Unit 1 – Brief History of Video Games

PostedSeptember 12, 2021

UpdatedSeptember 18, 2021

Byadmin

Items In This Unit

The 20 oldest video games
Console generations
The 2D games
The 3D games
The top 10 games by each decade

The 20 Oldest Video Games

The rise of computers and computing devices dates back to the thirties of the 20th century. When we take a look at computer history we can observe that video games have played a big role in the overall appeal of computers and computing devices since their inception during the 50s in the previous century. The following table lists the 20 oldest video games.

#	Name	Release Date	Creator	Mode	System
1	Tic-tac-toe	1952	A.S. Douglas	Multiplayer	Standalone
2	Tennis for Two	1958	William Higinbotham	Multiplayer	Standalone
3	Spacewar	1962	Steve Russell et al	Multiplayer	Standalone
4	Computer Space	1971	Nolan Bushnell et al	Multiplayer	Standalone
5	Galaxy Game	1971	Bill Pitts et al	Multiplayer	Standalone
6	Table Tennis	1972	Ralph H. Baer et al	Multiplayer	Magnavox Odyssey
7	Ski	1972	Ralph H. Baer et al	Multiplayer	Magnavox Odyssey
8	Simon Says	1972	Ralph H. Baer et al	Multiplayer	Magnavox Odyssey
9	Analogic	1972	Ralph H. Baer et al	Multiplayer	Magnavox Odyssey
10	Hockey	1972	Ralph H. Baer et al	Multiplayer	Magnavox Odyssey
11	Football	1972	Ralph H. Baer et al	Multiplayer	Magnavox Odyssey
12	Cat and Mouse	1972	Ralph H. Baer et al	Multiplayer	Magnavox Odyssey
13	Haunted House	1972	Ralph H. Baer et al	Multiplayer	Magnavox Odyssey
14	Submarine	1972	Ralph H. Baer et al	Multiplayer	Magnavox Odyssey
15	Roulette	1972	Ralph H. Baer et al	Multiplayer	Magnavox Odyssey
16	States	1972	Ralph H. Baer et al	Multiplayer	Magnavox Odyssey
17	Pong	1972	Allan Alcorn	Multiplayer	Standalone
18	Space Race	1973	Atari	Multiplayer	Standalone
19	Gran Trak 10	1974	Atari	Multiplayer	Standalone
20	Tank	1974	Kee Games / Atari	Multiplayer	Standalone

Out of all of the listed games, I bet you only heard of “Pong”. Pong simulated an overly simplified tennis game of two players represented by two small lines at the end of each side of the screen. The objective of the game was to bounce the ball over to the other side in the hope of the opponent missing the ball.

Gaming Consoles & Game Console Generations

The gaming industry really took off once the first gaming consoles started appearing. The following table lists some of the most known but also historically important consoles.

