Polybius - The Bloody Mary of gaming.

[Narrat0r]

Polybius is a supposed arcade game featured in an Internet urban legend. According to the story, the Tempest-style game was released to the public in 1981, and caused its players to go insane, causing them to suffer from intense stress, horrific nightmares, and even suicidal tendencies. According to the story, an unheard-of new arcade game appeared in several suburbs of Portland, Oregon in 1981, something of a rarity at the time. The game, Polybius, proved to be incredibly popular, to the point of addiction, and lines formed around the machines, quickly followed by clusters of visits from men in black. Rather than the usual marketing data collected by company visitors to arcade machines, they collected some unknown data, allegedly testing responses to the psychoactive machines. The players themselves suffered from a series of unpleasant side-effects, including amnesia, insomnia, nightmares, night terrors, and even suicide in some versions of the legend. Some players stopped playing video games, while it is reported that one became an anti-gaming activist. The supposed creator of Polybius is Ed Rotberg, and the company named in the urban legend is Sinneslöschen (German for "sensory-extinguishing" is the exact translation), often named as either a secret government organization or a codename for Atari. The gameplay is said to be similar to Tempest (a shoot 'em up game utilizing vector graphics), while the game is said to contain subliminal messages which would influence the action of anyone playing it. Some people playing the game found messages like:" No imagination","Obey","Stay asleep"," Work 8 hours, Play 8 hours, Sleep 8 hours", "Surrender", "Be normal", "Game corrupt","No thought", "Conform","Do not question the authority", among others.

tl;dr: It's supposed to be real, but noone knows. There are no screenshots or videos, only a cheap remake. It killed peoplez.

Anyone except me wanna play it so badly right now?

 

[commoe]

Mentally insane, you say? Of course ill play it!

 

[Narrat0r]

If you could just find it.

 

[commoe]

Ah, but you doubt the power of google!

 

[Narrat0r]

Ah, but you doubt the power of google!

It was never found. There are no screenshots or videos on the internet, only a cheap remake.

 

[commoe]

It was never found. There are no screenshots or videos on the internet, only a cheap remake.

Perhaps it was made by the aliens in "I am number 4". If they had the powar to erase pictures and videos, there's no doubt that they can erase video games

 

[Dr Super Good]

The players themselves suffered from a series of unpleasant side-effects, including amnesia, insomnia, nightmares, night terrors, and even suicide in some versions of the legend.

A legend it is not. A lie it is...

was released to the public in 1981

The fact that computers back in the 1981 ran in the order of a couple of MHz at most, had virtually no storage space/memory and cost more than some large compinies earned a year is proof.

There is no way to generate emersive enough graphics at that time to ever have a psycological effect on anyone. Gameplay itself would have been stupidly simple as well. It is clear this legend has sprung up due to modern games having similar effects on some people and relys on the ignorant who can not imagine life without atleast a PS2.

tl;dr: It's supposed to be real, but noone knows. There are no screenshots or videos, only a cheap remake. It killed peoplez.

Anyone except me wanna play it so badly right now?

I garuntee you, there are millions of games you would rather play than it, if it is real.

Why? Well, if there is any truth behind the story...
"Polybius" must have been an experimental arcade game trying a new optical display type or technique. It was tested in only 1 arcade and then destroyed due to poor feedback. It could have potentially been made in germany and "Sinneslöschen" could have just been a nickname given to it by the engineers who worked on the hardware. This name could have been an in-joke related to development on the new display technology, much like guybrush who is a video game character named after the file that his character art was first saved as.

The guys in suits (probably not even black) were just there gathering information. The game was undergoing a field test and so guys were there to gather information. This is a common form of testing that engineers do (observe how people use it) and modern home consoles are subject to the exact same test before being released (given to a few people to play while their responses are observed). The data written probably was unusal as if the console was german it would have been in german and if testing new hardware it would have been data on the interaction with the hardware and not the game. The people could have even been researchers for a totally unrelated company into people using arcades (like for a fast food chain or another arcade).

The side effects probably were extreemly bad, causing people mental illnesses that were not present before playing it. Eplepsie, headaches, migrains and even potential damage to vision might have occured (with nightmares induced by suffering from these) would be more than enough to doom a console (conspiricy theroists mutated these into something stupid). It is very easy to induce a lot of serious health problems with hardware, especially experimental display techniques.

As this was before the age of plasma, OLED, LCD and TFT displays, it was probably some new form of CRT technology. CRT technology, specially older ones, is well known to give off nasty radiation (even as far as X-rays) as well as upset the eyes due to inconsistant display (images were scanned and not consant). Especially if they tried some form of steroscopic effect (maybe it was the first 3D game) it could very easilly cause horrible problems with people.

