website/content/software/quadrapong.md

title, tags, years, params

title	tags	years	params
Quadrapong	ball and paddle	1974	image specs screenshots machines company oc_id source /media/museum/software/atari_quadrapong_ss1.png label value year of release 1974 label value companies Atari label value type game label value media arcade cabinet label value systems Arcade label value number of players 1 - 4 players (versus) title subtitle text image 4-player game /media/museum/software/atari_quadrapong_ss1.png title subtitle text image 2 players are out /media/museum/software/atari_quadrapong_ss2.png title subtitle text image arcade cabinet /media/museum/software/atari_quadrapong_cab_1.jpg /museum/misc-arcade-video-games /companies/misc 423 url date https://web.archive.org/web/20230324070840/http://www.old-computers.com/museum/software_detail.asp?id=423 2023-03-24

Quadrapong is a 4-player variation of the famous hit Pong.

A ball is bouncing from to side off the four walls of the screen trying to penetrate each player's goal. A beeping sound simulates its rebounds. Each player tries to keep the ball out of his goal with his paddle. If the ball penetrates his goal, he loses of one his 4 initial points with which he begins the game. When all are gone, his goal closes. Players are eliminated until only the victor is left.

Although Atari was at the origin of Pong (largely inspired by Magnavox Odyssey's Tennis game though), by 1975 only 10% of all pong games were made by Atari. The competition was fierce. Atari had to innovate and started creating variations of its Pong hit: Pong Doubles, Quadrapong, Super Pong, etc...

Quadrapong was in fact initially conceived by Kee Games in 1973, under he name Elimination!, but as Kee Games was a kind of subsidiary of Atari, the game was quickly adapted and sold as Quadrapong.

Elimination and its Quadrapong counterpart were the first cocktail cabinet arcade video games.

Pong and most of its variants, including Quadrapong, were succesfully ported to the Atari VCS 2600 system, within the "Video Olympics" cartridge.

In 1980, the gameplay format was expanded into the Atari arcade game Warlords, which was also ported to Atari's home consoles and computers.