Retroism (Retro Games in general)

Member Name: shadowhawk

Product:	Retro Games in general
Date:	04/08/04 (118 review reads)
Rating:

Advantages: Classics

Disadvantages: Dated

Retro Games That Will Always Be Remembered:
(Anything that was 16-bit or less, not including game boy games)

Asteroid:
The game involved spinning and moving to dodge and destroy pieces of rock that were flying at you through space, but as soon as you blow up a big one you make more smaller ones.

Bomberman:
A violent game where you use bombs to destroy your opponent

Columns:
Mega Drive game where you move the blocks to match up the patterns

Donkey Kong:
Play as Mario and try to make your way up the ladders avoiding the barrels and objects being thrown at you, get to the top to save Princess Peach.

Doom:
The première first person shoot them up, set an era in games setting the mild stone for Quake, Unreal and all the followers.

Dungeons and Dragons:
Maybe the first game with a cult following, it was a platform game. Make your way through the dungeons solving puzzles while trying to survive resulted in a deep and long game that many enjoyed for a long time.

Lemmings:
Control little green men trying to get as many as you can to the finish. They have no intelligence they just walk forward and obey you so think fast and save the idiots.

Mario Brothers:
Originally a spin off from Donkey Kong but proved the fans favourite and has had many spin offs itself not to mention the countless sequels. Mario headed the Nintendo campaign.

Pac Man:
Made a classic in the arcade, make your way around a room eating as many balls as you can and remember to avoid the ghosts.

Pong:
A game that had 2 paddles on each side of the screen that moved up and down to keep the ball in play. The more hits the more the game sped up and the higher the individual score.

Sonic The
Hedgehog:
The fast critter was Sega?s leading character, the idea of the game was to get from start to finish of the levels picking up as many emeralds and rings as you could. Occasionally you fought the odd boss but fighting was simple just jumping and move was all you could do.

Tetris:
Make a line across the screen using weirdly shaped blocks the more complete lines you make the higher the score you get and it speeds up the further you progress.

Anything I have missed let me know.

History

1961:
The first computer game was called ?Spacewar?, 2-player game where they moved icons trying to shoot the opponent to win. It was completely black and white. Martin Graetz, Stephen Russell, and Wayne Wiitanen made it in 1961.

1966-68
Lunar Landing came next and this was such an exciting text based game where you programmed in the variables to try and land a ship on lunar ground. It didn?t even give a visual feedback as this was not available in 1966 the feedback came in numbers and figures.

Hummurabi Kingdom was next on the agenda and if this sounds familiar at anytime just shout out Sim City. You programmed into the game tax rates and other things and it gave you the feedback of population, birth and death rates, tax revenue and other specifics.

Hunt the Wumpus was a funny game where all you had was a lot of tunnels and rooms where you wonder trying to avoid the Wumpus, which no-one was ever sure what it was. It was the start of the dungeon and dragon?s era, a free roaming game.

1971:
Commercialism took over and Coin Operated machines came into play with games like PONG.

1972:
ATARI noticed the success of PONG in arcade and started work on a home version.

1974:
PON&#
71; was realised for home use by ATARIi.

1975:
The market opened up and Commodore realised the Commodore PET, a machine that used cassettes as storage for the games. Making Commodore famous and setting their name.

1976:
The big flop, Channel F was realised by Fairplay the first console for cartridges, they did set a standard with cartridges so I mentioned them in the hope to make them the household name they deserve to be.

1977:
The timeless classic Space Invaders was realised in the arcades it was a game where you controlled a spaceship and you stay alive by destroying as many hostile spaceships as possible. Bet you didn?t know that Space Invaders was the first game to have a ?high score screen?, setting a new era of competitive gaming.

1978:
ATARI's VCS 2600 becomes a commercial success as a hybrid station consisting of tv-set, videogame-software and computer

1979:
4 Ex ATARI employees formed Activision the first group of programming dedicated purely to the making and programming of computer games.

1980:
Intellvision are formed, another group of programming dedicated purely to the making of games.
Nintendo pop up and realise Pac Man on arcade and home use and set another timeless classic securing Nintendo?s place in our homes.

1981:
Nintendo and Sega start sending games over to the USA opening up the market and increase possible revenue.

1982: Donkey Kong and the NES are realised, but its not the expected success and computer games face a down turn.

1984: Mattel are forced to sells its electrical division

1989: The surviving company of Nintendo try to resurrect the market and realise the Game Boy and Tet
ris

1990: Nintendo sell Super Mario Bro?s and make a profit of $500 million worldwide.

The game market was now set.

Hope you have found this a nice read

© David Clark ? Electronics Guide
(DavidJamesClark@hotmail.com)

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