Warren Robinett discusses the making of Adventure 

"They had the power to keep my name off the box, but I had the power to put my name on the screen." Man, you can feel the power of these words.

"They had the power to keep my name off the box..... but I had the power to put my name on the screen." That's effing right! Lets go baby!!!!

Warren, you changed my life with Adventure, Seriously. I am 54 and still play Adventure to this day... and always will as long as I am able. Thank you sir.

Bleeding edge tech in 1980. The idea you could explore a virtual world full of treasures and dragons on your TV was new and super exciting. The best was when you'd get eaten by a dragon but still kill it and then the bat would pick you up and fly you diagonally over all the walls.

The first video game easter egg!!! It was great added value, I remember as a kid after having moved on from Adventure after beating all the levels multiple times reading about this (maybe in Atari Age?) and going back to the game to get into the "signature room" myself. I even dusted off an Atari in the 90s when I was in college. I had made the claim that Adventure had the first easter egg to some friends and one of my friends wanted me to prove it. Actually did it again after all those years. Way to go Warren!!! Thanks for the surprise.

I remember being about 7 years old and discovering that very secret all on my own. I dreamed countless dreams of what else lay hidden in that game. As a 6th grade school teacher, I often show this "Easter Egg" to my class on the Big Screen of our classroom projector, playing via one of those compendium Plug & Play Atari game systems. The kids even today STILL love Atari Adventure! Thank you, Warren!! You ARE amazing!!

Warren managed to create an experience with real atmosphere even on the humble VCS, great game!

He's been hinting at a book - still waiting.

Alright this is one video that needs more views, seriously. Legendary content here

It's still fun to this day.

I love that Atari is showing it because as I recall, Activision was founded because of this thing too where they didn't get credit for their work.... these types of stories are absolutely amazing.

Yup , I remember finding this when I was a kid. Family , friends and others thought I was lying kid or nuts . Until I showed them . Great times back in the 80's .

Great story. Well worth the 3 minutes to watch.

I played this game as an eight-year old kid in 1982 on the ATARI and it was mesmerizing. I still remember it today after all these years. It was like crack in a box .. the more you played it, the more you wanted to play it!

I played this on my Atari 2600. I remember playing the increased difficulty ... which brought in the bat. The bat would randomly flap through the game and if it saw you it would steal what you were carrying and fly off with it. And if it happened to be carrying something already it would leave whatever it had behind. So the bat came in, saw me, took my sword, and left me a DRAGON. After a spirited chase through the catacombs, the Dragon ate me. The bat was like the first chaotic enemy in a game which caused panic. Always thought this game deserved an embellished remake in the spirit of the cover art.

I never get tired of hearing this story. Seeing this game for the first time 100 or so years back was mind-blowing. I can't fathom how creative one had to be to develop for the 2600, and I hope that this one finds a new life as part of the Recharged series. ⚔🐲🍻🕹

I loved the game back then, especially variation 3. Somehow my older brother found out about the secret, and showed me how to get the "microdot" as he called it. BTW, you know there is something in that room because things blink when you bring another item into it. This was much more than adding a signature to the game; it was adding an additional quest, so to speak.

Thank you so much Warren. Adventure was the first video game I played on my cousins 2600 many years ago. The impact and impression it had on me was so amazing. Me and my friends would make our own little adventures in the playground. Pretending to be characters from the game while one was the "adventurer" the others would be dragons or bats lol.

Still my favorite game of ALL TIME! :)

Great story.

The first Easter egg in a video game. Thanks for the video.

This the game that sparked my interest in the adventure and action genre.

Just read an article about this and I can’t believe how awful Atari was to the devs, major props to Warren for this legendary move!!!

Credit to him. Thank you.

Absolute Legend.

Love your content on You Tube (and your recent games!) Atari…..keep up the great work!

I have the game and my light sixer still. They both work.

First Easter egg. And one of the best games of all times, even today.

Great video! This my seem pretty minor in the grand scheme of things, but having video game's first ever easter egg is undeniably a neat legacy. I my have never experience this myself because I am much younger than the Atari, but that does not change how good this story is.

My favorite Atari game as a kid. Finding the dot was magical! I still have my original 2600 and all the cartridges. I can also replay via emulator.

This video needs more views!

My friends Atari had a wonky power switch and if you fiddled with it that room would open. So while I knew about the room it was not until I started collecting in the late 90's that I found out you can open the room with the dot.

Ha ha and now this story is on the Atari youtube channel. Thanks Warren for the game!

Esse game foi um marco! Garantiu horas de diversão!

And I bought a copy the day it came out.

And boy did he do the right thing! 🎉

OK hear me out. First of all, there should be a screen where designers get credit. There's no reason not to do that and I love that he did this. Having said that, the brutal logic behind not putting different names on the boxes is because it would dilute the brand. You have the company name, then you have the title. The focus is the specific game, not who designed it. Adding more information confuses consumers. I am not saying this is good, just that it is what it is. In a way, this apparently bad situation, along with other dubious things happening, was a blessing because it caused designers to see their own value and go on to better things.

