1974 had new titles such as ''

Speed Race is a 1974 arcade racing video game developed and manufactured by Taito and released under the titles ''Racer'' and ''Wheels'' in North America by distributor Midway Manufacturing in 1975. Designed by Tomohiro Nishikado, the gameplay involves th ...

'', ''

Dungeon A dungeon is a room or cell in which prisoners are held, especially underground. Dungeons are generally associated with medieval castles, though their association with torture probably belongs more to the Renaissance period. An oubliette (from ...

'', ''

Gran Trak 10 ''Gran Trak 10'' is an arcade game, arcade driving video game developed by Atari, Inc., Atari through its subsidiary Cyan Engineering, and released by Atari in May 1974. In the game, a single player drives a car along a race track, viewed from a ...

'', ''

Tank A tank is an armoured fighting vehicle intended as a primary offensive weapon in front-line ground combat. Tank designs are a balance of heavy firepower, strong armour, and good battlefield mobility provided by tracks and a powerful engi ...

'' and '' TV Basketball''. The year's best-selling arcade game was ''Tank'' by

Kee Games Kee Games was an American arcade game manufacturer that released arcade and video games from 1973 to 1978. History Kee was formed by Joe Keenan, a friend and neighbor of Atari co-founder Nolan Bushnell, in September 1973. In reality, Bushnell h ...

Best-selling arcade video games in the United States

The following titles were the best-selling

arcade video game An arcade video game takes player input from its controls, processes it through electrical or computerized components, and displays output to an electronic monitor or similar display. Most arcade video games are coin-operated, housed in an arc ...

s of 1974 in the United States, according to annual arcade cabinet sales estimates provided by Ralph H. Baer.

Events

* The number of copies of ''

Pong ''Pong'' is a table tennis–themed twitch arcade sports video game, featuring simple two-dimensional graphics, manufactured by Atari and originally released in 1972. It was one of the earliest arcade video games; it was created by Allan Al ...

'' and its commercial

clones Clone or Clones or Cloning or Cloned or The Clone may refer to: Places * Clones, County Fermanagh * Clones, County Monaghan, a town in Ireland Biology * Clone (B-cell), a lymphocyte clone, the massive presence of which may indicate a pathologi ...

exceed 100,000 units. Approximately 10,000 of these units were manufactured by Atari, the original developer of ''Pong''. * H.R. "Pete" Kaufman leaves

Ramtek Ramtek is a city and municipal council in Nagpur district of Maharashtra, India. History Ramtek hosts the historic temple of Rama. It is believed that Ramtek was the place where Rama, the Hindu god, rested while he was in exile. According to H ...

to found Exidy, Inc. *

Namco was a Japanese multinational video game and entertainment company, headquartered in Ōta, Tokyo. It held several international branches, including Namco America in Santa Clara, California, Namco Europe in London, Namco Taiwan in Kaohsiung, ...

acquires the Japanese division of Atari, Inc. and formally enters the

video arcade An amusement arcade (often referred to as a video arcade, amusements or simply arcade) is a venue where people play arcade games, including arcade video games, pinball machines, electro-mechanical games, redemption games, merchandisers (such a ...

game market. * Atari acquires

as a "marketing ploy." Atari will continue to use the "Kee Games" title as a

brand name A brand is a name, term, design, symbol or any other feature that distinguishes one seller's good or service from those of other sellers. Brands are used in business, marketing, and advertising for recognition and, importantly, to create an ...

until 1978. * Royal Philips Electronics N.V. acquires

Magnavox Magnavox (Latin for "great voice", stylized as MAGNAVOX) is an American electronics company that since 1974 has been a subsidiary of the Dutch electronics corporation Philips. The predecessor to Magnavox was founded in 1911 by Edwin Pridham and ...

, which becomes "Philips Consumer Electronics."

Notable releases

Magazines

* ''

Play Meter ''Play Meter'' (initially ''Coin Industry Play Meter'') was an American trade magazine focusing on the coin-op amusement arcade industry, including jukebox and arcade game machines. It was founded in December 1974 by publisher and editor Ralph C. ...

'', the first magazine devoted to coin-operated amusements (including arcade games), publishes its first issue.

Arcade games

* February –

Taito is a Japanese company that specializes in video games, toys, arcade cabinets and game centers, based in Shinjuku, Tokyo. The company was founded by Michael Kogan in 1953 as the importing vodka, vending machines and jukeboxes into Japan. I ...

releases ''

Basketball Basketball is a team sport in which two teams, most commonly of five players each, opposing one another on a rectangular court, compete with the primary objective of shooting a basketball (approximately in diameter) through the defender's h ...

'', an early example of sprite graphics, used to represent baskets and player characters, making it the first video game with human figures. The same month, Midway licenses the game for a North American release under the title ''TV Basketball'', making it the first Japanese game licensed for North American release. * July 24 – Atari releases ''

'', the first car-

racing video game Racing games are a video game genre in which the player participates in a racing competition. They may be based on anything from real-world racing leagues to fantastical settings. They are distributed along a spectrum between more realistic rac ...

