THE HISTORY OF VIDEO GAMES
THIS IS THE COMPLETE HISTORY OF THE GREATEST INDUSTRY TO HAVE BEEN EVER CREATED AND EVER WILL BE CREATED
FIRST IS A YEARLY RUN DOWN FROM THE BEGINNING TO THE FUTURE, THEN LINKS TO A BRIEF DESCRIPTION OF SELECTED MACHINES AND RECOMMENDED GAMES.
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MAGNAVOX ODYSSEY - 1972 |
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FAIRCHILD CHANNEL F - 1976 |
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BALLY ARCADE - 1976 |
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ATARI PONG - 1976 |
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ATARI VIDEO PINBALL - 1977 |
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MAGNAVOX ODYSSEY 2 - 1978 |
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ATARI VCS/2600 - 1978 |
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ATARI 400 - 1979 |
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INGERSOLL TV GAME - 1979 |
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MATTEL INTELLIVISION - 1980 |
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SINCLAIR ZX80 - 1980 |
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EPOCH CASSETTE VISION - 1981 |
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SEGA SC3000H - 1981 |
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SINCLAIR ZX81 - 1981 |
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TEXAS INSTRUMENTS TI-99/4A - 1981 |
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COMMODORE VIC-20 - 1981 |
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EMERSON ARCADIA - 1982 |
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ZX SPECTRUM - 1982 |
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COMMODORE 64 - 1982 |
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CBS COLECOVISION - 1982 |
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ACORN BBC - 1982 |
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CAMPUTERS LYNX - 1982 |
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ORIC - 1982 |
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DRAGON 32 - 1982 |
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JUPITER ACE - 1982 |
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SUPER CASSETTE VISION - 1983 |
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ACORN ELECTRON - 1983 |
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MATTEL AQUARIUS - 1983 |
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JVC MSX - 1983 |
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MB VECTREX - 1983 |
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SHARP MZ700 - 1983 |
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AMSTRAD CPC464 - 1984 |
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ATARI 800XL - 1984 |
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MEMOTECH MTX512 - 1984 |
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NINTENDO FAMICOM ENTERTAINMENT SYSTEM - 1984 |
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SINCLAIR QL - 1986 |
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NEC PC ENGINE - 1986 |
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SEGA MASTER SYSTEM - 1986 |
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ATARI 65XE - 1987 |
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SEGA MEGADRIVE - 1988 |
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NEC TURBOGRAFX - 1988 |
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COMMODORE AMIGA 500 - 1988 |
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SHARP FAMICOM TWIN - 1988 |
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AMSTRAD GX4000 - 1990 |
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SNK NEO GEO - 1990 |
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SUPER NINTENDO ENTERTAINMENT SYSTEM - 1990 |
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FUJITSU FM TOWNS MARTY - 1991 |
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PHILIPS CD-I - 1991 |
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ATARI JAGUAR - 1993 |
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PANASONIC 3DO - 1993 |
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COMMODORE AMIGA CD32- 1993 |
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NINTENDO VIRTUAL BOY - 1995 |
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SEGA SATURN - 1995 |
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SONY PLAYSTATION - 1995 |
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NINTENDO 64 - 1996 |
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SEGA DREAMCAST - 1999 |
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After everybody had grown tired of swatting balls with blocky bats in pong, the Atari 2600 arrived. As one of the first home consoles, it was hilariously primitive, with a few coloured squares being about the best its cartridges could manage. But it was staggeringly popular, and developed a mammoth catalogue of games. The fake wood casing was a bad move, but the 2600 helped bring gaming to the masses.
FIVE BIGGEST GAMES
1. SPACE INVADERS
2. PITFALL
3. THE EMPIRE STRIKES BACK
4. RIVER RAID
5. DEMON ATTACK
A small black plastic computer with rubber keys, invented by a small, semi-bald, ginger-headed man called Sir Clive Sinclair. For years, the 'Speccy' (as it became fondly known) was the UK's most popular games machine, despite its tendency to get confused if there were more than two colours on-screen. Games came on cassette and, if you were lucky enough to get a tape that worked, the cassettes took 5 minutes to load. The Speccy's mortal enemy was the Commodore 64. They hated each other.
TEN BIGGEST GAMES
1. HEAD OVER HEELS
2. JET SET WILLY
3. SKOOL DAZE
4. RENEGADE
5. R-TYPE
6. DIZZY
7. THE HOBBIT
8. WAY OF THE EXPLODING FIST
9. MATCH DAY 2
10. ADVENTURES OF ROBIN HOOD
Launched after the Spectrum, the Commodore quickly became the sworn nemesis of Clive's rubbery black box. Technically, the C64 was a better machine- more colours, more memory, more keys- but the games cost a teensy bit more pocket money. It came in a sickening shade of beige, and had an add-on disk drive that was slower than loading from cassette tape. Despite the obvious faults, the C64 was almost as popular as the Speccy.
