It was like holding the future in your little 10 year old hands.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mattel_Auto_Race
Mattel Electronics Auto Race was released in 1976 by Mattel Electronics as the first handheld electronic game to use only solid-state electronics; it has no mechanical elements except the controls and on/off switch. Using hardware designed for calculators and powered by a nine-volt battery, the cars are represented by red LEDs on a playfield which covers only a small portion of the case. The audio consists of beeps. George J. Klose based the game on 1970s racing arcade video games and designed the hardware, with some hardware features added by Mark Lesser who also wrote the 512 bytes of program code.
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I had this exact one. Even back then, it guy boring really fast.
I didn’t even know these existded.
No, wait, I also had the Tomy Digital Derby Auto Raceway. It’s funny bc the only visible “digital” part of it was the light that lit up when you crashed, the rest of it is all mechanical. It was pretty fun tho, and looked cool.
I was just thinking of this one when I saw the post. Everyone who was a kid back then either had this, or knew someone who had it.
Ohhhh, actual pictures of cars! So much better!!
😀
Tandy 3-in-1 SportsArena was what I got. Wasn’t that great TBH. Killer idea, though.
I don’t remember this one but it looks fun and having those extra overlays would be cool.
From that video: “You are the brighter dot”. Lol, yes!
Yah, the creative things they came up with, using very primitive electronics was amazing. Even looking back at them now I appreciate their designs.
I had the Electronic Football game too. That one was more fun.
I had a newer version, it was black and had a “screen”. The play area was much larger and all of the controls were on the bottom. Fun game.
