1.
Donkey Kong (video game)
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Donkey Kong is an arcade game released by Nintendo in 1981. It is an example of the platform game genre, as the gameplay focuses on maneuvering the main character across a series of platforms while dodging and jumping over obstacles. In the game, Mario must rescue a damsel in distress named Pauline, the hero and ape later became two of Nintendos most popular and recognizable characters. Donkey Kong is one of the most important titles from the Golden Age of Video Arcade Games, the game was the latest in a series of efforts by Nintendo to break into the North American market. Hiroshi Yamauchi, Nintendos president at the time, assigned the project to a video game designer named Shigeru Miyamoto. The two men broke new ground by using graphics as a means of characterization, including cutscenes to advance the games plot, regardless of initial doubts by Nintendos American staff, Donkey Kong succeeded commercially and critically in North America and Japan. Nintendo licensed the game to Coleco, who developed home console versions for numerous platforms, other companies cloned Nintendos hit and avoided royalties altogether. Miyamotos characters appeared on boxes, television cartoons, and dozens of other places. A lawsuit brought on by Universal City Studios, alleging Donkey Kong violated their trademark of King Kong, the success of Donkey Kong and Nintendos victory in the courtroom helped to position the company for video game market dominance from its release in 1981 until the late 1990s. Winning the game requires patience and the ability to accurately time Marios ascent, in addition to presenting the goal of saving Pauline, the game also gives the player a score. The player typically receives three lives with an awarded for the first 7,000 points, although this can be modified via the games built in DIP switches. One life is lost whenever Mario touches Donkey Kong or any object, falls too far through a gap or off the end of a platform. The game is divided into four different single-screen stages, each represents 25 meters of the structure Donkey Kong has climbed, one stage being 25 meters higher than the previous. The final stage occurs at 100 meters, stage one involves Mario scaling a construction site made of crooked girders and ladders while jumping over or hammering barrels and oil drums tossed by Donkey Kong. Stage two involves climbing a five-story structure of conveyor belts, each of which transport cement pans, the third stage involves the player riding elevators while avoiding bouncing springs. The final stage involves Mario removing eight rivets which support Donkey Kong, removing the final rivet causes Donkey Kong to fall and the hero to be reunited with Pauline. These four stages combine to form a level, upon completion of the fourth stage, the level then increments, and the game repeats the stages with progressive difficulty. For example, Donkey Kong begins to hurl barrels faster and sometimes diagonally, the victory music alternates between levels 1 and 2
2.
Donkey Kong (character)
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Donkey Kong is a fictional gorilla who appears in games belonging to the Donkey Kong and Mario video game franchises. A popular character, he has appeared in video games. Donkey Kong was Marios first opponent in the game of the name, Nintendos popular 1981 arcade game. In 1981, Nintendo was pursuing a license to make a game based on the Popeye comic strip, when this fell through, Nintendo decided that it would take the opportunity to create new characters that could then be marketed and used in later games. Miyamoto came up many characters and plot concepts, but he eventually settled on a gorilla/carpenter/girlfriend love triangle that mirrored the rivalry between Bluto and Popeye for Olive Oyl. Bluto was replaced by an ape, which Miyamoto said was nothing too evil or repulsive, Miyamoto has also named Beauty and the Beast and the 1933 film King Kong as influences for the character. Miyamoto used donkey to convey stubborn in English, the name Donkey Kong was intended to convey stubborn ape to the American audience, when he suggested this name to Nintendo of America, he was laughed at, but the name stuck. Donkey Kong was redesigned for the Super NES in 1994 by former Rare character artist Kevin Bayliss and he presented the modern look to Nintendo and was immediately approved. Although the character design has been tweaked over the years, Donkey Kongs appearance remains consistent to this day when Bayliss last modified him, the Donkey Kong Country series introduced the setting Donkey Kong Island and a backstory for the character. The series also introduced Diddy Kong as Donkeys nephew and sidekick and this would become the standard look for Donkey Kong still used over two decades later. The modern Donkey Kong is portrayed as a powerful yet laid-back ape, brawl and Donkey Kong Country Returns, the current Donkey Kong is referred to as Crankys grandson. The story designs of the present DK series, which began with Donkey Kong Country, are clearly different, which Nintendo uses alteration of generations to explain. Donkey Kongs personality is similar to a gorillas, DK shows pride in his strength, enjoys eating and hoarding bananas. He is a hero to the Kongs but a rival to Mario, occasionally this rivalry erupts especially when DK kidnaps Pauline, whom he finds attractive. The original Donkey Kong made his first appearance as the titular antagonist of the 1981 arcade game Donkey Kong alongside protagonist Mario and damsel in distress, as Jumpman, the player must reach Donkey Kong at the top of each stage, where he is holding the Lady captive. Donkey Kong attempts to hinder the progress by throwing barrels, springs. The ape reappeared the following year in the sequel Donkey Kong Jr. where Donkey Kong is taken captive and locked in a cage by the renamed Mario, while Donkey Kong Junior sets out to rescue him. Donkey Kong resumed his role in Donkey Kong 3, this time the character Stanley the Bugman taking Marios place as the protagonist
3.
Platform game
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A platform game is a video game which involves guiding an avatar to jump between suspended platforms and/or over obstacles to advance the game. The player controls the jumps to avoid letting the avatar fall from platforms or miss necessary jumps, the most common unifying element of games of this genre is the jump button, but now there are other alternative like swiping in touchscreen. Jumping, in genre, may include swinging from extendable arms, as in Ristar or Bionic Commando, or bouncing from springboards or trampolines. These mechanics, even in the context of genres, are commonly called platforming. Games where jumping is automated completely, such as 3D games in The Legend of Zelda series, Platform games originated in the early 1980s, with 3D successors popularized in the mid-1990s. The term itself describes games where jumping on platforms is an part of the gameplay and came into use after the genre had been established. While commonly associated with gaming, there have been many important platform games released to video arcades, as well as for handheld game consoles. North America, Europe and Japan have played major parts in the genres evolution, Platform themes range from cartoon-like games to science fiction and fantasy epics. At one point, platform games were the most popular genre of video game, at the peak of their popularity, it is estimated that between one-quarter and one-third of console games were platformers. No genre either before or since has been able to achieve a market share. Since 2010, a variety of endless running platformers for mobile devices have brought renewed popularity to the genre, Platform games originated in the early 1980s. Because of the limitations of the day, early examples were confined to a static playing field. Space Panic, a 1980 arcade release by Universal, is credited as being the first platform game. While the player had the ability to fall, there was no ability to jump, swing, or bounce, however, it clearly influenced the genre, with gameplay centered on climbing ladders between different floors, a common element in many early platform games. Another precursor to the genre released that year was Nichibutsus Crazy Climber. Donkey Kong, a game created by Nintendo and released in July 1981, was the first game that allowed players to jump over obstacles and across gaps. Donkey Kong had an amount of platforming in its first two screens, but its last two screens had a more pronounced platform jumping component. This game also introduced Mario, an icon of the genre
4.
Action-adventure game
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The action-adventure video game genre includes video games that combine core elements from the action and adventure genres. With the decline of the game genre from mainstream popularity. It is not uncommon for gamers to apply the term adventure or action adventure to describe the genre of fiction to which a game belongs, typically, pure adventure games have situational problems for the player to solve, with very little or no action. If there is action, it is confined to isolated minigames. Pure action games have gameplay based on real-time interactions that challenge the reflexes, therefore, action-adventure games engage both reflexes and problem-solving, in both violent and non-violent situations. An action-adventure game can be defined as a game with a mix of elements from an action game and an adventure game, especially crucial elements like puzzles. Action-adventures require many of the physical skills as action games, but also offer a storyline, numerous characters, an inventory system, dialogue. They are faster-paced than pure adventure games, because they include both physical and conceptual challenges, action-adventure games normally include a combination of complex story elements, which are displayed for players using audio and video. The story is heavily reliant upon the characters movement, which triggers story events. Some examples of games include The Legend of Zelda, God of War. Exactly when a game stops being a game and becomes an action game is a matter of interpretation. There are quite a few disagreements in the community and in the media over what constitutes an action-adventure game. In some cases a game with puzzles will be classified as an action-adventure game. Others see action games as a genre, while an action-adventure is an action game that includes situational problem-solving. Adventure gamers may also be purists, rejecting any game that makes use of physical challenges or time pressure, regardless, the action-adventure label is prominent in articles over the internet and media. The term action-adventure is usually substituted for a particular subgenre due to its wide scope, although action-adventure games are diverse and difficult to classify, there are some distinct subgenres. These are sometimes called Real-Time Adventure games or RTAs for short, notable examples of this include Metroid Prime, Half-Life 2, Dishonored, and Far Cry 3. Third-person action-adventure, in gameplay is in the third-person
5.
Puzzle video game
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Puzzle video games are a genre of video games that emphasize puzzle solving. The types of puzzles can test many problem-solving skills including logic, pattern recognition, sequence solving, the player may have unlimited time or attempts to solve a puzzle, or there may be simple puzzles made difficult by having to complete them in real-time, as in Tetris. Puzzle games focus on logical and conceptual challenges, although often the games add time-pressure or other action-elements, although many action games and adventure games involve puzzles such as obtaining inaccessible objects, a true puzzle game focuses on puzzle solving as the primary gameplay activity. Games usually involve shapes, colors, or symbols, and the player must directly or indirectly manipulate them into a specific pattern. Rather than presenting a collection of puzzles to solve, puzzle games typically offer a series of related puzzles that are a variation on a single theme. This theme could involve pattern recognition, logic, or understanding a process and these games usually have a simple set of rules, where players manipulate game pieces on a grid, network or other interaction space. Players must unravel clues in order to achieve some victory condition, completing each puzzle will usually lead to a more difficult challenge, although some games avoid exhausting the player by offering easier levels between more difficult ones. There is a variety of puzzle games. Some feed to the player an assortment of blocks or pieces that they must organize in the correct manner, such as Tetris, Klax. Others present a game board or pieces and challenge the player to solve the puzzle by achieving a goal. Puzzle games are easy to develop and adapt, being implemented on dedicated arcade units, home video game consoles, personal digital assistants. An action puzzle or arcade puzzle requires that the player manipulates game pieces in an environment, often on a single screen and with a time limit. This is a term that has been used to describe several subsets of puzzle game. Firstly, it includes falling-block puzzles such as Tetris and KLAX and it includes games with characters moving through an environment, controlled either directly or indirectly. This can cross-over with other genres, a platform game which requires a novel mechanic to complete levels might be a puzzle platformer. Finally, it includes other action games that require timing and accuracy with pattern-matching or logic skills, other notable action puzzle games include Team Icos Ico and Shadow of the Colossus. A hidden object game is a genre of video game in which the player must find items from a list that are hidden within a picture. Hidden object games are a popular trend in gaming, and are comparatively inexpensive to buy
6.
Racing video game
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They may be based on anything from real-world racing leagues to entirely fantastical settings. In general, they can be distributed along a spectrum anywhere between hardcore simulations, and simpler arcade racing games, Racing games may also fall under the category of sports games. In 1973, Ataris Space Race was an arcade video game where players controlled spaceships that race against opposing ships, while avoiding comets. It was a competitive two-player game controlled using a two-way joystick, the same year, Taito released a similar space-themed racing video game Astro Race, which used an early four-way joystick. The following year, Taito released Speed Race, an early driving racing game designed by Tomohiro Nishikado and it also featured an early racing wheel controller interface with an accelerator, gear shift, speedometer and tachometer. It could be played in either single-player or alternating two-player, where each player attempts to beat the others score, the game was re-branded as Wheels by Midway Games for release in the United States and was influential on later racing games. That same year, Sega released Moto-Cross, an early motorbike racing game, based on the motocross competition. Also known as Man T. T. Sega re-branded the game as Fonz, the game also introduced the use of haptic feedback, which caused the motorcycle handlebars to vibrate during a collision with another vehicle. Road Champion, released by Taito in 1978, was an overhead-view timed car racing game where players try to race ahead of the opposing cars and cross the finish line first to become the winner. In 1979, Segas Head On was a game that played like a maze chase game and is thus considered a precursor to the 1980 hit Pac-Man. Monaco GP, released by Sega in 1979, improved upon previous overhead-view racing games with a scrolling view. It also featured an early example of a radar, to show the cars location on the map. Turbo, released by Sega in 1981, was the first racing game to feature a third-person perspective and it was also the first racing game to use sprite scaling with full-color graphics. The most influential racing game was released in 1982, Pole Position, developed by Namco and published by Atari in North America. It was the first game to be based on a racing circuit, and the first to feature a qualifying lap. While not the first third-person racing game, Pole Position established the conventions of the genre, tX-1, developed by Tatsumi in 1983, was licensed to Namco, who in turn licensed it to Atari in America, thus the game is considered a successor to Pole Position II. It also introduced nonlinear gameplay by allowing players to choose which path to drive through after each checkpoint, if the fuel runs out, the game would end. An early attempt at creating a driving simulator was Tomys Turnin Turbo Dashboard
7.