TEN BIGGEST GAMES
1. LITTLE COMPUTER PEOPLE
2. THE SENTINEL
3. URIDIUM
4. IMPOSSIBLE MISSION
5. BOULDERDASH
6. SPY VS SPY
7. GHOSTBUSTERS
8. MERCENARY
9. WIZBALL
10. INTERNATIONAL SOCCER
A company called Acorn won the contract to build the first officially-licensed BBC machine, and it emerged as this chunky, creamy home computer. It wasn't as well-suited to games as the Speccy or C64, and, thanks to the BBC's blessing (and a wallet-busting price tag). Was thought of as a boring 'computer for schools'. The BBC (and it's little cousin, the Electron) had a fair few decent titles, though.
FIVE BIGGEST GAMES
1. ELITE
2. EXILE
3. REVS
4. FRAK
5. SWOOP
The third contender in the 8-bit punch-up, released by Spurs boss Alan Sugar. It looked like it was made from chocolate, had a shockingly poor built-in cassette player, and was doomed to host games that looked and sounded identical to the Spectrum's. The CPC was truly the runt of the '80s litter of home computers, with its blocky graphics and six minute plus loading times, but was still midly popular.
TEN BIGGEST GAMES
1. BARBARIAN
2. SORCERY
3. DRILLER
4. BEACH HEAD
5. HIGHWAY ENCOUNTER
6. CHUCKIE EGG
7. NEBULUS
8. FOOTBALL MANAGER
9. BRUCE LEE
10. LODE RUNNER
Coleco were a huge, multi-national toy giant, the same people behind the eye-wincing Cabbage Patch Dolls. Their console was advanced, colourful, pricey (£150), and looked like a cross between a car radio and a playstation 2. It was helped along by its 'arcade perfect' conversions of popular coin-ops of the day. It died when the sequel (Adam) Kicked the bucket.
FIVE BIGGEST GAMES
1. THE SMURFS
2. MR DO
3. DONKEY KONG
4. ZAXXON
5. TURBO
Weighing in at a tear-inducing £200, the bits and pieces inside Mattel's machines made it a much better bet than Atari's prehistoric VCS. But it looked like an old-fashioned radiator, featuring adverts that simply pictured a group of people lookng unconvinced, and suffered from a titchy games catalogue. Popular for a while, but not that long at all.
FIVE BIGGEST GAMES
1. TRON DEADLY DISCS
2. SKIING
3. UTOPIA
4. ASTROSMASH
5. NIGHTSTALKERS
Nintendo's first console took japan by storm, and dominated gaming for years. Thanks to the vision of Shigsy and grumpy ol' Mr Yamauchi, the NES brought gamers a revolutionary controller, the best developers, and some of the 'funnest' games in history. Marketing mess-ups and a late arrival made for a quieter time in the UK, though, and looking like a unfriendly grey shoe box didn't help its cause much either.
TEN BIGGEST GAMES
1. SUPER MARIO BROTHERS
2. SUPER MARIO BROTHERS 3
3. MARIO BROTHERS
4. GRADIUS
5. GHOSTS 'N' GOBLINS
6. R.C. PRO AM
7. KID ICARUS
8. THE LEGEND OF ZELDA
9. MIKE TYSON'S PUNCH OUT!!
10. METROID
When Sega decided to hit back at the God-like dominance of the NES, this was what their boffins came up with. Games came on cartridge or credit card, and Sega had a back catalogue of popular arcade game conversions that provided irresistible to coin-op obsessed kiddies. The Master System didn't dent NES sales in Japan, but it soundly trounced Nintendo's machine in the UK.
TEN BIGGEST GAMES
1. ALEX KIDD IN MIRACLE WORLD
2. OUT RUN
3. PRINCE OF PERSIA
4. WONDER BOY
5. ALIEN SYNDROME
6. HANG ON
7. AFTERBURNER
8. PACMANIA
9. COOL SPOT
10. KICK OFF
These clunky, number-crunching boxes have been around since the dawn of time, but their popularity as games machines was slow to take off. Simple, purple-and-black games on one diskette gave way to vast, complex 3D games on two CDs, and now the PC is home to the worlds' most advanced games. The price is still heart-attack territory- decent PCs have always cost around £1000-but if you're looking for complex games, this is your man.
