--- title: Philips Videopac C52 categories: - Consoles params: name: Videopac C52 image: /media/museum/photos/philips_c52_r-side_s.jpg logo: /media/museum/logos/philips_videopac-c52_logo.gif company: /companies/philips company_name: Philips tabs: - photos - adverts - hardware - software - emulators - links photos: - title: C52 - FRONT subtitle: '' text: '' image: /media/museum/photos/philips_c52_front.jpg - title: LEFT SIDE subtitle: '' text: '' image: /media/museum/photos/philips_c52_l-side.jpg - title: RIGHT SIDE subtitle: '' text: '' image: /media/museum/photos/philips_c52_r-side.jpg - title: 'RIGHT SIDE #2' subtitle: '' text: '' image: /media/museum/photos/philips_c52_r-side_2.jpg - title: REAR subtitle: '' text: Two controller connectors, and external power supply input. image: /media/museum/photos/philips_c52_rear.jpg - title: FLAT MEMBRANE KEYBOARD subtitle: '' text: '' image: /media/museum/photos/philips_c52_keyboard.jpg - title: KEYBOARD DETAIL subtitle: '' text: '' image: /media/museum/photos/philips_c52_keyboard_zoom.jpg - title: POWER SWITCH subtitle: '' text: This power switch (push button in fact) is only seen on C52/01 & 02 models. Later versions of the C52 has no power switch at all ! You just plugged the power cord to turn the system on (for cost reduction sake). image: /media/museum/photos/philips_c52_powerswitch.jpg - title: CHANNEL SELECT SWITCH subtitle: '' text: '' image: /media/museum/photos/philips_c52_channel-select.jpg - title: CHANNEL SELECT subtitle: '' text: Initial placement ? image: /media/museum/photos/philips_c52_channel-select_hole.jpg - title: CARTRIDGE INSERTED subtitle: '' text: '' image: /media/museum/photos/philips_c52_detail.jpg - title: JOYSTICK subtitle: '' text: 8-directions self-centering joystick + one fire button. Extremly robust controller ! image: /media/museum/photos/philips_c52_joystick.jpg - title: BOX subtitle: '' text: '' image: /media/museum/photos/philips_c52_box.jpg - title: 'BOX #2' subtitle: '' text: '' image: /media/museum/photos/philips_c52_box_2.jpg - title: TOP VIEW subtitle: '' text: '' image: /media/museum/photos/philips_c52_box_3.jpg - title: OPENED subtitle: '' text: '' image: /media/museum/photos/philips_c52_box_4.jpg adverts: - title: FRENCH ADVERT (DEC.1980) subtitle: '' text: '' image: /media/museum/pubs/philips_videopac-c52_pub_2.jpg - title: FRENCH ADVERT (DEC.1981) subtitle: '' text: '' image: /media/museum/pubs/philips_videopac-c52_pub_3.jpg - title: FRENCH ADVERT (JAN. 1983) subtitle: '' text: '' image: /media/museum/pubs/philips_c52_pub_1s.jpg - title: PROMOTIONAL PICTURE subtitle: '' text: Happy family playing "La quête des anneaux" (Quest for the rings) image: /media/museum/pubs/philips_videopac-c52_prm_1.jpg - title: BROCHURE subtitle: '' text: 'This french brochure presented games from #1 to #43' image: /media/museum/pubs/philips_videopac-c52_brochure_1.jpg hardware: - title: VOCAL SYNTHESIZER subtitle: '' text: |- Extract from [The Odyssey² Homepage](http://www.classicgaming.com/o2home/index.asp) : The Voice of Odyssey² was released in 1982, and allows the console to emit realistic voices and sound effects. It is silver, the same color as the console, and fits snugly into the cartridge port. Once installed, an Odyssey² with a Voice looks like a single unit, not two things hooked together. The Voice has a self-contained speaker (the voices do not come out of the television), with a volume control. Regular cartridges will play normally through the Voice unit. Voice modules are uncommon, and every Odyssey² collector wants one, making them somewhat valuable. There is no European version of The Voice. In Brazil, a Voice module was announced but never released (see below). image: /media/museum/hardware/magnavox_odyssey2_thevoice_1.jpg - title: MOUNTED ON THE SYSTEM subtitle: '' text: '' image: /media/museum/hardware/magnavox_odyssey2_thevoice_mounted.jpg screenshots: - title: BOX ART subtitle: '' text: '' image: /media/museum/software/philips_videopac-c52_g01_box.jpg - title: RACE subtitle: Screenshot text: '' image: /media/museum/software/philips_videopac-c52_g01_1.gif - title: SPIN-OUT subtitle: Screenshot text: '' image: /media/museum/software/philips_videopac-c52_g01_2.gif - title: CRYPTOGRAM subtitle: Screenshot text: '' image: /media/museum/software/philips_videopac-c52_g01_3.gif - title: BOX ART subtitle: '' text: '' image: /media/museum/software/philips_videopac-c52_g02_box.jpg - title: PAIRS subtitle: Screenshot text: '' image: /media/museum/software/philips_videopac-c52_g02_1.gif - title: SPACE RENDEZ-VOUS subtitle: Screenshot text: '' image: /media/museum/software/philips_videopac-c52_g02_2.gif - title: LOGIC subtitle: Screenshot text: '' image: /media/museum/software/philips_videopac-c52_g02_3.gif - title: BOX ART subtitle: '' text: '' image: /media/museum/software/philips_videopac-c52_g03_box.jpg - title: BOX ART subtitle: '' text: '' image: /media/museum/software/philips_videopac-c52_g04_box.jpg - title: BOX ART subtitle: '' text: '' image: /media/museum/software/philips_videopac-c52_g06_box.jpg - title: BOX ART subtitle: '' text: '' image: /media/museum/software/philips_videopac-c52_g07_box.jpg - title: BOX ART subtitle: '' text: '' image: /media/museum/software/philips_videopac-c52_g09_box.jpg - title: BOX ART subtitle: '' text: '' image: /media/museum/software/philips_videopac_cart-10_box.jpg - title: BOX ART subtitle: '' text: '' image: /media/museum/software/philips_videopac_cart-11_box.jpg - title: BOX ART subtitle: '' text: '' image: /media/museum/software/philips_videopac_cart-12_box.jpg - title: BOX ART subtitle: '' text: '' image: /media/museum/software/philips_videopac_cart-13_box.jpg - title: BOX ART subtitle: '' text: '' image: /media/museum/software/philips_videopac_cart-14_box.jpg - title: BOX ART subtitle: '' text: '' image: /media/museum/software/philips_videopac_cart-15_box.jpg - title: BOX ART subtitle: '' text: '' image: /media/museum/software/philips_videopac_cart-16_box.jpg - title: BOX ART subtitle: '' text: '' image: /media/museum/software/philips_videopac-c52_g37_box.jpg - title: BOX ART subtitle: '' text: '' image: /media/museum/software/philips_videopac-c52_g38_box.jpg - title: BOX ART subtitle: '' text: '' image: /media/museum/software/philips_videopac-c52_g39_box.jpg - title: BOX ART subtitle: '' text: '' image: /media/museum/software/philips_videopac-c52_g40_box.jpg - title: BOX ART subtitle: '' text: '' image: /media/museum/software/philips_videopac-c52_g43_box.jpg - title: BOX ART subtitle: '' text: '' image: /media/museum/software/philips_videopac-c52_g44_box.jpg emulators: - title: Odyssey² Home Page - Emulation Ressource url: http://www.classicgaming.com/o2home/media/emulation.asp platform: Other platform text: This excellent Odyssey² website has a very detailed page about Videopac/Odyssey² emulation - title: M.E.S.S. url: http://www.mess.org platform: Multiplatform text: MESS can emulate the Odyssey² - title: O2EM url: http://o2em.sourceforge.net/ platform: Multiplatform text: Excellent emulator which can play Odyssey²/Videopac as well as Videopac+ games ! links: - title: Classic Consoles Center url: http://dieterkoenig.at/ccc/ text: Excellent site with a lot of interesting info. Very complete Videopac software page too. - title: Odyssey 2000 url: http://www.geocities.com/Hollywood/Hills/3226/ody2000.html text: Brazilian website dedicated to videopac, with brazilian box art scans - title: Odyssey² FAQ url: http://www.digitpress.com/faq/odyssey2.txt text: Interesting info - title: Odyssey² Home Page url: http://www.the-nextlevel.com/odyssey2/ text: Best Odyssey²/Videopac website ! Everything you wanted to know / see is here ! - title: Retro Gaming url: http://home.wanadoo.nl/naninck/retro/index2.htm text: This site explains how to replace your faulty Videopac power switch ! - title: www.videopac.org url: http://www.videopac.org/ text: Excellent site ! Everything Videopac is here ! comments: - author: Andres Serrano-Jordan (Spain) date: Saturday 21st March 2015 text: You don''t mention there was a C7420 BASIC module released that allowed you to save your programs to cassette. - author: Frederic (France) date: Tuesday 19th June 2012 text: |- There was something interesting with this machine : There were almost no "licenced" (by this I mean official port of famous game) games, but instead they were variations around the concepts, sometimes adding to the original.