Trivia for
E.T.: The Extra-Terrestrial (1982) (VG)

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• Rushed into development for the 1982 Christmas season, Howard Scott Warsaw was given only 5 to 6 weeks to design, program and test this game. The game was widely considered almost unplayable.
  
  
• Atari reputedly paid $20 million to purchase a license to make the game. It is the first video game based on a major motion picture.
  
  
• Unfortunately, because of the alleged problems with the game, most copies were never sold. The unsold cartridges were dumped in a garbage dump in the Southwest USA. Atari further paid for the cartridges to be crushed with a bulldozer and cement to be poured on top of the pile to discourage theft of what was still an Atari product.
  
  

• This game drove Atari close to bankruptcy, due to the extreme cost of the license.
  
  
• The game contains an Easter Egg. When E.T. falls down into the hole with the dead flower he can bring it back to life. Repeatedly doing this will eventually turn the flower into the fly from Yars' Revenge (1981) (VG) which promptly flies out of the hole.
  
  
• The odd looking telephone is meant to look like the letters ET.
  
  

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