1.
PlayStation (console)
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The PlayStation is a home video game console developed and marketed by Sony Computer Entertainment. The console was released on 3 December 1994 in Japan,9 September 1995 in North America,29 September 1995 in Europe, the console was the first of the PlayStation lineup of home video game consoles. It primarily competed with the Nintendo 64 and the Sega Saturn as part of the generation of video game consoles. The PlayStation is the first computer entertainment platform to ship 100 million units, in 2000, a redesigned, slim version called the PSone was released, replacing the original grey console and named appropriately to avoid confusion with its successor, the PlayStation 2. In 1999, Sony announced the successor to the PlayStation, the PlayStation 2, which is compatible with the PlayStations DualShock controller and games. The last PSone units were sold in winter 2004 before it was discontinued in March 2005. The inception of what would become the released PlayStation dates back to 1986 with a joint venture between Nintendo and Sony, Nintendo approached Sony to develop a CD-ROM add-on, tentatively titled the Play Station or SNES-CD. A contract was signed, and work began, Kutaragi was nearly fired by Sony because he was originally working with Nintendo on the side without Sonys knowledge. It was then-CEO, Norio Ohga, who recognized the potential in Kutaragis chip, Ohga kept Kutaragi on at Sony, and it was not until Nintendo cancelled the project that Sony decided to develop its own console. This was also to be the used in SNES-CDs, giving a large degree of control to Sony despite Nintendos leading position in the video gaming market. The product, dubbed the Play Station was to be announced at the May 1991 Consumer Electronics Show, yamauchi decided that the contract was totally unacceptable and he secretly cancelled all plans for the joint Nintendo-Sony SNES CD attachment. After the collapse of the project, Sony briefly considered allying itself with Sega to produce a stand-alone console. The Sega CEO at the time, Tom Kalinske, took the proposal to Segas Board of Directors in Tokyo, Kalinske, in a 2013 interview recalled them saying that’s a stupid idea, Sony doesnt know how to make hardware. They don’t know how to make software either, why would we want to do this. The federal judge presiding over the case denied the injunction and, in October 1991, however, it is theorized that only 200 or so of these machines were ever produced. However, Sony decided in early 1993 to begin reworking the Play Station concept to target a new generation of hardware and software. As part of process the SNES cartridge port was dropped. Early advertising prior to the launch in North America referenced PSX
2.
PlayStation 2
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The PlayStation 2 is a home video game console that was developed by Sony Computer Entertainment. It is the successor to the PlayStation, and is the installment in the PlayStation lineup of consoles. It was released on March 4,2000 in Japan, October 26,2000 in North America, November 24,2000 in Europe and it competed with Segas Dreamcast, Microsofts Xbox, and Nintendos GameCube in the sixth generation of video game consoles. Announced in 1999, the PlayStation 2 was the first PlayStation console to offer backwards compatibility for its predecessors DualShock controller, the PlayStation 2 is the best-selling video game console of all time, selling over 155 million units, with 150 million confirmed by Sony in 2011. More than 3,874 game titles have been released for the PS2 since launch, Sony later manufactured several smaller, lighter revisions of the console known as Slimline models in 2004 and well on, and in 2006, announced and launched its successor, the PlayStation 3. Sony unveiled the PlayStation 4 console the following month on February 20,2013, Sony announced the PlayStation 2 on March 1,1999. The Dreamcast itself launched very successfully in North America later that year, soon after the Dreamcasts North American launch, Sony unveiled the PlayStation 2 at the Tokyo Game Show on September 20,1999. Sony showed fully playable demos of upcoming PlayStation 2 games including Gran Turismo 2000 and Tekken Tag Tournament – which showed the consoles graphic abilities, the PS2 was launched in March 2000 in Japan, October in North America and November in Europe. Sales of the console, games and accessories pulled in $250 million on the first day, directly after its release, it was difficult to find PS2 units on retailer shelves due to manufacturing delays. Another option was purchasing the console online through websites such as eBay. This allowed the PS2 to tap the large install base established by the PlayStation – another major selling point over the competition, later, Sony added new development kits for game developers and more PS2 units for consumers. The PS2s built-in functionality also expanded its audience beyond the gamer and this made the console a low cost entry into the home theater market. The PS2 remained as the only active sixth generation console for over 6 months, before it would face competition from rivals, Nintendos GameCube and Microsofts Xbox. While the PlayStation 2 theoretically had the weakest specification of the three, it had a start due to its installed base plus strong developer commitment. Sony also countered the Xbox by temporarily securing PlayStation 2 exclusives for highly anticipated games such as the Grand Theft Auto series and Metal Gear Solid 2, Sons of Liberty. Sony cut the price of the console in May 2002 from US$299 to $199 in North America, making it the price as the GameCube. It also planned to cut the price in Japan around that time and it cut the price twice in Japan in 2003. In 2006, Sony cut the cost of the console in anticipation of the release of the PlayStation 3, Sony, unlike Sega with its Dreamcast, originally placed little emphasis on online gaming during its first few years, although that changed upon the launch of the online-capable Xbox
3.
