Computer Games: History and Content Presented by Barry Dean UWE

Game Genres n Shooters n Strategy n Sports n Adventure n World Control

Elements of Game Content n Environment n Players and Enemies n Animation n Visuals and Textures n Sound n FX n A.I. n Deployment

Some Game History

Late 1970s saw the emergence of dedicated arcade consoles

Cocktail-Style Arcade Consoles

Atari Games System

The 1980s gave rise to the ‘Home Micro’ Market The 1980s

1980s - microcomputers n Atari n BBC Microcomputer system n Commodore 16 & 64 u machines able to be programmed by user - many arcade games ported to 8 bit platform. u ‘home micro’ largest selling item Christmas 1986

1980s

1980s:Sinclair ZX Spectrum

1980s: Commodore 64

1980s: BBC Micro

1980s: BBC Master 128 (1986)

1980s:Games: Chuckie Egg

1980s:Games:Felix

1980s:Games:Pole Position

1980s:Games:Frogger

Nintendo Game Boy (1989)

1990s- Technology Driven n 16 Bit, consoles- Nintendo, Sega n PC emerges as a gaming platform (DOS) - Wolfenstein 3D, Doom n 32 bit Sony Playstation - software now in CD format - console also CD Player n Microsoft develop DirectX in an attempt to challenge the games console market n Internet provides for on-line games culture

1990s:Nintendo

1990s Nintendo Games

Nintendo Games: Tetris

Super Nintendo (SNES)

Sega

Sega Games: Sonic the Hedgehog

Sega:Batman

1990s:Sony PlayStation 32-bit + CD Player

Sony PlayStation games

1990s:Sega Saturn

Game Consoles n Know capabilities for developers n Standard graphics environment n Standard sound n No deployment issues u But not scaleable

1990s What about the PC? n 1990 still an ‘MSDOS world’ on the PC n Game complexity increases and even require start-up disc to load game. n Windows (1992) - no real gaming n Mid 1990s sees move towards better game support on PC under the new Windows 95 OS via ‘Game SDK’

Game SDK n Microsoft's solution to gaming for the Windows 32bit OS n First appeared in 1995 as the ‘Game SDK’ n Renamed to DirectX where X stands for a number of related ‘to the metal’ technologies.

DirectX n Direct3D (Real-time 3D) n DirectShow (Media Streaming) n DirectInput -force feedback joystick n DirectSound n DirectPlay (network gaming)

Principles of DirectX n Fast low-level libraries n Framework established by DirectX had to shift the burden of hardware support from developers to hardware manufacturers n Hardware Abstraction Layer (HAL) n Hardware Emulation Layer (HEL) n Provides developers with a known, dependable set of features they can use

Examples of DirectX n DirectX SDK (version Vista) n

PC Gaming provides for user -created content development so called ‘MODS’ n Creating new levels, players, and game scenarios n The game Counter Strike developed as MOD of the commercial game Half-Life

Open GL (Apple Mac) n Introduced in 1992 n Open GL = Open Graphics Library n High performance cross-platform graphics API n Specification and evolution guided by the OpenGL Architecture Review Board n Integrates with several languages n Open source code for developers

21st Century:State of the Art...

21st Century:Sony PlayStation 2

21st Century :Microsoft X Box

21st Century :Nintendo Game Cube

21st Century :Mobile Gaming

21st Century :2005 Sony PSP

21st Century :Next Generation

Innovation:Nintendo Wii

Suggested Reading High Score The illustrated History of Electronic Games - 2nd Edition DeMaria R. Wilson J. Osborne 2004

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