Consoles & Generations Generation 1 (1972 – 1977) • Discrete transistor-based digital game logic. • Games were native components of consoles rather than based on external or removable media. • Entire game playfield occupies only one screen. • Players and objects consist of very basic lines, dots or blocks. • Very basic colors • Either single-channel or no audio. • Lacked features of second generation consoles, such as microprocessor logic, ROM cartridges, flip-screen playfields, sprite-based graphics, and multi-color graphics. Generation 1 (1972 – 1977) Console Release Manufacturer Date Magnavox Odyssey 1972 Magnavox Ping-O-Tronic 1974 Zanussi PONG 1975 Atari PC-50X Family 1975 General Instrument Tele-Spiel 1975 Philips Video 2000 1975 Inerton Philips Odyssey 1976 Philips Coleco Telstar Arcade 1977 Coleco Color TV-Game 1977 Nintendo Generation 2 (1976 – 1983) • Microprocessor-based game logic. • AI simulation of computer-based opponents, allowing for single-player • ROM cartridges for storing games • Game playfields able to span multiple flip-screen areas. • Blocky and simplistic-looking sprites, with a screen resolution of around 160 × 192 pixels. • Basic color graphics, generally between 2-color (1-bit) and 16-color (4-bit). • Up to three channel audio. • Lacked features of third gen consoles, such as scrolling tile-based playfields. Microprocessor • Programmable electronic device (CPU) • Single integrated circuit • Accepts binary input Generation 2 (1976 – 1983) Console Release Manufacturer Date Fairchild Channel F 1976 Fairchild RCA Studio II 1977 RCA Atari 2600 1977 Atari Vtech Creativision 1981 VTech Atari 5200 1982 Atari Atari 2600 – The Holy Grail Atari 2600 • Prototype code named “Stella” • MOS 6507 Processor Chip • Games stored on ROM cartridges • Originally priced at $199 ($786 adjusted for inflation) • Shipped with two joysticks and a Combat cartridge Game Over? Generation 3 (8-bit era) Console Release Manufacturer Date SG-1000 1983 Sega NES 1983 Nintendo Mark III/Master System 1985 Sega Atari 7800 1986 Atari Atari XEGS 1987 Atari Generation 3 (1983 – 1987) • D-pad game controllers. • Screen modes with resolutions up to 256×240 or 320×200. • 25–32 colors on screen, from a palette of 53–256 colors. • Tile-based playfields with smooth multi-directional hardware scrolling. • Advanced hardware scrolling, including multi-directional scrolling, diagonal scrolling, and line-scrolling. • 64–100 sprites on screen, each with 4–16 colors and 8×8 to 16×16 pixel sizes. • Up to five channel (primarily square wave) mono PSG audio. Generation 4 (16-bit era) Console Release Manufacturer Date PC Engine/TurboGrafx 1987 NEC Mega Drive/Genesis 1988 Sega Super NES 1990 Nintendo Neo Geo 1991 SNK Commodore CDTV 1991 Commodore Generation 4 (16-bit era) • More powerful 16-bit microprocessors • Multi-button game controllers (3 to 8 buttons) • Complex parallax scrolling, multi-layer tilemap backgrounds, with pseudo-3D scaling & rotation • Large sprites (up to 64×64 or 16×512 pixels), 80–380 sprites on screen, scalable on-the-fly • Elaborate color, 64 to 4096 colors, from palettes of 512 (9-bit) to 65,536 (16-bit) • Flat-shaded 3D polygon graphics • CD-ROM support via add-ons, allowing larger storage space and full motion video playback • Stereo audio, with multiple channels and digital audio playback • Advanced music synthesis (FM synthesis and 'wavetable' sample-based synthesis) Generation 5 (3D era) Console Release Manufacturer Date 3DO Interactive 1993 Panasonic, Sanyo, Goldstar Atari Jaguar 1993 Atari Sega Saturn 1994 Sega PlayStation 1994 Sony Nintendo 64 1996 Nintendo Generation 5 (3D era) • 3D polygon graphics with texture mapping • Optical disc (CD-ROM) game storage, allowing much larger storage space (up to 650 MB) than ROM cartridges • CD quality audio recordings, 16-bit PCM audio with 44.1 kHz sampling rate • Wide adoption of full motion video, displaying pre-rendered computer animation or live action footage • Display resolution from 480i to 576i • Color depth up to 16,777,216 colors (24-bit true color) • 3D graphical capabilities such as lighting, Gouraud shading, anti-aliasing and texture filtering Gouraud Shading Generation 6 (128-bit era) Console Release Manufacturer Date Dreamcast 1998 Sega PS2 2000 Sony GameCube 2001 Nintendo Xbox 2001 Microsoft Generation 6 (128-bit era) • 128-bit graphics • Huge expansion of handheld consoles • Game Boy Advance • N-Gage • Tapwave Zodiak • Pokemon Mini Generation 7 (128-bit era) Console Release Manufacturer Date Xbox 360 2005 Microsoft Wii 2006 Nintendo PS3 2006 Sony Sega Zone 2010 Sega/Atgames Playstation Move 2010 Sony Generation 7 (128-bit era) • Rendered natively in HD • Additional features like movie playback • Wireless controllers, movement sensors Generation 8 • Form factor.