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It was the prototypical esports event, in a way. A mixed-media gaming competition Atari launched at the height of its early 80s success, Swordquest pitted players far and wide against a series of four Atari 2600 adventure titles, and then against each other in a grand final for a prize pool of $150,000 in jewel-encrusted treasures. Each game contained clues that revealed hidden messages in an accompanying comic book, and sending the correct message to Atari earned you a chance to compete for a real, honest-to-goodness piece of treasure at its headquarters. All that, without a gaming chair or energy drink in sight.But the audacious and elaborate Swordquest was never completed. Not long after the first game, Earthworld, released in October 1982, its fate was sealed by the videogame crash of 1983. When the bottom fell out of the market Atari was left facing catastrophe, and suddenly the idea of continuing a competition in which prizes worth five figures were to be given away no longer seemed viable. The competition simply ended midway through. Several of its prizes were never awarded, and the fourth title of the planned quartet, Airworld, wasn't even released.
In the intervening decades, though, a new quest has emerged: to find out what happened to the treasures Atari gave out, the ones it didn't, and the contest winners who never got the chance to compete for the eponymous sword worth $50,000.
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