Internet Archive Emulator for Atari 2600 Activision Pitfall!

As we head into the holiday season about 2 months from now, again I'm mining the digital treasure trove of the nonprofit organization Internet Archive, this time for home video game console systems and library of different games that worked with each console which first emerged in the late 1970's.

Home video game console systems continue to be produced today even if the companies selling them have changed (for example, Microsoft sells XBox consoles, and Sony sells the popular PlayStation gaming system, each in different iterations over time), plus Japan-based Nintendo continues to operate in the space, too.

Since this blog deals mainly with retro content, I won't be discussing any of the present purveyors of home video game consoles. But, I will address a few contained in the Internet Archive's Console Living Room (catch their December 2013 blog post at https://blog.archive.org/2013/12/26/a-second-christmas-morning-the-console-living-room/ for details), including companies with names like Coleco, Atari, Philips/Magnavox Odyssey 2 (the latter two were brands of the same if memory serves me correctly), and Mattel Intellivision (legal challenges from the litigious Mattel Corporation means that particular library will not be included in this collection).  Those are definitely games from my generation, and thanks to Internet Archive, even though the old hardware may now be history, their games live on -- online (FREE!), and are open to anyone with a web browser thanks to emulation.

Like the Internet Archive's Historical Software collection, its Console Living Room is in still technically in beta. Its very much a work-in-process, and new emulators are being developed all the time. At some point, we are likely to see much better cataloging of the content there, with relevant search functionality, instructions for using each game on the web, game documentation, etc. Right now, because its still in beta, most of those things are still missing.

Each home video game system console has its own history and games they were best known for. The Atari Video Computer System (or VCS) was originally released on September 11, 1977 (yes, on 9/11), but was re-named Atari 2600 in 1982.  It is credited with popularizing the use of microprocessor-based hardware and games contained on ROM cartridges. Newer home video game consoles such as Sony's PlayStation and Microsoft's XBox use CD-ROM's for games which are cheaper and easier to produce, and a very lucrative secondary market for buying and selling used games exists as of 2018, which has helped perpetuate their popularity.

In any event, while creating emulators of the original home video game consoles remains a work-in-progress, a number are there now and are working very well. Recall that while Atari (under its ownership of Warner Communications in the early 1980's) made some of its own games, many of its more popular ones were "ports" from other video game manufacturers who developed them (Atari 2600 being an under-powered system is often criticized for poor graphics and sound quality; the company's later generation machine the Atari 7800 was considered a big upgrade, and the game library here reflects those improvements), but third-party software developers quickly entered the space, and some of their games are considered among the best ever released on those game platforms.

One such company is still very much in business as a gaming company today: Activision, which began in 1978, the year after Atari released its original home video game console. Its signature game has been released, re-released, released as part of collections, and included on dozens of platforms (including phones). Yet Activision has largely resisted efforts to make the original Pitfall! game online, except on very limited occasions. That said, apparently, because Internet Archive is using open-code software in its emulator models, evidently, the company isn't fighting its effort, which is good for end-users.

For its time, Pitfall! was a revolutionary and original game. It showed video game audiences that a cartridge could let you walk, run, jump, swing, and climb. Players were given an expansive area in which they could explore while avoiding dangerous obstacles. Pitfall! also gave the player a goal to collect treasure within a specific amount of time. All of these elements were new and original in 1982, and it paved the way for future video games. On top of this, Pitfall! featured impressive graphics, animation, and a unique sound system.


Pitfall! was originally conceived and designed by David Crane while at Activision, who graduated from the De Vry School of Technology in 1972. After first working at Atari, David Crane and three of his fellow game designers left to start their own company called Activision. Before too long, David found himself designing Pitfall! at his new company. "The idea took all of ten minutes," David remarked. "It was a simple idea - a man running in a jungle. But, it spawned a genre of side-scrolling games. It was the beginning of a genre. Also, I guess people just remembered it as being neat."

Once upon a time, one website had an Adobe Shockwave player version of the game online. But most old Adobe software, while functional, tended to be bug-ridden and were banned by many IT departments because it didn't always play nice with Windows or server software.  More recently, Adobe has migrated virtually all of its software library online. Regardless, the Shockwave version of the Pitfall! game itself has since been removed from the site, but there's still (for the time being) some relevant Adobe Flash-based history there, and it has some interesting background still which can be found at http://www.langleycreations.com/pitfall/ if you're interested.