Nintendo
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Nintendo Co. Ltd. is a Japanese multinational consumer electronics and video game company headquartered in Kyoto, Japan. Nintendo is one of the worlds largest video game companies by market capitalization, founded on 23 September 1889 by Fusajiro Yamauchi, it originally produced handmade hanafuda playing cards. By 1963, the company had tried several small businesses, such as cab services. The word Nintendo can be translated from Japanese to English as leave luck to heaven. From 1992 until 2016, Nintendo was also the majority shareholder of Major League Baseballs Seattle Mariners, as of 31 March 2014, Nintendo has cumulative sales of over 670.43 million hardware units and 4.23 billion software units. The company has created and released some of the best-known and top-selling video game franchises, such as Mario, The Legend of Zelda, Nintendo was founded as a card company in late 1889 by Fusajiro Yamauchi. Based in Kyoto, Japan, the produced and marketed a playing card game called Hanafuda. The handmade cards soon became popular, and Yamauchi hired assistants to mass-produce cards to satisfy demand, in 1949, the company adopted the name Nintendo Karuta Co. Ltd. doing business as The Nintendo Playing Card Co. outside Japan. Nintendo continues to manufacture playing cards in Japan and organizes its own contract bridge tournament called the Nintendo Cup. In 1956, Hiroshi Yamauchi, grandson of Fusajiro Yamauchi, visited the U. S. to talk with the United States Playing Card Company and he found that the biggest playing card company in the world was using only a small office. Yamauchis realization that the card business had limited potential was a turning point. He then acquired the license to use Disney characters on playing cards to drive sales, in 1963, Yamauchi renamed Nintendo Playing Card Co. Ltd. to Nintendo Co. Ltd. The company then began to experiment in other areas of business using newly injected capital during the period of time between 1963 and 1968, Nintendo set up a taxi company called Daiya. However, Nintendo was forced to sell it because problems with the unions were making it too expensive to run the service. It also set up a hotel chain, a TV network. All of these ventures failed, and after the 1964 Tokyo Olympics, playing card sales dropped. In 1966, Nintendo moved into the Japanese toy industry with the Ultra Hand, Yokoi was moved from maintenance to the new Nintendo Games department as a product developer. Nintendo continued to produce toys, including the Ultra Machine, Love Tester
8.
Ikegami Tsushinki
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Ikegami Tsushinki Co. Ltd. is a Japanese manufacturer of professional and broadcast television equipment, especially professional video cameras, both for electronic news gathering and studio use. The company was founded in 1946, Ikegami introduced of the first portable hand-held TV camera. The camera made its debut in the United States in May 1962, in 1972, Ikegami introduced the HL-33, the first compact hand-held color video camera for ENG. The later HL-51 was popular among broadcasters for both ENG and EFP image acquisition, in 1995, Ikegami co-operated with Avid on a tapeless video acquisition format called Editcam, but few were sold. Ikegami developed a camera format is called GFCAM Toshiba. According to some sources in the early 80s, Ikegami developed a number of games as a subcontractor to Japanese video game companies. At that time, computer programs were not recognized as copyrightable material, in 1990, Ikegami and Nintendo reached a settlement, terms of which were never disclosed. Some Ikegami Models included the ITC -730, HL-79 HL-55, HL-V55, Ikegami makes a full line of SDTV and HDTV TV cameras. Many of the numbers of Ikegami portable television cameras begin with the initial letters HL, which stand for Handy-Looky
9.
Rare (company)
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Rare is a British video game developer located in Twycross, Leicestershire. The company was established in 1985 by Tim and Chris Stamper, during its early years, Rare was backed by an unlimited budget from Nintendo, primarily concentrated on Nintendo Entertainment System games. During this time they created successful titles such as Wizards & Warriors, Battletoads, Rare became a prominent second-party developer for Nintendo, who came to own a large minority stake of the company. During this period, Rare received international recognition and critical acclaim for such as Donkey Kong Country, GoldenEye 007, Banjo-Kazooie, Perfect Dark. In 2002, Microsoft acquired Rare, who retained their original brand, logo and it has since focused on developing games exclusively for Microsoft Studios video game consoles. Notable releases include Kameo, Elements of Power, Perfect Dark Zero, in 2015, Rare released Rare Replay, a compilation of 30 games produced by the company to celebrate their 30th anniversary. Rare is currently working on Sea of Thieves, an adventure game. Several key employees left Rare to form their own companies, such as Free Radical Design, Rare was widely recognised by the gaming industry and received numerous accolades from critics and journalists. The company has often described as secretive and seclusive. As a result, a new subdivision named Rare Ltd was established by Ashby Computers and its main goal was to reverse-engineer the console and investigate the codes for Famicoms games to learn more about the consoles programming. With successful results, the decided to sell the Ultimate brand to U. S. Gold. Famicoms owner, Nintendo, once claimed that it would be impossible for their console to be decoded, using the information the Ashby Computers and Graphics team learnt from the Rare division, the team prepared several tech demos and showed them to the Nintendo executive Minoru Arakawa in Kyoto. Impressed with their efforts, Nintendo decided to grant the Ashby team an unlimited budget for them to work on games for the Famicom platform. After they returned to England, they moved from Ashby-de-la-Zouch to Twycross and they set their headquarters in a Manor Farmhouse. Rare also set up another company known as Rare Inc. in Miami, headed by Joel Hochberg, the American company was involved in maintaining Rares operation in the US and contacting major US publishers. Famicom was eventually released in the UK under the name Nintendo Entertainment System, with the unlimited budget, the Rare studio could work a large variety of different games. The first project Rare worked on was Slalom, an ice-skiing title and they helped in creating new and original intellectual properties, including R. C. Pro-Am, a game with vehicular combat elements, and Snake Rattle n Roll
10.
Namco
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Namco Limited is a Japanese corporation best known as a video game developer and publisher. Following a merger with Bandai in September 2005, the two companies game production assets were spun off into Bandai Namco Games on March 31,2006, Namco was re-established to continue domestic operation of video arcades and amusement parks. Its headquarters are located in Ōta, Tokyo, the companys English name is often officially written as NAMCO. Namco was a front-runner during the age of arcade video games. Pac-Man went on to become the best-selling arcade game in history, Namco was also known for creating successful franchises such as Galaxian, Ridge Racer, Ace Combat, Tekken, as well as the Soul and Tales series. Masaya Nakamura founded the company as Nakamura Manufacturing in 1955, based in Tokyo, the company started out by running childrens rides on the roof of a department store in Yokohama. The business eventually expanded throughout the Tokyo area, Nakamura Manufacturing was reorganized in 1958 and later underwent a name change to Nakamura Manufacturing Company, which would be used to form the acronym NAMCO. In 1970, the company produced a coin-operated mechanical driving simulator called Racer, Atari Japan, the Tokyo-based subsidiary of Atari, was struggling financially by 1974. General manager Hide Nakajima was left in charge of the company after his boss had quit, Nakajima claims that employees had been stealing money and that he had contributed funds from his personal savings in order to pay creditors and stave off bankruptcy. Sega, then a manufacturer of machines, offered to acquire Atari Japan for $50,000. Nakamura put in a bid for $800,000 and shocked others out of competition, the deal was finalized at $500,000 and Bushnell was glad to take it. Debts inherited from Atari Japan would take Nakamura two years to pay off, but the deal had also secured for him a license to distribute Ataris games in Japan for ten years. Nakamura would follow up by opening video arcades featuring Atari games, everyone thought was mad when he paid so much for Atari, but it turned out to be a very wise investment. Nakajima was promoted to president in 1978, and on his recommendation Namco opened a subsidiary, Namco America. The location he chose was across the street from Ataris former headquarters in Sunnyvale, at the time, games were not released in the U. S. under the Namco label. Namco America existed mainly to license Namcos games to companies such as Atari, Galaxian revolutionized the industry as the first video game to use RGB color graphics. It was Pac-Man, however, that would become definitive of Namcos legacy, galaga, a follow-up to Galaxian, was one of the most successful sequels of the era. Dig Dug, Xevious, and Pole Position continued Namcos success in establishing iconic franchises during the Golden Age, during this period, Namco published video games for home consoles and personal computer under the Namcot brand name
11.
Retro Studios
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Retro Studios, Inc. is an American first-party video game developer and division of Nintendo based in Austin, Texas. The company began working on four different titles, all of which were cancelled once Retro focused their resources on Metroid Prime. The success of Metroid Prime led Retro to work on two sequels, and later to become involved with reviving the Donkey Kong series with Donkey Kong Country Returns, Retro Studios was founded in October 1998 as an alliance between Nintendo and former Iguana Entertainment founder Jeff Spangenberg. Retro began with 4 key people in late 1998 and opened an office in Austin, Texas in early 1999 with a staff of 25 people, by the time development began, the studio had already grown in size to 120 employees. The company continued to grow during production, eventually peaking at over 200 employees, the working environment was chaotic, with development getting behind schedule, and Nintendo executives complaining on how the games turned out. In 2000, producer Shigeru Miyamoto visited the studio, Retro eventually cancelled development of their other projects to focus solely on Metroid Prime. In February 2001, the company ended development of both NFL Retro Football and Thunder Rally, laying off about 20 employees, although Retro demonstrated Raven Blade at E3 in 2001, the development team was plagued by technical setbacks. In July 2001, Retro cancelled the project, retaining only nine members to work on Metroid Prime. On May 2,2002, Nintendo secured $1 million worth of Retro Studios stock from Spangenberg, after the sale, Spangenberg stepped down as president and was replaced by Steve Barcia, the founder of Simtex. During the final nine months of Metroid Primes development, Retros staff worked 80- to 100-hour weeks to reach their final milestone, after the critical and commercial success of Metroid Prime, Nintendo asked Retro Studios to produce a sequel. The developers decided against recycling the features of the first game while creating Metroid Prime 2, Echoes, and instead used new sound models, weapon effects, a multiplayer component was also added to the game. On April 2003, Steve Barcia left the company, michael Kelbaugh, who had worked with Nintendo for over 15 years, was appointed president, a job he retains to this date. Retro tried to include extras, such as a hidden version of Super Metroid. The critical reception for Metroid Prime 2, Echoes was very positive, sales for Echoes were lower than the first Prime, with a total of 800,000 units. Retro Studios was then put to produce the game in the Metroid Prime series titled Metroid Prime 3. Retro intended to give Metroid Prime 3, Corruption larger environments than Metroid Prime 2, Echoes, the developers were also interested in using the WiiConnect24 feature to provide additional content for the game that would be accessible from the Internet. Retro announced that Corruption would be the chapter of the Prime series and would have a plot about closure. While Retro was busy with the Prime sequels, they had to pass on the Nintendo DS title Metroid Prime Hunters
12.
Author
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An author is narrowly defined as the originator of any written work and can thus also be described as a writer. More broadly defined, an author is the person who originated or gave existence to anything, in the copyright laws of various jurisdictions, there is a necessity for little flexibility regarding what constitutes authorship. The United States Copyright Office, for example, defines copyright as a form of protection provided by the laws of the United States to authors of works of authorship. After a fixed amount of time, the copyright expires on intellectual work and it enters the public domain, however, copyright is merely the legal reassurance that one owns his/her work. Technically, someone owns their work from the time its created, an interesting aspect of authorship emerges with copyright in that, in many jurisdictions, it can be passed down to another upon ones death. The person who inherits the copyright is not the author, questions arise as to the application of copyright law. How does it, for example, apply to the issue of fan fiction. If the media responsible for the authorized production allows material from fans, what is the limit before legal constraints from actors, music. Additionally, how does copyright apply to fan-generated stories for books, what powers do the original authors, as well as the publishers, have in regulating or even stopping the fan fiction. In literary theory, critics find complications in the term author beyond what constitutes authorship in a legal setting, in the wake of postmodern literature, critics such as Roland Barthes and Michel Foucault have examined the role and relevance of authorship to the meaning or interpretation of a text. Barthes challenges the idea that a text can be attributed to any single author and he writes, in his essay Death of the Author, that it is language which speaks, not the author. The words and language of a text itself determine and expose meaning for Barthes, with this, the perspective of the author is removed from the text, and the limits formerly imposed by the idea of one authorial voice, one ultimate and universal meaning, are destroyed. The psyche, culture, fanaticism of an author can be disregarded when interpreting a text, because the words are rich enough themselves with all of the traditions of language. To expose meanings in a work without appealing to the celebrity of an author, their tastes, passions, vices, is, to Barthes, to allow language to speak. Michel Foucault argues in his essay What is an author and that all authors are writers, but not all writers are authors. He states that a letter may have a signatory—it does not have an author. For a reader to assign the title of author upon any written work is to certain standards upon the text which. Foucaults author function is the idea that an author exists only as a function of a work, a part of its structure
13.
