Kee was formed by Joe Keenan, a friend and neighbor of Atari co-founder Nolan Bushnell, in September 1973.

In reality, Bushnell had worked with Keenan to create Kee Games in response to the pinball and arcade distributors of the time who demanded exclusivity deals; Bushnell believed that Kee Games could offer similar but renamed arcade games, or "clones", to distributors, which would greatly expand Atari's distribution beyond the limits of these deals.

[1] Bushnell assigned several of Atari's staff to work at Kee Games, including Steve Bristow, Bill White, and Gil Williams, and discreetly supplied them the parts for which they could make their games.

[2] Tank became a popular arcade game, and helped Atari recover from the financial downturn.

Kee continued to produce arcade games through 1978, when the division was closed down by Warner Communications, which had acquired Atari in 1976.