Pong
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Pong is one of the earliest arcade video games and the first sports arcade video game. It is a tennis sports game featuring simple two-dimensional graphics. While other arcade games such as Computer Space came before it. The game was manufactured by Atari, which released it in 1972. Allan Alcorn created Pong as a training exercise assigned to him by Atari co-founder Nolan Bushnell, Bushnell based the idea on an electronic ping-pong game included in the Magnavox Odyssey, which later resulted in a lawsuit against Atari. Surprised by the quality of Alcorns work, Bushnell and Atari co-founder Ted Dabney decided to manufacture the game, soon after its release, several companies began producing games that copied Pongs gameplay, and eventually released new types of games. As a result, Atari encouraged its staff to more innovative games. The company released several sequels that built upon the gameplay by adding new features. During the 1975 Christmas season, Atari released a version of Pong exclusively through Sears retail stores. It was also a success and led to numerous copies. The game has been remade on numerous home and portable platforms following its release, Pong has been referenced and parodied in multiple television shows and video games, and has been a part of several video game and cultural exhibitions. Pong is a sports game that simulates table tennis. Players use the paddles to hit a back and forth. The aim is for player to reach eleven points before the opponent. Pong was the first game developed by Atari, after producing Computer Space, Bushnell decided to form a company to produce more games by licensing ideas to other companies. The first contract was with Bally Manufacturing Corporation for a driving game, soon after the founding, Bushnell hired Allan Alcorn because of his experience with electrical engineering and computer science, Bushnell and Dabney also had previously worked with him at Ampex. Prior to working at Atari, Alcorn had no experience with video games, to acclimate Alcorn to creating games, Bushnell gave him a project secretly meant to be a warm-up exercise. Bushnell told Alcorn that he had a contract with General Electric for a product, in 2011, Bushnell stated that the game was inspired by previous versions of electronic tennis he had played before, Bushnell played a version on a PDP-1 computer in 1964 while attending college
4.
Quake II
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Action Quake 2 is a mod for the video game Quake II created by The A-Team. Action Quake 2 was developed to recreate the look and feel of a movie, having a fast pace. It features many maps recreating realistic settings, such as city streets and office buildings, with a range of weapons. Action Quake 2 is essentially a version of deathmatch and team deathmatch in which most of the elements have been modified to some degree. Damage to extremities such as a shot to the leg with any weapon will cause damage, with a then unique style of play, realistic weapons and fast pace, Action Quake 2 became one of the most popular Quake II mods. The mod caught the attention of id Software in June 1998,1, Extremities, a commercial add-on product for Quake II. Members of the development team would go on to work on titles such as Action Half-Life. There are two modes of gameplay in Action Quake 2, Deathmatch and Teamplay. In Deathmatch, spawn points are distributed over most of the map, the map changes when one of two conditions is met, either the timelimit is reached, or the fraglimit is reached. By default each player spawns with only the MK23 pistol, staying alive is rewarded with more frags for each player killed. In Teamplay, players are split into two teams and play is round based, players select one primary weapon and one item to use, in addition to the default pistol and knife. The teams spawn on opposite sides of the map, and are let loose to kill each other. If one team eliminates the other, they win the round
5.
