Episode V

Well, having blasted through the earlier stages of computer gaming in my previous blog let me carry you quickly through the age of the arcade. The first arcade game was based on Steve Russell's "Spacewar!" and was creatively named "Computer Space". This gripping title was brought to the world by Nolan Bushnell and Ted Dabney in 1971, a year before Pong hit the shel- well not so much the shelves, but the floors certainly. Bushnell and Dabney then started working for atari to re-release Pong later in 1975, lo, the first generation to wonder how their parents could find such a simple game so difficult- the dawn of home gaming. In the summer of '72 Ralph Baer releases the Odyssey, the first console a previously rejected idea designed when Ralph Baer was still at Sanders Associates in 1966, pow.
Next on my list, looks to be the Fairchild as it was one of the first ever pieces of home kit to use a microchip and allow for a programmable cartridge system, all of this equated to more complicated games to be played. This console quickly changed its name to "Channel F" and immediately started provoking Atari into releasing next generation consoles and spawn the beginning of various arguments about whether or not it was a good idea to let children play these things, another "what can we panic about now?" mentality- boring.
Still on to the '80's, the home computer and entertainment systems were now walking about the place and had said their first words, well on their way to growing up.

I can't help but feel I answered a good portion about myself in the last blog entry, which has left me feeling a little staunched, ah well. My first Windows PC, what an exciting time, bringing on all the fun of Prince of Persia, Dune II, Doom, Hex and god knows what else. This was beautiful time, Dune II sticks out in my mind as the first of a long line of strategy games I would pick up in the future, not sure if anyone else played it, but it pans out like a dumbed down version of the film with three playable factions-Harkonnen, Atreides and the Ordos (who I'm fairly certain were made up to give the game a little more variety). Quality.
Consoles, I remember playing Sonic 3d and being awe inspired with my first glimpse into the world of 3rd dimension gaming, I was wowed at the time and remember thinking, "If the megadrive can run a game like this why aren't there loads of 3d games kicking about?" - nevermind Jow. Anyway whats important is that once a rogue football smacked the console while I was playing it, crashing the game and dislodging the cartridge, I'd gotten quite far into the game so you can imagine the obscenities I screamed, I was distraught, I was going to have to play through it all again, I hate repeating myself. Anyway I finally get a hold of myself and re-insert the cartridge properly and smash the white reset button, the screen goes blue for a minute and instead of the games regular intro, up comes a level select menu.... EH? Happy as Larry I pick up exactly where I left off on the game- (*cough*) maybe a level or two later on, but it was a water level and they're shit. Anyway I'd never read up on any cheats for Sonic 3d but who knew it consisted of smashing your console till it crashed?

"If kids imitated video games, kids would be going around a dark room, munching on mysterious pills, listening to repetitive music" -Head of Nintendo 1983