PacMan Ignited Video Wars on this Day in 1980

PacMan ignited video wars on this day in 1980 when the popular video game arrived in arcades across the country. For mere quarter you could play PacMan in malls, movie theaters, and pizza joints everywhere. The video game was so popular it spawned a Ms. PacMan game and a popular song called "PacMan Fever" by Buckner and Garcia that peaked at number 9 on the Billboard Hot 100 in the U.S. in 1982. More games followed like Space Invaders and Donkey Kong. Eventually, Atari cashed in by creating home versions of these games that could be played on your TV. Eventually, video games based on popular sports like baseball and football became available. The one-dimensional graphics of the home versions were poor but kids did not know any different. Certainly, few could imagine that the future would bring realistic 3-D video games like Madden NFL and any other sport you wish. (Photo by Adam Berry/Getty Images) PACMAN IGNITED VIDEO WARS In addition to sports videos, PacMan ignited video wars with the spread of violent games like Mortal Kombat and Grand Theft Auto as they made billions of dollars due to their wide popularity. Mobile games like Candy Crush and Pokemon became available too. No longer did a family sit down and play a board game like Monopoly or Sorry. Those became too boring to keep today's kid's attention spans. As for me? I was never really good at any of them. Never did I get to put my electronic initials into an arcade video's top ten performer list. Nor did I keep advancing with the technology with the enthusiasm that millions of other players did. I started with Atari and dabbled with Wii. That's about it and it probably puts me in a small minority of people compared to those who spend thousands of hours enjoying these games. But PacMan ignited video wars between all of these games 44 years ago. What is your favorite game? Tune into Craig Shemon and Company on ESPN Southwest Florida as we play video game Trivia for prizes. Good luck.