I wish that real-world corporate executives would devote more time to preventing exciting things from happening 
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I loved the Sega ads from the early 90s, like this one for Virtua Racing: British Virtua Racing commercial - YouTube
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i have the 2600 version and the graphics are simpler but its pretty great in terms of creating a 3D look with minimal graphics. it was one of my favorite atari games. but yeah the commercial looks like 5200 or something better than the 2600 version.
edit: video of the 2600 version. its very similar. just a few less colors and details: Atari 2600 Pole Position - YouTube
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actually i think thats the 7800 in the photo, but the ad is suggesting its available for multiple systems. which it was.
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Now I have to fire up my MAME arcade and play Pole Position. Okay, I did and I’m still no good at it.
My first car race game was in the 70s. We used to get them confiscated all the time by the teachers. Back then our parents would also punish us for playing in class, they would not yell at the teacher for taking our toys.
But I gotta go back and see if I can finish at least one lap.
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Bonkers. And Perfect. The new wave theme with the Van Halen solo really sells it.
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One need only look at the gameplay footage itself to know it is the 5200 version.
It says so right on the screen.
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I believe this was the “super-liminal” portion of Atari’s ad campaign for Pole Position.
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God Hand: no worries dad, that’ll buff right out
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i also really like that fact it showed a family.
atari marketed to boys, girls, moms, and dads up until the late 80s. then everybody switched to the market segmentation approach of pitching games only to adolescent boys. a whole generation grew up pretending that only guys could be gamers. boo to that i say
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I remember that song, but nothing else about that ad.
Are we sure this was '82? Seems more like (and I vaguely remember that song from being) a year or two later.
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When I worked at a movie theater in the late '80s, we had a full cockpit version Pole Position machine in the lobby. One night, waiting for the last show to get out, I figured out that one of the keys to a cash box or something opened up the back of the Pole Position machine. Thumbing through the technical manual inside, I located the “add a credit” button inside the cabinet. After that, I got pretty darn good at that game, and didn’t mind having to work until close nearly so much.
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The ad compared to the gameplay is as startlingly different as the box artwork for 80s games.
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The box art on games from the 80s was amazing. My facorite was the box art for the Atari 400/800 version of PacMan.
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I liked Pele’s Soccer for the 2600, the contents of which had nothing whatsoever to do with Pele (and, for that matter, was not much like soccer).
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That looks like a 5200.
The 7800 didn;'t come out until several years after this commercial was allegedly shown.
Here’s a viideo showing the improved graphics of the 5200 vs the 2600. The 2600 wouldn’t have rendered the blue skies and green landscapes shown in the ad.
(Allegedly, the 5200’s controller kind of sucked, which might have made the upgrade pointless)
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Atari would probably sue my pants off if I had t-shirts made of that mashup. Pity.
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well then. just make sure the shirt is extra long.
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