Make-It-Yourself projects
Radio Electronics, september 1980

This issue contains an article about an "easy" project (much simpler than others as it uses a dedicated game chip from General Instruments: the AY-3-8606).

The interesting side of the project is the type of games: 10 variants of a breakout game, each of them being for 1 or 2 players. This is a PONG variant, still played with the ball and the two paddles, but with a different goal as the players muct break the briks of a wall.

Interesting detail: the "solitaire" games as nearly impossible to finish. As a matter of fact, the ball must break the brisk when boucing on them, but this ball does not bounce on the right edge of the screen. It only bounces on the top and bottom edges. Therefore, as soon as a few briks are remaining, the ball easily loses on the right edge of the screen after breaking one or several briks. This could be an error in the game design, who knows...

The article shows, once again, the simplicity of such circuits based around a dedicated game chip. As the chip contains nearly all the circuitry of the games, a few external components are required to form the complete circuit, compared to the numerous components used in early analog projects.

Click the photos to see them in large scale.

Cover	Page 66	Page 67
Page 68	Page 69

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