Pong was one of the first social games, a fact that the game’s creator, Bushnell, appreciated. He said, “it was very common to have a girl with a quarter in hand, pulled a guy off a barstool and said, ‘I’d like to play pong, and there’s nobody to play.'” It was a way you could play games you were sitting shoulder to shoulder. You could talk, you could laugh, you could challenge each other as you became better friends. You could put down your beer and hug. You could put your arm around the other person. You could play left-handed if you so desired. In fact, there are a lot of people who have come up to me over the years and said, ‘I met my wife playing pong.’ and that’s kind of a nice thing to achieve.”
He was right, video games have always been a social experience in some way at their core, and Pong is no different.
