Microprocessors

The AY-3-8500 Ball & Paddle integrated circuit was the first in a series of ICs from General Instrument designed for the consumer video game market. These chips were designed to output video to an RF modulator, which would then display the game on a domestic television set. The AY-3-8500 contained six selectable games — tennis (a.k.a. Pong), soccer, squash, practice, and two rifle shooting games. The AY-3-8500 was the 625-line PAL version and the AY-3-8500-1 was the 525-line NTSC version. It was introduced in 1976, Coleco becoming the first customer having been introduced to the IC development by Ralph H. Baer.[1] A minimum number of external components were needed to build a complete system.

The AY-3-8500 was the first version. It played seven Pong variations. The video was in black-and-white, although it was possible to colorize the game by using an additional chip, such as the AY-3-8515.

General Instrument AY-3-8615 (1976) Colour picture encoder for the AY-3-8600

Coleco Telstar Colortron
Four of six games of 8500 (no rifle/target games), with full colors

Coleco Telstar Marksman
The same of 8500 but with colors

Tele-Game ES 2208 Las Vegas
Ideal-Computer Tele-Match Cassette 1


General Instruments AY-3-8550 que integraba la controladora gráfica, el generador de sonido y cuatro juegos pong (TENNIS, FUSSBALL, SQUASH y PELOTA) y dos de tiro (ocultos). Su imagen era en color y se sonido mono (en la TV)

PC-50x
Car race with vertical view. The car accelerate and the player must avoid collisions. 1 or 2 players

PC-50x
Three games: a ship must fire torpedoes to hit submarines

PC-50x
10 breakout games. 1 or 2 players

PC-50x
4 games with an optical rifle. More than one difficult level

The AY-3-8610 was a major update from General Instruments. It played more games (10), like basketball or hockey, with higher-quality graphics.
It was nicknamed Superstar by GI. It was in black and white, although it was possible to add color by using an additional AY-3-8615 chip.

Prior to producing the 8610, GI created the AY-3-8600. The pin configuration was the same as the 8610, but it was missing the two rifle/target games, bringing the total number of games down to 8.

Coleco Telstar Combat!
Four combat games with tanks, 2 players

PC-50x
Four combat games with tanks, 2 players

Superspace. Space battle for two players

(8765 PAL)
Atari Stunt Cycle
Sears Motocross
PC-50x
Motor-Cycle. Three game levels. A motorbike must jump over different objects (bus, etc.)

Four versions of this chip are known to exist. Each of them contains customised circuits adapted to the games played. For example, the Ball & Paddle version (MPS-7600-001) plays four games for two or four players and uses special paddle and ball generators. This particular chip was also released in PAL format as MPS-7601. So far, only Commodore is known to have used it in a system (model 3000H). Only one manufacturer used all of the MOSTek chips: Coleco (see the Telstar Arcade and Telstar Gemini systems). All others used the MPS-7600-001 chip.

Nintendo Color TV Game

6 Ball & Paddle variants

4 Ball & Paddle variants

Equivalent to AY-3-8500