Files
yann64andClaude Opus 5.5 de19014649 Content with the complete media download (15,344 files)
228 files were never archived; see docs/not-recovered.md in the extraction repo.

Co-Authored-By: Claude Opus 5.5 <noreply@anthropic.com>
Claude-Session: https://claude.ai/code/session_01YDRjtmAiNpo5mK5N3d7QwZ
2026-10-13 16:47:19 +02:00

2.2 KiB

title, tags, years, params
title tags years params
Bowling
bowling
sport
1971
image specs screenshots machines company oc_id source
/media/museum/software/rca%20fred%20bowling.png
label value
year of release 1971
label value
companies RCA
label value
type game
label value
media tape
label value
systems RCA Fred computers
label value
number of players 2 players (alternate)
label value
staff Joseph Weisbecker (Programmer)
title subtitle text image
Start of the game. First frame, player 1, first ball /media/museum/software/rca%20fred%20bowling.png
title subtitle text image
First frame, player 2's second ball /media/museum/software/rca%20fred%20bowling.1.png
title subtitle text image
Frame 3, first player second ball /media/museum/software/rca%20fred%20bowling.2.png
title subtitle text image
5th frame, end of the game.. Player 1 wins /media/museum/software/rca%20fred%20bowling.3.png
/museum/rca-fred
/companies/rca 851
url date
https://web.archive.org/web/20211027104635/http://www.old-computers.com/museum/software_detail.asp?id=851 2021-10-27

This game is simply the first ever Bowling video game known today !

It was programmed by Joseph Weisbecker on the 16th of august 1972 while developping the Fred concept at RCA.

This bowling concept eventually led to the bowling game found built-in the RCA Studio II videogame, also programmed by Joseph Weisbecker.

This version is a two players game, identified with X & O on the display. The game is played in 5 Frames, with 2 balls per frame for each player.

F1, F2 etc. indicates frame number on display. X1, X2, O1, O2 indicates player and ball number.

More incredibly, this game used sounds on tape when a ball is rolled ! The sounds on the tape were recordings from a bowling ball hitting targets, repeated multiple times.

There is no hook effects or anything like that. The player just has to press a key to launch the ball. But the randomness and incertitude of the game comes from the fact that the ball goes up and down in a erratic way, making it difficult to launch the ball at the desired position.