Grover's Music Maker in Business Week

[jhd]

The American magazine Business Week for January 24, 1983, p. 81 has an article on video game publishers moving into the then growing market for educational games. The companies profiled included Atari.

 

The only Atari game discussed in any detail is the unreleased Grover's Music Maker. http://www.atariprot...over/grover.htm

 

Oddly, the article states that “The game teaches the child colors and elementary music notation”. It is not clear where the author of the article got that idea as the game does not seem to use either colours or music notation.

[Wickeycolumbus]

Cool, thanks for sharing Do you have a scan or link to the article?

 

While there is no music notation, the colors on the side of the stage do light up depending on the note.

[jhd]

As far as I am aware, the article is not available online; I was reviewing the microfiche at the library (as part of a larger retrogaming-related project ).

 

Unfortunately, the quality of the microfiche copy is *very* poor and of extremely low contrast (i.e. dark grey text on a light grey background).

 

The library has the equipment to make a photocopy, but not to scan directly from the fiche. A scan of a photocopy (i.e. a 4th generation copy from the original) would be unreadable. Any major public or academic library would have this title if someone else wants to have a go at scanning it.

Edited March 26, 2012 by jhd

[Tempest]

Oddly, the article states that “The game teaches the child colors and elementary music notation”. It is not clear where the author of the article got that idea as the game does not seem to use either colours or music notation.

Yeah there's nothing on the 2600 that fits that description. The closest thing I can think of is the Atari Music series for the Atari 8-bit:

 

http://www.atarimania.com/game-atari-400-800-xl-xe-atarimusic-i_393.html

http://www.atarimania.com/game-atari-400-800-xl-xe-atarimusic-ii_394.html