Shigeru Miyamoto
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Shigeru Miyamoto is a Japanese video game designer and producer, currently serving as the co-Representative Director of Nintendo. Miyamoto originally joined Nintendo in 1977, when the company was beginning its foray into video games and his games have been seen on every Nintendo video game console, with his earliest work appearing on arcade machines in the late 1970s. Prior to the promotion, he formerly managed Nintendos Entertainment Analysis & Development software division, Miyamoto was born in the Japanese town of Sonobe, a rural town northwest of Kyoto, on November 16,1952. His parents were of modest means, and his father taught the English language, from an early age, Miyamoto began to explore the natural areas around his home. On one of expeditions, Miyamoto came upon a cave. Miyamotos expeditions into the Kyoto countryside inspired his work, particularly The Legend of Zelda. Miyamoto graduated from Kanazawa Municipal College of Industrial Arts with a degree in industrial design and he also had a love for manga and initially hoped to become a professional manga artist before considering a career in video games. He was influenced by mangas classical kishōtenketsu narrative structure, as well as Western genre television shows, the title that inspired him to enter the video game industry was the 1978 arcade hit Space Invaders. Nintendo, a relatively small Japanese company, had traditionally sold playing cards and other novelties, although it had started to branch out into toys, through a mutual friend, Miyamotos father arranged an interview with Nintendo president Hiroshi Yamauchi. After showing some of his toy creations, Miyamoto was hired in 1977 as an apprentice in the planning department, Miyamoto went on to become the companys first artist. He helped create the art for the companys first original coin-operated arcade video game and he first helped the company develop a game with the 1980 release Radar Scope. In an effort to keep the company afloat, Nintendo president Hiroshi Yamauchi decided to convert unsold Radar Scope units into a new arcade game and he tasked Miyamoto with the conversion, about which Miyamoto has said self-deprecatingly said that no one else was available to do the work. Nintendos head engineer, Gunpei Yokoi, supervised the project, Miyamoto imagined many characters and plot concepts, but eventually settled on a love triangle between a gorilla, a carpenter, and a girl. He meant to mirror the rivalry between comic characters Bluto and Popeye for the woman Olive Oyl, although Nintendo could not gain the rights to a Popeye adaptation, Bluto evolved into an ape, a form Miyamoto claimed was nothing too evil or repulsive. This ape would be the pet of the character, a funny. Miyamoto also named Beauty and the Beast and the 1933 film King Kong as influences, Donkey Kong marked the first time that the formulation of a video games storyline preceded the actual programming, rather than simply being appended as an afterthought. Miyamoto had high hopes for his new project, but lacked the skills to program it himself, instead, he conceived the games concepts. He wanted to make the different sizes, move in different manners
14.
Arcade game
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An arcade game or coin-op is a coin-operated entertainment machine typically installed in public businesses such as restaurants, bars and amusement arcades. Most arcade games are games, pinball machines, electro-mechanical games. While exact dates are debated, the age of arcade video games is usually defined as a period beginning sometime in the late 1970s. The old Midways of 1920s-era amusement parks provided the inspiration and atmosphere for later arcade games, in the 1930s the first coin-operated pinball machines emerged. These early amusement machines differed from their later electronic cousins in that they were made of wood and they lacked plungers or lit-up bonus surfaces on the playing field, and used mechanical instead of electronic scoring-readouts. By around 1977 most pinball machines in production switched to using solid-state electronics both for operation and for scoring, another Sega 1969 release, Missile, a shooter and vehicle-combat simulation, featured electronic sound and a moving film strip to represent the targets on a projection screen. In 1970 Midway released the game in North America as S. A. M. I, in the course of the 1970s, following the release of Pong in 1972, electronic video-games gradually replaced electro-mechanical arcade games. In 1972, Sega released a game called Killer Shark. In 1974, Nintendo released Wild Gunman, a shooter that used full-motion video-projection from 16 mm film to display live-action cowboy opponents on the screen. The 1978 video game Space Invaders, however, dealt a yet more powerful blow to the popularity of electro-mechanical games, in 1971 students at Stanford University set up the Galaxy Game, a coin-operated version of the Spacewar video game. This ranks as the earliest known instance of a video game. Later in the year, Nolan Bushnell created the first mass-manufactured game, Computer Space. In 1972, Atari was formed by Nolan Bushnell and Ted Dabney, Atari essentially created the coin-operated video game industry with the game Pong, the first successful electronic ping pong video game. Pong proved to be popular, but imitators helped keep Atari from dominating the fledgling coin-operated video game market, taitos Space Invaders, in 1978, proved to be the first blockbuster arcade video game. Its success marked the beginning of the age of arcade video games. Space Invaders, Galaxian, Pac-Man, Battlezone, Defender, by 1981, the arcade video game industry was worth $8 billion. By the late 1980s, the video game craze was beginning to fade due to advances in home video game console technology. By 1991, US arcade video game revenues had fallen to $2.1 billion, the pseudo-3D sprite/tile scaling was handled in a similar manner to textures in later texture-mapped polygonal 3D games of the 1990s
15.
Game & Watch
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Game & Watch is a line of handheld electronic games produced by Nintendo from 1980 to 1991. Created by game designer Gunpei Yokoi, each Game & Watch features a game to be played on an LCD screen in addition to a clock. This console inspired Nintendo to make the Game Boy and it was the earliest Nintendo product to gain major success. In 1979, Gunpei Yokoi, traveling on a Shinkansen, saw a bored businessman playing with an LCD calculator by pressing the buttons, Yokoi then thought of an idea for a watch that doubled as a miniature game machine for killing time. The units use LR4x/SR4x button-cell batteries, the type used in most laser pointers or handheld calculators. Different models were manufactured, with some having two screens and a clam-shell design, the Game Boy Advance SP, Nintendo DS, and Nintendo 3DS later reused this design. Titles available in Game & Watch form vary from Mickey Mouse to Balloon Fight, including Nintendo staples such as Donkey Kong, The Legend of Zelda, the modern cross Control Pad design was developed in 1982 by Yokoi for the Donkey Kong handheld game. The design proved to be popular for subsequent Game & Watch titles and this particular design was patented and later earned a Technology & Engineering Emmy Award. Most of the titles have a GAME A and a GAME B button, in Flagman, Game B is a mode where you have to press the right button in a certain amount of time, not memorizing patterns. In Judge, Boxing, Donkey Kong 3, and Donkey Kong Hockey, in Climber, Balloon Fight, and Super Mario Bros. There is no Game B button, as only 10,000 units were produced and it was never available for retail sale, the yellow version is considered rare. Mario the Juggler, released in 1991, was the last game created in the Game & Watch series. The Game & Watch games were renewed between 1995 and 2002 with the Game & Watch Gallery series, five Game & Watch collections released for the Game Boy, Game Boy Color, and Game Boy Advance. They feature the original ports, as well as new, modernized versions starring the Mario series cast, in 2001, Nintendo released Manhole-e bundled with its Nintendo e-Reader systems. Although an entire line of Game & Watch e-Reader cards were planned, between July 2006 and March 2010, Nintendo produced two Game & Watch Collection cartridges for the Nintendo DS to be released exclusively for Club Nintendo members. The first cartridge featured three games from the Game & Watch Multi Screen series, Oil Panic, Donkey Kong, and Green House. The second compilation, Game & Watch Collection 2, contained Parachute, Octopus, both cartridges are now available to the general public. Between July 2009 and April 2010 Nintendo released nine separate Game & Watch ports for DSiWare including remakes of Ball, Flagman, Manhole, and Marios Cement Factory among others
16.
Intellivision
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The Intellivision is a home video game console released by Mattel Electronics in 1979. Development of the began in 1978, less than a year after the introduction of its main competitor. The name Intellivision is a portmanteau of intelligent television, Games development started in 1978 and continued until 1990 when the Intellivision was discontinued. From 1980 to 1983 over 3 million Intellivision units were sold, in 2009, video game website IGN named the Intellivision the No.14 greatest video game console of all time. It remained Mattels only video game console until the release of the HyperScan in 2006, the Intellivision was developed at Mattel in Hawthorne, California along with their Mattel Electronics line of handheld electronic games. Mattel Electronics becoming a subsidiary in 1981, the Intellivision was test marketed in Fresno, California in 1979 with a total of four games available. It was released nationwide in 1980 with a tag of US$299, a pack-in game, Las Vegas Poker & Blackjack. Mattel began investigating a home game system in 1977. It was to have rich graphics and long lasting gameplay to distinguish itself from its competitors, Mattel identified a newly designed chipset from National Semiconductor and negotiated better pricing for a simpler design. Their consultant, APh Technological Consulting, suggested a General Instrument chipset, the GI chipset lacked reprogrammable graphics and Mattel worked with GI to implement changes. GI published an updated chipset in their 1978 catalog, after initially choosing National in August 1977, Mattel waited for two months before ultimately going with the proposed GI chipset in the fall of 1977. A team at Mattel, headed by David Chandler began engineering the hardware, in 1978, David Rolfe of APh developed the executive control software and with a group of Caltech summer student hires, programmed the first games. Graphics were designed by artists at Mattel that included Dave James, though not the first system to challenge Warner Communications Atari, it was the first to pose a serious threat to the market leader. One of the slogans of the television advertisements stated that Intellivision was the closest thing to the real thing, one example in an advertisement compared golf games. The other consoles games had a sound and cruder graphics, while the Intellivision featured a realistic swing sound and striking of the ball. There was also an advertisement comparing the Atari 2600 to it, in its first year, Mattel sold out its initial 175,000 production run of Intellivision Master Components. In 1981, over 1 million Intellivision consoles were sold, the Intellivision Master Component was branded and distributed by various companies. Before Mattel shifted manufacturing to Hong Kong, Mattel Intellivisions were manufactured by GTE Sylvania, GTE Sylvania Intellivisions were produced along with Mattels with the brand name the only differentiation
17.
ColecoVision
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The ColecoVision is Coleco Industries second-generation home video-game console which was released in August 1982. The ColecoVision offered an experience to more powerful arcade game systems compared to competitors such as the Atari 2600. Approximately 145 titles in total were published as ROM cartridges for the system between 1982 and 1984, Coleco withdrew from the video game market in 1985, and ColecoVision was discontinued that same year. River West Brands currently owns the ColecoVision brand name, by Christmas of 1982, Coleco had sold more than 500,000 units, in part on the strength of its bundled game. The ColecoVisions main competitor was the more advanced but less commercially successful Atari 5200. The ColecoVision was distributed by CBS Electronics outside of North America, sales quickly passed 1 million in early 1983, before the video game crash of 1983. By the beginning of 1984, quarterly sales of the ColecoVision had dramatically decreased, over the next 18 months, the Coleco company ramped down its video game division, ultimately withdrawing from the video game market by the end of the summer of 1985. The ColecoVision was officially discontinued by October 1985, the video game crash of 1983 has been cited as the main cause of the ColecoVisions being discontinued less than three years after its launch. In 1983 Spectravideo announced the SV-603 ColecoVision Video Game Adapter for its SV-318 computer, the company stated that the $70 product allowed users to enjoy the entire library of exciting ColecoVision video-game cartridges. In 1986, Bit Corporation produced a ColecoVision clone called the Dina, the controllers connect into plugs in a recessed area on the top of the unit. The design of the controllers is similar to that of Mattels Intellivision—the controller is rectangular and consists of a numeric keypad, in place of the circular control disc below the keypad, the Coleco controller has a short,1. 5-inch joystick. The keypad is designed to accept a thin plastic overlay that maps the keys for a particular game, each ColecoVision console shipped with two controllers. All first-party cartridges and most third-party software titles feature a 12-second pause before presenting the game select screen and this delay results from an intentional loop in the consoles BIOS to enable on-screen display of the ColecoVision brand. CPU, NEC version of Zilog Z80A @3, from its introduction, Coleco touted the ColecoVisions hardware expandability by highlighting the Expansion Module Interface on the front of the unit. These hardware expansion modules and accessories were sold separately, Expansion Module #1 makes the ColecoVision compatible with the industry-leading Atari 2600, with some exceptions. Functionally, this gave the ColecoVision the largest software library of any console of its day, the expansion module prompted legal action from Atari, but Atari was unable to stop sales of the module because the 2600 could be reproduced with off the shelf parts. Coleco also designed and sold the Gemini game system, which was a clone of the 2600, Expansion Module #2 is a driving controller that came packaged with a port of the arcade game Turbo. The gas pedal is merely a simple on/off switch, so many gamers used the second ColecoVision controller as a shift for more precise speed control
18.
Atari 2600
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The Atari 2600 is a home video game console by Atari, Inc. This format contrasts with the model of having non-microprocessor dedicated hardware. The console was sold as the Atari VCS, an abbreviation for Video Computer System. Following the release of the Atari 5200 in 1982, the VCS was renamed to the Atari 2600, after the units Atari part number, CX2600. The 2600 was typically bundled with two controllers, a conjoined pair of paddle controllers, and a game cartridge, initially Combat. Ted Dabney and Nolan Bushnell developed the Atari gaming system in the 1970s, originally operating under the name Syzygy, Bushnell and Dabney changed the name of their company to Atari in 1972. In 1973, Atari Inc. had purchased an engineering think tank called Cyan Engineering to research next-generation video game systems, and had been working on a prototype known as Stella for some time. Unlike prior generations of machines that use custom logic to play a number of games, its core is a complete CPU. It was combined with a RAM-and-I/O chip, the MOS Technology 6532, the first two versions of the machine contain a fourth chip, a standard CMOS logic buffer IC, making Stella cost-effective. Some later versions of the console eliminated the buffer chip, programs for small computers of the time were generally stored on cassette tapes, floppy disks, or paper tape. In 1976, Fairchild Semiconductor released their own CPU-based system, the Video Entertainment System. Stella was still not ready for production, but it was clear that it needed to be there were a number of me too products filling up the market. Atari Inc. didnt have the flow to complete the system quickly. Nolan Bushnell eventually turned to Warner Communications, and sold the company to them in 1976 for US$28 million on the promise that Stella would be produced as soon as possible. Key to the success of the machine was the hiring of Jay Miner. Once that was completed and debugged, the system was ready for shipping, the unit was originally priced at US$199, and shipped with two joysticks and a Combat cartridge. In a move to compete directly with the Channel F, Atari Inc. named the machine the Video Computer System, as the Channel F was at that point known as the VES, for Video Entertainment System. The VCS was also rebadged as the Sears Video Arcade and sold through Sears, Roebuck, another breakthrough for gaming systems was Ataris invention of a computer-controlled opponent, rather than the usual two-player or asymmetric challenges of the past
19.