PlayStation models
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A number of models of Sonys PlayStation video game console were produced. The PlayStation went through a number of variants during its production run, from an external perspective, the most notable change was the gradual reduction in the number of external connectors from the back of the unit. This started very early on with the original Japanese launch units, the SCPH-1000, released on December 3,1994, was the model that had an S-Video port. Also, the first models had problems with function and developers had to use another function instead. The CD player also included reverberation effects unique to those systems until the release of the PS one in 2000 and this model was followed by the SCPH-550x and exclusive PAL SCPH-5552 units, released in April 1997. Starting with the SCPH-550x series, PAL variants had the power, originally, the PlayStation was supposed to have provision on Video CD support, but this feature was only included on the Asian exclusive SCPH-5903 model. New to the SCPH-700x series was the introduction of the Sound Scope - light show music visualizations and these were accessible by pressing the Select button while playing any normal audio CD in the systems CD player. While watching these visualizations, players could add various effects like color cycling or motion blur. These were seen on the SCPH-700x, 750x, 900x, the final revision to the original PlayStation was the SCPH-900x series, released in May 1999. These had the hardware as the SCPH-750x models, except the parallel port was removed. It also incorporated a modified version of the menu design previously used only on PAL consoles. The later revision was functionally identical, but reduced manufacturing cost by moving to more highly integrated chips. There were also debugging consoles - these were generally in blue or green cases, although there were some special production units that were grey. The debug units were designed to be as close as possible to retail consoles, the reason for the two different case colors was a hardware change that Sony had made fairly early in the PlayStation production cycle - the original machines were built using Rev. They also used VRAM to store the video data - the later models used Rev, C silicon and SGRAM - although the two chipsets had very similar performance, they were not identical - the Rev. Because this made the two machine types quite significantly different from other, you had to test your title on both of them before submitting it. The blue debugs had the old silicon and the green ones had the new silicon, in 1997, Sony released a version of the PlayStation called the Net Yaroze. Naturally, the Net Yaroze lacked many of the features the full developer suite provided, programmers were also limited by the 2 MB of total game space that Net Yaroze allowed
6.
Fantastic Four
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The Fantastic Four is a fictional superhero team appearing in American comic books published by Marvel Comics. The group debuted in The Fantastic Four #1, which helped to usher in a new level of realism in the medium. As the first superhero team title produced by Marvel Comics, it formed a cornerstone of the companys 1960s rise from a division of a publishing company to a pop culture conglomerate. Since their original 1961 introduction, the Fantastic Four have been portrayed as a dysfunctional, yet loving. Breaking convention with other comic book archetypes of the time, they would squabble, the Fantastic Four have been adapted into other media, including four animated series and four live-action films. According to Lee, writing in 1974, Martin mentioned that he had noticed one of the published by National Comics seemed to be selling better than most. It was a book called The Justice League of America and it was composed of a team of superheroes, if the Justice League is selling, spoke he, why dont we put out a comic book that features a team of superheroes. Determined to carve a career for myself in the nowhere world of comic books, Lee concluded that, For just this once. Lee said he created a synopsis for the first Fantastic Four story that he gave to penciller Jack Kirby, Kirby turned in his penciled art pages to Lee, who added dialogue and captions. Kirby claims he came up with the idea for the Fantastic Four in Marvels offices, Kirby also sought to establish, more credibly and on numerous occasions, that the visual elements of the strip were his conceptions. He regularly pointed to a team he had created for rival publisher DC Comics in the 1950s, F you notice the uniforms, theyre the same. I always give them a skintight uniform with a belt, the Challengers and the FF have a minimum of decoration. And of course, the Things skin is a kind of decoration, the chest insignia of a 4 within a circle, however, was designed by Lee. The characters wear no uniforms in the first two issues, given the conflicting statements, outside commentators have found it hard to identify with precise detail who created the Fantastic Four. Comics historian R. C. Harvey believes that the Fantastic Four was a furtherance of the work Kirby had been doing previously, but Harvey notes that the Marvel Method of collaboration allowed each man to claim credit, and that Lees dialogue added to the direction the team took. Wells argues that it was Lees contributions which set the framework within which Kirby worked, and this made Lee more responsible. Comics historian Mark Evanier, an assistant to Jack Kirby in the 1970s, says that the considered opinion of Lee and Kirbys contemporaries was that Fantastic Four was created by Stan. No further division of credit seemed appropriate, the release of The Fantastic Four #1 was an unexpected success
7.
