Happy Birthday Home Video Games!
Home video games turn 45 this week. That’s right, on August 31, 1966, Ralph Baer originated the idea of playing a video game on a television. An electrical engineer and employee of defense contractor Sanders Associates, Inc., Ralph had toyed with the idea of using a television to play some sort of game before, but, now, the thoughts crystallized into a definite concept.
As Ralph records in his memoir, Videogames in the Beginning:
During a business trip for Sanders to New York City in 1966 I found myself waiting for another Sanders engineer at a bus terminal; he was going to join me for a meeting with a client. I took advantage of my free time and jotted down some notes on the subject of using ordinary home TV sets for the purpose of playing games. I have a distinct image in my mind of sitting on a cement step outside the bus terminal, enjoying a nice warm, sunny summer day, occasionally looking out at the passing traffic, waiting for my associate to show up and scribbling notes on a small pad. It was “Eureka” time.
The following day, Ralph returned to his office in New Hampshire and wrote four pages of notes. These documents, the Ur-text of home video games, not only documented Ralph’s invention and explained many of the technical requirements for the game, but they also forecasted the basic classes of games: action games, board games (based on skill and chance), artistic games, instructional games, card games, and sports games. In clear, concise language, Ralph presciently charted out many of the main lines of video game evolution.
Over the next six years, Ralph labored to turn his idea into a commercial reality—the Magnavox Odyssey—which hit store shelves and entered people’s homes in 1972. You can watch an online video of him playing his Brown Box prototype in 1969. Or better yet, you can visit ICHEG’s eGameRevolution exhibit here at The Strong’s National Museum of Play and play a version of the Brown Box that Ralph made for the museum. 
Television video games have grown and matured in the last 45 years, but it’s always fun to celebrate a birthday. I’m not recommending you go so far as to sing “Happy Birthday” to your PS3, Wii, or Xbox360, but it’s good to remember that sunny summer day in New York in 1966 when Ralph first dreamed up the concept of television video games.
I’m amused by all the words that seem extraneous (*television* video games, “playing video games on a television”) necessary to maintain Baer’s significance. Since we long ago disposed of his definition of a “video game” (which *only* involved hooking up to a television), now including computer games, portable games, etc., his contribution becomes less important, since video games (as we now know them) existed long before he “invented” them.
David, I agree that the multifaceted nature of video games means that many people contributed to their development, which is why I used specific terms like “television games.” As you point out, video games like Spacewar were created earlier on computers (not to mention Tennis for Two and earlier computer, non-video games such as Noughts and Crosses). One reason we use the term “electronic games” at ICHEG instead of “video games” is because the history of the medium is so rich. Many people contributed to the development of video games!
That being the case, however, doesn’t diminish, I believe, the important role Ralph Baer had. Playing a video game on a television presented many unique engineering challenges (compared to playing on a computer) that he had to overcome, and his ability to not only come up with the idea but create a commercial product is noteworthy. So his efforts are worth celebrating and remembering, along with those of other key contributors to the development of early electronic games.
I’m glad someone noticed this. however, the date was actually September 1, 1966, not August 31. I visited Ralph on September 3, and was upset because I missed the ‘anniversary’ by 2 days.
Leonard,
Thanks for noting the September 1st date. That’s the date when Ralph returned to his office after the New York trip and wrote down his ideas (the document I talked about in his blog) — I happened to be writing the blog originally at the end of August and so I decided to emphasize the original inspiration moment in New York. I think either day is fine to celebrate!
Blog readers, if you want a good overview of these early days of video games check out Leonard’s Phoenix: The Fall & Rise of Videogames.