Which 1971 arcade game is widely regarded as the first commercially sold video game?

Computer Space is widely regarded as the first commercially sold video game.

Nutting Associates released the coin-operated arcade machine in 1971, several months before Atari released Pong. Players controlled a rocket fighting flying saucers, adapting ideas from the earlier computer game Spacewar! to dedicated commercial hardware.

The game was designed by Nolan Bushnell and Ted Dabney, who later founded Atari. Computer Space was not a major commercial success, partly because its controls and rules were less immediately accessible than Pong’s. Nevertheless, it established the commercial arcade-video-game format.

A common mix-up is calling Spacewar! the first commercial video game. Spacewar! was an influential 1962 research-computer game, while Computer Space was the first widely recognized coin-operated commercial release.