Who was the Wizard of Odyssey?
The Wizard of Odyssey was a character created by Philips to promote Odyssey² in the United States and Brazil. In the 4th quarter of 1982, the Wizard began appearing on television commercials, in print ads, and in the pages of Odyssey² Adventure magazine, hawking Odyssey² games from his magical crystalline lair. The Wizard dressed in black robes and sported a lighted red circle on his chest. In Odyssey² Adventure comics, his lair is shown to be populated with gnomelike helpers, but these characters never appeared on television. Unfortunately it not known who portrayed the Wizard, but he was an older gentleman with dark gray hair, extremely bushy eyebrows and a somewhat blustery voice. The character is presented as being well-spoken but smug, quite obsessed with Odyssey², and strangely not very magical. The Wizard featured prominently in “The Wizard’s Great Game Giveaway,” a promotion run at the end of 1982 to drum up interest in Odyssey² by offering free and reduced-price games to buyer
