Cutscene
A cutscene or event scene is a sequence in a video game, not interactive, breaking up the gameplay. Such scenes could be used to show conversations between characters, set the mood, reward the player, introduce new gameplay elements, show the effects of a player's actions, create emotional connections, improve pacing or foreshadow future events. Cutscenes feature "on the fly" rendering, using the gameplay graphics to create scripted events. Cutscenes can be pre-rendered computer graphics streamed from a video file. Pre-made videos used in video games are referred to as "full motion videos" or "FMVs". Cutscenes can appear in other forms, such as a series of images or as plain text and audio; the term "cutscene" was coined by game designer Ron Gilbert to describe non-interactive plot sequences in the 1987 adventure game Maniac Mansion. Pac-Man is credited as the first game to feature cutscenes, in the form of brief comical interludes about Pac-Man and Blinky chasing each other, though Space Invaders Part II employed a similar technique in the same year.
In 1983, the laserdisc video game Bega's Battle introduced animated full-motion video cutscenes with voice acting to develop a story between the game's shooting stages, which became the standard approach to game storytelling years later. The games Karateka helped introduce the cutscene to home computers. Other early video games known to use cutscenes extensively include Portopia Renzoku Satsujin Jiken in 1983. Since cutscenes have been part of many video games in action-adventure and role-playing video games. Cutscenes became much more common with the rise of CD-ROM as the primary storage medium for video games, as its much greater storage space allowed developers to use more cinematically impressive media such as FMV and high-quality voice tracks. Live-action cutscenes have many similarities to films. For example, the cutscenes in Wing Commander IV used both constructed sets, well known actors such as Mark Hamill and Malcolm McDowell for the portrayal of characters; some movie tie-in games, such as Electronic Arts' The Lord of the Rings and Star Wars games, have extensively used film footage and other assets from the film production in their cutscenes.
Another movie tie-in, Enter the Matrix, used film footage shot concurrently with The Matrix Reloaded, directed by the film's directors, the Wachowskis. Pre-rendered cutscenes are animated and rendered by the game's developers, take advantage of the full array of techniques of CGI, cel animation or graphic novel-style panel art. Like live-action shoots, pre-rendered cutscenes are presented in full motion video. Real time cutscenes are rendered on-the-fly using the same game engine as the graphics during gameplay; this technique is known as Machinima. Real time cutscenes are of much lower detail and visual quality than pre-rendered cutscenes, but can adapt to the state of the game. For example, some games allow the player character to wear several different outfits, appear in cutscenes wearing the outfit the player has chosen, it is possible to give the player control over camera movement during real time cutscenes, as seen in Dungeon Siege, Metal Gear Solid 2: Sons of Liberty, Halo: Reach, Kane & Lynch: Dead Men.
Many games use both pre-rendered and real time cutscenes as the developer feels is appropriate for each scene. During the 1990s in particular, it was common for the techniques of live action, pre-rendering, real time rendering to be combined in a single cutscene. For example, popular games such as Myst, Wing Commander III, Phantasmagoria use film of live actors superimposed upon pre-rendered animated backgrounds for their cutscenes. Though Final Fantasy VII uses real-time cutscenes, it has several scenes in which real-time graphics are combined with pre-rendered full motion video. Though rarer than the other two possible combinations, the pairing of live action video with real time graphics is seen in games such as Killing Time. Interactive cutscenes involve the computer taking control of the player character while prompts appear onscreen, requiring the player to follow them in order to continue or succeed at the action; this gameplay mechanic called quick time events, has its origins in interactive movie laserdisc video games such as Dragon's Lair, Road Blaster, Space Ace.