Tales of Destiny
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Tales of Destiny is a role-playing video game originally developed by Telenet Japans Wolf Team as the second main title in Namcos Tales series. Originally released for the PlayStation in Japan in December 1997, an English version was made available in North America in September 1998. Its producers gave it the characteristic genre name RPG of Destiny, a remake for the PlayStation 2 was released in November 2006, which was followed by an updated version called Tales of Destiny Directors Cut in January 2008, both exclusive to Japan. The remake was given its own unique genre name by its producers as RPG called Destiny. Taking place in a world, the game follows the story of a young man named Stahn who comes across a sentient sword named Dymlos. Eventually, he and his friends must unite against evil forces seeking use a relic from an ancient war. The PlayStation version of Tales of Destiny was mostly well-received, selling over a million copies worldwide, the game uses an enhanced version of the Linear Motion Battle System that debuted in the first game of the series, Tales of Phantasia. Battles take place on a 2-D plane where characters and enemies act in real time, melee and ranged attacks are executed in real time, with spell casting requiring a chanting time that increases directly with the complexity of the spell being cast. When the chanting of a spell is complete, game-time temporarily stops as the animation is carried out and damage is assigned. Special melee and ranged attacks do more damage or have more hits than normal attacks, also, the battle system rewards the player with extra experience for stringing together multi-hit combos. Certain spells can also be taken off the casting list for computer-controlled allies. At any one time, the AI is controlling the characters in the party that the player is not directly commanding, taking general strategic orders into consideration when acting. The player controls one character directly at a time, but can switch to other characters and this menu system enables the player to use items, spells, or special attacks on the fly in battle. Also, the system allows the use of general commands given to the entire party during battle. In the past, a comet crashed into the world, throwing dust clouds into the sky and shrouding the world in cold, at about the same time, the inhabitants, the Aethers, discovered a new form of energy from the meteorites core, which they named Lens. Combining this with research, the people were able to create cities in the sky. Unfortunately, only a few were chosen, leaving the rest of the people to remain on the bleak surface of the planet. These people became known as the Erthers, over time, the skys inhabitants became known as the Aetherians and their Aeropolis cities
8.
Crash Team Racing
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Crash Team Racing is a kart racing video game developed by Naughty Dog and published by Sony Computer Entertainment for the PlayStation. Crash Team Racing is the installment in the Crash Bandicoot series. It is the first Crash Bandicoot game in the racing genre, the games story focuses on the efforts of a ragtag team of characters in the Crash Bandicoot series, who must race against the egomaniacal Nitros Oxide to save their planet from destruction. In the game, players can take control of one of fifteen Crash Bandicoot series characters, during the races, offensive and speed boosting power ups can be used to gain an advantage. Crash Team Racing was praised by critics for its gameplay and graphics, an indirect sequel, Crash Nitro Kart, was released in 2003 for the Game Boy Advance, GameCube, PlayStation 2, Xbox and N-Gage. Crash Team Racing is a game in which the player controls characters from the Crash Bandicoot universe. While racing, the player can accelerate, steer, reverse, brake, hop or use weapons and power-ups with the controllers analog stick. Two distinct forms of crates are scattered throughout the tracks and arenas of Crash Team Racing, Crates with question marks on them hold power-ups and weapons, which can be obtained by driving through and breaking apart the said crates. When the player collects a weapon or power-up, it appear in a box at the top of the screen. The player can activate the weapon or power-up to wreak havoc on the racers or supplement the players own performance. Fruit Crates carry Wumpa Fruit that increase the speed of the kart and strengthen the players weapons. A crucial maneuver in Crash Team Racing is the slide, the player executes the slide by holding down one of the shoulder buttons to perform a hop. While sliding, the Turbo Boost Meter on the corner of the screen fills up. At the same time, the exhaust gas from the players kart turns black, to get a speed boost, the player quickly presses the opposite shoulder button while the Turbo Boost Meter is red. The player can execute three speed boosts in a row during a slide, with the third speed boost being more powerful than the previous two. If the player waits too long into the slide for a boost, the kart back-fires. Aside from power slides, speed boosts can be obtained by gathering hang time when leaping over gaps in the track, the longer the player is in the air, the bigger the speed boost will be when the kart lands. Crash Team Racing features 5 racing modes, Adventure, Time Trial, Arcade, Versus, in each mode, the player selects 1 from 8 characters to control
9.
