History of Consoles Baseball Games.

Part 1 - History of Console Baseball Games

This will look at the first 8 games on 2nd Generation game consoles - primitive baseball games produced between 1978-1988.  Most of these games I have in my collections (minus the Intellivision and Coleco)

In the begging there were two home console baseball games released in 1978.

Atari Home Run gave you a choice of one or three players on the field at a time
that could not move independently. The play was not great and players could not
throw to each other.

Odyssey2 had the home run between the two games.  Baseball! had better game play and the
effort to actually place 9 players on the field.  Oddly, the the out fields moved together,
but the other players were independent. At the moment, Odyssey would have the best, but would never have another baseball game for the system.


"Home Run" on Atari 2600 - 1978


"Baseball!" on Odyssey² - 1978

Next Mattel released Major League Baseball in 1980 for Intellivision.  It just blew away
Magnavox Odyssey2's Baseball! and not even in the same planetary system as
Atari's Home Run.  The game had an actual baseball diamond.  Out fielders
moved independently.


"Major League Baseball" - Intellivision - 1980

Then Mattel came back in 1982 and created a baseball game that truly resembled baseball
with Super Challenge Baseball for the Atari 2600. This was a huge improvement for the Atari system.


"Super Challenge Baseball" for the Atari 2600 - 1982

Not to be out done, Atari released Realsports Baseball 1983.
Much, much better than their first attempt, but you might want to play with the sound off.

Still, Mattel's version the year before is better


"Realsports Baseball" on Atari 2600 - 1983



Mattel wanted to take baseball games to the next level from just the
traditional overhead vew.

"World Series Major League Baseball" Intellivision - 1983

Then came the next step, a baseball game with multi-view with Colecovision's baseball games

"Super Action Baseball" Colecovision - 1983

With Atari's last attempt with the 2600, they got the sound to be tolerable.  Sounds much
like Intellivision's.  Players no longer have multi-color clothes, but the animation is a bit
better.


"Super Baseball" on Atari 2600 - 1988