Director Steven Spielberg, director Guillermo del Toro, game designer Ken Levine, all of whom are avid video gamers, criticized the use of cutscenes in games, calling them intrusive. Spielberg states that making the story flow into the gameplay is a challenge for future game developers. Hollywood writer Danny Bilson called cinematics the "last resort of game storytelling," as a person doesn't want to watch a movie when they are playing a video game. Game designer Raph Koster criticized cutscenes as being the part that has "the largest possibility for emotional engagement, for art dare we say," while being the bit that can be cut with no impact on the actual gameplay. Koster claims that because of this, many of the memorable peak emotional moments in video games are not given by the game itself at all, it is a common criticism that cutscenes belong to a different medium. Others see cutscenes. An article on Gamefront calls upon a number of successful video games that make excessive use of cutscenes for storytelling
R-Zone
The R-Zone was a portable game console developed and manufactured by Tiger Electronics. The R-Zone was shown at the American International Toy Fair in February 1995, was released that year; the R-Zone was unsuccessful and would only be manufactured for a short period, before being discontinued in 1997. Although the R-Zone was not designed to compete directly with any other handhelds, it marked Tiger Electronics' first multi-game entry into the portable electronic game market; the original R-Zone unit consisted of a separate controller containing batteries. Each game cartridge had its own transparent LCD display screen, projected onto a mirrored surface held in front of the player's eye, it is thought that this original design, including the red color scheme, was designed to capitalize on popular buzz for the Nintendo Virtual Boy at the time. Three additional versions of the R-Zone were subsequently released: the R-Zone Super Screen, the X. P. G. Xtreme Pocket Game, the R-Zone "DataZone". R-Zone games vary only in subject.
As with Tiger's other gaming units, the software lineup is dominated by licensed titles. Games released for the console include Batman Forever, Virtua Fighter, Mortal Kombat 3, VR Troopers, Indy 500, Star Wars, Men in Black, The Lost World: Jurassic Park; this is a partial list: Apollo 13 Area 51 Batman & Robin Batman Forever Battle Arena Toshinden Daytona Racing Independence Day Indy 500 Judge Dredd The Lost World: Jurassic Park Men in Black Mortal Kombat 3 Mortal Kombat Trilogy NASCAR Racing Panzer Dragoon Primal Rage Road Rash 3 Star Trek Star Wars: Imperial Assault Star Wars: Jedi Adventure Star Wars: Millennium Falcon Challenge Star Wars: Rebel Forces Virtua Cop Virtua Fighter Virtua Fighter 2 VR Troopers: When Worlds Collide The R-Zone has ten face buttons. The buttons on the right are labeled "A", "B", "C", "D"; the functions of these face buttons vary from game to game but the buttons correspond to a four-direction attack scheme (where the "C" button attacks to the left, the "D" button attacks up, the "B" button attacks right, the "A" button attacks down or does nothing at all.
The buttons on the bottom are labeled "ON", "START", "SELECT", "SOUND", "PAUSE", "OFF". The functions of these face buttons do not vary from game-to-game; the "ON" button turns on the console but is un-used as inserting a game cartridge automatically turns the unit on. The "START" button is required to begin all games; the "SOUND" button toggles the audio off. The "PAUSE" button allows for any game to be paused; the "OFF" button turns the console off. The R-Zone features a directional pad, allowing four directions of movement in its games; the R-Zone game cartridges are transparent in the center. This allows light to reflect off a specialized mirror to the gamer's eyes; the LCD in each cartridge operates identically to Tiger's earlier handheld LCD game units. All of the graphics were permanently set into the LCD itself. Different portions of the display are darkened/activated at different times to provide animation; the mirror has minor tilt adjustment and can be pushed up against the unit for protection and storage.
The games only display a dark red color. The bottom side of the console shows two ports; each port holds the batteries. A single speaker allows for mono audio output. A few variations of the R-Zone were produced: The R-Zone Headgear was released in late 1995 and is different from units in that the game cartridge is inserted into a device, strapped onto the user's head; the user flips down a transparent lens, designed to reflect the game images into the user's right eye. The head unit holds the game being played and is connected to a controller with a cable 2.5 feet long. The controller requires 4 AAA batteries and sports a cartridge storage slot, volume adjustment dial, brightness adjustment dial; the console included a pack-in game. The R-Zone Super Screen was released in late 1996 and cost $29.99. It allowed R-Zone games to have color for the first time; some games allow for a special lens to be used with this particular R-Zone and provide the user with a non-animated color background. Game movement on screen is black.
