-
The start of Gaming
The start of modern gaming started with the magnavox odyssey. it was first tried in may 24TH 1972. The odyssey was then realesed in april 1972. designed by ralph Baer. The Odyssey uses a type of removable printed circuit board card that inserts into a slot similar to a cartridge slot, allowing the player to select the unit's various games. It was sold throughout the years until 1975. At first Odyssey was not so popular but then atari made a game called Pong making it hugely addictive. -
What are Bits
Each new generation of console hardware made use of the rapid development of processing technology. Newer machines could output a greater range of colors, more sprites, and introduced graphical technologies such as scaling, and vector graphics. One way console makers marketed these advances to consumers was through the measurement of "bits". The TurboGrafx-16, Sega Genesis, and SNES were among the first consoles to advertise the fact that they contained 16-bit processors. -
Atari 2600
The Atari 2600, originally called the Atari VCS, is the godfather of modern videogame systems, and helped spawn a multi-billion dollar industry. Atari sold over thirty million of the consoles, and together with other companies sold hundreds of millions of games. Cartridges for the system were produced across three decades, and there are still new games being produced today. In January 1977 RCA released the Studio II, another cartridge based system, although it only projected in black and white. -
The game crash of 1977
In 1977, manufacturers of older, obsolete consoles and Pong clones sold their systems at a loss to clear stock, creating a glut in the market, and causing RCA and later Fairchild to abandon their game consoles. Only Atari and Magnavox remained in the home console market, despite suffering losses in 1977 and 1978. -
The Nintendo NES
in 1983 after the big crash nintendo created the NES To distinguish its product from older game consoles, Nintendo used a front-loading cartridge port similar to a VCR on the NES, The NES was the highest selling console in the history of North America and revitalized the video game market. Mario of Super Mario Bros became a global icon from his NES games. Nintendo restricted third-party developers to three games a year so they didnt make games for diffrent companys. -
The crash of 1983
In 1983, the video game business suffered a much more severe crash. A flood of consoles, low quality video games by smaller companies (especially for the 2600), industry leader Atari hyping games such as E.T. and a 2600 Pac-man that were poorly received, and a growing number of home computer users caused consumers and retailers to lose faith and interest in video game consoles. Most video game companies were bankrupt, or moved into other industries, abandoning their game consoles. -
Fourth Generation of games
Sega gained market share by releasing its next-generation console, the Mega Drive in 1988 in Japan, 1989 in US (where it was branded the Genesis), and 1990 in Europe, two years before Nintendo released the Super Nintendo Entertainment System (SNES) in those territories. While initially sales of the next generation console were slow, Sega found its own must-have hit in Sonic the Hedgehog. Similar to Space Invaders for the Atari, sales spiked after its release. -
The fifth generation continued
It was not until Sega's Saturn, Sony's PlayStation, and the Nintendo 64 were released that fifth generation consoles started to become popular. The Saturn and PlayStation used CDs to store games, while the N64 used cartridges. All three cost far less than the 3DO, and were easier to program than the Jaguar. -
The first fifth generation games
The first fifth-generation consoles were the 3DO and the Atari Jaguar. Both of these systems were much more powerful than the Super Nintendo Entertainment System (SNES) or Mega Drive (known as Genesis in North America); they were better at rendering polygons, could display more onscreen colours, and the 3DO used discs that contained far more information than cartridges and were cheaper to produce. Neither of these consoles were serious threats to Sega or Nintendo, though. -
The sixth generation
The sixth generation saw a move towards PC-like architectures in gaming consoles, as well as a shift towards using DVDs for game media. This brought games that were both longer and more visually appealing. Furthermore, this generation also saw experimentation with online console gaming and implementing both flash and hard drive storage for game data. -
The Playstation 2
It was the follow-up to its highly successful PlayStation, and was also the first home game console to be able to play DVDs. As was done with the original PlayStation in 2000, Sony redesigned the console in 2004 into a smaller version. As of November 21, 2011 over 150 million PlayStation 2 units have been sold. This makes it the best selling home console of all time to date, and now the best-selling video game console to date. -
The seventh generation
The features introduced in this generation include the support of new disc formats: Blu-ray Disc, utilized by the PlayStation 3, and HD DVD supported by the Xbox 360 via an optional $200 external accessory addition, that was later discontinued as the format war closed. Another new technology is the use of motion as input, and IR tracking (as implemented on the Wii). Also, all seventh generation consoles support wireless controllers. -
The Xbox 360
Microsoft kicked off the seventh generation with the release of the Xbox 360 on November 22, 2005 in the United States, December 2, 2005 in Europe, December 10, 2005 in Japan and March 23, 2006 in Australia. It featured market leading processing power until the Sony PlayStation 3 was released one year later. While the original Xbox 360 "Core" did not include an internal HDD, most Xbox 360 models since have included at least the option to have one. -
The eighth Generation
No specific realese date at the moment have been announced yet. Aside from the usual hardware enhancements, consoles of the eighth generation focus on further integration with other media and increased connectivity. The 3DS introduced autostereoscopic 3D on consoles. The Wii U introduced a controller/tablet hybrid whose features include the possibility of augmented reality in gaming. The OUYA, a Kickstarter-funded Android-based game console, is slated for a June 25, 2013 public release.
