For most modern gamers, the words “Soviet video playing industry” sound like “Zimbabwe's space program”. Yes, someone had a notorious "wolf catches eggs". Someone will remember Alexei Pazhitnov with his ingenious Tetris. Someone will come to mind the pirate clones of NES from Steepler, although they appeared after the collapse of the USSR.
But not everyone knows that the gloomy totalitarian union did not produce so few electronic entertainments, including full -fledged consoles. Moreover, among them there are even their own developments, unique and by today's standards.
The famous "Well, wait!»In action. Judging by the description, the author of the video considers the wolf fox
Although, of course, for the most part Soviet game consoles were the most shameless clones. The issues of copyright were worried about the Soviet leadership no more than that concern some uncle Liao today, who sews Abibas sneakers in its basement on the outskirts of Guangzhou. So they transmitted everything – completely shameless and most often absolutely free of charge.
Total duplication is most noticeable among handhelds. As Timofei Skorenko writes in the book “Invented in the USSR: the history of inventive thought from 1917 to 1991”, among the Soviet porting, not to find a single independent development at all – they were all copied from where. This, of course, is not entirely true, but for the most part true.
In the source, the wolf looked different, and the place of the hare was occupied by the rooster
The most striking example is the same “well, wait!"In which the wolf catches eggs rolling from under the chickens. Of the original in it, perhaps the characters of the cartoon of the same name and the name of the model: "Electronics IM-02". Otherwise it is pure water pocket toy egg from the series Nintendo Game & Watch.
I came up with it, by the way, not anyone, but Humpay Yokoi himself, producer Metroid , pairs of games about Mario and the legendary Game Boy. And Soviet engineers, in turn, dismantled the device on the screws and made an exact Russified copy.
01, 02 – CHEF from Nintendo and "Funny Cook" from "Electronics". What is called, find ten differences (ABANDONGAMS photo.ru and antiquesnavigator.COM, respectively)
In Japan Game & Watch has been produced since 1980, so the USSR was not so much behind the damned capitalists-“well, wait a minute!"Appeared on the shelves only four years later. Following the “cheerful cook” (in Japanese girlishness of Chef), “Secrets of the Ocean” (Octopus), “Space Bridge” (Fire) – even “Mickey Mouse” (suddenly, the original is also Mickey Mouse) and many, many others.
In general, under the brand “Electronics by them” (that is, “Microprocessor Game”) produced a lot of all sorts of things, from musical synthesizers to chess computers. But pocket game consoles were particularly popular. They were distinguished by an uncomplicated gameplay and weak iron, but they cost quite acceptable money-around 23-25 rubles, about a quarter of the salary of the same Soviet engineer.
There were rumors that if you dial in "well, wait a minute!»A thousand points, the game will show the cartoon. Unfortunately, the segmented LCD display is not capable of such tricks (photo ru.Wikipedia.Org)
But not all pocket consoles of that time were so simple. There were very interesting and unusual things among the "electronics".
"Electronics IM-12" (Nintendo CJ-93 Donkey-Kong Jr) was equipped with a color screen and a mirror, through which, in fact, the user followed the game. The main feature was interchangeable cartridges, which already allows us to name the “IM-12” quite a full-fledged console. True, the game for this portable, apparently, existed only one, "Winnie the Pooh".
Only the most notorious retrograde will dare to play this today
"Electronics IM-26" (Bandai Digi Casse) also worked with interchangeable cartridges-screens. There were as many as five of them here and they all came complete with the device itself.
Totally Ussr!
Racing game "Electronics IR-01" (Mattel Electronics Auto Race) flaunted a display with a resolution of three for nine pixels. Not so bad for the device, the American prototype of which was the first pocket game console in history in 1976.
The game process of the original Auto Race from Mattel Electronics. Here you are, grandmother, and 4k
The appearance of the Soviet copy (photo from the ZX-PK forum.ru)
"Electronics MK 90" (aka PK-100) was a full-fledged microcomputer, fully developed in the USSR. There are no analogues of this machine in the West. In addition to serious tasks, MK 90 supported not bad games. There were Tetris, and Pakman, and “Snake”, and “Sapper”, and God knows what else.
And the one who lacked other people's creations could always write his own game right here, on the built -in Baseik. In addition, the applications could be transferred between devices on replaceable memory modules (something like the flash drives usual, but on batteries). Sorry, this fun cost 3,500 rubles – the average salary for three years.
This is how the games look at MK 90
“Electronics IM-50. Funny arithmetic " – another completely our project. In appearance, it is not much different from other portables from the series of "them", but the main difference is hidden inside.
The fact is that the processors of other "electronics" of all mathematical actions have mastered only the addition. There were also much more advanced electronic brains, which allowed to amuse the numbers in twelve modes.
Game for those who seem to be not an intellectual occupation enough to catch eggs
Rare export option (Photo by ABANDONGAMS.ru)
Perhaps the most brutal handheld in the USSR was released a limited party in 1991, shortly before the collapse of the country. A device with a sonorous index "DBGB-06I" (better known as "Altair") combined a game, clock and dosimeter in one compact case.