#	Video Game System	Release	Creator	Colours at once	CPU / Processor	CPU Bits	Gen
1	Odyssey	1972	Magnavox	monochrome	n/a	n/a	1
2	Atari 2600	1977	Atari	128	MOS 6507	8	2
3	Odyssey 2	1978	Magnavox	16	Intel 8048	8	2
4	Intellivision	1979	Mattel Electronics	16	GI CP1600	8	2
5	ColecoVision	1982	Coleco Industries	16	Zilog Z80	8	2
6	Atari 5200	1982	Atari	128	MOS 6502C	8	2
7	Sega SG-1000	1983	Sega	16	Zilog Z80	8	3
8	Nintendo Family Computer	1983	Nintendo	24	Motorola 6502	8	3
9	Nintendo Entertainment System (NES)	1985	Nintendo	64	Ricoh 2A03	8	3
10	Sega Master System (SMS)	1986	Sega	64	Zilog Z80A	8	3
11	Atari 7800	1986	Atari	256	6502C	8	3
12	Sega Genesis (Mega Drive)	1988	Sega	64	Motorola 68000 & Zilog Z80	32	4
13	TurboGrafx-16 (PC Engine)	1989	NEC	256	Hudson Soft HuC6280	8	4
14	Super Nintendo Entertainment System (SNES)	1991	Nintendo	256	Ricoh 5A22	16	4
15	Atari Jaguar	1993	Atari	8.1 thousand	2x Motorola 68000	32	5
16	Sega 32X	1994	Sega	32.7 thousand	2 × SH-2 32-bit RISC	32	4
17	Sega Saturn	1994	Sega	16.7 million	2× Hitachi SH-2	32	5
18	Playstation	1994	Sony	16.7 million	32-bit RISC	32	5
19	Nintendo 64	1996	Nintendo	16.7 million	NEC VR4300	64	5
20	Dreamcast	1998	Sega	16.7 million	Hitachi SH-4 32-bit RISC	32	6
21	Playstation 2	2000	Sony	16.7 million	MIPS R5900	64	6
22	GameCube	2001	Nintendo	16.7 million	IBM PowerPC 750CXe	32	6
23	Xbox	2001	Microsoft	16.7 million	Intel Pentium III	32	6
24	Xbox 360	2005	Microsoft	16.7 million	PowerPC Tri-Core Xenon	64	7
25	Playstation 3	2006	Sony	16.7 million	Cell Broadband Engine	64	7
26	Wii	2006	Nintendo	16.7 million	IBM PowerPC	32	7
27	Wii U	2012	Nintendo	16.7 million	IBM PowerPC	32	8
28	Playstation 4	2013	Sony	16.7 million	AMD x86-64 Jagua	64	8
29	Xbox One	2013	Microsoft	16.7 million	AMD 8-core APU	64	8
30	Nintendo Switch	2017	Nintendo	16.7 million	4 Cortex-A57 & 4 Cortex-A53	64	8

In the early days of gaming consoles, their arcade equivalents in amusement parks were of much better quality. This is no longer the case as the latest consoles pack the same computing power or in some cases even more computing power.

The 2D Games

Let’s preface this section by saying that all computer video games are ultimately 2D. Even 3D games are fundamentally 2D because they are drawn on a two-dimensional plane. How they because known as 3D is by the clever use of optical illusion (clever graphical rendering) of three-dimensional space.

Some of the most popular 2D games include Pacman, Mario Brothers, Phoenix, Crush Roller, Tetris and Sonic.

The 3D Games

The most popular games today are typically in the 3D genre and first-person shooters.

3D video games refer to animated characters (sprites) and scenes rendered by specialized 3D programs.
Action and movements in 3D games simulate depth.
3D Monster Maze, developed by Malcolm Evans in 1981 for the Sinclair ZX81 platform, was the 1st ever 3D game.
3D games became mainstream with the release of Doom in 1993
3D games are further enhanced with virtual reality (VR) sets or specialized 3D glasses

Top 10 Games by Decade

While you may be familiar with the most recently released games, there are plenty of great games that were made many years ago. Without further ado here is the list.

#	The 70s	The 80s	The 90s	The 2000s	The 2010s
1	Space Invaders	Pac-man	Half-Life	The Sims	The Legend of Zelda
2	Pong	Ms. Pac-man	Final Fantasy VII	Grand Theft III	The Witcher 3
3	Galaxian	Donkey Kong	Doom	Guitar Hero	The Last of Us
4	Asteroids Breakout	Gauntlet	Metal Gear Solid	World of Warcraft	The Elder Scrolls V Skyrim
5	Tank	Star Wars	Super Metroid	Brain Age	Dark Souls
6	Computer Space	Tetris	Super Mario 64	Halo	Super Mario Odyssey
7	Anti-Aircraft	Frogger	The Legend of Zelda	Bejeweled	Batman: Arkham City
8	Death Race	Golden Axe	Super Mario World	Wii Sports	Portal 2
9	Lunar Lander	Pole Position	Chrono Trigger	Geometry Wars	Grand Theft Auto V
10	Star Raiders	Duck Hunt	StarCraft	Metroid Prime	Minecraft