org/web/20210329150607/https://akiba-pc.watch.impress.co.jp/docs/column/retrosoft/1311012.html March 29, 2021 March 30, 2021 September 14, 2026 Japanese 月刊アスキー編集部に侵入して破壊工作を行うゲーム『表参道アドベンチャー』 Jun Sasaki Impress Watch March 11 – Infocom releases their first non-Zork title, Deadline. August 24 – Ultima II: The Revenge of the Enchantress is released. November – Microsoft Flight Simulator is released for the IBM Personal Computer. It becomes a standard compatibility test for IBM PC compatibles and launches a long-running series. Big Five Software releases the widely ported Miner 2049er, a platform game with ten screens compared to the four of Donkey Kong. Broderbund releases Choplifter for the Apple II. Edu-Ware releases Prisoner 2 for the Apple II, Atari 8-bit computers, and IBM PC compatibles. Koei releases The Dragon and Princess, the earliest known Japanese RPG, for NEC's PC-8001 home computer platform.ランダム・アクセス・メモ http://www.retropc.net/fm-7/random_access_memo/04.html Oh! FM-7 September 19, 2011 4 August 4, 2001 March 22, 2012 https://web.archive.org/web/20120322151107/http://www.retropc.net/fm-7/random_access_memo/04.html dead (Translation) It is an early example of tactical turn-based combat in the RPG genre.http://blog.hardcoregaming101.net/2013/04/dark-age-of-jrpgs-dragon-princess-1982.html Dark Age of JRPGS (1): The Dragon & Princess (1982) Koei releases Night Life, the first erotic computer game (Eroge).Retro Japanese Computers: Gaming's Final Frontier, Hardcore Gaming 101, reprinted from Retro Gamer, Issue 67, 2009 The company also released the erotic title, Seduction of the Condominium Wife 団地妻の誘惑 Danchi Tsuma no Yūwaku, which was an early role-playing adventure game with color graphics,Danchizuma no Yuuwaku Legendra http://www.legendra.com/rpg/fiche-rpg_id-3276-rpg-danchizuma_no_yuuwaku.html#fichesr_33_3276 2011-03-16 https://web.archive.org/web/20110713195411/http://www.legendra.com/rpg/fiche-rpg_id-3276-rpg-danchizuma_no_yuuwaku.html#fichesr_33_3276 2011-07-13 deadDanchi-zuma no Yuuwaku GameSpot http://www.gamespot.com/fm7/rpg/danchizumanoyuuwaku/index.html 2011-03-16 owing to the eight-color palette of the PC-8001 computer. It became a hit, helping Koei become a major software company.Pesimo, Rudyard Contretas 'Asianizing' Animation in Asia: Digital Content Identity Construction Within the Animation Landscapes of Japan and Thailand Reflections on the Human Condition: Change, Conflict and Modernity—The Work of the 2004/2005 API Fellows 2007 The Nippon Foundation 124–160 https://web.archive.org/web/20110904050744/http://www.apimal.org/blogcms/media/13/File/Pesimo.pdf September 4, 2011 http://www.apimal.org/blogcms/media/13/File/Pesimo.pdf Pony Canyon releases Spy Daisakusen, another early Japanese RPG. Based on the Mission: Impossible franchise, it replaces the traditional fantasy setting with a modern espionage setting.http://blog.hardcoregaming101.net/2013/04/dark-age-of-jrpgs-2-some-games-we.html Dark Age of JRPGS (2): Some games we cannot playhttp://fm-7.com/museum/softhouse/ponyca/540200300.html Oh!FM-7：スパイ大作戦（ポニカ） November 6, 2014 November 16, 2020 https://web.archive.org/web/20201116033132/http://fm-7.com/museum/softhouse/ponyca/540200300.html dead Sir-Tech releases Wizardry II: The Knight of Diamonds, the second scenario in the Wizardry series. Sierra On-Line releases Time Zone for the Apple II. May–June 1982 Time Zone: An interview with Roberta Williams Computer Gaming World 14–15 Written and directed by Roberta Williams, the graphical adventure game shipped with 6 double-sided floppy disks and cost US$99. Synapse releases Necromancer and Shamus for the Atari 8-bit computers. Hiroyuki Imabayashi's Sokoban is released for the PC-88 and becomes an oft-cloned puzzle game concept. Datamost releases the action/adventure game Aztec for the Apple II. The Arcade Machine from Broderbund is one of the first general-purpose game creation kits. Hardware Arcade January – Sega releases the Sega Zaxxon, an arcade system board that introduces isometric graphics. September – Namco releases the Namco Pole Position, the first arcade system board to use 16-bit microprocessors, with two Zilog Z8002 processors.Defanti Thomas A. The Mass Impact of Videogame Technology Advances in Computers 1984 23 115 http://www.vasulka.org/archive/Writings/VideogameImpact.pdf#page=23 It is capable of pseudo-3D, sprite-scaling, and displays up to 3840 colors.http://mamedev.org/source/src/mame/drivers/polepos.c.html MAME | SRC/Mame/Drivers/Polepos.c 2014-11-06 dead https://web.archive.org/web/20141006074324/http://mamedev.org/source/src/mame/drivers/polepos.c.html October 6, 2014 mdy Console thumb|ColecoVision May – Emerson releases the Arcadia 2001. August – Starpath releases the Starpath Supercharger add-on for the Atari 2600 August – Coleco launches ColecoVision in North America, the first console with versions of Donkey Kong and Sega's isometric Zaxxon. November – General Consumer Electronics releases the Vectrex with built-in vector monitor. November – Atari renames the venerable Atari Video Computer System to the Atari 2600. Atari releases the Atari 5200, a console based on the hardware of Atari 8-bit computers with analog joysticks and no keyboard. Entex releases the Adventure Vision tabletop console. Computer July – Timex Sinclair releases a modified ZX81 in the US as the TS1000. It's the first sub-$100 home computer. Commodore Business Machines releases the Commodore 64 home computer, which would become one of the best-selling computers of all time. NEC releases the NEC PC-98, which would become the Japanese market leader and one of the best-selling computers of all time. It is released as the APC overseas. Sharp releases the X1. Sinclair Research releases the ZX Spectrum home computer, which would become Britain's best-selling computer.Cellan-Jones Rory The Spectrum, the Pi - and the coding backlash https://www.bbc.co.uk/news/technology-17811925 BBC News 30 June 2021 23 April 2012 Dragon Data, initially a subsidiary of Mettoy, releases the Dragon 32 home microcomputer. See also 1982 in games Notes References Category:Video games by year