The screen is larger than the other R-Zone models. The unit requires 4 D batteries to run. In this model the D-pad was swapped out for four directional buttons. "X. P. G. Xtreme Pocket Game" is a handheld version of the console, it lacks a headset, instead projects the display onto a mirrored surface directly above the game controller area on the unit. This version uses AAA batteries; the R-Zone DataZone was released in late 1996. It includes a data organizer, it rather just flat displays it with a backlight. It uses one watch battery to store data and 2 AAA batteries to run the game portion. At the time of its release, David Jones of the Chicago Tribune called the R-Zone "a waste of time and money" and wrote that its screen "is hard to see and the controls are awkward. That's not all – if you keep the head band on for, five minutes, you'll have two deep lines on your fore-head and a headache"
Konami
Konami Holdings Corporation referred to as Konami, is a Japanese entertainment and gaming conglomerate. It operates as video game developer and publisher company. Besides those, it has casino around the world and operates health and physical fitness clubs across Japan. Konami is best known for their video games, including Metal Gear, Silent Hill, Contra, Gradius, Yu-Gi-Oh!, Suikoden and Pro Evolution Soccer. Additionally, Konami owns Bemani, known for Dance Dance Revolution and Beatmania, as well as the assets of former game developer Hudson Soft, known for Bomberman, Adventure Island, Bloody Roar and Star Soldier. Konami is the twentieth-largest game company in the world by revenue; the company originated in 1969 as a jukebox rental and repair business in Toyonaka, Japan, by Kagemasa Kōzuki, who remains the company's chairman. The name "Konami" is a portmanteau of the names Kagemasa Kozuki, Yoshinobu Nakama, Tatsuo Miyasako. Konami is headquartered in Tokyo. In the United States, Konami manages its video game business from offices in El Segundo and its casino gaming business from offices in Paradise, Nevada.
Its Australian gaming operations are located in Sydney. As of March 2016, it owns 21 consolidated subsidiaries around the world; the company was founded on March 21, 1969 and was incorporated under the name Konami Industry Co. Ltd. on March 19, 1973. The company's founder and current chairman, Kagemasa Kozuki ran a jukebox rental and repair business in Toyonaka, Osaka before transforming the business into a manufacturer of amusement machines for video arcades, their first coin-operated video game was released in 1978, they began exporting products to the United States the following year. Konami began to achieve success with hit arcade games such as 1981's Frogger and Super Cobra, many of which were licensed to other companies for stateside release, including Stern Electronics and Gremlin Industries, they established their U. S. subsidiary, Konami of America, Inc. in 1982. It was during this period that Konami began expanding their video game business into the home consumer market following a brief stint releasing video games for the Atari 2600 in 1982 for the U.
S. market. The company would release numerous games for the MSX home computer standard in 1983, followed by the Nintendo Entertainment System in 1985. Numerous Konami franchises were established during this period on both platforms, as well as the arcades, such as Gradius, Twin Bee, Ganbare Goemon and Metal Gear. Due to the success of their NES games, Konami's earnings grew from $10 million in 1987 to $300 million in 1991. In June 1991, Konami's legal name was changed to Konami Co. Ltd. and their headquarters would relocated to Minato, Tokyo in April 1993. The company started supporting the 16-bit video game consoles during this period, starting with the Super NES in 1990, followed by the PC Engine in 1991 and the Sega Genesis in 1992. After the launch of the Sega Saturn and PlayStation in 1994, Konami became a business divisional organization with the formation of various Konami Computer Entertainment subsidiaries, starting with KCE Tokyo and KCE Osaka in April 1995, followed by KCE Japan in April 1996.
Each KCE subsidiary would end up creating different intellectual properties such as KCE Tokyo's Silent Hill series and KCE Japan's Metal Gear Solid series. In 1997, Konami started producing rhythm games for arcades under the Bemani brand and branched off into the collectable card game business with the launch of the Yu-Gi-Oh! Trading Card Game. On July 2000, the company's legal English name was changed once again to Konami Corporation, the Japanese legal name remained the same; as the company transitioned into the developing video games for the sixth-generation consoles, they branched out into the health and fitness business with the acquisitions of People Co. Ltd and Daiei Olympic Sports Club, Inc. which became Konami subsidiaries. In August 2001, Konami invested in another video game developer, Hudson Soft, which became a consolidated subsidiary after Konami accepted new third-party shares issued by them. In March 2006, Konami merged all their video game development divisions into a new subsidiary known as Konami Digital Entertainment Co. as the parent company became a pure holding company.
