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Tennis for Two
William Higinbotham created the first video game ever called Tennis for Two -
Chase system invented
In 1966, Ralph Baer (then at Sanders Associates) created a simple video game called Chase that could be displayed on a standard television set. -
First Mouse patented
1970, describing it in the patent application as an "X-Y position indicator for a display system," the mouse was patented. -
Pong Released to the public
The first version of Pong was mass released to the world. -
First Handheld Game system
The first portable, handheld electronic game was Tic Tac Toe, made in 1972 by a company called Waco. -
The Odyssey
In 1972, the first commercial video game console that could be played in the home, the Odyssey was invented. -
Fairchaild Video Entertainment System
In 1976, Fairchild released the first programmable home game console called the Fairchild Video Entertainment System. -
Atari released
In 1977, Atari released its cartridge-based console called the Video Computer System (VCS), later called Atari 2600. This revolutionized home gaming. -
Space Invaders Released
The arcade game industry entered its Golden Age in 1978 with the release of Space Invaders by Taito. -
Defender Game released
Defender (1980) established the scrolling shooter and was the first to have events taking place outside the player's view, displayed by a radar view showing a map of the whole playfield. -
Mystery House released - first graphic adventure game
Also published in 1980 was Roberta Williams' Mystery House, for the Apple II. It was the first graphic adventure on home computers. -
First gaming PC's introduced
The personal computer became a competitive gaming platform with IBM's PC/AT in 1984. -
Major modern game companies come to be
In the early 1990s, shareware distribution was a popular method of publishing games for smaller developers, including then-fledgling companies such as Apogee (now 3D Realms), Epic Megagames (now Epic Games), and id Software. -
Myst released
Published in 1993, Myst itself was one of the first computer games to make full use of the new high-capacity CD-ROM storage format. -
Shareware becomes popular
Shareware was also the distribution method of choice of early modern first-person shooters (FPS) like Wolfenstein 3D and Doom. -
Third Person Shooters developed
The first third-person shooter games were created such as Grand Theft Auto, Splinter Cell and Hitman -
Quake - first online FPS
Id Software's 1996 game Quake pioneered play over the Internet in first-person shooters. -
Voodoo 3DFX card released
In 1996, 3dfx released the Voodoo chipset, leading to the first affordable 3D accelerator cards for personal computers. -
Java/Flash become popular
Developments in web browser plugins like Java and Macromedia Flash allowed for simple browser-based games. -
Playstation 2 released
Sony released the PlayStation 2. -
Major games released
During this year Doom 3, Halo 2, and Half-Life 2 were released and achieved Gold status in sales. -
X-Box 360 released
Microsoft releases their second video game console, the Xbox 360 -
Social Networking games become popular
Facebook games such as YoVille, Mob Wars, Mafia Wars, and FrontierVille, and FarmVille gain significant popularity. -
Call of Duty: Black Ops Released
Call of Duty: Black Ops changes the way people play FPS's online and single player -
GeForce GTX 500 series is released
GeForce GTX 500 series is created and marketed to public