Aside from that, a few other things I felt were worth sharing here.

First, an original television Commercial for Pitfall! from Internet Archive. The quality isn't great, but its one of the few out there and is worth a look. That can be viewed below, or by visiting https://archive.org/details/Pitfall_1982_Activision.



AtariAge also has a lot of great documentation for the original Activision Pitfall! found online -- I find it a little bit cumbersome to navigate. For example, each page of the original manual is scanned as a separate jpg file. Format aside, the manual can be found at http://atariage.com/manual_thumbs.php?SoftwareLabelID=360 but is still worth a visit.

As for the relevant user details on playing the game, while the manual has most of those, some are a tiny bit different than the old Atari 2600 in a web browser-based environment (for example, most people don't have joystick controllers as the old Atari system had), and as noted, once its out of beta, we can expect Internet Archive will have this stuff cleaned up, documented and readily available. Right now, in Pitfall! parlance "It's a Jungle Out There!" so I've assembled the most relevant components here, followed by the game itself.

Instructions for Playing Pitfall! Online in an Internet Web Browser

The object of Pitfall! is to guide Harry through a maze of jungle scenes, jumping over or avoiding many deadly dangers, and helping Harry grab the most treasures in the shortest possible time.

GETTING UNDERWAY

1. Use of Keyboard Controls:

Although the following details have not (YET) been documented by Internet Archive (which one would expect once its no longer in beta format), but the following have been discovered by users and are worth sharing here.

• Ctrl - To jump
• Arrow Key Up - To move up
• Arrow Key Down - To move down
• Arrow Key Left - To move left
• Arrow Key Right - To move right
• P - To Pause Game
• C - To cycle the game from Color to Black and White

2. Scoring. You start each adventure with 2000 points. If you fall down a hole, you will lose 100 points. Rolling logs also cause point loss; how much depends on how long contact is made with them.

Finding treasure earns you points. There are eight of each type of treasure in the game, 32 in all, worth a total of 112,000 points. Collect them all without losing any points for falling down holes or tripping on logs and you'll have earned a perfect score - 114,000!

Some misfortunes will cause a deduction of points.  Should you fall down a hole by accident, you will lose 100 points.  Rolling logs will also cause point loss depending on how long contact is made with them. Each treasure you find will add points to your score.  There are eight of each type of treasure in the entire game, 32 in all, for a total of 112,000 points.  A perfect score is 114,000 points (reached by collecting all treasures. without losing any points by falling down holes or tripping on logs).

•  DIAMOND RING = 5000 POINTS
•  GOLD BAR = 4000 POINTS
•  SILVER BAR = 3000 POINTS
•  MONEY BAG = 2000 POINTS

Below is an image I took of the various "treasures" you'll likely encounter during game-play.

3. Time. You have 20 minutes to complete each adventure. Pitfall Harry begins each game with three lives (see "Perils of Pitfall" below). Game ends when time runs out or Harry loses all three lives.

PERILS OF PITFALL!

Pitfall Harry's Jungle Adventure involves great danger. Some hazards slow him down, robbing you of points; others stop him cold. The "inconvenient" hazards are open holes in the ground and rolling logs (see "Scoring" above). The "catastrophic" hazards include scorpions, fires, cobras, crocodiles, swamps, quicksand and tar pits. These obstacles will not cost you any points, but they will cost Harry one of his three lives.

STRATEGY TIPS FROM DAVID CRANE, ORIGINAL DESIGNER OF PITFALL! FOR ATARI 2600

"As you set off on your first adventure with Harry, you'll notice two important features: The logs always roll from right to left, and the 'replacement' Harrys (after Harry loses a life) drop from trees on the left side of the screen. So, to minimize the number of rolling logs to be jumped, and the catastopic hazards to be re-tried, simply run to the left.

"Pitfall Harry's trip must be made through a maze of surface and underground passages through the jungle. To capture all 32 treasures in under twenty minutes, Harry will have to use some of the underground passages. I'd suggest that you make a map of the terrain each time you play. Knowing the jungle and planning the best route to all the treasures is the only way to ensure success time after time.