Their headquarters would be relocated once again, this time to headquarters was moved to Minato, Tokyo, in 2007. The absorption of Hudson Soft in 2012 resulted in the addition of several other franchises including: Adventure Island, Bloody Roar, Far East of Eden and Star Soldier. In April 2015, Konami delisted itself from the New York stock exchange following the dissolution of their Kojima Productions subsidiary. In a translated interview with Nikkei Trendy Net published in the following month, the newly appointed CEO of Konami Digital Entertainment, Hideki Hayakawa announced that Konami will shift their focus towards mobile gaming for a while, claiming that, "Mobile is where the future of gaming lies." The trade name of the company was changed from Konami Corporation to Konami Holdings Corporation during the same month. In 2017, Konami is to publicly announce that they would be reviving some of the company's other well-known video game titles following the success of their Nin
Shoot 'em up
Shoot'em up is a subgenre of the shooter genre of video games. There is no consensus as to; some restrict the definition to games featuring spacecraft and certain types of character movement. The genre's roots can be traced back to Spacewar!, one of the earliest computer games, developed in 1962. The shoot'em up genre was established by the hit arcade game Space Invaders, which popularised and set the general template for the genre in 1978, the genre was further developed by arcade hits such as Asteroids and Galaxian in 1979. Shoot'em ups were popular throughout early 1990s. In the mid-1990s, shoot'em ups became a niche genre based on design conventions established in the 1980s, catered to specialist enthusiasts in Japan. "Bullet hell" games are a subgenre that features overwhelming numbers of enemy projectiles in visually impressive formations. A "shoot'em up" known as a "shmup" or "STG", is a game in which the protagonist combats a large number of enemies by shooting at them while dodging their fire.
The controlling player must rely on reaction times to succeed. Beyond this, critics differ on which design elements constitute a shoot'em up; some restrict the genre to games using fixed or scrolling movement. Others widen the scope to include games featuring such protagonists as robots or humans on foot, as well as including games featuring "on-rails" and "run and gun" movement. Mark Wolf restricts the definition to games featuring multiple antagonists, calling games featuring one-on-one shooting "combat games". Critics described any game where the primary design element was shooting as a "shoot'em up", but shoot'em ups became a specific, inward-looking genre based on design conventions established in those shooting games of the 1980s. Shoot'em ups are a subgenre of shooter game, in turn a type of action game; these games are viewed from a top-down or side-view perspective, players must use ranged weapons to take action at a distance. The player's avatar is a vehicle under constant attack. Thus, the player's goal is to shoot as as possible at anything that moves or threatens them.
In some games, the player's character can withstand some damage. The main skills required in shoot'em ups are memorising enemy attack patterns; some games feature overwhelming numbers of enemy projectiles and the player has to memorise their patterns to survive. These games belong to one of the fastest-paced video game genres. Large numbers of enemy characters are featured; these enemies may behave in a certain way dependent on their type, or attack in formations that the player can learn to predict. The basic gameplay tends to be straightforward and many games offset this with boss battles and a variety of weapons. Shoot'em ups have realistic physics. Characters can change direction with no inertia, projectiles move in a straight line at constant speeds; the player's character can collect "power-ups" which may afford the character greater protection, an "extra life", or upgraded weaponry. Different weapons are suited to different enemies, but these games keep track of ammunition; as such, players tend to fire indiscriminately, their weapons only damage legitimate targets.
Shoot'em ups are categorized by design elements viewpoint and movement:Fixed shooters restrict the protagonist to a single axis of motion, enemies attack in a single direction, each level is contained within a single screen. Atari's Centipede is a hybrid, in that the player can move but that movement is constrained to a small area at the bottom of the screen, the game otherwise meets the fixed shooter definition. Tube shooters feature craft flying through an abstract tube, such as Gyruss. Rail shooters limit the player to moving around the screen. Examples include Space Harrier, Captain Skyhawk, Star Wars: Rebel Assault, Panzer Dragoon, Star Fox 64, Sin and Punishment. Light-Gun games that are "on-rails" are not in the shoot-em-up category but the FPS category, the term has been applied to scripted events in first-person shooters such as Call of Duty. Scrolling shooters include horizontal scrolling games. Vertically scrolling shooters: In a vertically scrolling shoot'em up, the action is viewed from above and scrolls up the screen.