I wonder if Warren knew about the other game.designers who had already did this before him or was the same feeling he conceived was the same reason the other programmers put them in too.

Loved that game!

Thats sooooo awesome!!!! I fidnt know that ATARI Sctewed their designers over so badly, that REALLY SUCKS BIG TIME!!!! Now easter eggs are common and ciol thanks to MR. WARREN ROBINETTE! Thank you SIR! YOURE THE BEST!

Well done brotha

I remember playing Adventure on Sony PS2 as Atari Anthology when I was a teenager. Now I have it on Microsoft Xbox One (also playable on Microsoft Xbox Series XS but I actually don't have an Xbox Series XS yet) as Atari 50: The Anniversary Collection so I got it for Christmas in 2022. It's a great game. It's really fun but the black bat can be a real nuisance. Sometimes it won't stop bugging me like attempting to steal my items such as keys and chalice. Also sometimes it drives me mad. Greetings from Ireland 🇮🇪.

This makes me very sad hearing this stuff went on at Atari. We truly missed out of some very good games because of his quitting because of poor treatment.

It’s best to say that this game was made in 1979 and not 1980 since Warren already left Atari by 1980.

I would do the same, have secrets nobody knows unless they unlock or find by accident.

He made a mistake and that's the gold/yellow key can start inside the gold/yellow castle making the game impossible to win 3.4% of the time (1/29). I read online it was room 18 and at the start of game 3 it could be in rooms 1-29. If it had been numbered 1 (or 29) then the randomizer would pick 2-29 (or 1-28). However, this does add some "charm" to the game, in that it usually takes awhile to realize the game is unwinnable and you need to hit the select switch to start a new game. There's also a 1.7% chance the keys will be mutually locked, which is OK, for the reason given above. Sadly, the black key is never in the white castle in game 3 because of how he did the number-layout in order to put the chalice in the black castle maze (rooms 19-22) or the white castle (rooms 23-26) by randomly picking 19-26. Then it picks rooms 1-18 for the black key to prevent it from being self-locked and 1-22 for the white key to avoid being self-locked. Had half the 19 rooms outside the castles been given numbers higher than the white castle then he could have picked rooms 1-15 for the white key (with room 1 being in gold and 11-15 being inside the black castle) and 16-29 for the black key (with no chance of being in gold castle and 16-19 being in the white castle). There'd still be a chance they'd be mutually locked. There's also a slight chance the bat with the bridge is inside the gold castle, while the gold key is in the white castle's room that's inaccessible without them. However it's 1/(29^3) or 1/24389 or 0.000041, so very improbable it will ever happen to you. And since there's a 3% chance the gold key is in the gold castle, how would you ever know?

It could have a premium subscription service, for example, the person who, in addition to paying the subscription, has a channel to play online by the hour or finish game, is having a coop mode once each, one versus the winner remains and goes on a round until losing. And at a lower price than others.

Another of Atari’s firsts. Epic! Now please come out with a second generation Atari VCS….. Your fan base is waiting.

I still play this often. Level 3 w diff switch making dragons run from sword. Must kill all. Get all objects in 1st castle. 100% w dead dragons n bat.

Young er your still young!

W warren robinett

Who's here from the movie "Ready Player One"?

"when I was young" (shows a photo of him balding and looking 39)

I feel sad about the programmers being treated so badly at Atari. They were magicians just being able to produce anything better than pong on the Atari which was notoriously difficult to program. I suspect the attitude towards them was exacerbated when Warner bought the company. Corporations generally only care about the bottom line. On the other hand, Warner's hubris resulted in the creation of Activision, one of the biggest video game makers of the 1980s. Without the executives' dismal treatment of the Atari programmers, we would never have gotten dozens of classic Atari titles such as Pitfall and River Raid.

who made this video?

Warrin Bawitz

Omg some of these comments make me laugh. Nerdville. Yes it was cool to find a name but life changing lol

Atari for the next system you make after the VCS please make some exclusive games for it I'd love it if you did.

On the next Atari system in the future the next Atari system in the future should have exclusive games.

Atari I beg of you don't give up on making hardware I beg of you make a VCS 2

those brows are loud!

Yeah, well nowadays they have the power to keep your name out of everything, no matter what you've done and where you hid it.

His eyebrows look like the bat's wings now 😃

the funny part is activision became just as bad as atari

In the 3rd grade, a friend loaned me a guide which explained this secret dot for a hidden message (this was earth shattering in 1984.) I did it...and sat there in awe, looking at the screen with my cousin. We had been hammering on the 2600 for 4 years straight, and never before had we seen THIS. Because of that secret screen, and because my friend also lent me Pitfall II, I finally became a true gaming fan that day. Fast forward almost 15 years later and after some programming courses, I became a software tester (my first tech job) for The Learning Company in Fremont, CA. Which was: C b o y f . o . u . n . d . e . d . W . a . r . r R e o n b . i . n . e . t . t What a nerd!! 😂