Games - Chase the Chuck Wagon

Home > Listing Index > Games > Chase the Chuck Wagon

	Games - Chase the Chuck Wagon

Chase The Chuck Wagon is a video game for the Atari 2600 developed by Spectravision and released as part of a promotion by Purina.

History

In an ill-conceived promotion campaign, Purina contracted video game developer Spectravision to create a game themed after the Chuck Wagon commercials it was running to promote Purina dog chow. Sending in proofs of purchase from bags of dog food earned the sender a copy of the game in the mail.

This promotion was not very successful. At the time of the promotion, most video game players were young children who were probably not thrilled by the idea of playing the part of a canine in a game with a dog food theme. The adults who actually took interest in purchasing the dog food were uninterested in games. As a result, few copies of the game made it into hands of the public, making this game something of a collector's item.

This example of absurd video games developed by unusual parties is an extreme example of the kind of frenzy produced by the breakaway popularity of video games in general and atari 2600 games in particular during the early 1980s.

Among Collectors

The game has something of a reputation among collectors of Atari video games. It is far from the rarest of games for the Atari 2600, yet the mystique surrounding its backstory grants it a disproportionate amount of interest. It is commonly referred to as the Holy Grail of Atari 2600 video game collecting.

[ Visit the complete Wikipedia entry for Chase the Chuck Wagon ]

Searches on eBay

chase the chuck wagon