SNES Playstation N64 Dreamcast Nintendo Sony Nintendo Sega Sega Nintendo Atari Magnavox Genesis NES 2600 Odysee 1988 1983 1977 1972 all of which are still thriving franchises to this day. this to franchises thriving still are which of all Zelda, and Metroid; Capcom's Mega Man; and Square Enix's Final Fantasy, Fantasy, Final Enix's Square and Man; Mega Capcom's Metroid; and Zelda, the NES, including Nintendo's own Super Mario Bros., The Legend of of Legend The Bros., Mario Super own Nintendo's including NES, the Some of the most successful series in gaming history got their start on on start their got history gaming in series successful most the of Some Videogame Rating Council. Rating Videogame the Nintendo platform. Nintendo the first content rating system for games - the the - games for system rating content first third-party developers, allowing them to produce and distribute titles for for titles distribute and produce to them allowing developers, third-party having it become heavily censored, to create the the create to censored, heavily become it having publishing realm by introducing the now-standard practice of licensing to to licensing of practice now-standard the introducing by realm publishing its violent content, so Sega decided instead of of instead decided Sega so content, violent its Nintendo’s business model with the NES revolutionized the game game the revolutionized NES the with model business Nintendo’s the latter of which was controversial in the US for for US the in controversial was which of latter the in the ring. the in include Sonic the Hedgehog and Mortal Kombat, Kombat, Mortal and Hedgehog the Sonic include on all primary controllers today. controllers primary all on and it opened the door for numerous other companies to throw their hat hat their throw to companies other numerous for door the opened it and Successful game series to start on the Genesis Genesis the on start to series game Successful which was later adopted by the industry and remains remains and industry the by adopted later was which Magnavox’s part. However, it proved that home consoles were feasible feasible were consoles home that proved it However, part. Magnavox’s went on to sell more than 25 million units and 120 million game cartridges. game million 120 and units million 25 than more sell to on went directional pad, or D-pad as it is known, a feature feature a known, is it as D-pad or pad, directional technology market, it wasn’t long before it fell victim to poor marketing on on marketing poor to victim fell it before long wasn’t it market, technology Pac-Man and Asteroids, increasing the console’s popularity immensely. It It immensely. popularity console’s the increasing Asteroids, and Pac-Man having been replaced by a more precise, 4-way 4-way precise, more a by replaced been having which utilized ROM cartridges. ROM utilized which game emerging and new the in well fairly performed initially it While Breakout. Atari also licensed the arcade smash hits Space Invaders, Invaders, Space hits smash arcade the licensed also Atari Breakout. previous consoles’ physical interfaces, with joysticks joysticks with interfaces, physical consoles’ previous games in CD-ROM format, and the Sega 32X, a 32-bit peripheral peripheral 32-bit a 32X, Sega the and format, CD-ROM in games action-adventure genre and the first game to have an ‘easter egg’ - and and - egg’ ‘easter an have to game first the and genre action-adventure The controller was also extremely different from from different extremely also was controller The CD (or Mega CD outside North America) that played its own library of of library own its played that America) North outside CD Mega (or CD screens. the well known games Adventure - often credited for being the beginning of the the of beginning the being for credited often - Adventure games known well peripherals that each supported their own game libraries - the Sega Sega the - libraries game own their supported each that peripherals behind moved light of dots while draw, not could system the that graphics Atari Inc. published many original game titles for the console, including the the including console, the for titles game original many published Inc. Atari console, which was supposed to look more like a toy. toy. a like more look to supposed was which console, compatibility with Sega Master System games, as well as two two as well as games, System Master Sega with compatibility background the simulate to screen television the on placed be to overlays, entertainment devices - as well as the look of the the of look the as well as - devices entertainment with it, including the Power Base Converter for backwards backwards for Converter Base Power the including it, with plastic special utilized games the of majority The capability. sound any experience. more easily added to a TV stand with other other with stand TV a to added easily more The Genesis had a number of associated peripherals compatible compatible peripherals associated of number a had Genesis The lacking as well as material, visual little very producing of capable digital, controllers, trackballs and keypads, greatly diversifying the gaming gaming the diversifying greatly keypads, and trackballs controllers, with the front loading cartridge slot allowing it to be be to it allowing slot cartridge loading front the with The Odyssey operated in a very crude way, as it was analog rather than than rather analog was it as way, crude very a in operated Odyssey The variations, ranging from the standard joystick, to paddles, driving driving paddles, to joystick, standard the from ranging variations, specific choice as to the form factor of the console - - console the of factor form the to as choice specific gaming consoles and home computer systems. systems. computer home and consoles gaming of RAM and 4kB of ROM. The console also had a number of controller controller of number a had also console The ROM. of 4kB and RAM of design of the hardware, with Nintendo making a a making Nintendo with hardware, the of design Europe as well as North America, competing against both dedicated dedicated both against competing America, North as well as Europe Gallery. Shooting and Volleyball Tennis, Table Says, Simon did it better and took it a step further by doubling the memory to 128 bytes bytes 128 to memory the doubling by further step a it took and better it did Much consideration was taken in regards to the the to regards in taken was consideration Much of its generation to achieve notable market share in continental continental in share market notable achieve to generation its of as such ones known better some including console, the for cartridges Though a less popular predecessor was the first to do this, the Atari 2600 2600 Atari the this, do to first the was predecessor popular less a Though The Genesis ushered in the start of the 16-bit era, and was the first first the was and era, 16-bit the of start the in ushered Genesis The different 12 in available games 27 were there 1972, in release On the best-selling console of its time. its of console best-selling the technology and innovation in gaming than others in the Sega family. family. Sega the in others than gaming in innovation and technology a non-microprocessor dedicated hardware. dedicated non-microprocessor a due to its popularity and success, going on to become become to on going success, and popularity its to due Sega Saturn, though the Genesis marked a greater leap in in leap greater a marked Genesis the though Saturn, Sega 1966. as early a device microprocessor-based hardware, instead of having all the games built in to to in built games the all having of instead hardware, microprocessor-based NES console helped to rebuild the video game industry industry game video the rebuild to helped console NES the Sega Master System, and the predecessor to the successful successful the to predecessor the and System, Master Sega the this on started work Magnavox, company electronics US for Baer Ralph by popularizing the use of ROM cartridges containing the game code on it, and and it, on code game the containing cartridges ROM of use the popularizing Following the video game crash of 1983, Nintendo’s Nintendo’s 1983, of crash game video the Following Third in Sega’s line of consoles, the Genesis was the successor to to successor the was Genesis the consoles, of line Sega’s in Third Created console. game video home commercial first the was Odyssey The Released in 1977 by Atari Inc., the Atari 2600 was responsible for for responsible was 2600 Atari the Inc., Atari by 1977 in Released Magnavox Odyssey Odyssey Magnavox Sega Genesis Sega Nintendo NES Nintendo 2600 Atari Nintendo SNES Sony Playstation Nintendo N64 Sega Dreamcast Successor to Nintendo’s NES, the Super Nintendo Entertainment System Sony’s first game console, the PlayStation, had an unlikely start to its Nintendo didn’t intend to be dethroned as the king of The last console of the 20th century was also the last console for the quickly overtook other consoles of the generation, becoming the career, and almost didn’t come to be. Originally, Nintendo approached Sony consoles yet, even with the success of the PS1. Though once-gaming giant, Sega. The Dreamcast was well received initially, with its best-selling console of the 16-bit era despite heavy competition from the to develop a CD-ROM peripheral for the SNES, as CDs started becoming they had intended to switch to CD-ROM gaming with a advanced graphics capabilities due to its 128-bit microprocessor and Genesis console.