The 3D effect some kids were getting would obviously make it super addictive (like some of you went to watch the film avatar 7 or more times). Inorder for 3D to be meaningfull, a basic form of vector graphics were probably used (another major wow factor for the time). Especially if the game featured 8 bit colour (or even 16 bit colour some how), it would have been increadable for kids at the time.

However, any form of 3D from a CRT display is not very healthy. As the screen scans, unusal visual artifacs can occur like flickering (well known to cause eplepsie). Additionally 3D itself used in such a primitive way (not real 3D, just low quality vector 3D) could easilly cause headaches alone (as people report from over using the 3DS or watching 3D movies). Add to it fast moving graphics (very bad for 3D) and you got an instant health problem. Especially if the kids are addicted to it and play for multiple hours (you should not spend more than 1-2 hours watching 3D on modern day technology, let alone old technology that was not properly tested).

The result was probably multiple cases of eplepsie and psycologiclaly scared kids as a result (epelepsie is reoccuring once occured, also very tromatic for kids). Parents would immediatly try and sue for compensation (as testing laws were less strict back then) and as a result the console failed a field test and so must have been destroyed. Research papers on the technology used in the console probably still exist, but the actual console itself might have been undocumented and potentially lost to time (especially since the makers would have been fired / gone in solvent after the loss).

So what about the game Polybius? Well, it was probably a crappy 3D game, with poor colour and basic vector graphics. It would have been made as a techdemo and tryout for the new console so was probably extreemly short and most likly shit. As it relied heavilly on the hardware, the game itself died with the console and was probably lost to time.

Do remember we were in the peak of the cold war in 1981, so it is well possible that some casulties or vandalisim in Germany (where the console could have come from) destroyed any trace of it.

Frankly too many retarded conspiricy theorists weave their shit into stories like this. It could quite possibly be a case of amoral testing but sure as hell could not feature half the stuff they mentioned. There are also a whole lot of other games that have become lost to time that would be far better to play.

Apparenlty a very good pirates of the carabian game (Same universe as movie series but unrlated to Jack) was nearly finished but was completly cancled before testing.
Numberous play test dummy games are also lost every year, including for mega popular game series (how companies sell themselves in the game industry).
Let us not forget StarCraft: Ghost, another game nearly ready but lost forever during management changes (I think it was when Blizzard joined Vevendi Games).

 

[commoe]

A legend it is not. A lie it is...

The fact that computers back in the 1981 ran in the order of a couple of MHz at most, had virtually no storage space/memory and cost more than some large compinies earned a year is proof.

There is no way to generate emersive enough graphics at that time to ever have a psycological effect on anyone. Gameplay itself would have been stupidly simple as well. It is clear this legend has sprung up due to modern games having similar effects on some people and relys on the ignorant who can not imagine life without atleast a PS2.


I garuntee you, there are millions of games you would rather play than it, if it is real.

Why? Well, if there is any truth behind the story...
"Polybius" must have been an experimental arcade game trying a new optical display type or technique. It was tested in only 1 arcade and then destroyed due to poor feedback. It could have potentially been made in germany and "Sinneslöschen" could have just been a nickname given to it by the engineers who worked on the hardware. This name could have been an in-joke related to development on the new display technology, much like guybrush who is a video game character named after the file that his character art was first saved as.

The guys in suits (probably not even black) were just there gathering information. The game was undergoing a field test and so guys were there to gather information. This is a common form of testing that engineers do (observe how people use it) and modern home consoles are subject to the exact same test before being released (given to a few people to play while their responses are observed). The data written probably was unusal as if the console was german it would have been in german and if testing new hardware it would have been data on the interaction with the hardware and not the game. The people could have even been researchers for a totally unrelated company into people using arcades (like for a fast food chain or another arcade).

The side effects probably were extreemly bad, causing people mental illnesses that were not present before playing it. Eplepsie, headaches, migrains and even potential damage to vision might have occured (with nightmares induced by suffering from these) would be more than enough to doom a console (conspiricy theroists mutated these into something stupid). It is very easy to induce a lot of serious health problems with hardware, especially experimental display techniques.

As this was before the age of plasma, OLED, LCD and TFT displays, it was probably some new form of CRT technology. CRT technology, specially older ones, is well known to give off nasty radiation (even as far as X-rays) as well as upset the eyes due to inconsistant display (images were scanned and not consant). Especially if they tried some form of steroscopic effect (maybe it was the first 3D game) it could very easilly cause horrible problems with people.

