January 1981

Jan 28, 2021

Nintendo opens its first offices in New York
Commodore introduces the VIC 20
and
Adventure gets reviewed

These stories and many more on this episode of the Video Game Newsroom Time Machine

This episode we will look back at the biggest stories in and around the video game industry in January of 1981.
As always, we'll mostly be using magazine cover dates, and those are of course always a bit behind the actual events.

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Links:
Corrections:
https://books.google.de/books?id=sy8EAAAAMBAJ&pg=PA152&lpg=PA152&dq=gene+lipkin&source=bl&ots=R4C2CM7gzm&sig=ACfU3U2ETkAXNpGOsq2ypyp8gFO8lM6nGA&hl=en&sa=X&ved=2ahUKEwjVqceun7btAhWGCuwKHQ53AwMQ6AEwD3oECBIQAg#v=onepage&q=gene%20lipkin&f=false

1981:
Nintendo of America opens its first offices
Vending Times, January 1981, pg. 40
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Doug_Bowser

Atari debuts Warlords and Red Baron
https://www.mobygames.com/game/warlords_
https://www.mobygames.com/game/red-baron____
https://archive.org/details/Atari_Coin_Connection_Volume_5_Number_1_January_1981
https://www.patreon.com/posts/36710924

Commodore introduces the Vic20
https://archive.org/details/CreativeComputingbetterScan198101/page/n25/mode/1up
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Commodore_VIC-20
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Atari_8-bit_family
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Texas_Instruments_TI-99/4A

Chris Crawford explains sprites on the Atari 8 bits
https://archive.org/details/1981-01-compute-magazine/page/n67/mode/1up
https://www.mobygames.com/game/star-raiders
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Chris_Crawford_(game_designer)
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jay_Miner
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3_VDM8nC9sM
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=jN49G3RwSQs
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Game_Developers_Conference

Akalabeth reviewed
https://archive.org/details/softalkv1n05jan1981/page/17/mode/1up
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Akalabeth:_World_of_Doom
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=hTG3KRGJAjk
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=yINb5Huh0C4

Adventure reviewed
Video January 1981, pg. 28
https://www.mobygames.com/game/adventure
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Adventure_(1980_video_game)
http://podcast.theycreateworlds.com/e/the-100-most-influential-games-part-1/

Record sales slipping
Forbes, January 5, 1981, pg. 227

Recommended Links:
The History of How We Play: https://thehistoryofhowweplay.wordpress.com/
Gaming Alexandria: https://www.gamingalexandria.com/wp/
They Create Worlds: https://tcwpodcast.podbean.com/
Digital Antiquarian: https://www.filfre.net/
The Arcade Blogger: https://arcadeblogger.com/
Retro Asylum: http://retroasylum.com/category/all-posts/
Retro Game Squad: http://retrogamesquad.libsyn.com/

Sound Effects by Ethan Johnson of History of How We Play and Enzo Maida.