A brief history of home consoles

When it comes to the history of home consoles, it should go back more than 40 of years. At the time, the world's oldest video game maker, Atari, launched a home console version of Home-pong (1975) based on its arcade (not at home, but on a commercial game console installed in the arcade). This is a two-player tennis game, the content is actually very simple, is in a pure black background with a white rectangle to represent the racket and the ball.

However, for the people at that time, to be able to manipulate things on the TV screen, but also to fight with others, this is a novel entertainment way. Because of people's love, at that time several manufacturers began to introduce a variety of similar tennis games and play block games. Among these manufacturers, there is a Kyoto toy manufacturer, it is the future leading the world's game market Giant-Nintendo.

There was only one game built into the home consoles, and there was no concept of changing the software. Nintendo has also launched a number of products such as Tv-game 6, Tv-game 15, which can play a variety of games on a game console, but in fact it is not built into a number of game software, but only by switching the circuit connection to produce some very limited changes. For example, Tv-game 15 on the mark can play "Tennis" "Volleyball" "Hockey" "Ping-Pong" "shooting" and other games, but in fact these games are almost identical to the picture, it feels more like playing "everyone to find fault." Moreover, these so-called different games actually have similar "A/b" "Singles/Doubles" and other different versions, all of which add up to be counted as "a total of 15 games", I really want to say: "Do not take such a pit Dad!" "Of course, this is not only the Nintendo family, Epoch, Bandai, Tomy and other companies are no exception, such as the game directly into the circuit game console, the form is similar.

In short, there is no concept of hardware and software being independent of each other in that era. At that time of design thought, if want to change a game to play, must design different circuit for each game, the difficulty can imagine. Today, "game consoles" and "gaming software" have become two independent products, such a situation, in fact, is equipped with a programmable "microprocessor" game console was established after the advent.

As we mentioned earlier, Atari, led by Nolan Bushnell A, launched a popular pong, but Atari's real goal was to develop a microprocessor-equipped game console that could replace game software. The game was eventually launched in 1977 and named Atari VCS (Video computer System), but in fact, Fairchild B had introduced a similar feature called Channel F a year earlier. Even so, Atari VCs has made a big difference in history because it is not only a game console that can play multiple games, but also a product that has revolutionized the game industry.

A 　Nolan Bushnell，1943—。B 　尽管Fairchild公司的正式中文名称为“飞兆半导体”，但人们往往更熟悉“仙童”这个名字。

The ability to change software means that the game console itself, as a hardware, is separated from the game as a software. Prior to this, to create a game, light creative and ideas are not enough, but also must have hardware knowledge. But with the separation of the two concepts of hardware and software, making a fun game is no longer dependent on hardware skills. In other words, the hardware vendor can focus on the design and development of the product, without regard to the "game is not fun", while the software vendor does not have to rely on technology such as circuit design to fully focus on software development. In such a trend, began to create a group of software manufacturers specializing in game software development, including by the former Atari technical staff founded Activisiona, and Br?derbund, Electronic ARTSB and other today's famous software vendors, from that time began to start.

In the convertible software of the home game console, at that time generally used a "ROM cassette" with a plastic shell semiconductor device as the game software media. Now many portable game consoles still use ROM cassette, Famicom's game card also belongs to this kind of, when the Atari VCS used software media is the same ROM cassette.

The biggest benefit of a convertible software game console is self-evident--the game software can be sold separately and can be added indefinitely. In addition, there are the following benefits.

① the price of the game console can be cheaper

Some of the game consoles represented by the epoch's cassette vision have made the host's price very cheap by moving major circuits such as CPUs into ROM cassettes. Of course, this is tantamount to the cost of passing on the software, but in the price war, the host can sell cheap is indeed a powerful weapon.

② is able to follow the latest fashion trends

Another great strength of the convertible software game consoles is the flexibility to respond to changes in times and trends. For example, for a dedicated game console that can only play blocks, even if manufacturers notice that it is now popular "Super Mario", it is impossible to catch up with such a new trend in a dedicated machine.