Frogger
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Frogger is a 1981 arcade game developed by Konami. It was licensed for North American distribution by Sega-Gremlin and worldwide by Sega itself and it is regarded as a classic from the golden age of video arcade games, noted for its novel gameplay and theme. The object of the game is to direct frogs to their homes one by one by crossing a busy road, the Frogger arcade version is an early example of a game with more than one CPU, as it used two Z80 processors. By 2005, Frogger in its various video game incarnations had sold 20 million copies worldwide. The game starts with three, five, or seven frogs, depending on the used by the operator. The player guides a frog which starts at the bottom of the screen, the upper half of the screen consists of a river with logs, alligators, and turtles, all moving horizontally across the screen. The very top of the screen contains five frog homes which are the destinations for each frog, every level is timed, the player must finish the level before the time expires. The only player control is the 4 direction joystick used to navigate the frog, on the bottom half of the screen, the player must guide the frog between opposing lanes of trucks, cars, and other vehicles, to avoid becoming roadkill. The middle of the screen, after the road, contains a central reservation where the player must prepare to navigate the river. By jumping on swiftly moving logs and the backs of turtles and alligators except the alligator jaws, the player can guide their frog safely to one of the empty lily pads. The player must avoid alligators sticking out at one of the five homes, snakes, and otters in the river. When all five frogs are directed home, the game progresses to the next level, after five levels, the game gets briefly easier yet again gets progressively harder to the next fifth level. Softline in 1982 stated that Frogger has earned the distinction of being the arcade game with the most ways to die. The controls consist solely of a 4-direction joystick used to guide the frogs jump direction, the number of simultaneous players is one, and the game has a maximum of two players. The games opening tune is the first verse of a Japanese childrens song called Inu No Omawarisan, the song remained intact in the US release. Other Japanese tunes that are played during gameplay include the themes to the anime Hana no Ko Lunlun, the US release also has Yankee Doodle Dandy. Every safe step scores 10 points, and every frog arriving home scores 50 points plus 10 per unused second. Guiding a lady frog home or eating a fly scores 200 points), players earn an extra life at 10,000 or 20,000 points, and none thereafter
10.
Devil Dice
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Devil Dice is a video game for the PlayStation. It was originally created by developer Shift on the homebrew Yaroze platform, released in 1998, it is one of only a handful of games to make the leap from the Yaroze to commercial release. The game is a million-seller and a version was released as a PlayStation Classic game for the PlayStation 3. A sequel, Xi Jumbo was released on the original PlayStation in Japan, the Jumbo Mode gameplay changes were integrated into Bombastic on the PS2. A version Xi Little also appeared on the Wonderswan Color, a PSP version, Xi Coliseum, was released in Japan on March 9,2006. This version includes support for ad hoc wireless play between up to five players, Bombastic, for the PlayStation 2, is the second sequel to Devil Dice, and incorporates all play modes from previous releases. Devil Dice is a puzzle game, where the player controls a small devil that runs around a grid covered in large dice. The player can both stand atop dice, and stand on the ground, when standing on the dice, the player can move from die to die, or can roll a die in the direction he or she runs, revealing a different face as the die rotates. Creating a group of adjacent dice with identical pips—the size of which must be at least the number of pips—causes those dice to slowly sink into the field before disappearing, chain reactions are possible by adding additional dice to a sinking set. Different types of dice are available in some modes, with different properties to make the more challenging. The game features the following modes, Battle - Pits the player against a computer opponent. Puzzle - Mode in which players must solve puzzles using only a number of steps or moves. Solving a whole row of puzzles allows players access to a picture that they can play on in Battle mode, trial - The standard arcade-style mode, where the objective is to remove as many dice as possible before the grid completely fills with dice. Wars - A frenzied multiplayer mode, supporting up to four computer opponents. Players damage each other as they complete chains, with the last devil standing becoming the winner, Devil Dice at GameSpot Devil Dice at IGN
11.
