WAR GAMES

Pop quiz: What was the name of the first video game? If you’re thinking of something from the ’80s or even the ’70s, you’re not going back far enough. Created in 1961 at MIT, Spacewar! was intended as a demonstration for the new Digital Equipment Corporation PDP-1 computer, but soon found its way to computer labs across the country, and an addiction was born. Now Spacewar! gets its due credit in the Museum of the Moving Image’s new exhibition “Spacewar! Video Games Blast Off,” which gives an overview of the past 50 years of games through the lens of the one that started it all. Admission gets you four arcade tokens, so you can try out a playable simulation of Spacewar! as well as 20 other games, including Space Invaders (1979), Yar’s Revenge from Atari (1981), and Galaxy Force II (1988).

Mondays-Sundays. Starts: Dec. 15. Continues through March 3, 2012