The Atari 2600, released in 1977, has been making waves for its shocking victories over modern AI technologies, including ChatGPT, Copilot, and even causing Gemini to back out of a match.
This 48-year-old gaming console, which boasts an 8-bit processor running at 1.19MHz and a mere 128 bytes of RAM, has proven to be more formidable than many expected, especially when it comes to a game of chess.
In a surprising twist, when the Atari 2600 faced off against ChatGPT, the AI chatbot was completely overwhelmed, even at the beginner level. According to Robert Caruso, an infrastructure architect who shared his findings in June, ChatGPT made several critical errors during the game, including confusing rooks for bishops, missing pawn forks, and losing track of the board state. Despite being told it was making mistakes, ChatGPT failed to recover, losing the game badly. When questioned, ChatGPT blamed the Atari’s abstract representation of chess pieces, though even after switching to standard notation, it couldn’t get its moves right.
Interestingly, ChatGPT had suggested the match, claiming it could easily beat Atari Video Chess, which only looks 1-2 moves ahead. However, the reality was far from what ChatGPT expected. In the end, after an hour and a half of mistakes and resets, ChatGPT conceded defeat.
But the Atari 2600 wasn’t done yet. It then went up against Microsoft’s Copilot, which had a similar story. Initially confident, Copilot claimed it could think several moves ahead and wouldn’t have any issues playing against the Atari, despite the Atari’s “suboptimal moves.” However, Caruso had to intervene, sending Copilot screenshots after every Atari move due to Copilot’s spatial memory problems. Despite its capabilities, Copilot couldn’t manage to win, and the Atari 2600 emerged victorious once again, leaving two AI opponents defeated.
Gemini, the AI developed by Google, was the next challenger. Confident in its abilities, Gemini agreed to play against the Atari, only to admit that it had “hallucinated” its chess-playing skills. Realizing it was out of its depth, Gemini canceled the match, calling it the most sensible and time-efficient decision. Though Gemini never got to face off with the Atari, Caruso respected its ability to recognize its limitations.
So, how is it possible that a 48-year-old console, with outdated technology, could outplay AI systems that use the latest advancements in machine learning and computational power? The answer lies in the fact that the Atari 2600 was specifically designed to play chess, while modern AI chatbots like ChatGPT and Copilot were built for natural language processing, not strategy games. Senior Software Engineer Kyle Witeck summed it up best: “You’re comparing language models to a chess bot that was designed to play chess…classic…”