Hogs of War
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The game is set in a First World War-era where anthropomorphic pigs engage in combat. Play proceeds in a fashion, with 3D graphics, vehicles, a career-based single-player mode. The tune for the game is John Philip Sousas Liberty Bell March, the design of the game is discussed in the book The Game Makers Apprentice, which is co-authored by the lead programmer of the game and has a foreword by one of the games designers. The gameplay of Hogs of War is a turn-based tactics game where players take turns controlling individual members of their squad of hogs to engage in combat with the opposition, similar to Worms. Other hazards include bodies of water that, while they can be swam in, is damaging to nearly all types of soldiers, if a teammate is knocked into water by an opponent, they will automatically swim to the nearby shore line. While difficult, it is possible to knock hogs off the map resulting in instant death. If all health is gone and the player is on land, each squad member can be assigned a class type where they have immediate access to certain weapons and abilities. Despite the classes, any hog can pick up and use any weapon or ability if found in a crate that can be found across each map or dropped from blimps. Bunkers and MASH tents also provide protection but without weaponry. At the start of each campaign, the player chooses their nation, the main objective for the player is to conquer all five regions of the world map with each region containing five missions against each opposing nation. At the start of the campaign, the squad is made up of grunts who have little maximum health. Hogs, however, can be promoted as the player progresses through the campaign by earning medals, a single medal is given upon completion of a mission and five with every region conquered, with additional medals given if all squad members survive and any others collected during the missions. First promotion opens up the four classes with the choice to pursue one and develop further, for example espionage begins with scout before being promoted to sniper. While all classes are distinctive, after enough promotions, all can eventually be promoted to a commando class that specialises in all weapons and abilities. If a hog is killed during a mission they can return for the next mission. If, however, three die, one will be permanently lost, and two lost if four die, along with their promotions, in single player mode a significant difference exists in the versions of the game as presented on PlayStation and PC. The six nations include the United Kingdom, France, Germany, the UK is represented by Tommys Trotters who are clothed in green and wear standard British issue First World War helmets. They are based on the British Expeditionary Force and are portrayed as either incredibly posh or hooligan like, France is represented by the Garlic Grunts who are clothed in dark blue and wear army caps
12.
Tales of Eternia
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Tales of Eternia, known as Tales of Destiny II in its original North America release, is a role-playing video game published by Namco as the third main title in their Tales series. Initially released for the PlayStation in November 2000 in Japan, an English version was released in North America in September 2001. It was developed by members of Telnet Japans Wolfteam, who had worked on its predecessors Tales of Phantasia. The games producers gave it the characteristic genre name RPG of Eternity, a port was released for the PlayStation Portable handheld in Japan in March 2005, and the PAL region in February 2006. Tales of Eternia was mostly well-received during its release. It would later inspire a 13-episode anime co-produced by Production I. G loosely based on the games plot, the game plays similar to other Tales games, following the precedent set by previous role-playing video games in general as well. An overworld map is used to navigate from one location to another in the fictional world. Additionally, city merchants will exchange Gald, the in-game currency, progress can be saved at any time - a first for the series, and the player can also learn recipes throughout the game, using them to cook status-enhancing or healing food out of combat. Battles with enemies are done through the Linear Motion Battle System, movements and attacks are done in real-time, with the fighting being compared to the Street Fighter series. Much like its predecessors, Tales of Eternia gives the player a large degree of control over computer-controlled allies and the techniques they use. Since the player directly controls one character at a time, all other characters are governed by the general rules of AI behavior set by the player before. During battle, the player can switch which character he or she is controlling, the action can be paused to use different menus for things such as item. The games menu screens can be used to organize and uses items, creates new magic spells, develops battle strategies, changes character equipment, and views character statistics. Selected features from the screen, such as item use. The game follows Reid Hershel as he tries to prevent the Grand Fall, specifically, the Grand Fall entails the violent collision of twin planets Inferia and Celestia. The two planets, face one another, separated by the Orbus Barrier, the Aurora War, an ancient conflict that set Inferia against Celestia over two thousand years ago, continues to generate persistent mistrust between the two groups. The Orbus Barrier has shown recent signs of weakening and possible due to the actions of an unknown external force. The journey takes Reid across both planets, as he seeks out those responsible for movement towards the brink of annihilation
