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Breakout is a Pong-like video game and arcade game published by Atari in 1976.

In the game, a layer of 'bricks' lines the top third of the screen. A ball travels across the screen, 'bouncing' off the top and side walls of the screen. When the ball hits a brick, the ball bounces off and the brick disappears. The player loses a life when the ball touches the bottom of the screen, and to prevent this from happening, the player has a movable paddle that the ball can bounce off.

The original arcade version of Breakout was designed for a black and white monitor. However, the top part of the monitor had tinted strips of transparent material placed over it so that the bricks appeared to be in color.

This amazingly simple yet addictive game is the basis of countless remakes, including Super Breakout and Arkanoid.

The original circuit for Breakout was put together by Steve Jobs and Steve WozniakStephen Wozniak ( Polish: Wozniak, nickname The) Woz or Wizard of Woz (born August 11, 1950) is credited with initiating the entry of computers into private homes. Although his contribution may be seen as a compilation of a few well-known ideas that have, the founders of Apple ComputerApple Computer, Inc. is a Silicon Valley company based in Cupertino, California, whose main business is computer technologies. Best known for its range of Macintosh computers and, more recently, its iPod personal audio ( MP3 and otherwise) player and iTun. Wozniak managed to program the original game with an incredibly small number of integrated circuitAn integrated circuit (IC is a thin chip consisting of thousands or millions of interconnected semiconductor devices, mainly transistors, as well as passive components like resistors. As of 2004, typical chips are of size 1 cm2 or smaller, but larger oness. Unfortunately, Wozniak's design was so complex that Atari's engineers could not fathom how it worked, and so were unable to put the original game into mass production; the game's circuits had to be redesigned before this could happen.

Years later, Wozniak discovered that Jobs, who handled negotiations with Atari for the design of the game, had short-changed him. This resulted in Wozniak quitting Apple.

Despite this, the game eventually went into mass production, and became a huge success. It is fondly remembered by arcade game fans the world over.