"Until you get really skilled at making Harry jump from croc to croc, you might wait until the crocodiles jaws are closed, jump to the top of the first croc's head, then wait for the jaws to open and close again before jumping to the next one. Soon, you'll be skipping across crocs like they were stepping stones in a stream.

"If you find any writing materials deep in the jungle, drop me a line. I'd love to hear how you and Harry are getting along."

David Crane

As David Crane suggested about the map, several users at the AtariAge website had a dialogue about a big map for Pitfall! that had been developed by users years earlier, and one user recommended a location where the full map of the playing area for Pitfall! is still available.  Keep in mind that while the main playing area represents a single screen of the game, by going to the lower levels, you can skip several of the main screens (sometimes a dozen at a time!), although you may also give up the ability to capture some treasures above to boost your score. There are "catastrophic" hazards found at the lower levels, so beware. Then again, if you're pressed for time (the game only runs for 20 minutes), its a way of more rapidly moving through the jungle -- just beware that some underground passageways are dead ends, which would waste your time.  Because its useful reference, I'm including the complete Pitfall! jungle map below, or you can still visit it online at http://pitfallharry.tripod.com/MapRoom/PitfallMap.html if you prefer.

So, without any other boring text, below are the emulators on file with Internet Archive's Console Living Room for the Atari 2600 (which can be accessed at  https://archive.org/details/atari_2600_library if you want to check out all of the other games for that system), and the original Activision Pitfall! emulator can be found below, or by visiting https://archive.org/details/atari_2600_pitfall_1983_cce_c-813. My biggest disappointment is that when users share the emulator content, the full-screen game play is not enabled, while it is slightly better at Internet Archive's own pages. But the game itself, like my posts for the emulators of handheld games including Texas Instruments Speak & Spell and Parker Brothers Merlin: The Electronic Wizard, the game will load up on desktop computer browsers by clicking on the image below. I'm less clear how functional (if at all) those are on mobile browsers, which are often stripped-down versions of the real thing.  Still, with the stuff above, there should be enough for users to have some fun. Try not to waste too much time!

Again, I'll list the key browser controls here:

• Ctrl - To jump
• Arrow Key Up - To move up
• Arrow Key Down - To move down
• Arrow Key Left - To move left
• Arrow Key Right - To move right
• P - To Pause Game
• C - To cycle the game from Color to Black and White

Milton Bradley's Merlin:The Electronic Wizard

Since my previous post (also refer HERE for my very first post) was on the iconic Texas Instruments' Speak & Spell electronic teaching game, today I thought it might be worthwhile to post something else from the Internet Archive's Handheld History Collection (catch the original blog post for the introduction at http://blog.archive.org/2018/03/18/some-very-entertaining-plastic-emulated-at-the-archive/) that was slightly less educational, and a bit more fun.

Today, I'll be covering the original Parker Brothers' Merlin (sometimes known as Merlin, the Electronic Wizard).  Subsequent, more advanced versions of this toy, such as Master Merlin are considered different products and will not be addressed here, although some can also be found in Internet Archive's Handheld History Collection.

During the late 1970's and into the early 1980's, hand held electronic games became very popular with children of that era.  Traditional board game manufacturers were forced to enter that market with their own electronic games.  Mattel, for example, introduced its handheld electronic Football, Baseball, Basketball and Hockey to some success, before transitioning to video game system known as Intellivision that could be played from a television set.

Toy maker Milton Bradley was perhaps best known for making such low-tech board game classics such as Battleship, the dice game Yahtzee, and the checkers game Connect Four.  That company released the Simon electronic game in 1978, which was fairly late in the electronic games movement. Yet by 1980, Simon had still become that company's best-selling item.

I want to acknowledge here that both Milton Bradley and Parker Brothers both ultimately ended up as units of Rhode Island-based toy giant Hasbro, Inc. which competes aggressively with California-based Mattel for the title of the world's largest toy manufacturer.

Parker Brothers was another old-school board game manufacturer also based in Massachusetts best known as the seller of such board game classics as Monopoly, Ouija, and Clue.  Its entry into the electronic games arena began in 1978.  The original Merlin was for a time its bestselling handheld electronic game.

