Polybius | The Most Deadly Video Game in History | More Truth than Legend

Was Polybius real? In 1981, an arcade in Portland was the scene of countless gamers coming down with migraines, having heart attacks, seizures and strokes. Local teens were suffering from amnesia and having hallucinations. All due to a mysterious game that seemed to arrive out of thin air.

The game was called Polybius.

And even though playing the game was dangerous, it was highly addictive and caused some teens to become hyper-aggressive.

Fights started breaking out at the arcade. One player was stabbed to death. All traced back to people who played Polybius.

Why would the government allow the public to play such a dangerous game? Because the government created it.

Let's find out why.

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⁍ TWF on SOCIAL (in order of importance)

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#unsolvedmysteries #urbanlegend #science

[skatinwhenican]

I Just Found This Channel, & It’s Awesome. I’m Subscribed & Locked In!!

[jasonluong]

I had the misfortune of running into such a deadly video game as a kid. It ate all of my quarters.

[Johken]

Every time I see the "WF?" red circle I think I see "WTF?" for a split second. I think it's part of a mind-control experiment. I feel so used ☣

[guypoole]

The only mind control is Smart Phones, we have now 2 generations who are addicted and mindless without their

[jlarrybrewer]

I always thought the Duffer brothers missed a huge Easter egg by not including a Polybius game in the arcade scene in Stranger Things season 2

[Lordslog]

Luv the show. Since I found your show last week, I've watched at least 30 episodes. I'd like to thank you and Lord HeckleFish for all your hard work.

[johnnycardwell]

That episode brought back some memories. I remember all those games I was 80s kid who loved video games. 52 year old man and I still enjoy playing a video game

[rba]

Thank you for bringing back memories of the arcade! I remember when donkey Kong first came out you could hit the lower corner of the change panel and it would rack up a game. You hit it real strong 10 times, you would rack up 10 credits. If you look at any of the old donkey Kong machines they're usually dented in that area. The way that worked was there was a swing mechanism that every time a quarter was deposited, would cause This bar to raise up and hit a button that would give you a credit. Hit it hard enough and you did not need a quarter to make that bar swing up. I believe the vendor finally got smart enough and started putting a hard metal strap across that front. Just a small history lesson from an old man.

[angeladawn]

This is two years old - lucky old me for finding it. The content is ALWAYS so well presented. I've taken to listening to the extended podcasts on Spotify, but I also like to hop on here to feed the algorithm 😊

[quitetidy]

I am a true crime junky in recovery. These videos have helped me not binge on true crime stories. I've learned a lot too 😂 This is great content.

[cheifthumbs]

I worked as an Arcade game technician back in the early 80's. I also worked as a Slot Technician for IGT repairing and maintaining slot machines. Nothing special. It was standard 8bit vector graphics using a VF power supply. North America uses 60 cycle (hz) AC power. The UK and elsewhere use 50hz AC power. Some people are sensitive to screen flicker that is known to cause nausea, headaches, epileptic fits, dizziness and in a couple cases fatal strokes after prolonged exposure. Games produced in the EU have warnings hard coded into the game. The Warnings are displayed as the games initialize.

[Springbok]

A good friend and I played Battle Zone every time we visited our local arcade back in '82-'84. He was much better at it than I was. For some odd reason when I saw the name and font Polybius in this video, it rings a bell in the deepest recesses of my mind. I honestly feel as if I saw the game back in 8th grade at an arcade.

[TacDyne]

Agents tried this at the arcade near my high school back in the early '80s. I was approached one afternoon and asked if I had any drugs for sale by an obvious LEO. I told him yeah I can get whatever he wants, but it will take me a while to get them so wait here.... then I went home and laughed.

[erikiversen]

I grew up in the town next to Calumet City, which is a southern suburb of Chicago. I remember the incident AJ mentions about someone being stabbed to death outside of the arcade very well, because I knew the kid who was killed. The arcade was called Aladdin's Castle and I rarely visited it because it would always be too crowded, but it was one of the first arcades to close in the area. The rumor going around as to why it closed was because of constant violence at the arcade and it seemed to occur only within a year. So, who knows? Maybe Polybius-like tech might be to blame?

[-sv]

Growing up in the 80s, the only game I was absolutely addicted to was Joust. I could not get enough of it… even dreaming about it. We would regularly sneak out of the house just to go down to the arcade to play it. It was nuts.

[Just.A.T-Rex]

I was shocked to actually learn something new about Polybius that hasn’t already been covered to death by other channels. Kudos! Liked and subscribed!

[rond]

I grew up near Seattle in the early 80’s and we used to play Tempest all the time. It was very addictive. Then Dragons Lair came out. That game was crazy

[leequinn]

There's a book titled Acres of Skin by Allen Hornblum which details some of these experiments. Some of these people were mentally disabled and they certainly didn't give consent to this (abuse). Thanks for the video, good content.

[elfenmagix]

Back. In those days I worked creating video games for a company in NYC. Also at the time I was a big Battle Zone player, figuring out how to play the game for hours on a single quarter. In one of the games the arcade owner came behind me and said "No matter how hard you play the game, you are not getting your quarter back!"

[FireFlyMaxx]

You have a terrific channel. I remember arcades in the 80s. The smell of stale beer pot and pizza, big hair, skateboards and breaking as far as the eye can see down the boardwalk on the beach in my hometown. It was rough and beautiful at the same time. You'd put your quarter on the cabinet to call dibs on the machine. Fist fights, the obligatory cat calls and wolf whistles. Good times. My brother being 9 years younger had him growing up with a kind of reimaging of the boardwalk & arcades. It was much cleaner, very policed, and lost much of the rough beauty I grew up with. It became a sterilized utopia.