re: I could have been the King of Astrosmash on Intellivision

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From March until August 11, Intellivision owners were invited to send photographs of their TV screens showing their high score in Astrosmash. Just for entering, they would receive an Astrosmash Shootoff patch, and it was announced that 16 regional high-scorers would be flown to Houston to compete for eight cash prizes. Over 13,000 people entered, and quickly it became obvious there was a problem. First, because of the scoring bug, many of the pictures showed scores made up of seemingly random ASCII characters. John Sohl had to review the photos and, with an ASCII table, decipher the actual scores. Second, it turned out that no one in Marketing realized that Astrosmash, like many Intellivision games, can be played at slower speeds simply by starting the game by pressing 1, 2, or 3 instead of the disc. (This is a feature programmed into the EXEC.) There was no way of telling who had legitimately obtained a high score and who had played at the easiest speed. There were reports of competitors who literally played for days at the slowest speed, pausing the game (pressing 1 and 9 simultaneously, also programmed into the EXEC) to sleep or go to school. Unable to decide who was legit and who wasn't, instead of the announced 16, Mattel Electronics wound up flying 73 entrants to Houston for an all-expense paid weekend, September 11 & 12, 1982. There, the entrants competed in 1 hour of timed play. 18-year-old Manuel Rodriguez of Stockton, California won the $25,000 top prize with a score of 835,180.

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