Don't get me wrong, I've got nothing against marriage. And if you've got a wife awesome enough to agree to an invitation like this, it'll probably be pretty smooth sailing from here on out. But let's face it, there'll be times where verbal Hadouken's are thrown. So why not acknowledge that with an awesome wedding invitation?

I'm assuming the front says "Marry Me" in binary, but I'll leave that to those of you fluent in cyborg parlance to decode. Combine this with the Tauntaun cake and you've got yourself a real wedding. [GeekStir, designed by Carla Berrocal]

But for you younger types, Boing Boing has a run down of this season's big brain games. From Star Wars to neural mice, they're all here, ready to move and impress with nothing but the power of thought. Well, not exactly. As BB's Rob Beschizza notes, the same primitive control schemes of the 1980s are somewhat in place with these crude toys as well. Maybe next year we'll have a real neural interface under the tree.

For you nostalgic types, there's the Atari MindLink, pictured. Sadly, the profound box art of its solitary game couldn't really hide the fact that it was Breakout with headgear. As such, the unit never officially made it into production. It lives on today, however, in gimmicky Star Wars-branded floating plastic ball games. [Boing Boing]

Built using a pair of old PCs, some fishing wire, inkjet printer motors, spools and little lander models. You use a wheel to control where the lander is and a button to control the rockets, aiming your lander to its ideal landing position on the moon's surface. It only cost him $800 to build, and it'd be an impressive creation if it cost twice that. [PopSci]

As Ben notes in the video, it's really the vintage Atari keyboard that sells this thing. The clickity clack is unmistakable, soothing and flashback inducing all in one—he even managed to get the thing to pop up at near the same angle as the original!

Some more specs, courtesy Ben's web site:

- Base unit is Atari XEGS motherboard, as usual.
- XE 130 RAM expansion built-in.
- Uses MyIDE circuitry and custom OS ROM to use a 2.5″ PATA hard drive. Very fast! You can check out Mr Atari's site here.
- Large 15″ screen, similar to the C64 laptop but this one is better looking and shinier (obviously important)
- Uses original, new-old-stock Atari 800 keyboard. This is probably the best keyboard in the history of computing, so it was worth including, despite the complications (see story)
- Flush-mount cartridge slot.
- Amazing old-school styling!

Oh, and there's the classic Ballblazer too:

[Ben Heck via Technabob]

Duck Hunt (1976)
Before Duck Hunt hit the NES as part of the most famous (and arguably most successful) gaming bundle of all time, Nintendo released a version of the game as a standalone toy. A revamp of their IR-based Laser Clay Shooting System! (1973), Duck Hunt used a battery powered lightgun and projector to fly ducks randomly around your wall. Tastefully, there was no little dog there to laugh at you when you inevitably ran out of batteries. [See Duck Hunt in action here]

The Atari 2600 (1977)
Parents may hate consoles now, but the Atari 2600 was greeted with open arms by parents who were happy to keep their kids safe at home rather than exploring seedy arcades. It wasn't the first modern (cartridge-based) console—that award goes to the 1976 Fairchild Channel F. But Fairchild gave up on games before the phenomenon had passed while Atari became the best selling Christmas gift of 1979. Powered by a 1.19MHZ process and bundled with two joysticks, two paddles (for Pong) and a game, the launch price was $199. That doesn't sound like much, but in when adjusted for inflation since 1977, that was about $700.

Simon (1978)
In 1974, Atari released an arcade cabinet called Touch Me. It was a critical flop. But four years later, a pair of inventors tweaked the game, shrinking it down to portable sizes and adding color to the formerly black buttons. The result? Simon, the addictive memory-music game that holds up to this day. Sold by Milton Bradley, a slew of clones would pop up over the years. But c'mon, Simon they were not.

Really Bad Sports Games
Sports are hard enough to stomach on their own, but Atari's early versions of baseball, basketball and football, while necessary to the evolution of video game sports, were simply horrible. With the exception of Activision's 1981 Ice Hockey, none of these games have aged well because even in their simplified versions with limited rule sets and minuscule rosters, the very premises of these sports are far wider in scope than any early era video game. Then again, Pong, made in the early '70s, may be the best "tennis" game of all time.

Space Invaders (1978)
Space Invaders is, quite simply, the biggest arcade game of all time. Taito's simple game incorporated sci-fi elements like lasers and aliens to a humble 5x11 grid of monochromatic descending sprites. (In fact, Space Invaders was never technically in color—colored cellophane was merely laid over the monitor.) It's been attributed to coin shortages in Japan and the rise of mainstream arcade prominence in the US. And while Pac-Man would also be a mega force of its own, he wouldn't be around until 1980.

