Atari Pencils – Series 1, Part 1
Here’s a slightly odd video game collectible that I haven’t seen get much coverage online—24-year-old Atari pencils!
I first got these pencils when I was in sixth grade, all the way back in 1986. They may, however, actually be a couple years older than that. By 1986, the Atari era had been over for a couple of years thanks to the video game crash of 1983, and Nintendo’s reign was just starting up. This didn’t stop my junior high school from stocking our cafeteria pencil machine with seemingly outdated Atari pencils, though.
Even though nobody really played Atari systems anymore, that didn’t stop my classmates and me from going nuts over these pencils. At a mere ten cents each, kids were buying multiple pencils a day trying to get a complete set. Of course, ample trading took place as well, and highly dubious rumors of “rare” pencils led to all sorts of elaborate deals.
In total, there were 20 different pencils, each featuring a separate game. The pencils were released as two “series” of ten pencils each, and each of the ten pencils within a series was a different color.
I was always an anal retentive sort of kid (a trait that has followed me to adulthood), so I could never bring myself to actually use any of these writing utensils. They were always viewed as a collector’s item. I’ve been hanging on to them for all this time, and I figured that I should take some pictures of them so that more people can learn of their existence. For the next few blog entries here, I will be showing off all 20 of these rare goodies.
Series 1: Asteroids
The shiny blue pencils were always the most desired back in the day, and it’s not very hard to see why. Out of all the pencils, their color was the most attractive. Even if you weren’t a fan of Asteroids, the metallic blue finish looked awesome in your pencil case. The blue pencils were the ones that my classmates claimed were the rarest. I don’t know if this was true or not, but I do only have one Asteroids pencil.
Asteroids was first released in the arcades by Atari in 1979. The artwork on the pencil, however, was taken from the marquee of Atari’s 1980 arcade game, Asteroids Deluxe.
Series 1: Battlezone
Although not as desired as the blue pencils, these shiny silver pencils were still pretty popular. I have four of these Battlezone pencils.
Battlezone was Atari’s 1980 arcade game that utilized vector graphics to create the wireframe world. I’m not sure where the artwork on the pencil is from, however. If you happen to know, please let me know in the comments section.
(Game screens taken from The International Arcade Museum)
Nice… WRITE-up.
You certainly didn’t LEAD us on.
My favorite movie us ERASERhead.
Alright, enough.
Good nostalgia, Phil. I believe I lost all of these pencils in the great pencil wars of the mid-80′s at Troy. If you recall, these consisted of each person attempting to destroy the pencil of the other by in turns bending back one’s own until it struck the center of the others. The round Atari pencils were considered to be particularly strong. But I don’t recall them being very flexible. I guess you played Switzerland in these wars or had to find a different form of weaponry. I also recall that Jim was considered one of the top pencil-breakers. Keep blogging!
Oh man, I had all of these pencils. Thanks for the article!
@Childhood Friend
If you remember the game, then you must surely remember it’s name–Pencil Pop. And yeah, Jim was the champ at that. He had some sort of funky trademark wind-up that he would use before snapping the pencil. I also have a distinct memory of him using a pencil to crack open one of those fat, yellow highlighters. Luckily, I kept my precious Atari pencils far away from the carnage.