TRS-80 Color Computer
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The Radio Shack TRS-80 Color Computer is a line of home computers based on the Motorola 6809 processor. The Color Computer was launched in 1980, and lasted through three generations of hardware until being discontinued in 1991. Despite bearing the TRS-80 name, the Color Computer is a departure from the earlier TRS-80, in particular it has a Motorola 6809E processor. Thus, despite the name, the new machine is not compatible with software made for the old TRS-80. The Motorola 6809E was a processor for the time, but was correspondingly more expensive than other, more popular. Competing machines such as the Apple II, Commodore VIC-20, the Commodore 64, the Atari 400, some of these computers were paired with dedicated sound and graphics chips and were much more commercially successful in the 1980s home computer market. The Tandy Color Computer line started in 1980 with what is now called the CoCo 1 and ended in 1991 with the more powerful, yet similar CoCo 3. All three CoCo models maintained a level of software and hardware compatibility, with few programs written for the older model not running on the newer ones. The death knell of the CoCo was the advent of lower-cost IBM PC clones, the TRS-80 Color Computer started out as a joint venture between Tandy Corporation of Fort Worth, Texas and Motorola Semiconductor, Inc. of Austin, to develop a low-cost home computer in 1977. The initial goal of project, called Green Thumb, was to create a low cost Videotex terminal for farmers, ranchers. This terminal would connect to a line and an ordinary color television. Motorolas MC6847 Video Display Generator chip was released about the time as the joint venture started. At the core of the prototype Green Thumb terminal, the MC6847, along with the MC6809 microprocessor unit, unfortunately, the prototype contained too many chips to be commercially viable. Motorola solved this problem by integrating all the functions of the many smaller chips into one chip, by that time in late 1979, the new and powerful Motorola MC6809 processor was released. The SAM, VDG, and 6809 were combined and the AgVision terminal was born, the AgVision terminal was also sold through Radio Shack stores as the VideoTex terminal around 1980. Internal differences, if any, are unclear, as not many AgVision terminals survive to this day, with its proven design, the VideoTex terminal contains all the basic components for a general-purpose home computer. The internal modem was removed, and I/O ports for storage, serial I/O. An expansion connector was added to the side of the case for future enhancements and program cartridges
20.
Atari 8-bit family
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The Atari 8-bit family is a series of 8-bit home computers introduced by Atari, Inc. in 1979 and manufactured until 1992. All of the machines in the family are similar and differ primarily in packaging. They are based on the MOS Technology 6502 CPU running at 1.79 MHz, star Raiders is widely considered the platforms killer app. The original Atari 400 and 800 models were released with a series of plug-n-play peripherals that used Ataris SIO serial bus system, to meet stringent FCC requirements, the early machines were completely enclosed in a solid cast aluminum block, which made them physically robust but expensive to produce. Over the following decade, the models were replaced by the XL and XE series which had the same basic logical design. The Atari 8-bit computer line sold two million units during its production run between late 1979 and mid-1985. They were not only sold through dedicated computer retailers, but department stores such as Sears, the primary competition in the worldwide market was, starting in 1982, the Commodore 64. This was the first computer to offer similar performance. Atari also found a market in Eastern Europe and had something of a renaissance in the early 1990s as these countries joined a uniting Europe. On January 1,1992, Atari corp, officially dropped all remaining support of the 8-bit line. Design of the 8-bit series of machines started at Atari as soon as the Atari 2600 games console was released in late 1977. While designing the 2600 in 1976, the team from Atari Grass Valley Research Center felt that the 2600 would have about a three-year lifespan before becoming obsolete. They started blue sky designs for a new console that would be ready to replace it around 1979, what they ended up with was essentially a greatly updated version of the 2600, fixing its more obvious limitations but sharing a similar overall design philosophy. The newer design would be faster than the 2600, have better graphics, work on the chips for the new system continued throughout 1978 and focused on much-improved video hardware known as the Color Television Interface Adaptor, or CTIA. During this gestation the home computer era began in earnest in the form of the TRS-80, Commodore PET, Warner Communications had purchased Atari from Nolan Bushnell for $28 million in 1976 in order to fund the launch of the 2600. Atari had recently sent Ray Kassar to act as the CEO of the company, Kassar felt the chipset should be used in a home computer to challenge Apple. In order to adapt the machine to this role, it would need to support character graphics, include some form of expansion for peripherals, and run the then-universal BASIC programming language. The CTIA, like the 2600s TIA, was designed to produce Player-Missile graphics, instead of expanding the CTIA to handle these tasks, the designers instead introduced an entirely new chip for this purpose, the Alphanumeric Television Interface Controller, or ANTIC
21.
Texas Instruments TI-99/4A
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The Texas Instruments TI-99/4A is a home computer, released June 1981 in the United States at a price of $525. It is a version of the less successful TI-99/4 model. The TI-99/4 has a calculator-style chiclet keyboard and a set that lacked lowercase text. The TI-99/4A added an additional graphics mode, lowercase characters consisting of capitals. Both use 16-bit processors, making the TI-99/4 series the first 16-bit home computers, the TI-99/4As CPU, motherboard, and ROM cartridge slot are built into the keyboard. The power regulator board is housed below and in front of the cartridge slot under the area to the right of the keyboard. This area gets very hot so users commonly refer to it as the coffee cup warmer, the external power supply, which was different according to the country of sale, is a step-down transformer. The TI-99/4 was sold both the computer and a monitor as Texas Instruments could not get its RF modulator approved by the U. S. Federal Communications Commission in time. The TI-99/4A did ship with an RF modulator, in the early 1980s, TI was known as a pioneer in speech synthesis, and a highly popular plug-in speech synthesizer module was available for the TI-99/4 and 4A. Speech synthesizers were offered free with the purchase of a number of cartridges and were used by many TI-written video games, the synthesizer uses a variant of linear predictive coding and has a small in-built vocabulary. The original intent was to release small cartridges that plugged directly into the synthesizer unit, however, the success of software text-to-speech in the Terminal Emulator II cartridge cancelled that plan. In many games, the synthesizer has relatively realistic voices. For example, Alpiners speech includes male and female voices and can be quite sarcastic when the player made a bad move, the TI-99/4s original expansion concept was that peripherals would be connected serially to the console and each other, in a daisy-chain fashion. This original idea was replaced by a system based on expansion cards. Each card also has its own light, an LED which would blink or flicker when the card was being used by software. As on the earlier S-100 bus, the section of the supply that power the card slots is unregulated. The PEB also carries an analog sound input on the expansion bus and this allows the TI Speech Synthesizers audio to be carried through the console to the monitor. No official cards from Texas Instruments ever made use of this line, early models includes a built-in equation calculator, but in the 99/4A this feature was discontinued
22.
IBM Personal Computer
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The IBM Personal Computer, commonly known as the IBM PC, is the original version and progenitor of the IBM PC compatible hardware platform. It is IBM model number 5150, and was introduced on August 12,1981 and it was created by a team of engineers and designers under the direction of Don Estridge of the IBM Entry Systems Division in Boca Raton, Florida. IBM compatible became an important criterion for sales growth, only the Apple Macintosh family kept significant market share without compatibility with the IBM personal computer, International Business Machines, one of the worlds largest companies, had a 62% share of the mainframe computer market in 1981. Its share of the computer market, however, had declined from 60% in 1970 to 32% in 1980. In 1979 BusinessWeek asked, Is IBM just another stodgy, mature company, by 1981 its stock price had declined by 22%. IBMs earnings for the first half the year grew by 5. 3%—one third of the inflation rate—while those of minicomputer maker Digital Equipment Corporation grew by more than 35%. B. M, No longer dominates the computer business. IBM wished to avoid the outcome with the new personal computer industry, dominated by the Commodore PET, Atari 8-bit family, Apple II, Tandy Corporations TRS-80. With $150 million in sales by 1979 and projected growth of more than 40% in the early 1980s. The Japanese project, codenamed Go, ended before the 1981 release of the American-designed IBM PC codenamed Chess, whether IBM had waited too long to enter an industry in which Apple and others were already successful was unclear. An observer stated that IBM bringing out a computer would be like teaching an elephant to tap dance. Successful microcomputer company Vector Graphics fiscal 1980 revenue was $12 million, the company only sold through its internal sales force, had no experience with resellers or retail stores, and did not introduce the first product designed to work with non-IBM equipment until 1980. Another observer claimed that IBM made decisions so slowly that, when tested, as with other large computer companies, its new products typically required about four to five years for development. IBM had to learn how to develop, mass-produce. The potential importance to microcomputers of a company so prestigious, that a saying in American companies stated No one ever got fired for buying IBM, was nonetheless clear. InfoWorld, which described itself as The Newsweekly for Microcomputer Users, stated that for my grandmother, is far and away the media star, not because of its features, but because it exists at all. When the number eight company in the Fortune 500 enters the field, the influence of a personal computer made by a company whose name has literally come to mean computer to most of the world is hard to contemplate. The editorial acknowledged that some factions in our industry have looked upon IBM as the enemy, desktop sized programmable calculators by Hewlett Packard had evolved into the HP9830 BASIC language computer by 1972. In 1972–1973 a team led by Dr. SCAMP emulated an IBM1130 minicomputer to run APL\1130, in 1973 APL was generally available only on mainframe computers, and most desktop sized microcomputers such as the Wang 2200 or HP9800 offered only BASIC
23.
Commodore 64
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The Commodore 64, also known as the C64, C-64, C=64, or occasionally CBM64 or VIC-64 in Sweden, is an 8-bit home computer introduced in January 1982 by Commodore International. It is listed in the Guinness World Records as the single computer model of all time. Volume production started in early 1982, marketing in August for US$595, preceded by the Commodore VIC-20 and Commodore PET, the C64 took its name from its 64 kilobytes of RAM. It had superior sound and graphical specifications compared to earlier systems such as the Apple II and Atari 800, with multi-color sprites. The C64 dominated the low-end computer market for most of the 1980s. Sam Tramiel, a later Atari president and the son of Commodores founder, said in a 1989 interview, When I was at Commodore we were building 400,000 C64s a month for a couple of years. In the UK market, the C64 faced competition from the BBC Micro and the ZX Spectrum, part of the Commodore 64s success was its sale in regular retail stores instead of only electronics and/or computer hobbyist specialty stores. Commodore produced many of its parts in-house to control costs, including custom integrated circuit chips from MOS Technology and it has been compared to the Ford Model T automobile for its role in bringing a new technology to middle-class households via creative and affordable mass-production. Approximately 10,000 commercial software titles have made for the Commodore 64 including development tools, office productivity applications. C64 emulators allow anyone with a computer, or a compatible video game console. The C64 is also credited with popularizing the computer demoscene and is used today by some computer hobbyists. In 2008,17 years after it was taken off the market, in January 1981, MOS Technology, Inc. Commodores integrated circuit design subsidiary, initiated a project to design the graphic, Design work for the chips, named MOS Technology VIC-II and MOS Technology SID, was completed in November 1981. Commodore then began a game console project that would use the new chips—called the Ultimax or the Commodore MAX Machine and this project was eventually cancelled after just a few machines were manufactured for the Japanese market. At the same time, Robert Bob Russell and Robert Bob Yannes were critical of the current product line-up at Commodore, with the support of Al Charpentier and Charles Winterble, they proposed to Commodore CEO Jack Tramiel a true low-cost sequel to the VIC-20. Tramiel dictated that the machine should have 64 KB of random-access memory, although 64-Kbit dynamic random-access memory chips cost over US$100 at the time, he knew that DRAM prices were falling, and would drop to an acceptable level before full production was reached. The product was named the VIC-40 as the successor to the popular VIC-20. The team that constructed it consisted of Yash Terakura, Bob Russell, Bob Yannes, the design, prototypes and some sample software were finished in time for the show, after the team had worked tirelessly over both Thanksgiving and Christmas weekends
24.