Horizontally scrolling shooters: In a "horizontal shooter" or "side-scrolling shooter", the action is viewed side-on and scrolls horizontally. Isometrically scrolling shooters: A small number of scrolling shooters, such as Sega's Zaxxon, feature an isometric point of view. Multidirectional shooters feature 360 degree movement where the protagonist may rotate and move in any direction. Multidirectional shooters with one joystick for movement and one joystick for firing in any direction independent of movement are called "twin-stick shooters."Bullet hell is a shoot'em up in which the entire screen is almost fille
Panzer Dragoon Orta
Panzer Dragoon Orta is a 2002 rail shooter game for the Xbox, published by Sega and developed by Sega's Smilebit studio. It is the fourth game in the main Panzer Dragoon series. Many of the developers had been part of the defunct Sega studio Team Andromeda, which disbanded after the release of the previous Panzer Dragoon game, Panzer Dragoon Saga, on the Saturn; the story follows a teenage girl, rescued from her lifelong prison by a mysterious dragon and must defend herself from the forces of an oppressive empire. Panzer Dragoon Orta is a rail shooter: players can control the dragon's position onscreen, may slow down or speed up, but are in no control to fly about the level. Attacking is performed by holding down a mappable attack button, maneuvering an onscreen cursor over enemies, releasing the button to fire a volley of arching lasers at each target. Orta is equipped with a rapid-fire pistol, which can be used by tapping the attack button instead of holding it down. Enemies must thus be defeated before they vanish offscreen as the levels "scroll" by, with the exception of boss battles, which take place in environments that "loop" until the boss is defeated).
An onscreen radar marks enemies in the dragon's immediate surroundings as red dots. Using the Right and Left Triggers, the player can rotate the view 90 degrees to the right; this way the player can look in front, to the sides or behind the dragon and take down incoming enemies. A Life Gauge displays the dragon's current health; when the dragon's health reaches zero, the game ends and the player will have to redo the entire Episode. If the dragon dies during the final boss fight of the Episode, the player gets the option to restart the Episode at the boss fight. Orta's dragon can morph itself instantaneously between three different forms: the Base Wing, Heavy Wing, or Glide Wing; each of these forms can level up by collecting "gene bases" from certain enemies. Unique to the Glide Wing is the ability to have the dragon perform a barrel roll by moving the thumbstick sideways in quick succession; each dragon type has a different Glide Gauge. The dragon's ability to slow down or speed up can only be done a limited number of times as it decreases the Glide Gauge.
When the Glide Gauge is empty, the dragon can no longer slown down or speed up and must wait for the gauge to refill. The Glide Wing can speed up or slow down up to three times using a full Glide Gauge, while the Base Wing can only do so two times; the Heavy Wing can't speed up at all, trading its mobility for a greater damage output. As with the Glide Gauge, each dragon type has a different Berserk Gauge. Using the dragon's Berserk Attack depletes the Berserk Gauge. Besides inflicting a lot of damage on the onscreen enemies, the attack grants the dragon invincibility for a short amount of time. In the case of the Glide Wing, the attack steals life from the onscreen enemies and uses it to refill the dragon's own Life Gauge. During the boss battles, the player can position the dragon to the front, the sides or behind the boss using the dragon's ability to speed up or slow down. During a boss fight the onscreen radar shows the areas around the boss where the dragon is vulnerable to attacks and the ones where the dragon is safe, these areas change as the battle goes on.
The player must use this information to move around the boss and avoid being hit, while finding and attacking the boss's weak points. At the conclusion of each Episode, the player is ranked based on the number of enemies defeated, hits taken, the time it took to defeat the boss; each of these is assigned a letter grade from S, A, B, C, D. The four grades are averaged together to give the player an overall assessment of how well they performed; this grading occurs at the conclusion of the game's numerous side-missions. The Empire has returned to power, using ancient technology to genetically engineer dragons called dragonmares. A young girl, has lived all her life in a tower in a valley, imprisoned by the nomadic Seekers, who fear she is a harbinger of doom. One night, the Empire attacks the valley with its dragonmares. Before the dragonmares can harm Orta, a mysterious dragon eliminates them. Orta flees the valley on the dragon. Evren, a general in the Imperial Army and leader of the dragonmare squadron, pursues her.