The play area of the game consisted of a matrix of 11 membrane, touch-responsive buttons; each button contained a red LED which each illuminated depending on the game selected for play. The array was encased in a red/maroon-colored plastic housing, bearing a slight resemblance to an overgrown touch-tone telephone.  Four game-selection and control buttons were also placed at the bottom of the unit; and a speaker took up the top section.  There was also a port for an A/C adapter (which sold separately), because it used six AA alkaline batteries.

Merlin's key point of differentiation from other hand held electronic games of that same era was that it was designed to play several different games, rather than one game exclusively.  Merlin supported six different games, some of which could be played against the computer or against another person. The games that could be selected were: Tic tac toe, Music machine, Echo which was a repeat game similar to Milton Bradley's Simon, Blackjack 13 which was a version of blackjack that functioned with only 9 digits so users would play for a maximum hand value of 13 rather than 21, Magic square which was a pattern game similar to Lights Out, and Mindbender which was supposed to be similar to the game known as Mastermind.

Each of the main keys corresponded with a number, akin to the dial pads found on a smartphone.  The numbers that correspond to each key are relevant for game play.  For example, each game in the hand held unit corresponded to numbers 1-6.  Also, in Blackjack 13, the user must keep count of their hand and the number assigned to each key are their total for their hand in the game, plus the Music machine game, the songs are programmed with a particular key representing a note in the song.

The Merlin electronic game was reportedly invented by former NASA employee Bob Doyle, his wife Holly, and brother-in-law Wendl Thomis.  The game looked kind of like an analog telephone handset such as the Western Electric Trimline touchtone model (catch my post which covered that by visiting http://hgm.sstrumello.com/2017/10/iphone-didnt-kill-landline-telephones.html for reference and a photo), which could be controlled completely from the handset (including the ability to hang-up the phone, whereas older desktop models could only be disconnected from the phone's base.

Merlin is notable as one of the earliest and most popular handheld games, selling over 5 million units during its initial run, as well as one of the most long-lived, remaining popular throughout the 1980's. A re-released version of the game was re-released by Hasbro in 2004.  It differed slightly from the original because the newer version did not feature an illuminated membrane keyboard, rather it had actual buttons which illuminated instead.  It was also slightly smaller in size than the original, and it used fewer AA batteries (four) than the original.

Manual

Its particularly useful to read the manual to understand how the game is played, which number corresponds to each game, etc.  Its only a few pages in length.  Internet Archive has a copy of the manual available for reading below, or by visiting  https://archive.org/details/manuals-handheld-games-ParkerBros-Merlin/page/n0, the text-only version can be found at https://archive.org/stream/manuals-handheld-games-ParkerBros-Merlin/ParkerBros-Merlin_djvu.txt:


Also, a downloadable copy of the original Merlin manual can be found at http://www.theelectronicwizard.com/manual.pdf.

Internet Archive has the emulator which can be played below, or by visiting https://archive.org/details/hh_merlin:

Texas Instruments' Speak & Spell

A while back, I updated a post I did about classic, handheld LED electronic games which were popular with kids in the late 1970's into the mid-1980's in a P.S. about those devices being restored as emulators by the Internet Archive (catch my post with the relevant P.S. HERE, or the Internet Archive's post documenting it HERE for more information).

I acknowledged that the non-profit organization known as the Internet Archive had recently expanded its content library to include browser-based emulators for some of the old electronic toys that kids of that era actually played with.  Those emulators function mainly on personal computers (Apple Macintosh machines are not guaranteed to be included on this list, neither are the browsers found on many mobile devices (but it did work on my Android tablet computer, but the buttons were difficult to use on the virtual device below), but nevertheless, it provides a decent method of preserving some things that might otherwise be lost to history.

Although Mattel Electronics were among the more popular handheld electronic games in terms of units sold, those are not included because the litigious toy company likely threatened legal challenges, but many of the others that were made by now-defunct companies that once dominated the space (think of firms like Coleco, Radio Shack's Tandy brand, Tomy and of course, Texas Instruments or "TI" consumer electronics).

Texas Instruments is worthy of a special mention because while the company still manufactures semiconductors and integrated circuits (at least as I write this) which power other company's products, its no longer in the consumer electronics and personal computer business (such as things like electronic calculators, toys, PC's, etc.), but for a time in the late 1970's into the mid-1980's, it was a very big player in consumer devices.  TI sold many of those businesses (those which TI was still manufacturing; it had discontinued a number of those it once made even prior to the sale) to Taiwan-based Acer in 1998.