TEN BIGGEST GAMES
1. MONKEY ISLAND
2. MINESWEEPER
3. HALF-LIFE
4. DOOM
5. MYST
6. COMMAND & CONQUER
7. ULTIMA
8. THEME PARK
9. QUAKE 2
10. GRIM FANDANGO
The Speccy and C64 panicked when this arrived. The Amiga was '16 bit', which meant twice as powerful as previous computers. A proper keyboard, thousands of colours, games that loaded in an instant from disk- this was the future. It didn't take off at first, thanks to a stupefyingly high £1000 price point, but as the price began to drop, so the punters began to flock. As a rival, the Amiga had the less popular Atari ST.
TEN BIGGEST GAMES
1. RAINBOW ISLANDS
2. POPULOUS
3. SENSIBLE SOCCER
4. LEMMINGS
5. IT CAME FROM THE DESERT
6. THE CHAOS ENGINE
7. WORMS
8. KICK OFF 2
9. INDIANA JONES & THE FATE OF ATLANTIS
10. SHADOW OF THE BEAST
In a gloves-off, hard hitting fight with the Amiga, the 16-Bit ST lost. Both machines were similar-proper computers with clickety-clack keyboards, colourful graphics, disk-loading games- but Atari's machine was slightly less powerful, and the games soon dried up. And, like the Amiga, there were few people prepared to shell out for the ST until it dropped to a sensible price. When this finally happened, its popularity improved.
TEN BIGGEST GAMES
1. SPEEDBALL
2. STARGLIDER
3. XENON
4. DUNGEON MASTER
5. BUBBLE BOBBLE
6. FRONTIER: ELITE 2
7. SIM CITY
8. STUNT CAR RACER
9. BATMAN THE MOVIE
10. THE PAWN
Although it never made it to these shores, NEC's PC Engine had a healthy following in Japan and America. Home to some of the most authentic coin-op conversions, despite having the same pitiful power as the weedy NES and Master System, games on credit card were soon replaced by some of the first titles on shiny CDs. The PC Engine was ordered direct from Japan by some impatient European gamers, breathing life into an import scene that thrives to this day. Mint!
TEN BIGGEST GAMES
1. BC KID
2. R-TYPE 2
3. ATOMIC ROBOKID
4. NEW ZEALAND STORY
5. CHASE H.Q.
6. BOMBERMAN
7. PAC-LAND
8. ALIEN CRUSH
9. GUNHED
10. DUNGEON EXPLORER
While Nintendo ruled over the rest of the planet. Sega conquered Europe with the 16-Bit Megadrive. It wasn't pretty- a matt black slab of plastic that was eerily lightweight- but it had big-name developers lining up to bring their games to its plasticy cartridges. Again, The Big S had a hefty line-up of popular coin-ops to convert, and its sales meant a boom time for gaming. And with the release of top titles like the Sonic series, Mortal Kombat series and the Ecco series it gradually broke through in America.
TEN BIGGEST GAMES
1. JOHN MADDEN'S AMERICAN FOOTBALL
2. SONIC THE HEDGEHOG
3. GHOULS 'N' GHOSTS
4. MORTAL KOMBAT
5. ECCO THE DOLPHIN
6. GOLDEN AXE
7. STRIDER
8. MICKEY MOUSE IN THE CASTLE OF ILLUSION
9. SPACE HARRIER 2
10. KID CHAMELEON
SUPER NINTENDO ENTERTAINMENT SYSTEM
Nintendo's Super Nintendo Entertainment System knocked the Megadrive into a cocked hat, with superb graphics, a revolutionary shoulder-pad equipped joypad, and a casing that was more pleasant to look at than Sega's charred brick. Thanks to a steeper price and a late arrival, the SNES couldn't match the Megadrive's sales, but the bloody battle between the two brought about a boom in electronic gaming, with the famous Sonic vs Mario war which still rages on today.
TEN BIGGEST GAMES
1. YOSHI'S ISLAND
2. SUPER MARIO ALL-STARS
3. SUPER MARIO WORLD
4. SUPER MARIO KART
5. STARWING
6. THE LEGEND OF ZELDA 3
7. DONKEY KONG COUNTRY
8. F-ZERO
9. SUPER METROID
10. STREET FIGHTER 2 TURBO
Nintendo's golden child. The Game Boy was-and is- the world's most successful games console. The original black and white incarnation was chunky, ugly and difficult to see in anything but strong artificial light, but gaming-on-the-go proved irresistible. Now, with the sleek full-colour version and tasty transparent casing, the Game Boy is literally more popular than ever.
