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| price = $99 USD |discontinued = |CPU = None |controllers = Two paddles |unitssold = 330,000〔 |topgame = |successor = Magnavox Odyssey² }} The Magnavox Odyssey is the first commercial home video game console. It was first demonstrated in April 1972〔 and released in August of that year, predating the Atari ''Pong'' home consoles by three years. It is a digital video game console, though is often mistakenly believed to be analog, due to misunderstanding of its hardware design. The Odyssey was designed by Ralph H. Baer, assisted by engineers William Harrison and William Rusch.〔(The Independent )〕 They began around 1966 and had a working prototype finished by 1968. This prototype, known as the ''Brown Box'',〔 is now at the Smithsonian Institution's National Museum of American History in Washington, D.C. ==Design== Like all other video game consoles, the Magnavox Odyssey is a digital console. However, many collectors mistakenly considered the Odyssey to be an analog console, which led Baer to clarify that the console is in fact digital. The electronic signals exchanged between the various parts (ball and players generators, sync generators, diode matrix, etc.) are binary. The games and logic itself are implemented in DTL, a common pre-TTL digital design component using discrete transistors and diodes. The system can be powered by six C batteries, which were included. An optional A/C power supply was sold separately. The Odyssey lacks sound capability,〔(Digital Spy )〕 something that was added with the "Pong systems" of several years later, including Magnavox's own Odyssey-labeled Pong consoles. Ralph Baer proposed a sound extension to Magnavox in 1973, but the idea was rejected. The Odyssey uses a type of removable printed circuit board,〔 called a game card, that inserts into a slot similar to a ROM cartridge slot. The game cards do not contain any components, but have a series of "jumpers" — simple electrical connections — between pins of the card connector. These jumpers interconnect different logic and signal generators in the Odyssey to produce the desired game logic and screen output. The system was sold with translucent plastic overlays that players could put on their television screen〔(GQ )〕 to simulate color graphics,〔 though only two TV sizes were supported. Some of these overlays could even be used with the same cartridges, though with different rules for playing. Odyssey came packed with dice,〔 poker chips, and score sheets to help keep score, play money, and game boards much like a traditional board game. Ralph Baer is also believed to have proposed the concept of "active cartridges" containing additional electronic components, allowing adding more game features, such as sound effects, variable net position, and variable ball speed, though the idea apparently did not catch any interest. 抄文引用元・出典: フリー百科事典『 ウィキペディア（Wikipedia）』 ■ウィキペディアで「Magnavox Odyssey」の詳細全文を読む スポンサード リンク
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