, to video arcades. * November – Taito releases Tomohiro Nishikado's ''

'', the second car-racing video game. It introduces

scrolling In computer displays, filmmaking, television production, and other kinetic displays, scrolling is sliding text, images or video across a monitor or display, vertically or horizontally. "Scrolling," as such, does not change the layout of the text ...

sprite graphics with

collision detection Collision detection is the computational problem of detecting the intersection of two or more objects. Collision detection is a classic issue of computational geometry and has applications in various computing fields, primarily in computer grap ...

,Bill Loguidice & Matt Barton (2009), ''Vintage games: an insider look at the history of Grand Theft Auto, Super Mario, and the most influential games of all time'', p. 197, Focal Press, and uses a

racing wheel A simulator racing steering wheel is a control device for use in racing video games, racing simulators, and driving simulators. They are usually packaged with a large paddle styled as a steering wheel, along with a set of pedals for accelerato ...

controller. Midway releases it as ''Wheels'' and ''Racer'' in the United States. * November 5 – Prior to their acquisition by Atari, Kee Games releases ''

'' to video arcades.

Computer games

* Steve Colley, Howard Palmer, and Greg Johnson develop ''

Maze War ''Maze'', also known as ''Maze War'', is a 3D multiplayer first-person shooter maze game originally developed in 1973 and expanded in 1974. The first version was developed by high school students Steve Colley, Greg Thompson, and Howard Palmer fo ...

'' on the

Imlac PDS-1 IMLAC Corporation was an American electronics company in Needham, Massachusetts, that manufactured graphical display systems, mainly, the PDS-1 and PDS-4, in the 1970s. The PDS-1 debuted in 1970. It was the first low-cost commercial realizatio ...

at the

NASA Ames Research Center The Ames Research Center (ARC), also known as NASA Ames, is a major NASA research center at Moffett Federal Airfield in California's Silicon Valley. It was founded in 1939 as the second National Advisory Committee for Aeronautics (NACA) labora ...

in California. It is recognized as an ancestor of the

first-person shooter First-person shooter (FPS) is a sub-genre of shooter video games centered on gun and other weapon-based combat in a first-person perspective, with the player experiencing the action through the eyes of the protagonist and controlling the p ...

genre. * Jim Bowery develops ''

Spasim ''Spasim'' is a 32-player 3D networked space flight simulation game and first-person space shooter developed by Jim Bowery for the PLATO computer network and released in March 1974. The game features four teams of eight players, each controll ...

'' for the

PLATO system Plato ( ; grc-gre, Πλάτων ; 428/427 or 424/423 – 348/347 BC) was a Greek philosopher born in Athens during the Classical period in Ancient Greece. He founded the Platonist school of thought and the Academy, the first institution ...

. Two versions are released, the first in March and the second in July. It is also recognized as an ancestor of the first-person shooter genre. * Gary Whisenhunt and Ray Wood develop '' dnd'', the first game with a

boss Boss may refer to: Occupations * Supervisor, often referred to as boss * Air boss, more formally, air officer, the person in charge of aircraft operations on an aircraft carrier * Crime boss, the head of a criminal organization * Fire boss, ...

, and arguably the first role-playing video game, for the

. Development continued into 1975; it is unclear at what point the game became playable.

Video game consoles

* Magnavox reissues the

Odyssey The ''Odyssey'' (; grc, Ὀδύσσεια, Odýsseia, ) is one of two major ancient Greek epic poems attributed to Homer. It is one of the oldest extant works of literature still widely read by modern audiences. As with the ''Iliad'', th ...

and releases it in Australia, Belgium, the United Kingdom, France,

West Germany West Germany is the colloquial term used to indicate the Federal Republic of Germany (FRG; german: Bundesrepublik Deutschland , BRD) between its formation on 23 May 1949 and the German reunification through the accession of East Germany on 3 O ...

, Greece,

Israel Israel (; he, יִשְׂרָאֵל, ; ar, إِسْرَائِيل, ), officially the State of Israel ( he, מְדִינַת יִשְׂרָאֵל, label=none, translit=Medīnat Yīsrāʾēl; ), is a country in Western Asia. It is situated ...

, Italy, Switzerland, and

Venezuela Venezuela (; ), officially the Bolivarian Republic of Venezuela ( es, link=no, República Bolivariana de Venezuela), is a country on the northern coast of South America, consisting of a continental landmass and many islands and islets in th ...

References

{{History of video games

Video games Video games, also known as computer games, are electronic games that involves interaction with a user interface or input device such as a joystick, controller, keyboard, or motion sensing device to generate visual feedback. This feedbac ...

Video games by year

Best-selling arcade video games in the United States

Events

Notable releases

Magazines

Arcade games

Computer games

Video game consoles

See also

References