She is saved by a renegade imperial drone. He flies away and Orta asks the dragon to follow him. In her search, Orta meets a friendly but reckless member of the wormriders. Mobo leads Orta through a sea of ash to the wormrider village; the imperial fleet attacks the village and Evren's squadron engages Orta, but she and the dragon defeat them. Evren's dragonmare self-destructs and Orta and the dragon fall from the sky; the wounded dragon carries Orta on foot across a snowy land. They fend of an attack from a flying predator. Abadd kills the family with a laser volley, he claims to have information about Orta's birth. They descend into the ruins of a access the ancient information network known as Sestren. Orta finds a message recorded by her mother, saying that she formed using DNA she recovered from a human in Sestren. Abadd explains that he has learnt the secret
Microsoft Windows
Microsoft Windows is a group of several graphical operating system families, all of which are developed and sold by Microsoft. Each family caters to a certain sector of the computing industry. Active Windows families include Windows Embedded. Defunct Windows families include Windows Mobile and Windows Phone. Microsoft introduced an operating environment named Windows on November 20, 1985, as a graphical operating system shell for MS-DOS in response to the growing interest in graphical user interfaces. Microsoft Windows came to dominate the world's personal computer market with over 90% market share, overtaking Mac OS, introduced in 1984. Apple came to see Windows as an unfair encroachment on their innovation in GUI development as implemented on products such as the Lisa and Macintosh. On PCs, Windows is still the most popular operating system. However, in 2014, Microsoft admitted losing the majority of the overall operating system market to Android, because of the massive growth in sales of Android smartphones.
In 2014, the number of Windows devices sold was less than 25 %. This comparison however may not be relevant, as the two operating systems traditionally target different platforms. Still, numbers for server use of Windows show one third market share, similar to that for end user use; as of October 2018, the most recent version of Windows for PCs, tablets and embedded devices is Windows 10. The most recent versions for server computers is Windows Server 2019. A specialized version of Windows runs on the Xbox One video game console. Microsoft, the developer of Windows, has registered several trademarks, each of which denote a family of Windows operating systems that target a specific sector of the computing industry; as of 2014, the following Windows families are being developed: Windows NT: Started as a family of operating systems with Windows NT 3.1, an operating system for server computers and workstations. It now consists of three operating system subfamilies that are released at the same time and share the same kernel: Windows: The operating system for mainstream personal computers and smartphones.
The latest version is Windows 10. The main competitor of this family is macOS by Apple for personal computers and Android for mobile devices. Windows Server: The operating system for server computers; the latest version is Windows Server 2019. Unlike its client sibling, it has adopted a strong naming scheme; the main competitor of this family is Linux. Windows PE: A lightweight version of its Windows sibling, meant to operate as a live operating system, used for installing Windows on bare-metal computers, recovery or troubleshooting purposes; the latest version is Windows PE 10. Windows IoT: Initially, Microsoft developed Windows CE as a general-purpose operating system for every device, too resource-limited to be called a full-fledged computer. However, Windows CE was renamed Windows Embedded Compact and was folded under Windows Compact trademark which consists of Windows Embedded Industry, Windows Embedded Professional, Windows Embedded Standard, Windows Embedded Handheld and Windows Embedded Automotive.
The following Windows families are no longer being developed: Windows 9x: An operating system that targeted consumers market. Discontinued because of suboptimal performance. Microsoft now caters to the consumer market with Windows NT. Windows Mobile: The predecessor to Windows Phone, it was a mobile phone operating system; the first version was called Pocket PC 2000. The last version is Windows Mobile 6.5. Windows Phone: An operating system sold only to manufacturers of smartphones; the first version was Windows Phone 7, followed by Windows Phone 8, the last version Windows Phone 8.1. It was succeeded by Windows 10 Mobile; the term Windows collectively describes any or all of several generations of Microsoft operating system products. These products are categorized as follows: The history of Windows dates back to 1981, when Microsoft started work on a program called "Interface Manager", it was announced in November 1983 under the name "Windows", but Windows 1.0 was not released until November 1985.
Windows 1.0 was to achieved little popularity. Windows 1.0 is not a complete operating system. The shell of Windows 1.0 is a program known as the MS-DOS Executive. Components included Calculator, Cardfile, Clipboard viewer, Control Panel, Paint, Reversi and Write. Windows 1.0 does not allow overlapping windows. Instead all windows are tiled. Only modal dialog boxes may appear over other windows. Microsoft sold as included Windows Development libraries with the C development environment, which included numerous windows samples. Windows 2.0 was released in December 1987, was more popular than its predecessor. It features several improvements to the user memory management. Windows 2.03 changed the OS from tiled windows to overlapping windows. The result of this change led to Apple Computer filing a suit against Microsoft alleging infringement on Apple's copyrights. Windows 2.0
Nintendo Switch
The Nintendo Switch is a video game console developed by Nintendo and was released on March 3, 2017. It is a hybrid console that can be used as both a portable device, its wireless Joy-Con controllers, which include standard buttons and directional analog sticks for user input, motion sensing, high-definition tactile feedback, can attach to both sides of the console to support handheld-style play. They can connect to a Grip accessory to provide a traditional home console gamepad form, or be used individually in the hand like the Wii Remote and Nunchuk, supporting local multiplayer modes; the Nintendo Switch's software supports online gaming through standard Internet connectivity, as well as local wireless ad hoc connectivity with other Switch consoles. Nintendo Switch games and software are available on both physical flash-based ROM cartridges and digital distribution via Nintendo eShop; as an eighth-generation console, the Nintendo Switch competes with Microsoft's Xbox One and Sony's PlayStation 4.