There is an opinion that such a strange combination was associated with the lack of components for ordinary dosimeters, which were required after the Chernobyl disaster. As a result, a real atomopank turned out, very in the spirit of time.
Probably the only console in the world with dosimeter. Monkey-breeder catches the balls, Mickey gives the Mauses, Carlson leads the process from heaven. Panopticum (photo RW6ase.NAROD.ru)
Finally, one cannot fail to mention the "Electronics IM-27. Cosmic Adventures "with stereo -tank and 3D effect. Unfortunately, a clone is also-for this time toys Planet Zeon from the Tomytronic 3-D series from Tomy.
What kind of Okulus? (Photo by JATEKMUZEUM.BLOG.Hu)
In general, among the porting in Soviet times, everything was fine. So much so that they were damped even for export, with English localization.
But what about the home segment?
In fact, and among the television prefixes, everything was not as bad as it is believed. At least, if we talk about the first-generation game consoles, which are sometimes called “Pong Consoles” in honor of the main game of the mid-1970s.
What is PONG in general? One of the first home consoles and one of the most popular video games of all times. In essence, this is tennis, simplified to nowhere – an elementary throwing of a square “ball” from one half of the screen to another. But with all its monochrome simplicity, Pong is quite capable of tightening today. What can we say about the 70s!
The Pong Consoles era, "Wooden Age of Video Games"
Clones "Ponga" were made everywhere in huge numbers, and the USSR did not lag behind. We started working on television game consoles almost simultaneously with the whole world. And home consoles in the Union released a lot.
Each had its own small features. One was distinguished by a bright design, the other – the ability to display the TV on the TV screen as many colors instead of two, the third – the light gun in the kit and so on. However, there were practically no fundamental differences between them, so there is nothing special to talk separately about each. It’s better to just show.
"Pacelsra-02". Volleyball, football, tennis and squash (photo vladimirkrym.Livejournal.com)
"Tournament". Unexpectedly nice and bright design for its time
"Exxi Video-01" (photo vladimirkrym.Livejournal.com)
"Video-3". Light pistol console
"Leader", one of the simplest consoles, even in his class (photo Playground.ru)
"Eureka". It looks frightening (photo ru.Wikibooks.Org)
In general, these were excellent devices, even if terribly scarce and terribly expensive. It was necessary to lay out from 100 to 150 rubles for some PALETRA-so many Soviet citizen earned in a month. But the main problem was not in price, but in the fact that time did not stand still.
In the West, the first, half analogue generation of consoles, replaced the second, microprocessor, led by Atari 2600. The eight -bit Nes and Sega Master System came next. 16-bit loomed on the horizon … But nothing changed in the USSR.
Soviet citizens, at best, played the development of the 70-80s and did not know about any technical progress. The console was neither the second nor the third generation in the Union, even in the form of pirate copies.
On ebay.COM you can buy Rambo TV Game for just $ 69.99
The best of the affordable is the Taiwanese clone of Atari 2600 called Rambo TV Game, which already appeared on the sunset of perestroika. The slot for cartridges was sealed with him, but 360 games were sewn in memory and depicted on a box of muscular sling. Against the backdrop of “Eurick” with the “leaders” Rambo TV Game, which was already out of ten years old, looked like a laser gun next to a stone ax.
But we had one thing much cooler than any prefixes of that time, it doesn’t matter how bitter. We are talking about the Elf console – the Belarusian version of ZX Spectrum, imprisoned specifically for video games.
The appearance of "Elf" (photo from the site zxbyte.ru)
During its heyday, ZX Spectrum computers were perhaps the most popular home platform. Almost every basement in the USSR soldered their clone of Speccy. The main reason for such popularity is not the most advanced system even for your dense time is a huge number of games.
So the "elf" has become the logical development of the "spectrum" as a purely gaming device. The console was equipped with a pair of gamepads – with a cross and two buttons, just like the original NES. The prefix read cartridges instead of dishes or audio cassettes (the most common information carrier at that time). Moreover, some games were completely translated into Russian by fans of the Spectrum back in the 90th or 91st.
Gampads for Elf sold and separately. They were much simpler than NES controllers, which made them almost eternal: there is simply nothing to break there (photo from the ZXBYTE website.ru)
In general, all the chances of success of the Elf were. They just launched it into production too late, in 1993, after the collapse of the USSR. And the brainchild of the Brest Plant "Flintoton" could not withstand competition. The muddy stream of the ubiquitous Dendy and a variety of Chinese consumer goods simply washed off the “elf” to hell.
Thus ended the history of Soviet consoles. Nothing of the post -Soviet replacement has not yet been replaced.
Apparently, this is an emulation, but it was precisely such games on the Elf that were
As you can see, the assortment of Soviet gaming consoles was much richer than is commonly believed. But you can still recall slot machines, personal computers, a variety of electronic toys and other digital entertainments! Yes, mostly there were copies of American and Japanese devices. But this is more than doing in Russia today. It's a shame.
