Activision releases the Pitfall! cartridge for the Atari VCS home video game system. Subtitled “The Adventure of Pitfall Harry” (implying that further adventures are yet to come), this becomes one of the Atari VCS’ “killer app” games, and is ported to other systems and updated for more modern platforms for decades to come. 
Activision releases the Megamania! cartridge for the Atari VCS home video game system. Inspired by the arcade game Astro Blaster, and subtitled “A Space Nightmare”, Megamania! pits players against airborne bow ties and hamburgers – and their own energy management skills. A national TV ad campaign featuring The Tubes heralds the game’s arrival.
Now that video game “easter eggs” – secret messages hidden in the games by their designers – are public knowledge, Atari releases its first game in which finding these messages is an integral part of the game. Swordquest: Earthworld kicks off a four-game cycle whose hidden secrets, when found, will allow the first player sharp enough to find and decipher the clues to claim a prize. A downturn in Atari’s financial fortunes will keep the contest from being completed, and the fourth game is never actually released.
Telesys releases the video game cartridge Fast Food for the Atari 2600 home video game system, just in time for the Christmas buying season. A glut of new releases for the 2600 by the end of the year, many from third-party companies like Telesys, causes some consumer confusion which has unexpected consequences for the entire industry.
Telesys releases the video game cartridge Cosmic Creeps for the Atari 2600 home video game system, just in time for the Christmas buying season. A glut of new releases for the 2600 by the end of the year, many from third-party companies like Telesys, causes some consumer confusion which has unexpected consequences for the entire industry.
Activision releases Carol Shaw’s River Raid for the Atari VCS home video game system.
Activision releases Bob Smith’s Dragonfire for the Atari VCS home video game system.
Mythicon releases Fire Fly for the Atari 2600 home video game, one of the company’s quickly-developed line of discount game cartridges for that system.
Upstart video game manufacturer Mythicon releases Sorcerer for the Atari 2600. One of only three games issued by Mythicon before it goes out of business, and considered one of the worst games ever made for the 2600, Sorcerer is designed to be sold at a low price point at drug stores and other retail venues not normally associated with video games.
Imagic releases the No Escape! cartridge for the Atari 2600 home video game system.
Activision releases the Enduro cartridge for the Atari 2600 home video game system. Competing directly with Atari’s home version of the coin-op racing game Pole Position, Enduro features night driving, different surface reactions (driving on ice), and numerous changes of scenery.
Activision releases the Robot Tank cartridge for the Atari 2600 home video game system, Activision’s answer to Atari’s home verison of Battlezone. As usual, Activision raises the ante with such features as a night vision mode and multiple targets.
Activision releases The Activision Decathlon for the Atari 2600 home video game, one of several video games themed around the 1984 Olympic Games.
Activision releases the Pressure Cooker cartridge for the Atari 2600 home video game system. A fast-paced video game version of the fast food industry, Pressure Cooker turns players into short-order cooks with very little time to accurately build burgers to order.
Activision releases Steve Kitchen’s Space Shuttle: A Journey Into Orbit for the Atari 2600 home video game system, an attempt to do a realistic flight simulator on limited hardware. Many of the console’s option switches – normally used to toggle difficulty levels, color or black & white graphics, and so on – are used for in-game functions instead.
Activision releases the Beamrider cartridge for the Atari 2600 home video game system.
Activision releases the Pitfall II: Lost Caverns cartridge for the Atari 2600 home video game system, adding new adventures to Pitfall Harry’s resume and wowing players with sophisticated polyphonic music from a console infamous for its buzzes, bleeps and bloops. (The secret: the cartridge contains its own special audio chip.)
Activision releases the H.E.R.O. cartridge for the Atari 2600 home video game system.
Avalon Hill, a company best known for its boardgame and tabletop wargaming catalog, releases Shuttle Orbiter for the Atari 2600.
Just in time for Halloween, Activision releases the Ghostbusters cartridge for the Atari 2600 home video game system, based on the hit movie of the same name.
Atari releases a port of Crystal Castles for the Atari VCS, a home version of Atari’s graphically elaborate coin-op game.
MIT Press publishes the non-fiction book Racing The Beam: The Atari Video Computer System by Nick Montfort & Ian Bogost, a technically-oriented overview of the historic home video game system.
Former Atari game designer and programmer Howard Scott Warshaw self-publishes his memoir, Once Upon Atari: How I Made History By Killing An Industry.