page_title: Magnavox Odyssey
section_title: Development
hierarchical_section_title: Magnavox Odyssey / Development
caption_attribution_description: Accessories that were included with the Magnavox Odyssey gaming console. Released in 1972, the Magnavox Odyssey was a very simple and limited machine that was only capable of producing simple shapes on the screen. Magnavox included various games in the box that could be played with this simple setup, which included: Playing chips Colored screen overlays Game boards Various types of play cards Dice Play money 6 jumper cards
context_page_description: The Magnavox Odyssey is the first commercial home video game console. It was developed by a small team led by Ralph H. Baer at Sanders Associates and released by Magnavox in the United States in September 1972 and overseas the following year. The Odyssey consists of a white, black, and brown box which connects to a television set, and two rectangular controllers attached by wires. It is capable of displaying three square dots on the screen in monochrome black and white, with differing behavior for the dots depending on the game played, and with no sound capabilities. Players place plastic overlays on the screen to create visuals, and the one or two players for each game control their dots with the three knobs and one button on the controller in accordance with the rules given for the game. The Odyssey console came packaged with dice, paper money, and other board game paraphernalia to go along with the games, and a peripheral controller—the first video game light gun—was sold separately.
  The idea for a video game console was thought up by Baer in August 1966, and over the next three years he, along with Bill Harrison and Bill Rusch, created seven successive prototype consoles.
context_section_description: In 1951, while working for military contractor Loral Electronics, engineer Ralph H. Baer was assigned to build a television set; while doing so, Baer claims he had the idea to build something into a television set that the owner could control in addition to its normal function of receiving signals from a remote television station. Loral did not decide to pursue the idea, but it returned to Baer in August 1966 while waiting for a bus. Baer, then the head of the Equipment Design Division at military contractor Sanders Associates, came up with the concept of using a television to play games, and the next morning wrote up a four-page proposal for a US$20 "game box" that would plug into a television screen and play games on it. While the commercial video game industry did not yet exist at that point, the very first electronic computer games had been developed at the start of the 1950s, and by 1966 several early mainframe games had been developed for mainframe computers, which were typically only found in large academic or research institutions. In the proposal, Baer began by referring to the project using military terminology, but by the time he finished it he was referring to it as Channel LP, short for "let's play". The proposed device would transmit a signal that the television set could tune into as if it were a television channel, and Baer described several games that could be played on it.
  As Channel LP had little to do with the typical military contracts Sanders worked on, rather than bring the idea to his bosses Baer instead commandeered an empty room and assigned one of his technicians, Bob Tremblay, to work on it with him. By December 1966, an initial prototype later christened "TV Game #1" was completed, which could display and move a vertical line on a television screen. Baer demonstrated the prototype to the Sanders director of research and development, Herbert Campman, who hesitantly agreed to fund it for US$2,000 of labor and US$500 for materials, making it an official project.
  Baer spent the next few months designing further prototypes, and in February 1967, assigned technician Bill Harrison to begin building the project. Harrison spent the next few months in between other projects building out successive modifications to the prototype. Baer, meanwhile, collaborated with engineer Bill Rusch on the design of the console, including developing the basis of many games for the system. The first game was developed by May, a two-player game where the players repeatedly press a button in competition to fill or empty a bucket of water, and by June multiple games were completed for what was then a second prototype box. These included a game where players controlled dots chasing each other and a light gun shooter game with a plastic rifle. Baer demonstrated the new prototype to Campman, who enjoyed the shooting game, increased funding, and recommended Baer demonstrate the project to senior management. Baer demonstrated the console to the board, who were largely uninterested, though a couple of members were enthusiastic; nevertheless, CEO Royden Sanders authorized the project to be continued with the aim of selling or licensing the console as a commercial product.
  By August 1967, Baer and Harrison completed a more focused prototype machine with fewer components, but found that to even come near to Baer's initial aim of a US$25 (equivalent to about $192 in 2019) console would require so much to be excluded that the resulting product would not be very enjoyable. Baer additionally felt that he was not proving successful at designing fun games for the system; to make up for this he formally added Bill Rusch, who had helped him come up with the initial games for the console, to the project. Though the pair found Rusch difficult to work with, he soon proved his value to the team by coming up with a way to display three spots on the screen at once rather than the previous two, and proposing the development of a ping pong game. By November, the team, now on their fourth prototype machine, had a ping pong game, a chasing game, a l
caption: The Odyssey was packaged with board game accessories like dice and play money, as well as game cards.
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