Video Olympics
Video Olympics is a video game programmed by Joe Decuir for the Atari 2600.[1] It is one of the nine 2600 launch titles Atari, Inc. published when the 2600 system was released in September 1977. The cartridge is a collection of games from Atari's popular arcade Pong series. A similar collection in arcade machine form called Tournament Table was published by Atari in 1978.[2]
Video Olympics | |
---|---|
![]() | |
Developer(s) | Atari, Inc. |
Publisher(s) | Atari, Inc. |
Designer(s) | Joe Decuir[1] |
Platform(s) | Atari 2600 |
Release |
|
Genre(s) | Sports |
Mode(s) | Single-player, multiplayer |
Video Olympics was rebranded by Sears as Pong Sports.
Gameplay
The games are a collection of bat-and-ball style games, including several previously released by Atari, Inc. as arcade games. The games use the Video Computer System's paddle controllers,[3] and are for one to four players (three or four players requires a second set of paddles).
Games

Video Olympics includes 50 games and variations:[4]: 30
- Pong - The classic table tennis simulation.[5]: 42
- Super Pong - A Pong variation where each player has two paddles.[5]: 42
- Robot Pong - A solitaire Pong variation.[5]: 42
- Pong Doubles
- Quadrapong - A four-player, four-wall Pong variation.[5]: 42
- Foozpong - Based on Foozball, this Pong variant has the players control a vertical three-paddle column.[5]: 42
- Soccer[6]
- Handball - A handball simulation.[5]: 42
- Ice hockey
- Hockey III - An ice hockey simulation where players can catch and shoot the puck at the opposing goal.[5]: 42
- Basketball - A basketball simulation.[5]: 42
- Volleyball - A volleyball simulation where the traditional (Pong-style) left-right volley is swapped for a top-bottom volley. Players can volley or spike.[5]: 42
Reception
The cartridge and its individual games were reviewed twice in Video magazine. In the Winter 1979 issue of Video, the cartridge was reviewed as part of a general review of the Atari VCS where it received a review score of 8.5 out of 10, and its constituent games were characterized as "old standbys" but "still lots of fun".[4]: 33 A more thorough review appeared in Video's "Arcade Alley" column in the Summer 1979 issue where the release was generally praised for "tak[ing] Atari's Pong concept and explor[ing] it to the limit." Individual games were singled out as well, with praise for Volleyball and Robot Pong (described as "astonishingly good"), and criticism for Handball (for its use of a visually disturbing blinking paddle rather than an absent paddle to indicate inactive players), and Basketball (described as primitive compared to Atari's own 1978 version of Basketball).[5]: 42
See also
References
- Hague, James. "The Giant List of Classic Game Programmers".
- Tournament Table at the Killer List of Videogames
- "AtariAge - Atari 2600 Manuals (HTML) - Video Olympics (Atari)".
- Kaplan, Deeny, ed. (Winter 1979). "VideoTest Report Number 18: Atari Video Computer". Video. Reese Communications. 1 (5): 30–34. ISSN 0147-8907.
- Kunkel, Bill; Laney, Frank T. II (Summer 1979). "Arcade Alley: Atari Video Computer System". Video. Reese Communications. 2 (3): 42, 43, and 66. ISSN 0147-8907.
- "Creative Computing (Better Scan) 1978 07". July 1978.