I remember so vividly receiving that game as a present from my uncle one Christmas in the early 80s, he must've found it in the clearance bin for $5 or less, it was the most frustrating piece of shit I had ever played, I remember asking my dad (who used to play Pacman, Robotron and Empire Strikes Back with me for hours on our 2600) to help me escape the freaking pits.
We both got so fed up that he told me my copy of the game was probably broken, and would get me a new copy (I was like 6 or 7 at the time, and ET was all the rage back then) He probably found a copy in the same discount bin and brought it home one night, we both sat in front of this huge CRT TV anxiously waiting to start the game and evade the evil government agents while looking for the phone pieces and Elliot as the colorful manual explained, the first time ET fell in a pit and we tried unsuccessfully to escape it (just like in my first copy) my father turned off the Atari in disgust and asked me not to play that game anymore.
He avoided playing video games with me whenever he could after that, the next Christmas my Atari 2600 was seating behind our betamax gathering dust, it wouldn't be until 1989 before I finally convinced my father to buy me an NES, thanks for almost ruining my entire gamer life Atari! Those cartridges are the spawn of the devil and deserved to be left buried if you ask my dad!