The 3D effect some kids were getting would obviously make it super addictive (like some of you went to watch the film avatar 7 or more times). Inorder for 3D to be meaningfull, a basic form of vector graphics were probably used (another major wow factor for the time). Especially if the game featured 8 bit colour (or even 16 bit colour some how), it would have been increadable for kids at the time.

However, any form of 3D from a CRT display is not very healthy. As the screen scans, unusal visual artifacs can occur like flickering (well known to cause eplepsie). Additionally 3D itself used in such a primitive way (not real 3D, just low quality vector 3D) could easilly cause headaches alone (as people report from over using the 3DS or watching 3D movies). Add to it fast moving graphics (very bad for 3D) and you got an instant health problem. Especially if the kids are addicted to it and play for multiple hours (you should not spend more than 1-2 hours watching 3D on modern day technology, let alone old technology that was not properly tested).

The result was probably multiple cases of eplepsie and psycologiclaly scared kids as a result (epelepsie is reoccuring once occured, also very tromatic for kids). Parents would immediatly try and sue for compensation (as testing laws were less strict back then) and as a result the console failed a field test and so must have been destroyed. Research papers on the technology used in the console probably still exist, but the actual console itself might have been undocumented and potentially lost to time (especially since the makers would have been fired / gone in solvent after the loss).

So what about the game Polybius? Well, it was probably a crappy 3D game, with poor colour and basic vector graphics. It would have been made as a techdemo and tryout for the new console so was probably extreemly short and most likly shit. As it relied heavilly on the hardware, the game itself died with the console and was probably lost to time.

Do remember we were in the peak of the cold war in 1981, so it is well possible that some casulties or vandalisim in Germany (where the console could have come from) destroyed any trace of it.

Frankly too many retarded conspiricy theorists weave their shit into stories like this. It could quite possibly be a case of amoral testing but sure as hell could not feature half the stuff they mentioned. There are also a whole lot of other games that have become lost to time that would be far better to play.

Apparenlty a very good pirates of the carabian game (Same universe as movie series but unrlated to Jack) was nearly finished but was completly cancled before testing.
Numberous play test dummy games are also lost every year, including for mega popular game series (how companies sell themselves in the game industry).
Let us not forget StarCraft: Ghost, another game nearly ready but lost forever during management changes (I think it was when Blizzard joined Vevendi Games).

Woooow thats a wall of text! Challenge accepted

Edit: Done! Way to be a buzz kill lol. Where did you find all that information? Wikipedia or something?

 

[Dr Super Good]

It is called using logic. A lot of it is common knowledge for a computer scientis though.

It could still be that the whole thing is a total lie. Although it seems a bit excessive for no truth at all.

 

[Narrat0r]

A legend it is not. A lie it is...

The fact that computers back in the 1981 ran in the order of a couple of MHz at most, had virtually no storage space/memory and cost more than some large compinies earned a year is proof.

There is no way to generate emersive enough graphics at that time to ever have a psycological effect on anyone. Gameplay itself would have been stupidly simple as well. It is clear this legend has sprung up due to modern games having similar effects on some people and relys on the ignorant who can not imagine life without atleast a PS2.


I garuntee you, there are millions of games you would rather play than it, if it is real.

Why? Well, if there is any truth behind the story...
"Polybius" must have been an experimental arcade game trying a new optical display type or technique. It was tested in only 1 arcade and then destroyed due to poor feedback. It could have potentially been made in germany and "Sinneslöschen" could have just been a nickname given to it by the engineers who worked on the hardware. This name could have been an in-joke related to development on the new display technology, much like guybrush who is a video game character named after the file that his character art was first saved as.

The guys in suits (probably not even black) were just there gathering information. The game was undergoing a field test and so guys were there to gather information. This is a common form of testing that engineers do (observe how people use it) and modern home consoles are subject to the exact same test before being released (given to a few people to play while their responses are observed). The data written probably was unusal as if the console was german it would have been in german and if testing new hardware it would have been data on the interaction with the hardware and not the game. The people could have even been researchers for a totally unrelated company into people using arcades (like for a fast food chain or another arcade).

The side effects probably were extreemly bad, causing people mental illnesses that were not present before playing it. Eplepsie, headaches, migrains and even potential damage to vision might have occured (with nightmares induced by suffering from these) would be more than enough to doom a console (conspiricy theroists mutated these into something stupid). It is very easy to induce a lot of serious health problems with hardware, especially experimental display techniques.