\ By example, in the Pacman-like game the ghosts home portal was moving, and there was a level editor $ in the Space-Invaders-like game ($22) when your ship was destroyed you could trade shelters for a new ship $ the Asteroid-like game had an interesting shield-or-shoot gameplay...\ Some other games had very funny animations (catapult). - author: samantha podewski (germany) date: Friday 16th July 2010 text: |- thanks for being a little bit in the past with this site.\ the videopac g7000 was my first console...... - author: andree (Sweden) date: Monday 9th October 2006 text: |- Wow, great website. Myself started of as a 6 year old with the Philips Videopac C52. That was 23 years ago..... Amazing how stuff like this can bring sweet memories back to life. related: - /museum/brandt-electronique-ordinateur-de-jeu-jo7400-jopac - /museum/continental-edison-saba-ordinateur-video-jeu-jo-1450-jopac - /museum/magnavox-odyssey2 - /museum/philips-videopac-g7000 - /museum/philips-videopac-g7200 - /museum/siera-g7000 oc_id: 1060 source: url: https://web.archive.org/web/20230603211018/http://www.old-computers.com/museum/computer.asp?c=1060 date: '2023-06-03' --- Magnavox (which merged with Philips in 1974) released the [Odyssey²](/museum/magnavox-odyssey2/) in 1978 to compete with brand new cartridge based video game systems like the [Atari VCS](/museum/atari-vcs-2600/), [RCA Studio II](/museum/rca-studio-ii/) or [Fair-Child Electronics Channel-F](/museum/fairchild-channel-f/). The Videopac C52 is the french version of the [Magnavox Odyssey²](/museum/magnavox-odyssey2/). It was sold by Philips and was only available in France. The same system was sold in the rest of Europe as the [Videopac G7000](/museum/philips-videopac-g7000/), both systems being in fact identical apart from the frenchised keyboard... In fact several C52 models were marketed with minor differences between each others. These systems were labeled C52/01, C52/02, C52/03 or C52/04. 01 and 02 models had a nice power on/off button, detachable controllers, and external power supply with its own connector at the back of the system (system pictured here is a C52/02 model). For cost reduction sake, latest models (04) had no power switch (you plug the system to turn it on!), hard wired controllers and built-in power supply. There were also different packagings, and controllers were sometimes black, sometimes silver... The system is powered by an Intel 8048 microcontroller and a Video Display Controller (VDC) generating all audio & video. This VDC, which is a custom Intel IC, can generate 4 different types of graphic objects: a background grid, single characters, quad characters (made of 4 single characters) and sprites. A maximum of 4 independent sprites can be displayed. There are monochrome and of 8 x 8 pixels in size. Of course the VDC can detect sprite collisions. The C52 has 64 pre-defined characters (letters and graphic symbols) in memory. Up to 12 foreground characters can be displayed from this internal character set. Many games (especially early ones) used a lot those pre-defined characters: man walking, right arrow, slopes, tree, ships, plane and a ball. The flat membrane keyboard of the C52 was a major selling point. It was meant to be used for game selection, educational games, programming, entering its name for hi-scores,etc. Apart from the game selection, it was hardly used. Though not as popular as the [Atari VCS](/museum/atari-vcs-2600/), or later [Mattel Intellivision](/museum/mattel-electronics-intellivision/) in the USA, the Videopac systems did very well in Europe where it was marketed by several different brands (Philips, Radiola, Schneider, Brandt, Siera, etc.). An enhanced system with high resolution background graphics was released a bit later as the **Philips G7400**.