Coleco Telstar Arcade (1977/78)
No, the Coleco Telstar Arcade did not revolutionize gaming forever, it's just a personal favorite. Before the rise of cartridge-based consoles, single-title home arcade units were extremely popular. There was a huge market of PONG clones that were essentially a base unit with knobs that plugged into your TV. Anyway, Coleco made a lot of these dedicated machines, but their most advanced/ridiculous was the Telstar Arcade. The triangle base unit contained Pong, gun and racing controls, plus it actually accepted additional (triangle-shaped) cartridges to expand gameplay. I sort of wish that the Xbox 360 were designed so ludicrously.

Adventure (1979)
It might not look like much now, but Adventure was, aptly, the first action/adventure video game. A modest 4KB, Adventure followed a dragon-slaying hero through a labyrinth of mirrored environments (the Atari simply wasn't capable of more complex levels) in his quest to transport a chalice to a yellow castle. Grand! And beyond its invention of an entire genre, the game introduced the concept of inventory (to hold contemporary gaming mainstays like swords and keys). What Adventure was missing was the motivation of a damsel in distress. [Try it here]

Asteroids (1979)
One ship stuck in an asteroid field—duplicate that idea in arcade cabinet form over 56,000 times and you have Asteroids, Atari's best selling arcade game of all time (though admittedly only about a third as successful as Taito's Space Invaders). As players blew the heck out of space rocks, they also had to control inertia in what's considered the first real physics based game. The effect is akin to a dogfight on ice. [Try it here]

Pinball Wizardry
It's tough to think of the year 1979 without Pete Townshend popping into your head. So what was going on in terms of Pinball in that era? Circuitboards. In 1977, Bally's Lost World became the first pinball machine to replace chimes with electronic sounds. And by 1979, Williams' Gorgar introduced the first pinball game with a continuous soundtrack. But since this was the '70s we're talking about, we'll remind you that Kiss pinball came out, too, and people weren't playing it with any aura of self-deprecation.

Sources: 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10 11 and a healthy dose of Wikipedia/wasted youth].

Gizmodo '79 is a week-long celebration of gadgets and geekdom 30 years ago, as the analog age gave way to the digital, and most of our favorite toys were just being born.

From the creator, Byron Casebier:

Here is my weak (and slightly unfinished) Atari iPod Dock. I thought sharing may create interest for someone that can do this better. As far as specs, I gutted a broken, iPod clock radio and put it all inside the Atari. Everything works except for the clock (it was the broken part). There is even a remote control so I can sit back on my vinyl couch, drink some Tang and control my tunes...And yes, I'm still rocking a 3rd gen iPod.

A little geek factoid about that generation of iPod: It's still Jason Chen's, Matt Buchanan's and my favorite iPod design. Those orange glowing buttons were the best.

Stick together, little iPod and Atari. Your ability to find true love in this crazy, fast-paced world is an inspiration. [Thanks Bryon!]

The composer, YouTube user bd594, says what you hear is 100% pure, straight from the machines themselves—no effects or sampling were used. In the case of the Scanjet, the "vocals" were recorded in four separate parts using the one machine.

The aforementioned Atari 800XL is tickling the ivory on lead piano/organ, while a plucky Texas Instruments Ti-99/4a shreds on lead guitar. Rounding out the bunch are the floppy drive on bass and the hard drive clanging cymbals. As many have suggested already, the "instruments" could use a good tuning or ten.

On a related note, Scanjet symphonies seem to be in the air right now. Must be spring. [YouTube via Matrxisynth - Thanks, Matrix]

Doesn't look like there's any water in the pipe, and there's no way it's still functional, but any and all McGuyvering of marginally illegal substances must be championed. So, um, champion! [Thanks, Brian!]

Oh, who are we kidding? You have a crappy office job (whether you make a lot of money or not) that doesn't allow you to sit around and play video games in your underwear all day. And nothing about these $25 polyester gaming ties can change that.

But you know what works? Sneak a DS into your desk drawer and take really long bathroom breaks. [Amazon via OhGizmo!]

This marvel of 8-bit technology could hook up into your Atari home computer and digitally manipulate shapes and lines with the Atari paint software—an early precursor to the tablets we enjoy today. It was actually a pretty impressive piece of equipment back in the day, and the cool thing is that it looks brand new out of the box. It even fired up without a hitch. Check out Technologizer for the complete set of images. [Technologizer]

This DIY project seems a bit time consuming—so you really have to want it. However, the man behind it was able to get the job done with only a small supply of basic tools. If you have some decent equiptment like a band saw or a scroll saw, you should be able to get this one done in record time using the instructions provided in the following link. [instructables]

Over 30 years later, the game is still in production (though we're not sure you can still find the full sized version on store shelves)—and that's a lot more than you can say for Atari's Touch Me predecessor (which Simon essentially cloned and improved).

