Gaming has evolved drastically over the past 50 years, as the first console made was in 1967 by Ralph H. Baer and was also known as “The Father of Video Games”. The console was simply called “Brown Box” (Fig# 1) as all it was, was a brown box with two wired controllers, and at the time, there were only six games that you could have (Poh, 2018). The creator knew that if the games were not fun, people wouldn’t buy or use them, so to ensure that the games were enjoyable they had to test them. “The minute we played ping-pong, we knew we had a product. Before that we weren’t too sure.” – Ralph H. Baer (Smithsonian, U/K).
Fig 1. Brown Box Games Console 1967. (Smithsonian, U/K)
The late 1970’s to the early 1990’s can be considered as the ‘Golden Age’ for gaming as new arcade games, and home consoles were being developed, and people are still obsessed with them now. For example, in 1980, the iconic game Pac-Man was released and is still seen as the most influential games to ever be created. (Northfield, 2018) As well as this arcade game, Space Invaders was also released in 1978 as well as Donkey Kong in 1981 and Street Fighter II in 1991. All of these games are still played today and are constantly being remastered. For example, Donkey Kong still shows up in extremely popular games such as Super Mario Bros, which has a total of 31 games. As well as all these arcade games being created, there was a range of home consoles being released.
In 1983, the first Sega console and the first Nintendo Entertainment System was released. (Fig# 2) Both games’ consoles were, and are still, very desired, especially for collectors, with many retail shops putting them back on sale as people want to have more retro items in their homes to be seen as ‘trendy’.
Fig 2. Sega SG-1000, 1983. (Plunkett, 2017)
Finally, from 2005 to today game consoles have widely developed, for example, in 2005 the Xbox 360 was released, and then in 2013 the Xbox One was released and they have allowed the previous console’s games to be played on the new console, which allows players to relive their old gaming memories. As well as the Xbox console, the Nintendo Wii console was released in 2006, (Fig# 3) and at the time it was revolutionary as the controllers were fitted with motion sensors and would pick up the players movements, allowing the player to exercise and have a more interactive gameplay experience.
Fig 3. Nintendo Wii console, 2006. (u/k, u/k)
Gaming has now adapted even more, as virtual reality headsets have come into fashion, which allows gamers to have the ultimate gaming experience.
Fig 4. Samsung Odyssey VR Headset. (U/K, Road To VR, 2018)