Magnavox Odyssey 2

Game console that looked like a computer

Feb 25, 2026

By 1980 there was no question that the Atari VCS (soon to be renamed the 2600) was the dominant game console of the new video game industry. Many are aware of the Mattel Intellivision as its primary competitor, but there was another console around at the time: the Magnavox Odyssey 2.

The Odyssey 2 was Introduced in 1978, just about a year after the Atari VCS, at a price of $180 (about $900 in 2026).

The name implies there was an original Magnavox Odyssey. And there was. Released in 1970, the Odyssey is considered the first console, but it was incredibly limited. It only could display a few blocks on the screen and had no support for game cartridges or even color. It also looked pretty weird.

The Odyssey 2 also looks pretty weird itself. It has a membrane keyboard, for some reason. Apparently this was to facilitate educational software, but I don’t think it was used much.

The gray case and the space age font for Odyssey look pretty cool to me, though. And I like that the cartridge port is front and center, just like with the Atari VCS.

Product photo of Magnavox Odyssey 2, a second-generation home video game console released in North America in 1979.

The joysticks, however, were terrible. I believe they were analog, which wasn’t always the best for most games of the time. They also were permanently wired to the console, which means you cannot swap in replacements.

Every now and then I see one of these pop up on Facebook Marketplace and I debate buying it, but I usually come to my senses and realize I have enough retro consoles and don’t need another one.

I did actually use an Odyssey 2 a few times in the 80s. May grandfather had picked one up at a garage sale and I got to play it when we visited.

Specifications

The Odyssey 2 used the Intel 8048 CPU, which I’d not actually heard of before. This looks like a rather low-end CPU, with just 320 bytes of total RAM. It could output a maximum resolution of about 160x200 with up to 16 colors.

The cartridges could hold 2K, 4K or 8K ROMs, which was equivalent to the Atari VCS.

KC Munchkin

According to Wikipedia were 47 games released for the Odyssey 2, which was just a pittance compared to the many hundreds that were available for the Atari VCS.

Perhaps the most notable game was KC Munchkin, essentially a variation of Pac-Mac. KC Munchkin was worlds better than the Pac-Man for the Atari 2600 and I remember enjoying it as a kid.

Unfortunately Atari sued to get the game pulled from the market in one of the first look-and-feel copyright lawsuits.

Emulation

As with most retro stuff, there is a way to emulate it so that you don’t need the actual hardware. Using O2Em I was able to run KC Munchkin on my Mac, although I could not figure out how to actually play it using the keyboard.