Commodore VIC-20
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The VIC-20 is an 8-bit home computer that was sold by Commodore Business Machines. The VIC-20 was announced in 1980, roughly three years after Commodores first personal computer, the PET, the VIC-20 was the first computer of any description to sell one million units. The VIC-20 was intended to be more economical than the PET computer and it was equipped with 5 KB of static RAM and used the same MOS6502 CPU as the PET. As the Apple II gained momentum with the advent of VisiCalc in 1979, Jack Tramiel wanted a product that would compete in the same segment, for this reason Chuck Peddle and Bill Seiler started to design a computer named TOI. The TOI computer failed to materialize, mostly because it required an 80-column character display which in turn required the MOS Technology 6564 chip, however, the chip could not be used in the TOI since it required very expensive static RAM to operate fast enough. The serial IEEE 488-derivative CBM-488 interface was designed by Glen Stark, some features, like the memory add-in board, were designed by Bill Seiler. Altogether, the VIC20 development team consisted of five people, wed swipe whatever equipment we needed to get our jobs done. There was no way to get the work done. Theyd discover it was missing and they would just order more stuff from the warehouse, at the time, Commodore had an oversupply of 1 kbit×4 SRAM chips, so Tramiel decided that these should be used in the new computer. The end result was closer to the PET or TOI computers than to Yannes prototype. The original Revision A system board found in all silver-label VIC-20s used 2114 SRAMs and due to their tiny size, ten of them were required to reach 5k of system RAM. The Revision B system board, found in rainbow logo VIC-20s switched to larger 2048 byte SRAMs which reduced the count to five chips,2 x 2048 bytes chips +3 x 2114 chips. VIC-20s went through several variations in their 3-1/2 years of production, first-year models had a PET-style keyboard with a blocky font while most VIC-20s made during 1982 had a slightly different keyboard also shared with early C64s. The rainbow logo VIC-20 was introduced in early 1983 and has the newer C64 keyboard with gray function keys and it has a similar power supply to the C64 PSU, although the amperage is slightly lower. Older Revision A VIC-20s cannot use a C64 PSU or vice versa as their power requirement is too high, in April 1980, at a meeting of general managers outside London, Jack Tramiel declared that he wanted a low-cost color computer. When most of the GMs argued against it, he said, The Japanese are coming and this was in keeping with Tramiels philosophy which was to make computers for the masses, not the classes. Then, the project was given to Commodore Japan, a team led by Yash Terakura created the VIC-1001 for the Japanese market. The VIC-20 was marketed in Japan as VIC-1001 before VIC-20 was introduced to the US, when they returned to California from that meeting, Tomczyk wrote a 30-page memo detailing recommendations for the new computer, and presented it to Tramiel
25.
BBC Micro
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Designed with an emphasis on education, it was notable for its ruggedness, expandability, and the quality of its operating system. An accompanying 1982 television series The Computer Programme featuring Chris Serle learning to use the machine was also broadcast on BBC2, renamed the BBC Micro, the system was adopted by most schools in the United Kingdom, changing Acorns fortunes. It was also successful as a home computer in the UK despite its high cost. Acorn also employed the machine to simulate and develop the ARM architecture which, many later, has become hugely successful for embedded systems, including tablets. In 2013 ARM was the most widely used 32-bit instruction set architecture, during the early 1980s, the BBC started what became known as the BBC Computer Literacy Project. The BBC wanted to base its project on a microcomputer capable of performing tasks which they could then demonstrate in the TV series The Computer Programme. The list of topics included programming, graphics, sound and music, teletext, controlling external hardware, the Acorn team had already been working on a successor to their existing Atom microcomputer. Known as the Proton, it included better graphics and a faster 2 MHz MOS Technology 6502 central processing unit. The machine was only at the stage at the time. The team worked through the night to get a working Proton together to show the BBC, not only was the Acorn Proton the only machine to match the BBCs specification, it also exceeded it in nearly every parameter. Based on the Proton prototype the BBC signed a contract with Acorn as early as February 1981, by June the BBC Micros specifications and pricing were decided. The machine was released as the BBC Microcomputer on 1 December 1981, BYTE called the BBC Micro Model B a no-compromise computer that has many uses beyond self-instruction in computer technology. In terms of versatility and expansion capability, as with Sinclairs ZX Spectrum and Commodores Commodore 64, both released later in 1982, demand greatly exceeded supply. For some months, there were long delays before customers received the machines they had ordered, efforts were made to market the machine in the United States and West Germany. By October 1983, the US operation reported that American schools had placed orders with it totalling $21 million. In October 1984, while preparing a major expansion of its US dealer network, Acorn claimed sales of 85 per cent of the computers in British schools and that December, Acorn stated its intention to become the market leader in US educational computing. The New York Times considered the inclusion of local area networking to be of importance to teachers. The operation resulted in advertisements by at least one dealer in Interface Age magazine, Acorn became more known for its model B computer than for its other products
26.
MSX
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Microsoft conceived the project as an attempt to create unified standards among various hardware makers of the period. They were popular mostly in Japan, and several other countries and it is difficult to estimate how many MSX computers were sold worldwide, but eventually 5 million MSX-based units were sold in Japan alone. The Metal Gear series, for example, was written for MSX hardware. The exact meaning of the MSX abbreviation remains a matter of debate, at the time, most people seemed to agree it meant MicroSoft eXtended, referring to the built-in Microsoft eXtended BASIC, specifically adapted by Microsoft for the MSX system. Another suggested source for the abbreviation was Matsushita-Sony, however, according to Kazuhiko Nishi, MSX could also stand for Machines with Software eXchangeability. In 1985, Kazuhiko Nishi told that he named MSX after the MX missile, the hardware design of these computers and the various dialects of their BASICs were incompatible. Other Japanese consumer electronics such as Panasonic, Canon, Casio, Yamaha, Pioneer. Nishi proposed MSX as an attempt to create an industry standard for home computers. Inspired by the success of VHS as a standard for video recorders, many Japanese electronic manufacturers along with GoldStar, Philips and Spectravideo built. Any piece of hardware or software with the MSX logo on it was compatible with MSX products of other manufacturers, in particular, the expansion cartridge form and function were part of the standard, any MSX expansion or game cartridge would work in any MSX computer. Nishis standard was built around the Spectravideo SV-328 computer, the standard consisted primarily of several off-the-shelf parts, the main CPU was a 3. This was a choice of components that was shared by other home computers and games consoles of the period, such as the ColecoVision home computer. To reduce overall system cost, many MSX models used a custom IC known as MSX-Engine, however, almost all MSX systems used a professional keyboard instead of a chiclet keyboard, driving the price up compared to the original SV-328. Consequently, these components alongside Microsofts MSX BASIC made the MSX a competitive, though somewhat expensive, the Japanese companies avoided the intensely competitive U. S. home computer market, which was in the throes of a Commodore-led price war. Only Spectravideo and Yamaha briefly marketed MSX machines in the U. S, by the time the MSX was launched in Europe, several more popular 8-bit home computers had also arrived, and it was far too late to capture the extremely crowded European 8-bit computer market. A problem for some software developers was that the method by which MSX-1 computers addressed their video RAM could be quite slow compared to systems that gave direct access to the video memory. Some minor compatibility issues also plagued ported Spectrum games, later games tended to use the MSX-1 joystick port or used MSXs official arrow keys and space bar, or offered the option to choose other keys with which to control the program, solving the problem. Moreover, the MSXs BIOS did not provide information either
27.
ZX Spectrum
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The ZX Spectrum is an 8-bit personal home computer released in the United Kingdom in 1982 by Sinclair Research Ltd. It was manufactured in Dundee, Scotland, in the now closed Timex factory, the Spectrum was among the first mainstream-audience home computers in the UK, similar in significance to the Commodore 64 in the USA. Licensing deals and clones followed, and earned Clive Sinclair a knighthood for services to British industry, the Commodore 64, Dragon 32, Oric-1 and Atmos, BBC Microcomputer and later the Amstrad CPC range were rivals to the Spectrum in the UK market during the early 1980s. Over 24,000 software titles have been released since the Spectrums launch, in 2014, a Bluetooth keyboard modelled on the Spectrum was announced. The Spectrum is based on a Zilog Z80 A CPU running at 3.5 MHz, the original model has 16 KB of ROM and either 16 KB or 48 KB of RAM. Hardware design was by Richard Altwasser of Sinclair Research, and the appearance was designed by Sinclairs industrial designer Rick Dickinson. Video output is through an RF modulator and was designed for use with contemporary portable television sets, the image resolution is 256×192 with the same colour limitations. To conserve memory, colour is stored separate from the bitmap in a low resolution, 32×24 grid overlay. In practice, this means that all pixels of an 8x8 character block share one foreground colour, Altwasser received a patent for this design. An attribute consists of a foreground and a colour, a brightness level and a flashing flag which. This scheme leads to what was dubbed colour clash or attribute clash and this became a distinctive feature of the Spectrum, meaning programs, particularly games, had to be designed around this limitation. Other machines available around the time, for example the Amstrad CPC or the Commodore 64. The Commodore 64 used colour attributes in a way, but a special multicolour mode, hardware sprites. Sound output is through a beeper on the machine itself, capable of producing one channel with 10 octaves, software was later available that could play two channel sound. The machine includes an expansion bus edge connector and 3.5 mm audio in/out ports for the connection of a recorder for loading and saving programs. The ear port can drive headphones and the mic port provides line level audio out which could be amplified, the machines Sinclair BASIC interpreter is stored in ROM and was written by Steve Vickers on contract from Nine Tiles Ltd. The Spectrums chiclet keyboard is marked with BASIC keywords, for example, pressing G when in programming mode would insert the BASIC command GO TO. The ZX Spectrum character set was expanded from that of the ZX81, Spectrum BASIC included extra keywords for the more advanced display and sound, and supported multi-statement lines
28.
Amstrad CPC
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The Amstrad CPC is a series of 8-bit home computers produced by Amstrad between 1984 and 1990. The series spawned a total of six models, The CPC464, CPC664. The CPC models hardware is based on the Zilog Z80A CPU and their computer-in-a-keyboard design prominently features an integrated storage device, either a compact cassette deck or 3 inch floppy disk drive. The main units were sold bundled with either a colour. Additionally, a range of first and third party hardware extensions such as external disk drives, printers. The CPC series was pitched against other home computers used to play video games. During its lifetime, the CPC series sold approximately three million units, the CPC464 was one of the most successful computers in Europe and sold more than two million computers. The CPC464 featured 64 KB RAM and a cassette tape deck. It was introduced in June 1984 in the UK, initial suggested retail prices for the CPC464 were GBP249. 00/DM899.00 with a green screen and GBP359. 00/DM1398.00 with a colour monitor. Following the introduction of the CPC6128 in late 1985, suggested retail prices for the CPC464 were cut by GBP50. 00/DM100.00, in 1990, the 464plus replaced the CPC464 in the model line-up, and production of the CPC464 was discontinued. The CPC664 features 64 KB RAM and an internal 3-inch floppy disk drive and it was introduced in May 1985 in the UK. Initial suggested retail prices for the CPC664 were GBP339. 00/DM1198.00 with a green screen, after the successful release of the CPC464, consumers were constantly asking for two improvements, more memory and an internal disk drive. For Amstrad, the latter was easier to realize, at the deliberately low-key introduction of the CPC664 in May 1985, the machine was positioned not only as the lowest-cost disk system but even the lowest-cost CP/M2.2 machine. In the Amstrad CPC product range the CPC664 complemented the CPC464 which was neither discontinued nor reduced in price, compared to the CPC464, the CPC664s main unit has been significantly redesigned, not only to accommodate the floppy disk drive but also with a redesigned keyboard area. Touted ergonomic by Amstrads promotional material, the keyboard is noticeably tilted to the front with MSX-style cursor keys above the numeric keypad, compared to the CPC464s multicoloured keyboard, the CPC664s keys are kept in a much quieter grey and pale blue colour scheme. The back of the CPC664 main unit features the same connectors as the CPC464, unlike the CPC464s cassette tape drive that could be powered off the main units 5V voltage, the CPC664s floppy disk drive requires an additional 12V voltage. This voltage had to be supplied by an updated version of the bundled green screen/colour monitor. The CPC664 was only produced for six months
29.
Atari 7800
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The Atari 7800 ProSystem, or simply the Atari 7800, is a home video game console officially released by Atari Corporation in 1986. It is almost fully backward-compatible with the Atari 2600, the first console to have backward compatibility without the use of additional modules and it was considered affordable at a price of US$140. The 7800 has significantly improved graphics hardware over the 2600, and it also shipped with a different model of joystick than the 2600-standard CX40. A few units were released to test markets in June 1984 though, the Atari 7800 ProSystem was the first game system from Atari Inc. designed by an outside company, General Computer Corporation. The system was designed in 1983-84 with a mass market rollout in June 1984. The project was called the Atari 3600, though was later renamed the Atari 7800. Atari had been facing mounting pressure in the form of competition from the ColecoVision, at the same time, the Atari 5200 had been widely criticized for not being able to play Atari 2600 games without an adapter. GCC, which had a background in creating games, designed their new system with a graphical architecture similar to arcade machines of the time. The 7800 allows a number of moving objects that far exceeds previous consoles. Powering the system is a slightly customized 6502 processor, the Atari SALLY, in contrast to the Atari 5200, the Atari 7800 can play almost all Atari 2600 games out of the box, without the need for an adapter. In addition, it features a return to a digital controller, then as an added bonus, GCCs programmers would also do almost all of the Atari 2600,5200 games in 1983-1984 for Atari. atarimuseum. A keyboard was developed, and the keyboard had a port that allowed for the addition of peripherals such as disk drives. To further enhance the experience, GCC had also designed a high score cartridge. On the side of the 7800 was a port, reportedly for a planned connection with a laserdisc player. The 7800 was initially released in southern California in June 1984, following an announcement on May 21,1984 at the Summer Consumer Electronics Show. Thirteen games were announced for the launch, Ms. Pac-Man, Pole Position II, Centipede, Joust, Dig Dug, Desert Falcon, Robotron,2084, Galaga, Food Fight, Ballblazer. Atari was a sponsor of the 1984 Summer Olympics and planned to push the 7800 aggressively in time for Christmas that year, on July 2,1984, Warner Communications sold Ataris Consumer Division to Jack Tramiel. All projects were halted during an evaluation period
30.
