rekordy: History of video games

Evidence: 100 • authority: 72

The history of video games began in the 1950s and 1960s as computer scientists began designing simple games and simulations on minicomputers and mainframes. Spacewar! was developed by Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT) student hobbyists in 1962 as one of the first such games on a video display. The first consumer video game hardware was released in the early 1970s. The first home video game console was the Magnavox Odyssey, and the first arcade video games were Computer Space and Pong. After its home console conversions, numerous companies sprang up to capture Pong's success in both the arcade and the home by cloning the game, causing a series of boom and bust cycles due to oversat…

Evidence: 71 • authority: 72

Spacewar! is a space combat video game developed in 1962 by Steve Russell in collaboration with Martin Graetz, Wayne Wiitanen, Bob Saunders, Steve Piner, and others. It was written for the newly installed DEC PDP-1 minicomputer at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology. It was later expanded by other students and employees of universities in the area, including by Dan Edwards and Peter Samson. It also spread to many of the few dozen installations of PDP-1s, making it the first video game to be played at multiple computer installations. The game features two spaceships, "the needle" and "the wedge", engaged in a dogfight while maneuvering in the gravity well of a star. Both ships are cont…

Evidence: 63 • authority: 72

A video game, computer game, is an electronic game that involves interaction with a user interface or input device (such as a joystick, controller, keyboard, or motion sensing device) to generate visual feedback from a display device, most commonly shown in a video format on a television set, computer monitor, flat-panel display or touchscreen on handheld devices, or a virtual reality headset. Most modern video games are audiovisual, with audio complement delivered through speakers or headphones, and sometimes also with other types of sensory feedback (e.g., haptic technology that provides tactile sensations). Some video games also allow microphone and webcam inputs for in-game chatting and…

Evidence: 63 • authority: 72

Evidence: 48 • authority: 72

A multiplayer video game is a video game in which more than one person can play in the same game environment at the same time, either locally on the same computing system (couch co-op), on different computing systems via a local area network, or via a wide area network, most commonly the Internet. Multiplayer games usually require players to share a single game system or use networking technology to play together over a greater distance; players may compete against one or more human contestants, work cooperatively with a human partner to achieve a common goal, or supervise other players' activity. Due to multiplayer games allowing players to interact with other individuals, they provide an…

Evidence: 45 • authority: 72

The history of video games spans a period of time between the invention of the first electronic games and today, covering many inventions and developments. Video gaming reached mainstream popularity in the early 1970s, when arcade video games, gaming consoles and personal computer games were introduced to the general public. Since then, video gaming has become a popular form of entertainment and a part of modern culture in most parts of the world. The early history of video games, therefore, covers the period of time between the first interactive electronic game with an electronic display in 1947, the first true video games in the early 1950s, and the rise of early personal computer and arc…

Evidence: 45 • authority: 72

Evidence: 41 • authority: 80

Evidence: 22 • authority: 88

Students and Video Game Players. Some studies show that video games are used in teaching (Foreman 2004) and others report on players learning through their leisure activities online (Perriault 1987; Berry 2007), as formerly was the case through ordinary games. Even though the latter have been recognized by many researchers as leisure activities (Natkin 2003; Lafrance 2006), they were already used as learning tools (Brougere 1995, 2004). However, since the beginning of time, play has been more or less directly opposed to work (Caillois 1967; Henriot 1989). The term "work" can be related to the notion of school work for children and adolescents, and to academic work for young adults. But, if…

Evidence: 22 • authority: 80

Evidence: 22 • authority: 80