Known in development by its codename NX, the concept of the Switch came about as Nintendo's reaction to several quarters of financial losses into 2014, attributed to poor sales of its previous console, the Wii U, market competition from mobile gaming. Nintendo's then-president Satoru Iwata pushed the company towards mobile novel hardware; the Nintendo Switch's design is aimed at a wide demographic of video game players through the multiple modes of use. Nintendo opted to use more standard electronic components, such as a chipset based on Nvidia's Tegra line, to make development for the console easier for programmers and more compatible with existing game engines; as the Wii U had struggled to gain external support, leaving it with a weak software library, Nintendo preemptively sought the support of many third-party developers and publishers to help build out the Switch's game library alongside Nintendo's own first-party titles, including many independent video game studios. While Nintendo anticipated around 100 titles for its first year, over 320 titles from first-party, third-party, independent developers were released by the end of 2017.
The Nintendo Switch was unveiled in October 2016 and was released in most areas worldwide on March 3, 2017. The console shipped nearly three million in the first month of its launch, exceeding Nintendo's initial projection of two million, within a year of release achieved over 14 million units sold worldwide, outselling total lifetime sales of the Wii U. By the start of 2018, the Switch became the fastest-selling home console in both Japan and the United States; as of December 2018, Nintendo Switch has sold more than 32 million units worldwide. Switch sales have been tied to sales of Nintendo's first-party titles, with five games, The Legend of Zelda: Breath of the Wild, Super Smash Bros. Ultimate, Super Mario Odyssey, Mario Kart 8 Deluxe, Pokémon: Let's Go having sold over ten million units each. Nintendo had seen record revenues, net sales and profits in 2009 as a result of the release of the Wii and Nintendo DS in 2006 and 2004 but in Nintendo's subsequent years, its revenues had declined.
With the release of the Wii U in 2012, the company had posted its first loss as a video game company. The New York Times attributed Nintendo lowering financial forecasts in 2014 to weak hardware sales against mobile gaming; 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. About three years prior to the Switch's announcement, Tatsumi Kimishima, Genyo Takeda, Shigeru Miyamoto crafted a strategy for revitalizing Nintendo's business model, which included approaching the mobile market, creating new hardware, "maximizing intellectual property". Prior to his death, Iwata was able to secure a business alliance with Japanese mobile provider DeNA to develop mobile titles based on Nintendo's first-party franchises, believing this approach would not compromise their integrity. Following Iwata's death in July 2015, Kimishima was named as president of Nintendo, while Miyamoto was promoted to the title of "Creative Fellow".
Initial conception for the Switch started shortly after the release of the Wii U in 2012. Kimishima stated that when Nintendo was evaluating what new hardware they wanted to produce, they "didn't just want a successor" to either the Nintendo 3DS or Wii U, but instead asked "what kind of new experience can we create?" 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". Nintendo of America president and COO Reggie Fils-Aimé emphasized the console's appeal as a device that would provide gamers the option to play at home or on the go, noted that it would enable developers to create new types of games. Part of the inspiration of the Switch's design was from feedback players had given Nintendo on the Wii Remote, according to Shinya Takahashi. With the release of games like Wii Sports and Wii Fit, players had asked Nintendo if they could make the Wii Remote in a smaller form factor strapped it to a part of their body.
This led to Nintendo envisioning what a smaller form-factor controller could provide in both hardware and gameplay, led to the idea of a console, small enough with these new controllers to be portable. Other concepts came out of consumer feedback, critical of the Wii U. Fils-Aimé said that one common criticism they had for the Wii U was that while players did enjoy using the Wii U GamePad and would want to play games on it anywhere, it became functionless if they moved a distance away from the main console; this se