Nintendo Entertainment System
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The Nintendo Entertainment System is an 8-bit home video game console that was developed and manufactured by Nintendo. The best-selling gaming console of its time, the NES helped revitalize the US video game following the video game crash of 1983. With the NES, Nintendo introduced a business model of licensing third-party developers, authorizing them to produce. It was initially released in Japan as the Family Computer on July 15,1983, and was released in North America during 1985, in Europe during 1986. In South Korea, it was known as the Hyundai Comboy and was distributed by SK Hynix which then was known as Hyundai Electronics and it was succeeded by the Super Nintendo Entertainment System. In 2009, the Nintendo Entertainment System was named the single greatest video game console in history by IGN and it was judged the second greatest console behind the Sega Dreamcast in PC Magazines Top 10 Video Game Consoles of All Time. Following a series of arcade game successes in the early 1980s, Nintendo made plans to create a console called the Famicom. A test model was constructed in October 1982 to verify the functionality of the hardware, because 65xx CPUs had not been manufactured or sold in Japan up to that time, no cross-development software was available and it had to be produced from scratch. Perhaps we could say it is a family computer, meanwhile, Hiroshi Yamauchi decided that the console should use a red and white theme after seeing a billboard for DX Antenna which used those colors. Original plans called for the Famicoms cartridges to be the size of a cassette tape, careful design attention was paid to the cartridge connectors since loose and faulty connections often plagued arcade machines. As it necessitated taking 60 connection lines for the memory and expansion, the controllers were hard-wired to the console with no connectors for cost reasons. There were concerns regarding the durability of the design and that children might step on joysticks left on the floor. Katsuyah Nakawaka attached a Game & Watch D-pad to the Famicom prototype and found that it was easy to use, ultimately though, they installed a 15-pin expansion port on the front of the console so that an optional arcade-style joystick could be used. Uemura added an eject lever to the slot which was not really necessary. He also added a microphone to the controller with the idea that it could be used to make players voices sound through the TV speaker. The console was released on July 15,1983 as the Family Computer for ¥14,800 alongside three ports of Nintendos successful arcade games Donkey Kong, Donkey Kong Jr. and Popeye. The Famicom was slow to gather momentum, a bad chip set caused the release of the system to crash. Following a product recall and a reissue with a new motherboard, the deal was set to be finalized and signed at the Summer Consumer Electronics Show in June 1983
31.
Family Computer Disk System
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It uses proprietary floppy disks called Disk Cards for data storage. Through its entire span,1986 –2003,4.44 million units were sold. The device is connected to the Famicom deck by plugging a special known as the RAM Adapter into the systems cartridge port. The RAM adapter contains 32 kilobytes of RAM for temporary storage,8 KB of RAM for tile and sprite data storage. The ASIC acts as a controller for the floppy drive. Finally, embedded in the 2C33 is an 8KB BIOS ROM, the Disk Cards used are double-sided, with a total capacity of 112 KB per disk. Many games span both sides of a disk, requiring the user to switch sides at some point during gameplay, a few games use two full disks, totaling four sides. The Disk System is capable of running on six C-cell batteries or the supplied AC adapter, batteries usually last five months with daily game play. The battery option is due to the likelihood of a set of AC plugs already being occupied by a Famicom. In 1983, the disks 112 KB of storage space was quite appealing due to the high cost of cartridge-based solid state storage chips. The rewritable aspect of the disks also opened up new possibilities, games such as The Legend of Zelda, Metroid, and Kid Icarus were released to the FDS with a save feature. Many of these titles were ported to cartridge format and released for the NES a year or two later, with saving implemented via password resume or battery-backed memory. Sharp released The Twin Famicom, a Famicom model that features a built-in Disk System, widespread copyright violation in Japans predominantly personal-computer-based game rental market inspired corporations to petition the government to ban the rental of all video games in 1984. With games then being available only via full purchase, demand rose for a new, in 1986, as video gaming had increasingly expanded from computers into the video game console market, Nintendo installed Famicom Disk Writer Kiosks in game stores across Japan. For a rental fee of 500 yen as opposed to the 2,600 yen cost of new games, some game releases were exclusive to these kiosks. Calling the Disk Writer one of the coolest things Nintendo ever created, Kotaku says the systems premise still offers modern retail, the service was very popular and remained available until 2003. Disk Writer kiosks in select locations were also provisioned as Disk Fax systems, players could take advantage of the dynamic rewritability of blue floppy disk versions of Disk System games in order to achieve and save their high scores at their leisure at home. The player could bring the disk to a retailers Disk Fax kiosk
32.
Game Boy
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It is the first handheld console in the Game Boy line and was created by Satoru Okada and Nintendo Research & Development 1. This same team, led by Gunpei Yokoi at the time, is credited with designing the Game & Watch series as well as popular games for the Nintendo Entertainment System. Redesigned versions were released in 1996 and 1998 in the form of Game Boy Pocket and Game Boy Light, the Game Boy is Nintendos second handheld system following the Game & Watch series introduced in 1980 and it combined features from both the Nintendo Entertainment System and Game & Watch. It was either bought as a unit or bundled with the puzzle game Tetris. During its early lifetime, the Game Boy mainly competed with Segas Game Gear, Ataris Lynx, the Game Boy beat its rivals and became a tremendous success. The Game Boy and its successor, the Game Boy Color, have sold over 118 million units worldwide, upon the Game Boys release in the United States, it sold its entire shipment of one million units within a few weeks. The Game Boy and Game Boy Color were discontinued in the early 2000s in favor of the subsequent Game Boy Advance, the Game Boy has four operation buttons labeled A, B, SELECT, and START, as well as a directional pad. There is a control dial on the right side of the device. At the top of the Game Boy, a sliding on-off switch, the on-off switch includes a physical lockout to prevent users from either inserting or removing a cartridge while the unit is switched on. Nintendo recommends users leave a cartridge in the slot to prevent dust, the Game Boy also contains optional input and/or output connectors. On the left side of the system is an external 3. 5mm x 1. 35mm DC power supply jack that allows users to use a rechargeable battery pack or AC adapter instead of four AA batteries. The Game Boy requires 6 V DC of at least 150 mA, a 3.5 mm stereo headphone jack is located on the bottom side of the unit which allows users to listen to the audio with the bundled headphones or external speakers. The right-side of the device offers a port which allows a user to connect to another Game Boy system via a link cable, the port can also be used to connect a Game Boy Printer. The link cable was designed for players to play head-to-head two-player games such as in Tetris. However, game developer Satoshi Tajiri would later use the cable technology as a method of communication. CPU Custom 8-bit Sharp LR35902 at 4.19 MHz and this processor is similar to an Intel 8080 in that none of the registers introduced in the Z80 are present. However, some of the Z80s instruction set enhancements over the 8080, still other instructions are unique to this particular flavor of 8080/Z80 CPU. The IC also contains integrated sound generation, the unit only has one speaker, but headphones provide stereo sound Display, Reflective STN LCD160 ×144 pixels Frame Rate, Approx
33.
Super Nintendo Entertainment System
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In Japan, the system is called the Super Famicom, or SFC for short. In South Korea, it is known as the Super Comboy and was distributed by Hyundai Electronics, although each version is essentially the same, several forms of regional lockout prevent the different versions from being compatible with one another. It was released in Brazil on September 2,1992, by Playtronic, the SNES is Nintendos second home console, following the Nintendo Entertainment System. The console introduced advanced graphics and sound compared with other systems at the time. The development of a variety of enhancement chips integrated in game cartridges helped to keep it competitive in the marketplace. The SNES remained popular well into the 32-bit era, and continues to be popular among fans, collectors, retro gamers, and emulation enthusiasts, some of whom still make homebrew ROM images. To compete with the popular Family Computer in Japan, NEC Home Electronics launched the PC Engine in 1987, the two platforms were later launched in North America in 1989 as the TurboGrafx-16 and the Genesis respectively. Both systems were built on 16-bit architectures and offered improved graphics, however, it took several years for Segas system to become successful. Nintendo executives were in no rush to design a new system, designed by Masayuki Uemura, the designer of the original Famicom, the Super Famicom was released in Japan on Wednesday, November 21,1990 for 25,000 yen. The systems release also gained the attention of the Yakuza, leading to a decision to ship the devices at night to avoid robbery, with the Super Famicom quickly outselling its chief rivals, Nintendo reasserted itself as the leader of the Japanese console market. Nintendos success was due to its retention of most of its key third-party developers from its earlier system, including Capcom, Konami, Tecmo, Square, Koei. Nintendo released the Super Nintendo Entertainment System, a version of the Super Famicom. It began shipping in limited quantities on August 23,1991, the SNES was released in the United Kingdom and Ireland in April 1992 for £150, with a German release following a few weeks later. Most of the PAL region versions of the use the Japanese Super Famicom design, except for labeling. The Playtronic Super NES in Brazil, although PAL, uses the North American design, both the NES and SNES were released in Brazil in 1993 by Playtronic, a joint venture between the toy company Estrela and consumer electronics company Gradiente. The SNES and Super Famicom launched with few games, but these games were received in the marketplace. In Japan, only two games were available, Super Mario World and F-Zero. In North America, Super Mario World launched as a bundle with the console, and other titles include F-Zero, Pilotwings, SimCity
34.
Nintendo 64
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The Nintendo 64, stylized as the NINTENDO64 and often referred to as the N64, is Nintendos third home video game console for the international market. It was the last major home console to use the cartridge as its primary storage format until Nintendos seventh console, while the Nintendo 64 was succeeded by Nintendos MiniDVD-based GameCube in September 2001, the consoles remained available until the system was retired in late 2003. Codenamed Project Reality, the the N64 design was complete by mid-1995, but its launch was delayed until 1996. It launched with three games, Super Mario 64 and Pilotwings 64, released worldwide, and Saikyō Habu Shōgi, as part of the fifth generation of gaming, the system competed primarily with the Sony PlayStation and the Sega Saturn. The suggested retail price at its United States launch was US$199.99, the console was released in a range of colors and designs over its lifetime. In 2015, IGN named it the 9th greatest video game console of all time, as of 2016, the system remains a popular retro console in North America. At the beginning of the 1990s, Nintendo led the game industry with its Nintendo Entertainment System. Although the NES follow-up console, the Super NES, was successful, competition from long-time rival Sega, and relative newcomer Sony, emphasized Nintendos need to develop a successor for the SNES, or risk losing market dominance to its competitors. Further complicating matters, Nintendo also faced a backlash from third-party developers unhappy with Nintendos strict licensing policies, the company created a design proposal for a video game system, seeking an already well established partner in that market. James H. Clark, founder of SGI, initially offered the proposal to Tom Kalinske, the historical details of these preliminary negotiations were controversial between the two competing suitors. Tom Kalinske said that he and Joe Miller of Sega of America were quite impressed with SGIs prototype, the engineers from Sega Enterprises claimed that their evaluation of the early prototype had uncovered several unresolved hardware issues and deficiencies. Those were subsequently resolved, but Sega had already decided against SGIs design, Nintendo resisted that summary conclusion, arguing that the reason for SGIs ultimate choice of partner is due to Nintendo having been a more appealing business partner than Sega. While Sega demanded exclusive rights to the chip, Nintendo was willing to license the technology on a non-exclusive basis, michael Slater, publisher of Microprocessor Report said, The mere fact of a business relationship there is significant because of Nintendos phenomenal ability to drive volume. If it works at all, it could bring MIPS to levels of volume never dreamed of, james Clark met with Nintendo CEO Hiroshi Yamauchi in early 1993, thus initiating Project Reality. This announcement coincided with Nintendos August 1993 Shoshinkai trade show, as with most of the computing industry, Nintendo had limited experience with 3D graphics, and worked with several outside companies to develop the technology comprising the console. Some chip technology was provided by NEC, Toshiba, and Sharp, SGI had recently acquired MIPS Computer Systems, and the two worked together toward a low-cost realtime 3D graphics hardware system. SGI and its subsidiary MIPS Technologies were responsible for the R4300i microprocessor and that software-based console prototype platform was later supplanted by a workstation-hosted console simulation board, representing the finalized console hardware. SGIs performance estimates based upon their RealityEngine supercomputing platform were ultimately reported to be accurate to the final consumer console product
35.