Many children of the 1980’s probably either had one, or had a friend who owned a Speak & Spell toy from Texas Instruments. TI's Speak & Spell arguable planted the seeds of computing in the brains of small children of that era. I was a little too old (I could already spell all of the words), but I was proud that I used money earned from a paper route to buy my younger brother a second-generation Speak & Spell, which differed mainly because instead of having buttons on the device, it had a membrane touch keypad that powered its keyboard.

Below is an emulator of the 1979 version of TI's Speak & Spell, which can also be accessed by visiting https://archive.org/details/hh_snspell.  You can try using it here by pressing the image below!  Texas Instruments refers people to a particular web page for the device found HERE and which also directs users to a scanned copy of the 1980 manual for the device (in Adobe Acrobat format) HERE.

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The Speak & Spell electronic toy was probably most popular after it's prominent role in the 1982 Steven Spielberg-produced film "E.T. The Extra-Terrestrial" as one of the components the creature known as E.T. used in the communicator it built to "phone home."

The original Speak & Spell was the first of a three-part talking educational toy series that also included Speak & Read and Speak & Math. The series was a subset of TI's Learning Center product group and the Speak & Spell was released simultaneously with the Spelling B (a non-speech product designed to help children learn to spell), and the First Watch (designed to teach children to read digital and analog timepieces). The Speak & Spell was sold, with regional variations, in the United States, Canada, Australia, in Europe, and Japan.

One of the things that made Speak & Spell unique for its time was that it consisted of a linear predictive coding speech synthesizer, a keyboard, and a receptor slot to receive one of a collection of different ROM library modules (collectively covered under U.S. patent 3934233) meant to expand the library of words that a child could be quizzed on. The first Speak & Spell was introduced at the summer Consumer Electronics Show in June 1978, making it one of the earliest handheld electronic devices with a visual display to use interchangeable "game" cartridges.  Speak & Spell was named an IEEE Milestone in 2009.

Wikipedia says Speak & Spell was created by a small team of engineers led by Paul Breedlove, himself an engineer, with TI during the late 1970's. Development began in 1976 with an initial budget of $25,000, as an outgrowth of TI's research into speech synthesis. The completed proof version of the first console utilized TI's trademarked Solid State Speech technology to store full words in a solid state format similar to the manner in which calculators of the time stored numbers. Additional purchased cartridges (called expansion modules) could be inserted through the battery receptacle to provide new solid-state libraries and new games. This represented the first time an educational toy utilized speech that was not recorded on tape or phonograph record (as with Mattel's See 'n Say line or the earlier Chatty Cathy dolls).

In any event, because TI's Speak & Spell still holds a special place in the minds of people around my age because it was "gee-whiz" technology that was futuristic back in the day, I'm giving it a post in this blog.  While its somewhat crude by today's standards, it helped pave the way for the smartphones that kids of today want so badly.  We can thank Speak & Spell for opening those doors!

Preservation and Resurrection of Classic Handheld Electronic Games

Kids that grew up in the 1970s witnessed first-hand the birth of the digital revolution, and one of the first places that emerged was in our toy boxes.  While electronic toys had been around for a while (for example, Robots were probably among the first toys to require batteries, but perhaps one of the most prominent examples was the Milton-Bradley game known as "Operation" which emerged in the 1960s), electronic games sold to the masses really emerged during the 1970s.

Early electronic game iterations were, at best, pretty crude.  In the words of Peter Hirschberg, a prominent Silicon Valley personality who runs an initiative to preserve some of those early electronic games (mostly those from Mattel Electronics) on his website which he's dubbed (appropriately enough) "LEDHead" (see HERE), explains the reason for "preserving" these electronic toy relics in new formats:

"Why simulate these 20+ year old games that had, at best, only the crudest of graphics and sounds? Without an effort to preserve these memorable games, most or all of them would eventually fade into obscurity. Many already have. It is my endeavor to ensure these games are remembered into the future as the culturally significant icons I believe they represent."

