Visual Cortex: Skyrim for Intellivision?

Consider: They did a few AD&D games on the mighty Mattel Intellivision.  Bethesda Softworks' Elder Scrolls series of RPGs goes back a loooong way.  Imagine if these two titans of history met...

(cue wavy lines)

source: Bridgit Scheide at Deviant Art.

The Visual Cortex: Joust An Ad

Today the Visual Cortex hatches an ad for the Atari 2600 and 5200 versions of Williams' arcade hit Joust: 

Click to enlarge

Running in periodicals in 1984, it's short on actual screenshots of the game, and heavy on artist renditions of the action. I also find it humourous how it tries to sex-up the "beasts of the air" you fly in the game, the ostriches from the original arcade game.   The ad copy starts off with an unusual, confusing take on the classic opening words of the Star Wars movies:

Well, which is it?  Long ago, or a distant future?  Anyway, I don't think I want to purchase a game that spits eggs out of my TV screen, from whence evil, sharp-taloned dragons attack me.

The Visual Cortex: Remembering Christmas Wishes

I'm fairly certain that heading into the Christmas season, a lot of kids in 1983 were lying under their blankets at night with a flashlight, pouring over the video game section of that year's Sears Wishbook.  Crammed full of every important video game of the era, it was a cornucopia of gaming goodness.  It also has a tinge of doom with all the price slashing, a herald of the collapsing market that would lay waste to the video game landscape the following year.

In the Cortex today is a page from the 1983 Sears Wishbook, featuring what was considered a great, shining hope for the continuation of the industry, Coleco's 3rd-gen powerhouse ColecoVision.  Sadly, the great "arcade in your home" system sank with the rest of them in the great video game crash.  A page of history, forever turned:

For more on the history of the ColecoVision, consult your local Dot Eaters entry.