Decades after the first ever console war, Atari is re-releasing its former rival Intellivision’s console

In a move that would have had video game fans in 1980s stunned, Atari is releasing a console with Intellivision branding on it.

The Intellivision (‘intelligent television’) console was released by Mattel in 1979 and was responsible for starting the first ever video game console war, going head-to-head against the Atari VCS (later renamed the Atari 2600).

Now, following Atari’s acquisition of the Intellivision brand in 2024, the first ever console war has been definitively ended with the announcement of the Intellivision Sprint, an updated Intellivision to be released by Atari.

Set for release on December 5 in USA and Australia, and December 23 in Europe, the Intellivision Sprint will be priced at $149.99 / £99.99.

Designed to look like the original Intellivison console, the Sprint will support HDMI output for play on modern televisions, as well as a USB port for “library expansion”.

It will also come with 45 classic Intellivision games built in, including Baseball, Soccer, Super Pro Golf, Sea Battle, Space Battle, Astrosmash, Star Strike and Boulder Dash.

The Intellivision was infamous for its unique controller, which featured a round dial and a 12-button keypad similar to that found on a telephone.

Each game came with a card overlay that could be slotted into the controller and sat on top of the keypad, showing the controls for that particular game.

Because this was an integral part of the Intellivision experience, all 45 games included with the Intellivision Sprint will also have a pair of card overlays – one for each player – that can be inserted into the provided controllers (which are now wireless).

“We’re thrilled to celebrate Intellivision’s 45th anniversary, and what better way to honour it than by bringing back this innovative console for fans to experience once again?” Atari’s VP of strategic operations Matt Burnett said in a statement.

“Becoming caretakers of such an important brand is both a big responsibility and a very fun expansion of our work at Atari.”

Players who want to learn more about Intellivision before investing in the Intellivision Sprint may want to play Atari 50, the ‘interactive museum’ compilation released by Atari and Digital Eclipse in 2022.

Following Atari’s acquisitions of Digital Eclipse in 2023 and Intellivision in 2024, Atari 50 received a DLC pack called The First Console War which added an Intellivision section to the game, detailing the console’s history.