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Tennis for Two
October 1958- Physicist William Higinbotham invented the first unofficial video game, Tennis for Two, to liven up presentations. It was a big hit with the visitors. This event is essential, because it started the want for video games. After his creation of Tennis for Two, companies and people started to invent more video games, thus starting the evolution of video games. -
Release of Spacewar!
Spacewar!, the first computer video game, was created by Steve Russell, Peter Samson, and Martin Graetz. Spacewar! is a space combat game where you try to blow up your enemy. You can play a version of the game here: http://www.masswerk.at/spacewar/. This event is essential in the evolution of video games, because it was the first video game on a computer. However, it was designed for a computer that cost $150,000, so it was generally unknown to the public. -
Computer Space
The first arcade machine, Computer Space, was created by Nolan Bushnell and Ted Dabney. The invention of the arcade machine is important and essential to the evolution of video games, because it popularized video games even more, and entire arcades were created, which was a place you could go to play arcade games. When arcades were successful, other types of consoles were created, like the nintendo and gameboy. -
Atari- First Home Video Game System
The Atari 2600 was the first video game console you could use at home, and was sold with the game Pong. The invention of the Atari 2600 was essential to the evolution of video games, because it started the demand for home video game consoles. It paved the way for consoles like the Nintendo, Gameboy, Sega, Xbox, Playstation, and many more. -
First FPS(first person shooter)
It started as an experiment. Two high school students, Steve Colley and Howard Polmer, had just figured out how to rotate a cube on the screen. Howard Palmer suggested they could make a three-dimensional maze. They were in a work-study program with NASA. "Maze" started as a simple maze with no characters or objects, but evolved into a multiplayer game where you could shoot people, peek corners, and jump around. It became known as Wolfenstein 3D, and up to 8 eight players could play at once. -
First Video Game Tournament
Atari held the first video game tournament. It was for a game called Space Invaders. The Space Invader Tournament was important in the creation of eSports, because it is widely known as the first video game competition, and started eSports. Now, we have major tournaments every month on many different games. -
Handy Game- First handheld/mobile game device
Epyx created the Handy Game, which was the first handheld game device that was made. It would turn into Atari Lynx in 1989. This invention was essential to the evolution of video games, because it was the first handheld game device. After the invention of Handy Game, other handheld devices were created, like the Gameboy Nintendo DS. -
Steam is released
Steam, a digital distribution platform by Valve Corporation, was released, which allowed people to download and play games on that platform. Many popular games like Counter Strike, Dota 2, and Call of Duty are on Steam. This is important, because it allowed players to download games from one platform. You didn’t have to go to places to find games. You could just go on Steam and download paid/free to play games. -
PS3 and the Wii
Nintendo and Sony released popular game consoles. Nintendo released the Wii, which allowed players to vontrol characters with motion, which allowed people to tilt a steering wheel and swing rackets. Sony released the Playstation 3, which was created by Ken Kutraragi. It was a big hit. They were important, because they allowed players to play games in new ways. The Wii allowed people to use motion to control things, and the Playstation 3 allowed video games to become bigger and better. -
Social Games
Social gaming becomes popular with games like Angry Birds and Farmville. They allowed people to interact with each other and play with others instead of people playing alone. This was important, because it allowed more social games to be created. This allowed players to interact with each other instead of a single player playing by herself. Now, games like Counter Strike:Global Offensive aren’t mainly categorized as social games, but you can still talk and interact with other players in game. -
The International 2017
The International 2017, a Dota 2 event, was the largest eSports event ever. Players played from June 10 to August 12 for a grand prize of $10,862,683, and a total prize pool of $24,787,916. This is important to the development of eSports and video games, because it shows that people can make a living out of video games. With the number one team, Team Liquid, winning $10,862,683, this shows that there is a lot to be won in competitive video gaming, and that eSports will get larger and larger.
