Basketball © 1974 Taito.
Basically, it's a pong variant where each player control two players (defender and forward) at the same time with their unique knob (they thus can only move parallelly). The ball reacts as a normal pong game, but the the only way to score is to direct the ball into the basketball goals (from the top).
The gameplay is time limited. The timer is displayed at the top of the screen.
Released in April 1974. This is possibly the first game to depict human characters as something remotely resembling them (head/arms/legs).
This was licensed to Midway for manufacture in the USA (as "TV Basketball"), it being the first Japanese game to do so and launched the relationship that would eventually give Midway a major win when they would license Space Invaders four years later.
Each goal scores | 2 points. |
Machine's picture.