Did you know the Videogame industry almost collapsed into nothingness?

The 1983 videogame crash was brought about by several combined factors and led to the second generation of consoles and games dying out and the market struggling for 2 years to get back on its feet, forcing many game companies into bankruptcy.

The problem was that the industry had exploded over the previous decade or so and the market was oversaturated with consoles and games….and given that there was of no internet to look up game reviews and the fact that almost anyone could publish a game for many of the systems available, there was no way to tell what kind of game you were getting until you had already paid for it…leading to a a lack of trust in the industry.

To illustrate my point….here is a list of every game console I could find that was released in just 1982-1983 (Worldwide Releases).

You’ll notice a lot of similar models published by different companies….this was also a major problem as companies would sell of the designs off their systems to many different manufacturers to make virtually the same thing.

• Atari 800 XL
• Atari 1200 XL
• Atari 5200
• Cabel Universal Game Computer
• CGE Vectrex
• Coleco Colecovision
• Coleco Gemini
• Commodore 64
• Emerson Arcadia 2001
• Hanimex HMG 2650
• Hanimex SD-070 Couleur
• Intervision 2001 Home Video Center
• Intervision 3001 Home Video Center
• Leisure Dynamics Leisurevision
• Milton Bradley Vectrex
• Miragama GMC 802
• NEC PC 8001 MK 2
• Ormatu Electric BV Video Spielcomputer 2001
• Poppy 9017 Colour TV Game
• Schmid TVG 2000
• SHG Black Point FS-1003
• Sinclair ZX Spectrum
• Sony SMC 70
• Timex Sincalir 1000
• Acorn Electron
• Adivision Home Arcade
• Apple IIe
• Atari 1400XL
• Bandai Gundam RX-78
• Bentley Compu-Vision
• Brandt Electronique Jopac J07400
• Casio PV-1000
• Casio PV-2000
• Coleco Adam Family Computer
• Commodore Educator 64
• Continental Edison-Saba Jopac J01450
• DMS Telesports Mini
• Gakken Compact Vision Tv-Boy
• Hanimex HMG 7900
• IBM PC XT 1560
• Intellivision II
• ITMC SD 290
• Joueclub SD 290
• Mattel Electronics Aquarius
• Nintendo Famicom
• Phillips Videopac G7200
• Phillips Videopac +G7400
• Polycon PG-7
• Rollet Videocolor
• Sega SC-3000
• Sega SG-1000
• Sony MSX
• Sony SMC 777
• Soundic SD 290
• Soundic Soundicvision SD 200
• Timex Sinclair 1500

As a collector, I have in my possession an add-on for a Colecovision that allows it to play Atari 2600 games…this would be like Microsoft bringing out an add-on for the Xbox that played Playstation games….can anyone say lawsuit!….but back then, the laws were not what they are today.

Only 2 brands would really recover from the crash – Sega and Nintendo (Nintendo releasing the NES and Sega releasing the Mastersystem). Atari would release more consoles, but they would all be commercial failures…Sony would remerged with the Playstation…Sega would switch to Software only after the Dreamcast and Microsoft would start with the Xbox. And we are now left with 3 console manufacturers – Sony, Nintendo and Microsoft (4 if you count Apple’s iPhone).

With dozens of games coming out each month, some people believe we are heading for another crash in the next few years…I disagree….with the advent of the internet, people are able to see reviews/gameplay of games before they make their purchase, leading to better decisions.

ET for the Atari 2600 is a game singled out for causing much of the crash (although there were many other factors involved) and has often been called the worst video game of all time – If you are interested why – click here (Source: Wikipedia)

The link below has a 20+ minute video showing over 450 consoles released over the last 30+ years:
The Insane History Of Videogames 2.0

You can read more on the Videogame Crash of 1983 here
(Source: Wikipedia)

*Image from the Videogameconsolelibrary

Chris Thursfield