A 　中文一般称为“动视”。B 　一般简称EA，中文名称为“艺电”。

③ game console performance can be extended

The performance of a gaming machine is bound to gradually lag behind the development of the Times, and Famicom is able to occupy the market for a long time, because it can be family BASIC, Disk System, Large capacity ROM cassette and other peripherals to the performance of the host to expand.

After the advent of the Atari VCS, third-party vendors launched a variety of powerful game software, many people are interested in the game to buy VCs. Conversely, the popularity of VCs hardware has brought more game sales, thus forming a virtuous circle. Videotape field has been a VHS and Betamax dispute, in recent years we have also experienced the game of SD card and memory stick, such as the specifications and standards competition, as long as one party to obtain more users, there will be more manufacturers and users to come, in turn, further promote the popularization of their own standards To defeat the competitor (on the other hand, less hardware loses the support of the software, which in turn hinders the sale of the hardware and falls into a vicious circle).

Atari VCs was not a smooth sailing at the start of the IPO. 1980, with the "Little Bee" A "Pac Man" B "the Ultimate war zone" C and a number of well-known arcade games have been transplanted, only to drive the VCS popularity leap up. To "at home can play to" little Bee "and" Pac Man "! "As a selling point, VCs succeeded in achieving the Great Leap Forward and became synonymous with home consoles. In 1982, the VCs market share reached 67%,atari's product also swept the top 4 positions in the then sales rankings, it should not be difficult to imagine how rounds VCs was. In the case of the hardware so popular, software vendors naturally began to actively develop Atari VCS matching game. 5 years after the IPO, the sales of VCs hardware broke through 10 million units, a huge market is quietly formed.

A 　原名Space Invaders，开发厂商为大东（Taito）。B 　原名Pac-Man，开发厂商为南梦宫（Namco）。C 　原名Battlezone，开发厂商为Atari。

With the great success of Atari VCS, manufacturers have launched a variety of home consoles in the United States, but these products have been listed in Japan after 1982. Due to the late release, coupled with the 1983 Nintendo launched the family computer, so most of these products fell a apprenticeship not to die first, had to retire early. Let's take a brief look at these products that have been exposed to the Japanese market.

Atari 2800 (atari,1983 year May, 24000 yen)

This is the Atari VCS (which should be exactly Atari 2600) for the Japanese market, the product is essentially the same as the 1977-year-old North American version, but Nintendo launched the Famicom after the two-month listing, and was forced to retire in less than a year because of the large performance gap. The matching game of the model has 31, without exception are directly to the U.S. version to sell.

In addition, the original North American Atari 2600 was introduced directly by two companies earlier, named "Video Computer System" (Toyo Property, December 1977, 94800 yen) and "Cassette TV Game" respectively. (epoch,1979 year October, 47300 yen).

Intellivision (Bandai, July 1982 release, 49800 yen)

This is a game console launched by Mattel, a famous Barbie doll, introduced by Bandai (Bandai) to Japan for sale. The game console sold 3 million units in the United States, second only to Atari VCS, but in Japan it was sold in a dismal price.

Arcadia (Bandai, March 1983 release, 19800 yen)

This is a multi-compatible machine in various countries around the world, in addition to Bandai, there are several other companies with the name "Dynavision" (Asahi Tsusho) and other names in Japan at the same time sales, matching games have 51.

CreatiVision (cheryco,1982 year October, 54800 yen)

This is the Chinese Hong Kong VTech Company launched a home game console, the product's propaganda selling point is that the basic cassette can be turned into a computer, walking is the route of the home learning machine.

Light Speed Boat (Bandai, July 1983 release, 54800 yen)

This product is the American GCE company launches "Vectrex" the Japanese edition, from Bandai introduces the sale. It's the only game machine in history that uses "draw lines" rather than "dots" to display images (a bit like the kind of laser show that's projected in the night sky), perhaps because it's unique, and now the world still has a lot of its fans.

A brief history of home consoles