TEN BIGGEST GAMES
1. POKEMON
2. SUPER MARIO LAND
3. TETRIS
4. SUPER MARIO BROTHERS DX
5. ZELDA DX
6. TENNIS
7. R-TYPE DX
8. KIRBY'S DREAMLAND
9. BALLOON KID
10. MARIO GOLF
Once again, Atari had a tough time of it, this time with their rival to the Game Boy. It was a technical marvel-sleek, back-lighted and in full colour-but it guzzed batteries at a ridiculous rate, making actually playing the thing impossible. As the Game Boy conquered the world, Atari's expensive machine stumbled, fell and died.
TEN BIGGEST GAMES
1. APB
2. GAUNTLET
3. HARD DRIVIN
4. XYBOTS
5. CALIFORNIA GAMES
6. TOKI
7. NINJA GAIDEN
8. WARBIRDS
9. TODD'S ADVENTURES IN SLIMEWORLD
10. KLAX
Nintendo don't fall very often, but this virtual reality console was a mess of a machine. The painful red and black visuals that appeared as you peered down the strap-on goggles led to headaches and puking, the joypad resembled a scary-looking spider, and there were only a few games released before Nintendo quietly began to pretend that it had never exsisted. Bizzare.
THREE BIGGEST GAMES?
1. WARIO LAND
2. MARIO'S TENNIS
3. GOLF
Atari's attempt to re-enter the console macket practically killed them. It was the first 64-Bit console, but it made two mistakes. One, it used expensive cartridges when the rest of the world was gazing lovingly at CDs. Two, it had no games- the three listed below were just about the only titles in the shops. All sorts of consoles were dropping dead at the time, and the Jaguar was happy to help fill the graves.
THREE BIGGEST GAMES
1. TEMPEST 2000
2. ALIEN VS PREDATOR
3. DOOM
Trip Hawkins had big plans for this 32-Bit console. Sick of Nintendo and Sega's constant bickering, he wanted his 3DO to become a standardised console that everyone would own-making him a pot of money in the process. Sadly, the public turned their backs, and a lack of quality 3D games scuppered Trip's plans. It was a funny-looking beast, too, resembling a flatterened toaster, until the slick looking Goldstar appeared.
TEN BIGGEST GAMES
1. CRASH AND BURN
2. NEED FOR SPEED
3. SUPER STREET FIGHTER 2 TURBO
4. RETURN FIRE
5. JOHN MADDEN FOOTBALL
6. FIFA SOCCER
7. NIGHT TRAP
8. ALONE IN THE DARK
9. FLASHBACK
10. SHERLOCK HOLMES
An Amiga with the keyboard riiped out and a CD player glued on, the CD32 was the first 32-Bit console. The plan was for the existing Amiga programmers to shift seamlessly into producing games for the round-cornered wonder, but an appalling advertising campaign and lack of launch games finished it off mercilessly quick. Nice coloured joypads, though.
THREE BIGGEST GAMES
1. ZOOL
2. JAMES POND: ROBOCOD
3. MICROCOSM
After a run of successful consoles, Sega began to make fools of themselves with this add-on for the Megadrive. It allowed CD games to run on the old console, but the titles that appeared were half hearted, FMV-filled nonsense with a lack of actual gameplay. The public smelled a rat and stayed away.
THREE BIGGEST GAMES
1. THUNDERHAWK
2. BATMAN RETURNS
3. NIGHT TRAP
In 1997, Sony slipped on a giant boot and gave gaming an almighty kick. With the appearance of their magic box, Playstation, gaming became 'cool',with thousands of otherwise gaming-ignorant punters shelling out for the CD based machine. Since then, the Playstation has never looked back, and we've got the Big S to thank for the shape of gaming today.
TEN BIGGEST GAMES
1. METAL GEAR SOLID
2. GRAN TURISMO
3. FINAL FANTASY 7
4. TIME CRISIS
5. TOMB RAIDER
6. WIPEOUT
7. TEKKEN
8. RESIDENT EVIL
9. RIDGE RACER
10. FORMULA ONE
Originally named Project Reality, the Ultra 64, the Nintendo 64 was the Big N's answer to the Playstation. Sixty-four Bits made it twice as powerful, and another patented ground-breaking Nintendo controller made shifting 3D characters around easier than ever. Sadly, it's late arrival, lack of games and expensive cartridges have kept it in Playstation's ominous shadow
TEN BIGGEST GAMES
1. GOLDENEYE 007
2. ZELDA 64
3. SUPER MARIO 64
4. WAVE RACE 64
5. JET FORCE GEMINI
6. MARIO KART 64
7. F-ZERO X
8. LYLAT WARS
9. PILOTWINGS 64
10. BANJO-KAZOOIE