And if you like classic electronic game patents, there's a lot more at the link. The list of 33 images includes the first lightgun patent, Wac-a-Mole, the NES, and R.O.B. [Technologizer]

The controllers are offered in proper scale with each set of hands sized identically. And we see, while controllers have gotten more complicated, they've also grown larger—though we look to have peaked back in the last generation (if you discount arsenal of peripherals you'll find in Rock Band or GHIV).

One trend we found interesting: The ill-fated Atari 5200 represented the early height of how-many-buttons-will-this-thing-fit engineering. And I don't think that it was before two successful generations of consoles later that the arms race picked up again. [Chewing Pixels via Offworld]

That's what the chain gets for serving beer to parents already trying to cope with brats and arcade machine sound effects for hours on end. Not to mention the 30 minute performance of the Rocka-fire explosion animatronic band, playing on a 30 minute loop. Also, throw in the parental insincts to protect your kid from being sat on by the fat kid in the ball pit, and you've basically tossed a match to the powder keg.

The environment also brings out what security experts call the "mama-bear instinct." A Chuck E. Cheese's can take on some of the dynamics of the animal kingdom, where beasts rush to protect their young when they sense a threat.

Parents aren't able to contain their blood lust anymore, put under the pressure of this scenario, and it is happening in Chuck E. Cheeses all over the country, in statistically significant numbers, according to various local police officers. Finally, a mainstream paper, the WSJ, reports what I've known since I worked there as a teen: Chuck E Cheese is pure evil. Here's are the blow by blows of a few particularly gruesome fights, including one involving 85 people:

Chuck E. Cheese's Blotter

Brookfield, Wisc.: April 5, 2008

Seven Brookfield Police officers broke up a fight that involved as many as 40 people, according to police reports. The altercation broke out after an uninvited guest showed up at a child's birthday party. No one was arrested. (See police report.)

Flint, Mich.: Jan. 26, 2008

Flint Township police responded to a call about a large fight at Chuck E. Cheese's that involved as many as 85 people, according to police reports. A fight inside the restaurant between three females erupted, pepper gas was sprayed and people flooded outside the restaurant into the back parking lot. (See police report.)

Toledo, Ohio: Feb. 4, 2007

Police responded to the scene after a fight broke out. Several parents complained about children who were having their picture drawn at one of the machines and then continued to sit there after the drawings were complete. Parents began calling names and then throwing punches. Several people were injured and several cited for disorderly conduct. (See police report.)

Matteson, Ill.: 2007-2008

Police have responded to 12 disturbance calls at Chuck E. Cheese in the last year, said a local law enforcement official. The disturbances ranged in seriousness and included one in which two men attacked another man at a birthday party.

Milwaukee, Wisc.: Aug. 11, 2006

Upon officers' arrival at a south side Chuck E. Cheese's, they spoke with a male who stated that during a verbal argument, an elderly female threw a shoe at him, according to police reports. He stated the fight started over someone calling his child "ugly." He stated he was not injured, his pride was just hurt.

Topeka, Kan.: Jan. 17, 2005

Topeka Police responded to a disturbance call around 5:30 p.m., according to a department spokeswoman. Two adult females were involved in an altercation prior to police arrival. It was reported that one small child was either bumped or stuck by another child. The mothers of the girls began to argue and an altercation ensued. No one was charged.

In Pennsylvania, Susquehanna Township police are searching for suspects involved in a Nov. 9 altercation at a Chuck E. Cheese's outside Harrisburg. The police department gets called to respond to disputes at the restaurant as many as 15 times a year, Police Chief Robert Martin says.

This most recent assault, described in police reports, occurred after a woman in her 30s approached a 6-year-old boy who was playing a videogame. When the boy went to insert more tokens to continue playing, the woman grabbed the tokens out of his hand and told him to stop hogging the game. The boy went and got his 26-year-old mother, who walked over to the woman. The woman began screaming at the boy's mother, and another suspect, a man in his 30s, grabbed the mother by the throat and pushed her against the videogame machine. CEC employees had to pull the man off the mother. Both the man and the woman fled the scene.

How they plan on fixing it:

In Milwaukee, the store posted a sign outlining a dress code that prohibits what it calls "gang-style apparel." That location also implemented a code of conduct that prohibits knives, chains, screwdrivers and glass cutters.

While the chain is a breeding ground for these fights, this police captain says it best:

"The biggest problem is you have a bunch of adults acting like juveniles," says Town of Brookfield Police Capt. Timothy Imler. "There's a biker bar down the street, and we rarely get calls there."

Here's another fight I found on youtube:
[UPDATE: video removed because it was posted by some white supremacy group, and screw that!]

[WSJ]