Playing Games
Playing Games
A History of Video Games and systems
History of the Games
Computer Space was the first commercial arcade video game released to the public. It was designed by Nolan Bushnell. It had many technological innovations, but the gameplay was confusing and it didn't become a commercial success. Using the profits from the game Nolan Bushnell left Nutting Associates and formed Atari Inc.
Pong, Atari Inc., 1972
Pong was the first succesful arcade video game. It was designed by Nolan Bushnell and Alan Alcorn. The game play was extremely simple. Nolan placed the first game machine in a local gas station. When he became back the machine ceased to operate which it was full of money. Pong became an instant success and it created the arcade video game industry
Magnavox Odyssey
Magnavox Odyssey was designed by Ralph Baer, Bill Harrison and Bill Rusch of Sanders Associates, a military electronics firm in 1966-67. It was introduced in 1972 at a price of $100. Because micro chips were so expensive at that time, the Odyssey was designed using only 40 transistors and 40 diodes. Odyssey was able to generate only very simple on-screen effects and the players had to keep score by themselves, because the machine was incapable of doing so. Odyssey was packaged with screen overlays (to be placed on the TV screen to simulate complex graphics), two controllers, six game cards, play money, playing cards, a roulette and football playfield, a fold-out scoreboard, poker chips and a pair of dice. It wasn't a successful game.
Space Invaders, Taito/Bally/Midway, 1978
Space Invaders was the first blockbuster videogame. It brought the video games out of arcades and bars into restaurants, corner stores an brought video games into the public conciousness. It was translated to Atari 2600 video home game system and the home versio was also a huge commercial hit.
Atari 2600
Atari 2600, also known as Atari Video Computer System (VCS), was designed by Joe Decure, Harold Lee, and Steve Meyer. It was released in 1977 at introductory price of $199.95. It was the most popular videogame console of its day and it was available until 1990, being on the market longer than any other system in history.
Pac-Man, Bally/Midway, 1980
Pac-Man designed by Toru Iwatani and it was licensed from Namco. It was based on an ancient Japanese folk-tale. The idea of the game was to control the pac-man character which was moving inside a maze eating dots and to avoid ghosts which tried to kill pac-man.
Coleco Colecovision
Coleco released the Colecovision in 1982 at $199.95. It had 48 Kbytes of RAM and 3.58 MHz, 8-bit, Z80A CPU making it the most highpowered home system of its time.
Nintendo Entertainment System (Famicom)
Nintendo Entertainment System, briefly NES, was designed Masayuki Uemura. It released in 1985. It had an 8-bit CPU (6502 @ 1.79 MHz) and 2 kilobytes of RAM. The Graphics were capable of maximum of 256*224 pixel (NTSC) resolution and 16 simultaneous colors from a palette of 52 colors. It had 2 kilobytes graphics work RAM and 64 simultaneous sprites. Its sound system had 2 square wave channels, 1 triangle wave channel, 1 noise channel and 1 PCM channel.
Sega noticed that great games sold systems, so it took elements from its 16-bit arcade machines and produced the Mega-Drive in 1989. In America the machine was called Genesis, and it retailed for $199. It had 16-bit CPU (Motorola 68000 @ 7.6 MHz) and 72 kbytes RAM in addition to 64 Kbytes video RAM. The graphics were capable of 320*224 to 320x448 (NTSC) resolution and 61 simultaneous colors from a palette of 512 colors and 80 sprites. It had 10 sound channels and Z80 was used as an audio processor.
Super Nintendo Entertainment System (Super Famicom)
Super Nintendo, or briefly, SNES, system was introduced in 1990. SNES had 16-bit CPU (65816 @ 3.6 MHz) and 128 kbytes RAM and 64 Kbytes of video RAM. Its graphics were capable of 256*224 to 512x448 (NTSC) resolution, 256 simultaneous colors from a palette of 32768 colors and 128 sprites. It had 8 separate 8-bit PCM sound channels.
Sony Playstation
The Sony playstation uses a 33 MHz, 32-bit, MIPS R3900i CPU and it has hardware acceleration for texturemapped 3D polygon graphics at max. 640x480 resolution with 24-bit truecolor, 24 channel sound and a double speed CDROM drive.
Nintendo Ultra 64
Nintendo Ultra 64 was developed by Silicon Graphics and it was released in 1996 at an introductory price of $150. It has 64-bit CPU (customized MIPS R4300i series @ 93.75 MHz) and 4.5 Megabytes of RAM. Unlike the other new video games systems, Ultra 64 games are supplied on ROM cartridges
Playstation 2 System
Sony officially announces the PlayStation 2 in September 1999. In addition to playing PlayStation 2 games, the new unit will be compatible with all the games for the original PlayStation and will play audio CDs and DVDs. Sony plans to release the PlayStation 2 in Japan in March 2000 and in the United States and Europe in the fall of 2000.
Xbox Video Game System
Xbox is Microsoft's future-generation Video Game System that delivers the most powerful games experiences ever. Xbox empowers game artists by giving them the technology to fulfill their creative visions as never before, creating games that blur the lines between fantasy and reality.
Games Over the Years
Mario’s Evolution
Jodie's Resume
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