Game Boy Color
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It is the successor of the Game Boy. The Game Boy Color, as suggested by the name, features a color screen and it is slightly thicker and taller than the Game Boy Pocket, which is a redesigned Game Boy released in 1996. As with the original Game Boy, it has a custom 8-bit processor somewhat related to a Zilog Z80 central processing unit, the original name - with its American English spelling of color - remained unchanged even in markets where colour was the accepted English spelling. The Game Boy and Game Boy Color combined have sold 118.69 million units worldwide and it was discontinued in 2003, shortly after the release of the Game Boy Advance SP. The resultant product was backward compatible, a first for a handheld system and this became a major feature of the Game Boy line, since it allowed each new launch to begin with a significantly larger library than any of its competitors. The Game Boy Color also has three times as much memory as the original, the screen resolution was the same as the original Game Boy, which is 160x144 pixels. The Game Boy Color also featured an infrared port for wireless linking. A few games used Hi-Color mode to increase the number of colors available on-screen and this is a mode used most notably by the Italian company 7th Sense s. r. l. and can display more than 2000 different colors on the screen. Some examples of using this method are The Fish Files, The New Addams Family Series and Alone in the Dark. When playing an original Game Boy game on a later system and this is achieved by pressing certain button combinations, namely either A or B and a direction key while the Game Boy logo is displayed on the screen. These palettes each contain up to ten colors, the grayscale palette produces an appearance identical to that experienced on the original Game Boy, the inverted colors palette inverts the colors from the Game Boy Colors color palettes. In addition, some Game Boy games have a palette that is enabled when no buttons are pressed. Any game that not have a special palette will default to the dark green palette. The default palettes are stored in a database within the internal boot ROM of the system, titles that have color palettes on Super Game Boy will usually default to a similar palette when played on a Game Boy Color. These games would display a message and refuse to play if used in older Game Boy models. Pokémon Gold and Silver are also examples of Game Boy Color games that work on an original Game Boy system, the clear-colored Game Boy Color cartridges will function correctly only when used in a Game Boy Color or a later model. The logo for Game Boy Color spelled out the word COLOR in the five colors in which the unit was manufactured. Other colors were sold as limited editions or in specific countries, the last Game Boy Color game released in Japan was From TV Animation – One Piece, Maboroshi no Grand Line Boukenhen
36.
Game Boy Advance
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The Game Boy Advance is a 32-bit handheld video game console developed, manufactured and marketed by Nintendo as the successor to the Game Boy Color. It was released in Japan on March 21,2001, in North America on June 11,2001, in Australia and Europe on June 22,2001, and in the Peoples Republic of China on June 8,2004. Nintendos competitors in the market at the time were the Neo Geo Pocket Color, WonderSwan, GP32, Tapwave Zodiac. Despite the competitors best efforts, Nintendo maintained a majority market share with the Game Boy Advance, as of June 30,2010, the Game Boy Advance series has sold 81.51 million units worldwide. Its successor, the Nintendo DS, was released in November 2004 and is compatible with Game Boy Advance software. The Game Boy Advance was designed by the French designer Gwénaël Nicolas, in 1996, magazines including Electronic Gaming Monthly, issues 53 and 54 of Total. and the July 1996 issue of Game Informer featured reports of a new Game Boy, codenamed Project Atlantis. It also may have referred to the unnamed, unreleased Game Boy Color successor prototype that was revealed at 2009s Game Developers Conference and it was announced that Nintendo Co. Ltd. was working on a game for the system called Marios Castle. When playing Game Boy or Game Boy Color games on the Game Boy Advance, Game Boy games can be played using the same selectable color palettes as on the Game Boy Color. Every Nintendo handheld system following the release of the Game Boy Advance SP has included a built-in light and rechargeable battery. The Game Boy Advance and Nintendo DS 2D graphics hardware have scaling and rotation for traditional tiled backgrounds in its modes 1 and 2 and scaling, more complex effects such as fuzz are possible by using other equations for the position, scaling, and rotation of each line. The character mode supports up to 4 tile map background layers per frame, with each tile being 8x8 pixels in size and having 16 or 256 colors. The character mode supports up to 128 hardware sprites per frame, with any sprite size from 8x8 to 64x64 pixels. With hardware comparable to the Super NES, the Game Boy Advance represents progress for sprite-based technology, the Game Boy Advance has platformers, SNES-style role-playing video games, and classic games ported from various 8-bit and 16-bit systems of the previous generations. This includes the Super Mario Advance series, as well as the backward compatibility with all earlier Game Boy titles. Final Fantasy VI Advance was the final licensed Japanese GBA game release, Released November 2006, it was the final Nintendo-published game for the system. The Legend of Spyro, The Eternal Night was the final European GBA game, samurai Deeper Kyo was the final North American GBA game, released in February 2008. The last Nintendo-developed game released for the system was the Japan-only rhythm game Rhythm Tengoku, an accessory for the GameCube, known as the Game Boy Player, was released in 2003 as the successor to the Super Game Boy peripheral for the Super Nintendo Entertainment System. The accessory allows Game Boy Advance games, as well as Game Boy and Game Boy Color games, however, some games may have compatibility issues due to certain features
37.
Nintendo e-Reader
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The e-Reader is a discontinued device made by Nintendo for its Game Boy Advance portable video game system. It was first released in Japan in December 2001, with a North American release following in September 2002 and it has a LED scanner that reads e-Reader cards, paper cards with specially encoded data printed on them. Depending on the card and associated game, the e-cards are typically used in a function to unlock secret items, levels. See below for a comprehensive list of cards and their functions, the cards themselves contain data, as opposed to unlocking data already on the device itself. The e-Reader is not a console, but an add-on device, Two versions were released in Japan, the original e-Reader, which could read cards to unlock game content, etc. The e-Reader was only considered successful in Japan and it was announced for Europe but very few were made, as it was almost immediately canceled, and it was discontinued in North America in early 2004, due to a lack of popularity. In Japan, it sold better and was produced up to the discontinuation of the Game Boy hardware line. In order to add items and scan levels in such as Super Mario Advance 4. 3, a required two Game Boy Advance systems and a link cable. The gray end would go into the e-Reader GBA and the end into the GBA that had the game. After entering the point on the game, players would swipe the cards in. This function does not work with the Nintendo DS due to the lack of link cable support, Game & Watch Cards, originally there were plans to release every Game and Watch game on a series of E-reader cards, or at least 20 according to some people. There have been other games released with e-Reader support in Japan. Data is encoded on the cards using dot code, a specialized barcode technology licensed from Olympus Corporation, smaller games may require scanning only one card, while the greater NES games can require as many as five cards in order to start the application. The shorter sets of dot code were only used with the Pokémon Trading Card Game, Cards released in regular sets published by both Nintendo and Wizards of the Coast had dot code on the bottom side of the card. When scanned, the e-Reader displayed a Pokédex data entry for the Pokémon shown on the card, the e-Reader plugs into the cartridge slot of the Game Boy Advance like a regular game would. The end of the e-Reader sticks out from the Game Boy Advance unit to provide a slot to scan the e-Reader Cards, once installed, the link cable connector on the Game Boy Advance is obstructed, but a pass-through connection on the e-Reader allows link-up features to be used. The Game Boy Advance SP is also compatible, although the e-Reader does not mount flush with the SP
38.
GameCube
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The GameCube is a home video game console released by Nintendo in Japan on September 14,2001, in North America on November 18,2001, in Europe on May 3,2002, and in Australia on May 17,2002. The sixth-generation console is the successor to the Nintendo 64 and competed with Sony Computer Entertainments PlayStation 2, the GameCube is the first Nintendo console to use optical discs as its primary storage medium. The discs are similar to the format, as a result of their smaller size and the consoles small disc compartment. Contemporary reception of the GameCube was generally positive, the console was praised for its controller, extensive software library and high-quality games, but was criticized for its exterior design and lack of features. Nintendo sold 21.74 million GameCube units worldwide before it was discontinued in 2007 and its successor, the Wii, which is backwards-compatible with most GameCube software, was released in November 2006. In 1997, a hardware design company called ArtX was launched, staffed by twenty engineers who had previously worked at SGI on the design of the Nintendo 64s graphics hardware. The team was led by Dr. Wei Yen, who had been SGIs head of Nintendo Operations, at Nintendos press conference in May 1999, the console was first publicly announced as Project Dolphin, the successor to the Nintendo 64. At the conference, Nintendos Howard Lincoln said of ArtX, This company is headed up by Dr. Wei Yen, Dr. Yen has assembled at ArtX one of the best teams of 3D graphics engineers on the planet. Subsequently, Nintendo began providing development kits to game developers, Nintendo also formed a strategic partnership with IBM for the production of Dolphins CPU, code-named Gekko. ArtX was acquired by ATI in April 2000, whereupon the Flipper graphics processor design had already mostly completed by ArtX and was not overtly influenced by ATI. In total, ArtX team cofounder Greg Buchner recalled that their portion of the hardware design timeline had arced from inception in 1998 to completion in 2000. Of ATIs acquisition of ArtX, an ATI spokesperson said, ATI now becomes a major supplier to the console market via Nintendo. The Dolphin platform is reputed to be king of the hill in terms of graphics, the console was announced as the Nintendo GameCube at a press conference in Japan on August 24,2000, abbreviated as NGC in Japan and GCN in North America. Nintendo unveiled its software lineup for the console at E32001, focusing on fifteen launch titles, including Luigis Mansion and Star Wars Rogue Squadron II. Several titles that were scheduled to launch with the console were delayed. It is also the first console in the history not to accompany a Mario platform title at launch. Long prior to the launch, Nintendo had developed and patented an early prototype of motion controls for the GameCube. These motion control concepts would not be deployed to consumers for several years, prior to the Nintendo GameCubes release, Nintendo focused resources on the launch of the Game Boy Advance, a handheld game console and successor to the original Game Boy and Game Boy Color
39.
