Wikipedia

Intellivision World Series Baseball

Intellivision World Series Major League Baseballis abaseball video game(1983) designed byDon DaglowandEddie Dombrower,and published byMattelfor theIntellivisionEntertainment Computer System.IWSBwas one of the firstsports video gamesto use multiple camera angles and present athree-dimensional(as opposed totwo-dimensional) perspective. It was also the first statistics-based baseballsimulation gameon avideo game console;all prior console baseball games werearcade-stylerecreations of the sport.

Intellivision World Series Baseball
Developer(s)Mattel Electronics
Publisher(s)Mattel Electronics
Designer(s)Don Daglow(uncredited)
Eddie Dombrower
Programmer(s)Eddie Dombrower
Composer(s)David Warhol
Platform(s)Intellivision
Release
Genre(s)Sports
Mode(s)Single-player,multiplayer

The game's full formal title (due to licensing requirements) wasIntellivision World Series Major League Baseball.It was typically shortened toWorld Series Baseballin use to differentiate it from the prior Mattel baseball game.

Gameplay

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Intellivision World Series Baseballincorporates multiple camera angles, in a manner resembling asports televisionbroadcast.

Intellivision World Series Baseballdisplayed the batter and pitcher from a "center field camera" view. One player chose the pitch type, while the player batting chose when to swing when to take a pitch, and whether or not to bunt.

Once the ball was hit, the game switched to a "press box camera" view, where the defensive player could control the fielders and the batting player controlled the baserunners.

When runners were on base an inset window displayed them, and the batting player could lengthen or shorten their lead and attempt to steal.

The game was originally written with a simplified version of Daglow's 1971 mainframe baseball statistical simulation program, so that theMLBPAlicense could be acquired by Mattel and the game would accurately simulate the play of realMajor League Baseballplayers. For economic reasons in mid-1983, Mattel withdrew from this plan at the last minute, and the designers were forced to replace actual players with the names of theBlue Sky RangersIntellivision game design team.

Intellivision World Series Baseballis also notable for the following innovations:[citation needed]

  • In-gameplay by playannouncers, presented via Intellivoice
  • Stadiumbackground music,created by Dave Warhol (who also worked onEarl Weaver Baseballat EA)
  • Save/loadin a baseball game (through a RAM chip on the cartridge)
  • Lineups based on real player stats and skin colour (although names were changed)

History

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1980-1981

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In the early 1980s, video games were based on models established either bycoin-op games' scrolling playfields, or board games' static background images. The screen was either a stable field on which characters moved or a top-down (sometimes angled) display that scrolled horizontally, vertically or both ways across a larger virtual image. These restrictions were created by the limited memory size of earlyvideo game consoles,where a single screen would use up much of theRAMstorage space available in a machine, and smallvideo game cartridgesthat held only 4K (later 8K or 16K) ofROMmemory.

Daglow was one of the original five in-house Intellivision programmers at Mattel in 1980, and had written the first known computerbaseballgame,Baseballon aPDP-10mainframe computeratPomona Collegein1971.After completing his first Intellivision cartridgeUtopiain1981,he was promoted to lead the Intellivision game development team at Mattel.

1982

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While watching a baseball game on TV in the spring of1982,Daglow realized that the Intellivision could mimic the same camera angles shown in the broadcast. He immediately wrote a proposal for a new baseball game. He received approval from group Vice PresidentGabriel Baumto start work. No current programmers were free, so Daglow began a search for someone qualified to create this new kind of game.

He found the right person through the job placement office of his alma mater, Pomona College. Eddie Dombrower was a programmer, animator and classically trained dancer who had invented theDOMdance notationsystemon theApple IIcomputer as a way for choreographers to record dance moves the same way composers write down music. SinceIntellivision World Series Baseballwould require far better animations than past video games for its TV-style display, Dombrower was considered to be a perfect fit for the job.

By October1982Dombrower had a first screen display running, complete with another first: an inset screen to show a runner taking his lead off of first base. This was the first use of an inset or picture-in-picture display in a video game.

1983

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Baum and Daglow showed the prototype to Mattel's marketing department, which was locked in a TV advertising war with arch-rivalAtarifor the position of topvideo game console.Although the game was not slated for completion until mid-1983, the company rushed a new TV commercial into production for Christmas, in which Intellivision spokesmanGeorge Plimptonpulled a velvet drape from a monitor and proclaimed the title to be "the future of video games." Mattel's marketing strategy was to dissuade consumers from buying Atari orColecoconsoles by showing an exclusive new style of Mattel game.

While the game had been announced by Plimpton in Christmas 1982, Danny Goodman ofRadio-Electronicsreported n June 1983 that the game was not ready for release yet.[1]Thevideo game crash of 1983wiped out most of the market beforeIntellivision World Series Baseballever shipped. Like most video games completed after the spring of 1983, it entered a toy store network that believed the video game era was over and that the games had been a passing fad.

To make matters worse, while the game could be played without the use of theIntellivoicevoice synthesizer(which was already being phased out due to poorer-than-expected sales and declining user interest), itdidrequire the then-new IntellivisionEntertainment Computer System(ECS) keyboard component. Unfortunately, by the time the ECS was released, an internal shake-up at the top levels of management had shifted the company's focus away from hardware add-ons and almost exclusively towards software. As a result, the ECS was not well-promoted, and neither it nor its companion software titles sold particularly well... and sinceIWSBwas one of the last titles made for the ECS system, very few copies were sold, making it one of the rarest Intellivision titles in the collectors' market.

Daglow and Dombrower went on to create the hitEarl Weaver Baseballgame atElectronic Artsin1987,where they more fully implemented the ideas behindIntellivision World Series Baseball.This set the stage for theEA Sportsproduct line. In the early and mid-1990s, Daglow led the development of theTony La Russa Baseballgames, further refining baseball simulations.

See also

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References

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  1. ^abGoodman, Danny (June 1983)."Videogames '83".Radio Electronics.p. 58.
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