The History of Computer Games 1980s - 1990s

The 1980's-90s was where gaming went from arcades to the home, the industry riding the back of the personal computer revolution and the first experience of the boom bust cycle which continues in the industry today.

At the start of the 1980's after Atari's pong and the success of its home consoles, many companies wanted a piece of the action and so a huge array of home consoles began to surface. To name a few there was:

     There was the Coleco Telstar ¹                          The Magnavox Odyssey ²

                 And the Atari 2600 ³


Over the course of these consoles being created, the market became a bit stale as there was little variety. The rise of personal computers and the oversupply consoles led to the end of Atari in 1983. A part of what led to this is the release of 'E.T. the Extra-Terrestrial' video game, there were so millions of unsold copies returned to Atari due to word getting out how awful the game play was. This resulted in Atari burying millions of the cartridges in a land fill in New Mexico.⁴ This was the first video game crash and evidence of the boom bust cycle in the industry.⁵

It was the end of the US's dominance in the industry and Japan took over with the rise of Nintendo. The Nintendo Entertainment System (NES, Famicon) was reaccessed in 1983 and quickly became the best selling console of its time⁶. Part for its success was a total off 18 launch titles including: 'Ice Climber⁷, 'Excitebike'⁸ and 'Super Mario Bros'⁹



Sega had a hit with the Sega Mega Drive (Sega Genesis) in 1988, with titles like 'Golden Axe II'¹⁰, 'Sonic the Hedgehog'¹¹ and 'Eco the Dolphin'¹².
 

However Nintendo stayed the strongest and were the big kids of the playground for the late 80s to early 90' with their next console the Super Nintendo Entertainment System (SNES) in 1990 with some strong memorable tittles like 'Donkey Kong Country'¹³ and 'Super Mario Kart'¹⁴

 

Then Sony came into the picture with the Play Station in 1994 and introduced not only the transition from cartridge to CD's in home consoles but also 2D to 3D games. Some popular titles were: 'Crash Bandicoot'¹⁵ and 'Spyro the Dragon'¹⁶

To round off the 90's Nintendo released the Nintendo 64 in 1997. This console had one of the weirder controllers, but played some of the most memorable games of the 90's including: 'The Legend of Zelda: Ocarina of Time'¹⁷ and 'Super Mario 64'¹⁸.

 I felt like this kid when I opened my Nintendo 64¹⁹

 
To me this was on of the most important time of the games industry as I believe it showed the most progress in such a short space of time, and without the important achievements in technology reached in this era we wouldn't have a lot of the technology we have today.

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1 http://cdn2.ioffer.com/img/item/163/055/710/CTaF.jpg^↩
2 https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEiBw83IdLQIUjSTpf-8EwPuIPJdDbI1JC8SWR58B-hBJPTD3-uDrto8-uvz92pzGugAnw-bJ4G_75ETJqudyjeKUGfREZO5OytLSqE8FFRtapUhNIhstO-cLKzhqoQy2iGh0pEs3eXjXcCv/s1600/magnavox-odyssey-system.png^↩
3 http://throwbackreviews.com/wp-content/uploads/2013/10/atari-woody.jpg^↩
4 http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/E.T._the_Extra-Terrestrial_%28video_game%29^↩
5 http://www.8-bitcentral.com/images/reviews/atari2600/etLandfill.pn^↩
6 http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Nintendo_Entertainment_System^↩
7 http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/en/d/df/IceClimberboxartnes.jpg^↩
8 http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/en/thumb/f/f8/Excitebike_cover.jpg/250px-Excitebike_cover.jpg^↩
9 http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/en/thumb/0/03/Super_Mario_Bros._box.png/250px-Super_Mario_Bros._box.png^↩
10 http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/en/thumb/6/6d/Golden_Axe_II_Coverart.png/220px-Golden_Axe_II_Coverart.png^↩
11 http://www.cvgm.net/static/media/screenshot/image/Sonic_the_Hedgehog_Mega_Drive_cover.jpg^↩
12 http://www.deadgoodcomics.com/images/Megadrive%20Ecco%20the%20dolphin.jpg^↩
13 http://ocremix.org/files/images/games/snes/7/donkey-kong-country-snes-cover-front-eu-32727.jpg^↩
14 http://static.giantbomb.com/uploads/original/9/93770/2364824-snes_supermariokart.jpg^↩
15 http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/en/5/53/Spyro_the_Dragon.jpg^↩
16 http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/en/4/44/Crash_Bandicoot_Cover.png^↩
17 http://www.fabbl.de/Bilder/Nintendo/N64-Zelda-Ocarina-of-Time.jpg^↩
18 http://img4.wikia.nocookie.net/__cb20110703064718/nintendo/en/images/0/0f/Super_Mario_64_(NA).png^↩
19 https://24.media.tumblr.com/8c587624104c54f68cebe0a2f58a4c71/tumblr_my9urxOs3S1slogaso1_500.gif^↩