Inventer of Electric Football Game Dies

[brokeu91]

Norman Sas, inventor of Electric Football, dies at 87

http://profootballtalk.nbcsports.com/20 ... ies-at-87/

The generation that grew up on video games may find this hard to believe, but there was once a time when football fans could entertain themselves for hours by playing a low-tech game featuring inch-tall plastic players moving around chaotically on a vibrating metal football field. The game was Electric Football, and it grew so popular that more than 40 million copies of the game have been sold.

Electric Football was the brainchild of Norman Sas, who, according to the Hackensack Record, died on June 28 at the age of 87. Sas invented Electric Football in 1948, but it was in 1967, when he signed a deal with the NFL to put team colors and player names on his tiny plastic players, that the game really took off.

For the first decade or so of its partnership with the NFL, Electric Football was stunningly popular: Young football fans couldn’t get enough of strategizing with their 11 plastic players, putting them in just the right formation so that the ball carrier would vibrate his way into the end zone. Of course, the game’s motions were so unpredictable that the ball carrier was liable to go backward for a safety, but no matter: The game was pure fun.

Eventually, however, video games made Electric Football seem as obsolete as the horse and buggy.

“For the first 10 years, we generated more money for NFL Properties than anyone else,” Sas told the Washington Post in 1998. “Then the [video] games came out, and that was the beginning of the end.”

In a 1980 article about Electric Football, Jack McCallum of Sports Illustrated wrote, “I’ll take the oldtime Electric Football over some newfangled computer game every time.” Not enough people felt that way for Electric Football to remain the commercial success that it was in the 1960s and 1970s, but for millions of kids who grew up pretending to be Chuck Noll or Tom Landry as they placed plastic players on a vibrating metal gridiron, Electric Football provided endless hours of enjoyment. All thanks to Norman Sas.

 

[RamFan503]

Eventually, however, video games made Electric Football seem as obsolete as the horse and buggy.

That's funny. That game was obsolete before it was invented. I remember how stunned I was that the game really operated that way. OK... line up your guys, give one of them that little felt "football", and vibrate your way to random corners of the field.

 

[Yamahopper]

Eventually, however, video games made Electric Football seem as obsolete as the horse and buggy.

That's funny. That game was obsolete before it was invented. I remember how stunned I was that the game really operated that way. OK... line up your guys, give one of them that little felt "football", and vibrate your way to random corners of the field.

I had several of those. My Joe Namath one was my favorite. It had a "Life like" spring arm for better passing. Took some practice but it was very accurate. My friends and I used to play for quarters, sometimes even a dollar or a girl.

The key to fielding a successful team was the same as it is in the NFL...Training camp. That's where a little lite sanding or adding a few glue drops enhanced with lead dust would condition the players for the type of Off. and Def. you wanted to run. Zone blocking, no problem. Off tackle runs, easy as a couple drops of glue. Blitzing schemes were harder but that was the key to a stout defense.
Life was good.

 

[RamFan503]

Eventually, however, video games made Electric Football seem as obsolete as the horse and buggy.

That's funny. That game was obsolete before it was invented. I remember how stunned I was that the game really operated that way. OK... line up your guys, give one of them that little felt "football", and vibrate your way to random corners of the field.

I had several of those. My Joe Namath one was my favorite. It had a "Life like" spring arm for better passing. Took some practice but it was very accurate. My friends and I used to play for quarters, sometimes even a dollar or a girl.

The key to fielding a successful team was the same as it is in the NFL...Training camp. That's where a little lite sanding or adding a few glue drops enhanced with lead dust would condition the players for the type of Off. and Def. you wanted to run. Zone blocking, no problem. Off tackle runs, easy as a couple drops of glue. Blitzing schemes were harder but that was the key to a stout defense.
Life was good.

I was seven when I got mine - complete with the QB that could throw and kick. Your patience level and inventiveness was WAAAAAYYYY higher than mine (or maybe that's your nerd level) :sly: I might have played with that thing three or four times. I used to make some mean hot wheel and tonka tracks though.

So here is a video for you. You might have to see if you can get together with these guys.
[youtube]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ijCNk0PqaCs[/youtube]

 

[Yamahopper]

Eventually, however, video games made Electric Football seem as obsolete as the horse and buggy.

That's funny. That game was obsolete before it was invented. I remember how stunned I was that the game really operated that way. OK... line up your guys, give one of them that little felt "football", and vibrate your way to random corners of the field.

I had several of those. My Joe Namath one was my favorite. It had a "Life like" spring arm for better passing. Took some practice but it was very accurate. My friends and I used to play for quarters, sometimes even a dollar or a girl.

The key to fielding a successful team was the same as it is in the NFL...Training camp. That's where a little lite sanding or adding a few glue drops enhanced with lead dust would condition the players for the type of Off. and Def. you wanted to run. Zone blocking, no problem. Off tackle runs, easy as a couple drops of glue. Blitzing schemes were harder but that was the key to a stout defense.
Life was good.

I was seven when I got mine - complete with the QB that could throw and kick. Your patience level and inventiveness was WAAAAAYYYY higher than mine (or maybe that's your nerd level) :sly: I might have played with that thing three or four times. I used to make some mean hot wheel and tonka tracks though.

So here is a video for you. You might have to see if you can get together with these guys.
[youtube]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ijCNk0PqaCs[/youtube]

Like I always say, if your going to bother to show up you might as well win.
These guys take it serious. But it looks like fun.