Nintendo DS
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The Nintendo DS or simply, DS, is a 32-bit dual-screen handheld game console developed and released by Nintendo. The device went on sale in North America on November 21,2004, both screens are encompassed within a clamshell design similar to the Game Boy Advance SP. The Nintendo DS also features the ability for multiple DS consoles to directly interact with each other over Wi-Fi within a short range without the need to connect to a wireless network. Alternatively, they could interact online using the now-closed Nintendo Wi-Fi Connection service and its main competitor was Sonys PlayStation Portable as part of the seventh generation era. Prior to its release, the Nintendo DS was marketed as an experimental, third pillar in Nintendos console lineup, meant to complement the Game Boy Advance and GameCube. However, backward compatibility with Game Boy Advance titles and strong sales ultimately established it as the successor to the Game Boy series, on March 2,2006, Nintendo launched the Nintendo DS Lite, a slimmer and lighter redesign of the original Nintendo DS with brighter screens. On November 1,2008, Nintendo released the Nintendo DSi, another redesign with several hardware improvements and new features. All Nintendo DS models combined have sold 154.02 million units, making it the best selling game console to date. The Nintendo DS line was succeeded by the Nintendo 3DS line in 2011, on November 13,2003, Nintendo announced that it would be releasing a new game product in 2004. The company did not provide details, but stated it would not succeed the Game Boy Advance or GameCube. On January 20,2004, the console was announced under the codename Nintendo DS. Nintendo released only a few details at that time, saying that the console would have two separate, 3-inch TFT LCD display panels, separate processors, and up to 1 gigabit of semiconductor memory. He also expressed optimism that the DS would help put Nintendo back at the forefront of innovation, in March 2004, a document containing most of the consoles technical specifications was leaked, also revealing its internal development name, Nitro. In May 2004, the console was shown in prototype form at E32004, on July 28,2004, Nintendo revealed a new design that was described as sleeker and more elegant than the one shown at E3 and announced Nintendo DS as the devices official name. On September 20,2004, Nintendo announced that the Nintendo DS would be released in North America on November 21,2004 for US$149.99. It was set to release on December 2,2004 in Japan, on February 24,2005 in Australia, the console was released in North America with a midnight launch event at Universal CityWalk EB Games in Los Angeles, California. The console was launched quietly in Japan compared to the North America launch, the Nintendo DS was seen by many analysts to be in the same market as Sonys PlayStation Portable, although representatives from both companies have said that each system targets a different audience. At one point, Time magazine awarded the DS a Gadget of the Week award, at the time of its release in the United States, the Nintendo DS retailed for US $149.99
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Wii
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The Wii is a home video game console released by Nintendo on November 19,2006. As a seventh-generation console, the Wii competed with Microsofts Xbox 360, Nintendo states that its console targets a broader demographic than that of the two others. The Wii introduced the Wii Remote controller, which can be used as a pointing device. Another notable feature of the console is the now defunct WiiConnect24, like other seventh-generation consoles, it features a game download service, called Virtual Console, which features emulated games from past systems. It succeeded the GameCube, and early models are fully backward-compatible with all GameCube games, Nintendo first spoke of the console at the E32004 press conference and later unveiled it at E32005. Nintendo CEO Satoru Iwata revealed a prototype of the controller at the September 2005 Tokyo Game Show, at E32006, the console won the first of several awards. By December 8,2006, it had completed its launch in the four key markets, in late 2011, Nintendo released a reconfigured model, the Wii Family Edition, which lacks Nintendo GameCube compatibility, this model was not released in Japan. The Wii Mini, Nintendos first major redesign since the compact SNES. The Wii Mini can only play Wii optical discs, as it omits GameCube compatibility and all networking capabilities, the Wiis successor, the Wii U, was released on November 18,2012. On October 20,2013, Nintendo confirmed it had discontinued production of the Wii in Japan and Europe, although the Wii Mini is still in production, the console was conceived in 2001, as the Nintendo GameCube was first released. According to an interview with Nintendo game designer Shigeru Miyamoto, the concept involved focusing on a new form of player interaction, the consensus was that power isnt everything for a console. Too many powerful consoles cant coexist and its like having only ferocious dinosaurs. They might fight and hasten their own extinction, in 2003, game engineers and designers were brought together to develop the concept further. By 2005 the controller interface had taken form, but a showing at that years Electronic Entertainment Expo was canceled. Miyamoto stated that the company had some troubleshooting to do, so we decided not to reveal the controller and instead we displayed just the console. Nintendo president Satoru Iwata later unveiled and demonstrated the Wii Remote at the September Tokyo Game Show, the Nintendo DS is said to have influenced the Wiis design. Designer Kenichiro Ashida noted, We had the DS on our minds as we worked on the Wii and we thought about copying the DSs touch-panel interface and even came up with a prototype. The idea was rejected because of the notion that the two gaming systems would be identical
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Nintendo 3DS
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The Nintendo 3DS is a portable game console produced by Nintendo. It is capable of displaying stereoscopic 3D effects without the use of 3D glasses or additional accessories, Nintendo announced the device in March 2010 and officially unveiled it at E32010 on June 15,2010. The console succeeds the Nintendo DS, featuring compatibility with older Nintendo DS. Its primary competitor is the PlayStation Vita from Sony, the Nintendo 3DS was first released in Japan on February 26,2011, and worldwide beginning in March 2011. Less than six months later on July 28,2011, Nintendo announced a significant price reduction from US$249 to US$169 amid disappointing launch sales. The company offered ten free Nintendo Entertainment System games and ten free Game Boy Advance games from the Nintendo eShop to consumers who bought the system at the launch price. This strategy was considered a success, and the console has gone on to become one of Nintendos most successfully sold handheld consoles in the first two years of its release. As of September 30,2016, the Nintendo 3DS family of systems combined have sold 61.57 million units. Several redesigns have been made since, the Nintendo 3DS XL, an entry-level version of the console, the Nintendo 2DS, with a fixed slate form factor and lacking autostereoscopic functionality, was released in Western markets in October 2013. Nintendo began experimenting with stereoscopic 3D video game technology in the 1980s, the Famicom 3D System, an accessory consisting of liquid crystal shutter glasses, was Nintendos first product that enabled stereoscopic 3D effects. Although very few titles were released, Nintendo helped design one—called Famicom Grand Prix II, 3D Hot Rally—which was co-developed by Nintendo and HAL Laboratory, the Famicom 3D System failed to garner market interest and was never released outside Japan. Despite the limited success, Nintendo would press ahead with 3D development into the 1990s, gunpei Yokoi, creator of the Game Boy handheld device and popular Metroid video game, developed a new 3D device for Nintendo called the Virtual Boy. It was a portable system consisting of goggles and a controller that used a spinning disc to achieve full stereoscopic monochrome 3D. Released in 1995, the Virtual Boy sold fewer than a million units, spawning only 22 compatible game titles, the failure of the Virtual Boy left many at Nintendo doubting the viability of 3D gaming. Despite this, Nintendo continued to investigate the incorporation of 3D technology into other products, the GameCube, released in 2001, is another 3D-capable system. With an LCD attachment, it could display true stereoscopic 3D, due to the expensive nature of the requisite peripheral technology at the time, the GameCubes 3D functionality was never marketed to the public. Nintendo later experimented with a 3D LCD during development of the Game Boy Advance SP, another attempt was made in preparation for a virtual navigation guide to be used on the Nintendo DS at Shigureden, an interactive museum in Japan. Nintendo president Hiroshi Yamauchi encouraged additional 3D research in an effort to use the technology in the exhibition, although the project fell short, Nintendo was able to collect valuable research on liquid crystal which would later aid in the development of the Nintendo 3DS
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Wii U
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The Wii U is a home video game console developed by Nintendo, and the successor to the Wii. The console was released in November 2012 and was the first eighth-generation video game console, as it competes with Sonys PlayStation 4, the Wii U is the first Nintendo console to support HD graphics. The systems primary controller is the Wii U GamePad, which features a touchscreen, and combines directional buttons, analog sticks. The screen can be used either as a supplement to the display, or in supported games. Online functionality centers around the Nintendo Network platform and Miiverse, a social networking service which allows users to share content in game-specific communities. The Wii U was met with slow consumer adoption, with low sales primarily credited to a lineup of launch titles, third-party support. Wii U production officially ended in January 2017, on March 3,2017, Nintendo released a new flagship home console, the Nintendo Switch. With Wii U, Nintendo wished to bring back core gamers and it was decided that a new console would have to be developed to accommodate significant structural changes. Ideas on which direction to take for the new led to a lot of debate within the company. The concept of a touchscreen embedded within the controller was originally inspired by the light on the Wii disc tray that illuminates to indicate new messages. Miyamoto and his team wanted to include a screen to provide game feedback. However, Nintendo president Satoru Iwata later stated that he saw no significant reason to include HD into the Wii, miyamoto also expressed Nintendos interest in working with HD graphics, but clarified that the company is primarily focused on gameplay. Iwata also mentioned that the Wiis successor might be 3D-compatible but concluded that the rates of 3D televisions should increase to at least 30% first. Fils-Aimé also stated that Nintendos next home console would likely not feature stereoscopic 3D, in April 2011, an uncredited source indicated that Nintendo was planning to unveil a successor to the Wii known as Project Café at its E32011 presentation. Café was claimed to be a high definition console, also would have backward compatibility with Wii software. On April 25,2011, Nintendo released a statement announcing a system to succeed the Wii to be released during 2012. Speaking at a conference, Iwata stated the Wii successor would offer something new for home game systems. He also confirmed that the device would not launch in fiscal year 2012, Game was teased, and Electronic Arts then-CEO John Riccitiello appeared on-stage to discuss the companys prospective plans for products on Wii U
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Nintendo Switch
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The Nintendo Switch is the seventh major home video game console developed by Nintendo. Known in development as the NX, it was unveiled in October 2016, Nintendo considers the Switch a hybrid console, it is designed primarily as a home console, with the main unit inserted onto a docking station to connect to a television. Alternatively, it can be removed from the dock and used similarly to a computer through its LCD touchscreen. The Switch supports both physical flash ROM cartridges and digital content for games and software, and does not use region locking. From 2014, Nintendo had several quarters of financial losses due to poor sales of its previous console, the Wii U. Then-Nintendo president Satoru Iwata pushed the company towards mobile gaming and novel hardware, the Switchs design is aimed at a wider demographic of video game players through the multiple modes of use, while retaining Nintendos hardware uniqueness and innovation. Nintendo saw 2014 as one of its largest financial losses in its modern history, previously, the company had been hesitant about this market, with then-president Satoru Iwata considering that they would cease to be Nintendo and lose their identity if they attempted to enter it. Following Iwatas death in July 2015, Kimishima was named as president of Nintendo, in an interview with Asahi Shimbun, Kimishima stated that the Switch was designed to provide a new way to play that would have a larger impact than the Wii U. In some cases, games for the Switch are designed to encourage social interactions in groups, Kimishima said that as Nintendo is an entertainment company, they see games on the Switch that encourage enjoyable social interactions such as these as supporting their ultimate goals. EPD deputy general manager Yoshiaki Koizumi served as the producer of the Switch during development. According to Miyamoto, the Switchs development within Nintendo was headed by employees, with him saying. its really been them that have put this forward. For Miyamoto, his limited involvement allowed him to more time on Nintendos software titles being developed at the time. The development of the Switch continued Nintendos blue ocean approach for the competitive console marketplace, One choice made by the development team was to use an existing system on a chip rather than creating their own as they had done on previous consoles. Koizumi said that this break from tradition was to help be able to gain more third-party support for the console by using an SOC they could easily port to. The first public news of the Switch hardware was alongside the announcement of Nintendo, at this stage, Nintendo referred to the console under the codename NX, and described it as a brand new concept. At an investors meeting in April 2016, Nintendo announced that it planned to release the NX worldwide in March 2017. At a Nintendo shareholders meeting following the conference, Miyamoto stated that the company had concerns that competitors could copy ideas from the NX if they revealed it too soon. The following month, rumors began to surface surrounding the nature of the console, including its use of Nvidia Tegra hardware, and being a hybrid device intended for both home and mobile use
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Software release life cycle
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Usage of the alpha/beta test terminology originated at IBM. As long ago as the 1950s, IBM used similar terminology for their hardware development, a test was the verification of a new product before public announcement. B test was the verification before releasing the product to be manufactured, C test was the final test before general availability of the product. Martin Belsky, a manager on some of IBMs earlier software projects claimed to have invented the terminology, IBM dropped the alpha/beta terminology during the 1960s, but by then it had received fairly wide notice. The usage of beta test to refer to testing done by customers was not done in IBM, rather, IBM used the term field test. Pre-alpha refers to all activities performed during the project before formal testing. These activities can include requirements analysis, software design, software development, in typical open source development, there are several types of pre-alpha versions. Milestone versions include specific sets of functions and are released as soon as the functionality is complete, the alpha phase of the release life cycle is the first phase to begin software testing. In this phase, developers generally test the software using white-box techniques, additional validation is then performed using black-box or gray-box techniques, by another testing team. Moving to black-box testing inside the organization is known as alpha release, alpha software can be unstable and could cause crashes or data loss. Alpha software may not contain all of the features that are planned for the final version, in general, external availability of alpha software is uncommon in proprietary software, while open source software often has publicly available alpha versions. The alpha phase usually ends with a freeze, indicating that no more features will be added to the software. At this time, the software is said to be feature complete, Beta, named after the second letter of the Greek alphabet, is the software development phase following alpha. Software in the stage is also known as betaware. Beta phase generally begins when the software is complete but likely to contain a number of known or unknown bugs. Software in the phase will generally have many more bugs in it than completed software, as well as speed/performance issues. The focus of beta testing is reducing impacts to users, often incorporating usability testing, the process of delivering a beta version to the users is called beta release and this is typically the first time that the software is available outside of the organization that developed it. Beta version software is useful for demonstrations and previews within an organization
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Donkey Kong Country: Tropical Freeze
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Donkey Kong Country, Tropical Freeze is a 2014 side-scrolling platformer video game developed by Retro Studios, with assistance from Monster Games, and published by Nintendo for the Wii U. Originally slated to be released in November 2013, it was delayed until December, along with Diddy Kong, who returns with his barrel jetpack for crossing large gaps, two additional characters are added, Dixie Kong and Cranky Kong. Filling up a Kong-POW meter allows Donkey Kong and his partner to perform a move which defeats all on-screen enemies. The Super Guide from the game is absent and is replaced by an expanded shop. Like the previous game, each level contains various Kong letters and puzzle pieces, some of which require specific partners to reach, the Time Attack mode also returns, now featuring online leaderboards, allowing players to view video replays of the top ranked players. The story begins at Donkey Kongs hut, where the Kongs are celebrating his birthday, suddenly, one of the balloons flies off the Kong house and over the sea, where Snowmad ships are stationed. Far away from the island, a Pointy Tuck watches over them, locating the Kong house and relaying info to their leader, shrouded in a dark silhouette. Upon the leader nodding their approval, the Pointy Tucks bring him a horn which he blows, creating a large amount of wind, as well as an ice dragon. Just as he is about to blow the candle out of the fire, Donkey Kong notices a mysterious snowflake that appears and he turns away with a frustrated look on his face as he hears an uproar, and he and the other Kongs exit the house. The ice dragon from earlier flies toward Donkey Kong Island, turning the sea under it to ice, after traversing across 5 islands with each posing its own threats, the Kongs finally arrive at Donkey Kong Island under control of the Snowmads. The Kongs make their way through the fortress until they encounter the leader of the Snowmads, Lord Fredrik. After a long battle, Donkey Kong delivers the punch to Lord Fredrik. The Kongs wander out of the remains of the ship and look out from the mountainside to see the end of Lord Fredriks fall. Lord Fredrik crashes into the remainder of the Snowmad ships out in the seas of the island, defeating the entire Snowmad clan and freeing the island from their control. The Kongs watch and rejoice as the breeze of the flowers flutter around the island, melting all of the ice and snow and this is Dixie Kongs third appearance in the main series and the first since Donkey Kong Country 3, Dixie Kongs Double Trouble. This is also Cranky Kongs first appearance as a character in the series. The game was first announced during Nintendos E32013 Nintendo Direct presentation on June 11,2013 and was produced by Kensuke Tanabe who,2, has incorporated some elements from that game. In August 2013, Nintendo announced a planned North American release date of December 6,2013, however, in October 2013, Nintendo pushed back the release date to February 21,2014 citing the need for more time to optimize the game
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