Thanks at least in part to his efforts, in recent years, we've seen some of the classic Mattel handheld electronic game library that was sold from 1978 to 1980 being translated into various other operating system platforms.  For example, his own site offers free downloads for LEDhead on various iterations of Windows, PocketPC, and PalmOS handheld devices, iOS (iPhone/iPod Touch/iPad).  Indeed, his efforts to chronicle a part of toy history has inspired third-party developers to pursue the same thing, which seemed to be Mr. Hirschberg's intent all along, mainly to ensure these vestiges of the Gen X childhood didn't disappear completely.  So-called emulators exist for many early video games on PCs, but the handhelds didn't seem to hold as much appeal to developers, so Mr. Hirschberg's initiative seems to have hit an appropriate nerve.

Several nice ports of some of these early eletronic distractions we called games are already on the market, most notably from a San Diego-area (La Jolla, home to UCSD) firm called touchGrove, LLC which already markets a big part of the Mattel LED handheld games collection on iTunes, but has since ported the beststelling Football app over to Android.  The pricetags are decent, as I write this in September 2012, at just $0.99 on iTunes. although the Android version is priced at $1.99 and must be purchased from the Amazon.com App Store, not via the Google Play marketplace.  I wouldn't mind that if Amazon didn't also require the Amazon marketplace to remain on the phone in order to use the downloaded app; I consider that bloatware.  Although the port into Android is decent enough, it does require the device to be held sideways and does not automatically rotate with the device itself.

Mattel's Original Electronic Basketball

LEDHead's Mattel Electronic Basketball

Beyond Mattel Electronics' extensive collection, we must not forget its competitors.  At the time, Parker Brothers' (now part of Rhode Island-based toy conglomerate Hasbro) had a few electronic games, one of which was "Merlin: The Electronic Wizard".  Again, a full replication of that is now sold on iTunes from Tewti Development (see HERE).  Coleco was another player at the time (the company went out of business many years ago) which had a stable of electronic handheld games, but I haven't seen any preservations of those.

Finally, aside from these mobile phone ports, reproductions of the originals have since been reintroduced.  In 2009, for example, Mattel began selling lookalike versions of the originals dubbed "Mattel Classic Football/Basketball/Baseball Handheld".  That was also around the same time we saw versions of the Atari 2600 and Intellivision with about 30 games built-in marketed in small, plug-in devices for your TV.

For the record, Time magazine has dubbed the original Mattel Electronic Football as one of the greatest 100 toys (technically, #69, see HERE), writing: "Simplicity served Mattel well in this ancestor of the handheld games of today."

Some of Mattel's TV commercials for these games can be seen below, or by visiting https://goo.gl/Zpfzs4.



For the moment, these devices remain widely available in new formats, but the extent they are updated for new operating systems which have yet-to-emerge may ultimately depend on how accessible those platforms are for developers.  However, for Gen Xers wanting to return to the simple electronic handheld games of their childhoods, they remain widely available on something you're likely to be holding anyway: your smartphone.

For the record, be sure to visit Peter Hirschberg's site "LEDHead" at http://www.peterhirschberg.com/handheld/ledhead, there, you'll find some early ports of these old games as well as links to such sites as HandheldMuseum.com, both of which are worth visiting.  Keep in mind that new ports for Android may be sold via third-party marketplaces, such as the Amazon App Store, so just because you don't find it on the Google Play Market doesn't mean an app doesn't exist.

Author P.S., March 18, 2018: There was news today that Internet Archive will be offering  a new series of emulators for handheld toys and games which are designed to mimic some of gaming's more obscure artifacts — the handheld games, such as those sold by Mattel Electronics, Parker Brothers, Coleco, Tiger Electronics and others (including Texas Instruments' Speak & Spell highlighted in the film "E.T. the Extra-Terrestrial") of the sort that were highlighted in this post.  It attempts to make portable, digital versions of the LCD, VFD and LED-based machines that were sold, often cheaply, at toy stores and booths over the decades.  Aside from the archival and nostalgia value provided by the emulators themselves, this effort also documents some relevant computer coding and manufacturing detail, as well as instruction booklets that frequently accompanied the original handheld games which have long since become artifacts of history.  This is consistent with Peter Hirschberg's objective to try and preserve these relics of the past.  The collection at Internet Archive can be found at https://archive.org/details/handheldhistory.