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April 25, 1980: Activision Formed

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Activision is Founded
April 25, 1980: Activision Fantastic Four comes together

1980 – Activision was technically founded in 1979, but it wasn’t until April 25 that the “Fantastic Four” joined up as the first third-party software company for video games. David Crane and Alan Miller left Atari August 1979 to start programming under the Activision name. Larry Kaplan and Bob Whitehead stayed behind until April 25th when Activision came out. Richard Muchmore was the venture capitalist and Jim Levy rounded the group as Activision’s CEO.

Full Day in Tech History podcast show notes for April 25

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  • Sun Microsystems announces project JXTA
  • XP x64 OS
  • Yahoo begins the national TV ad campaign
Playstation 2

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March 4, 2000: Sony Playstation 2

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Playstation 2
Playstation 2

2000 – The Playstation 2 was released in Japan to rival Sega’s Dreamcast system and Nintendo Game Cube. The Playstation 2 had an “Emotion Engine” processor at 294 MHz (later 299 MHz with 128 bit capabilities), 32 MB RAMBUS memory, Graphics synth at 147 MHz, USB 1.1, Ethernet connection and 2 memory card slots which could accept up to 8 MB cards.

The Sony Playstation 2 didn’t hit the US market until October, 2000. Some say PS2 caused Dreamcast to falter and eventually close down. Many believed this was because the PS2 was backwards compatible with games from the original Playstation.

Sony’s game console sat unopposed for 6 months after Dreamcast stopped production. That is, until Nintendo released the Game Cube and Microsoft released XBox.

Wikazine – Full show notes for March 4

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  • The first Cray-1 Supercomputer is shipped
  • The World Wide Web goes online (in primitave form)
  • Sony releases the Playstation 2 in Japan

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February 23, 1998: JTS Sells Atari to Hasbro

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Hasbro Interactive
Hasbro Interactive

1998 – After a merger with JTS (Jugi Tandon Storage) in 1996, Atari couldn’t keep afloat. Their new Jaguar gaming system was not selling and losses were mounting. Therefore, JTS sold all Atari intellectual properties to Hasbro Interactive for $5 million.

The only item not sold was the Atari name, for that was owned by THQ.

Hasbro held the rights until 2001 when they sold Hasbro Interactive (and all assets) to Infogrames. Hasbro bought back Atari in 2005 for $65 million. This included games like Dungeons and Dragons, Monopoly, Scrabble, Battleship, the Game of Life, Clue, Risk, Candyland and many other games.

JTS eventually went bankrupt.

Wikazine – Full show notes for February 23

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  • Texas Instruments recalls the TI-99/4a for a short in the system
  • Comcast OnDemand is launched
The Legend of Zelda

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February 21, 1986: The Legend of Zelda

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The Legend of Zelda
The Legend of Zelda

1986 – The 3rd person action adventure game The Legend of Zelda was released by Nintendo for the Famicon in Japan. There, it was known as “The Hyrule Fantasy: The Legend of Zelda”. Hyrule was the fantasy land the game took place in. In the game, Link was given tasks in ultimate goal to rescue Princess Zelda from Ganon.

The game took up the full 128 KB ROM. Passwords had to be written to Famicon’s disk drive. Something that the NES did not have.

The game wasn’t released to the US until August 22, 1987. Nintendo had doubts this game would be well received in the US, therefore they made a gold cartridge casing and had a corner of the box cut away so people could see it. But it was the game that won people’s hearts as by 1988 the Legend of Zelda sold 2 million copies.

Wikazine – Full show notes for February 21

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  • Empire Strikes Back – Special Edition
  • IBM Sues Eagle Computer
  • iMac Special Edition released
Phantom Console

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May 16, 2006: Phantom Console Pump and Dump Scheme

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Phantom Console
May 16, 2006: Phantom Console called a “Pump and dump” scheme

2006 – Phantom Entertainment former CEO Timothy Roberts was accused of running a Pump and dump scheme on the Phantom console – a Game system that never came to market. In 2004, he hired a promoter to send faxes stating the Phantom system would ship January 2005. Of course that drove up stock prices in which investors could profit on, including Roberts and the promoter (who got 4 million shares of restricted stock)

Full Day in Tech History podcast show notes for May 15

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  • Spaghetti-O’s are introduced
  • Sugar Labs extends Sugar OS to EeePC
  • OS X Tiger vs. Tiger Direct ruling.
K.C. Munchkin

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March 3, 1982: Pac-Man vs. K.C. Munchkin for Odyssey2

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K.C. Munchkin
March 3rd, 1982 K.C. Munchkin was deemed too much like Pac-Man

1982 – a popular game for the Odyssey2 system was called K.C. Munchkin. However, this game looked a little too much like Pac-Man. A Federal court in Chicago, IL. agreed. They ordered Philips Consumer Electronics to take the game off store shelves. A sequal was released called Crazy Chase, which was a game that mocked the legal battle of the Pac-Mac – K.C. Munchkin. Of course that game was very close to Centipede, which could have caused a new legal issue altogether.

Wikazine – Full show notes for March 3

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  • Unix Timestamp hits 9 decimal places
  • Rodney King beating caught on tape
  • Gibson vs. Guitar Hero case thrown out
Tetris - spectrum holobyte

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January 29, 1988: Tetris Enters United States

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Tetris - spectrum holobyte
January 29, 1988: Tetris – spectrum holobyte

1988 – Spectrum Holobyte releases the puzzle game Tetris for the Commodore 64 and IBM PC. This was the first game imported from the Soviet Union. The game was written by Alexi Paszitnov and Vagim Gerasimov at the Computer Center of the USSR Academy of Sciences in Moscow. The Commodore 64 version would cost you $24.95, and the IBM version cost $34.95.

Wikazine – Full show notes for January 29

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  • Microsoft releases Word 3.0 for Mac
  • Best Buy announces they will stop selling Macintosh
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Magnovox Odyssey

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January 27, 1972: Magnavox Odyssey Production Begins

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Magnovox Odyssey
Magnovox Odyssey

1972 – Magnavox begins the production of the Odyssey Video game system. The final release date was not until May. It was a very primitive system with no processors and the cartridges are jumpered configurations. The system will be on the market for a year before being discontinued.

Wikazine – Full show notes for January 27

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In Wisconsin, friends are called "Sconnies". Even if you're not from Wisconsin, you can be part of the Sconnie Geek Nation through my coverage! By pledging, you join the Geek Sconnie Nation! Plus, you help me cover costs so I can continue the coverage of Gadget tech, music tech, and geek culture through the shows.

  • MIT vs. David LaMaccia
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