1980 in video gaming

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Events

Electronic Games hosts the first Arcade Awards, the first video game awards ceremony. It awards games released during 1978-1979, with Space Invaders winning the overall Game of the Year award.

New companies: Brøderbund, Bug-Byte, HAL Laboratory, Human Engineered Software, Mindscape, On-Line Systems, Sirius, Sir-Tech
Mattel creates the original five-programmer Intellivision game design team, nicknamed the Blue Sky Rangers by a magazine writer when the company keeps their names secret in a TV Guide interview.
The arcade game market in the US generates $2.81 billion in revenue^[1] (equivalent to $8.07 billion in 2024).

May 22, Namco releases Pac-Man (originally known as Puckman in Japan). It becomes the highest-grossing game of all time.^[2] It has the first gaming mascot character, established the maze chase genre, opened gaming to female audiences,^[3] introduced power-ups,^[4] and featured cutscenes.^[5]
July, Atari releases Missile Command.
November 12, Stern Electronics releases Berzerk, with designer Alan McNeil's signature on the monitor glass of each cabinet.
November, Namco releases Rally-X, the first game with a bonus round. It also features multi-directional scrolling.
November, Universal releases Space Panic, often cited as the first platform game, though the term didn't exist yet.
Atari releases Battlezone (it is later enhanced for the US Army for military training — albeit relying on specialized vector graphics hardware).
Cinematronics releases Star Castle. In 1982 the Atari 2600 port ends up as Yars' Revenge.

Atari's port of Space Invaders becomes the 2600's killer app, and the first console title to sell a million copies.

December, Infocom releases Zork I, the first Zork game and the first Infocom game.
Rogue is written by Michael Toy, Glenn Wichman, and Ken Arnold, spawning the category of roguelike games.
Edu-Ware releases The Prisoner for the Apple II, loosely based upon the 1960s TV series of the same name.

May, Namco Pac-Man hardware debuts.
December, Data East releases the DECO Cassette System, the first standardized arcade platform, for which many games are developed during the golden age of arcade video games.

Mattel releases the Intellivision video game console.
Sinclair Research releases the ZX80 home computer and Acorn Computers release the Atom, the first 'domestic' computers to play games in the UK.
Tandy releases the Tandy Color Computer.