As this was before the age of plasma, OLED, LCD and TFT displays, it was probably some new form of CRT technology. CRT technology, specially older ones, is well known to give off nasty radiation (even as far as X-rays) as well as upset the eyes due to inconsistant display (images were scanned and not consant). Especially if they tried some form of steroscopic effect (maybe it was the first 3D game) it could very easilly cause horrible problems with people.

The 3D effect some kids were getting would obviously make it super addictive (like some of you went to watch the film avatar 7 or more times). Inorder for 3D to be meaningfull, a basic form of vector graphics were probably used (another major wow factor for the time). Especially if the game featured 8 bit colour (or even 16 bit colour some how), it would have been increadable for kids at the time.

However, any form of 3D from a CRT display is not very healthy. As the screen scans, unusal visual artifacs can occur like flickering (well known to cause eplepsie). Additionally 3D itself used in such a primitive way (not real 3D, just low quality vector 3D) could easilly cause headaches alone (as people report from over using the 3DS or watching 3D movies). Add to it fast moving graphics (very bad for 3D) and you got an instant health problem. Especially if the kids are addicted to it and play for multiple hours (you should not spend more than 1-2 hours watching 3D on modern day technology, let alone old technology that was not properly tested).

The result was probably multiple cases of eplepsie and psycologiclaly scared kids as a result (epelepsie is reoccuring once occured, also very tromatic for kids). Parents would immediatly try and sue for compensation (as testing laws were less strict back then) and as a result the console failed a field test and so must have been destroyed. Research papers on the technology used in the console probably still exist, but the actual console itself might have been undocumented and potentially lost to time (especially since the makers would have been fired / gone in solvent after the loss).

So what about the game Polybius? Well, it was probably a crappy 3D game, with poor colour and basic vector graphics. It would have been made as a techdemo and tryout for the new console so was probably extreemly short and most likly shit. As it relied heavilly on the hardware, the game itself died with the console and was probably lost to time.

Do remember we were in the peak of the cold war in 1981, so it is well possible that some casulties or vandalisim in Germany (where the console could have come from) destroyed any trace of it.

Frankly too many retarded conspiricy theorists weave their shit into stories like this. It could quite possibly be a case of amoral testing but sure as hell could not feature half the stuff they mentioned. There are also a whole lot of other games that have become lost to time that would be far better to play.

Apparenlty a very good pirates of the carabian game (Same universe as movie series but unrlated to Jack) was nearly finished but was completly cancled before testing.
Numberous play test dummy games are also lost every year, including for mega popular game series (how companies sell themselves in the game industry).
Let us not forget StarCraft: Ghost, another game nearly ready but lost forever during management changes (I think it was when Blizzard joined Vevendi Games).

Let's see...

A lot of vector shooters at that time, Tempest for example, could cause epileptic seizures upon playing for too long. People believe that Polybius took this to the extreme, screwed over all sense of sanity and started to kill off players. If it did exist in this form AND was made by a german company (which name cannot be found in any records today, which makes its legal existance doubtful), it was probably some kind of... hypnosis test on Americans? If it was that, they did succed, because lines were formed in front of that arcade machine every day. And supposedly, those "guys in suits" did not take coins from the machine, only collecting player data, as if it were some kind of an experiment.

Still, with all this info, how can you not believe that this game did exist and did what it's said it was doing?

 

[Dr Super Good]

If it was that, they did succed, because lines were formed in front of that arcade machine every day.

Unfortunatly I could say the same about the Avatar film. Less hypnosis and more hype/stupidity. All it would need is to be the first "3D" game or something and you would have had the same effect back then.

If it did exist in this form AND was made by a german company (which name cannot be found in any records today, which makes its legal existance doubtful),

Germany was still split into east and west. It is very well possible that documentation relating to a failed company could have become lost, especially if it never was legally registered. Documentation may have even been forcefully destroyed to prevent legal reprecutions that their tests could have had (causing eplepsie in kids with no previous history).

And supposedly, those "guys in suits" did not take coins from the machine, only collecting player data, as if it were some kind of an experiment.

Yes, like most field tests. Collecting coins was pointless, the console might have even been free if it was a prototype. They would be there to take note on how people interact with the hardware/game and record the result. Once again, this is a very common form of testing and all hardware (especially gaming) undergoes something simlar. Nowdays, law requires more controled testing environments though but back in the 1980s it was probably quite easy to get away with a public test without warning the people involved.

There are many, potentially real, stories about computer / psycological testing going horriably wrong. These include people being almost killed in a "harmless" experiment and others being permantly emotionally scared. Both psycologists and computer scientists carry out the same kinds of tests (same documentation covers both). Since such tests, extreemly strict documentation was created to minimise the risk that test subjects are exposed to and violating or improper testing now can result in major legal compensation.