History of Video Games Part 1

The 50’s saw the birth of many things; Disneyland, Stevie Wonder, Michael Jackson, My Mam and Dad, Velcro, Colour Televisions, Dr. Seuss’ Cat in the Hat, Organ Transplants and –of course- Video Games.

Estle Ray Mann (not quite)

Well, okay this isn’t entirely true because in 1947 two people called Thomas T.Goldsmith Jr and Estle Ray Mann fannied about with interactive electronic devices to create a simulation game in which the player fired missiles at “targets” (drawings that were fixed to the screen) this was the “Cathode ray tube Amusement Device”. Doesn’t exactly sound riveting but lets think of this baby step as the first stitch in a gigantic –still unfinished- tapestry.

However, I say that Video Games were born in the 1950’s because really, this is when advances in technology began to give birth to the form of entertainment that we’re so obsessed with today. In 1952 a man named A. S. Douglas created a graphical version of Tic-Tac-Toe which was programmed on a EDSAC vacuum-tube computer; he also wrote his PHD Degree on Human-Computer interaction. This guy wrote a PHD, and by just fiddling about making something for a bit of fun, he had perhaps unknowingly planted the seeds for a massive, rapidly growing industry .

What I find interesting about this is that as video game technology advanced, game storylines and objectives become more and more complex and imaginative; wandering away from the original very basic: “shoot aliens” all the way to, befriend all of your fellow companions, collect all of the different gems, do all the quests, pluck all the chickens and help the princess give birth (or something). However, these days it has come full circle, with more simple games such as iPhone apps like candycrush or draw something and Portal gaining extreme popularity. It just amuses me that we always seem to revert back to the basics for entertainment. Perhaps simple is best.

Sadly I am a Candy Crush Addict

Anyway, back on track!

Another little stepping stone came along in 1958 when a bloke called William Higinbotham made what is considered the first video game ever; he called it “Tennis for two” which was created and played on a Brookhaven National Laboratory oscilloscope (nice short name there!). Skip forward just a few years to 1962 and then we have the first ever video game intended for computer use! Steve Russell created it and named it Spacewar! Which I think looks pretty cute, typical female opinion hahaaa.

Quick little skip forward to the early 70s, when out came;

COMPUTER SPACE

Nice Marketing Strategy?

Beginning to see a little bit of a space theme going on here. This was the first ever commercially sold and (of course) coin operated video game, hello beginning of the arcade! Following this came two different versions of the famous Pong, one designed for home use, and the other arcade version which was released in 1972. Video games had finally entered the home and the mainstream entertainment industry. Kids getting their pocket money and spending their coins on a little virtual ping pong screen, when they could play real ping pong at home for free. I mustn’t jest however, because simple little Pong turned out to be the game that really jumpstarted the games industry after other companies picked up on the hype of Pong and began to develop their own clones and systems.

Imitation is the sincerest form of flattery!

Turns out though that perhaps the boost of success for pong and its clone consoles was not as good for the new companies as they had hoped, as this led to the notorious video game crash of 1977.

Luckily it was SPACE INVADERS TO THE RESCUEEE! Taitos 1978 shooter further inspired manufacturers to enter the market, perhaps realizing this new entertainment genre’s potential. Boom boom along came more arcade machines appearing in mainstream locations and being written about in magazines. Arcade games, and video games had entered popular culture officially.

Its funny because many people nowadays would think of the original creators of video games maybe being some kids sitting messing about in their basement, trying to find ways of procrastinating from their exams or some such. In fact I’ve found they’re not far off, really to put it simply, Video Games were created by academics who were (in their own way) procrastinating and fannying about. I’ve always hoped that one day video games would be taken just as seriously as a medium as that of the film industry. Discovering that academics were the ones originally behind the industry reinforces this hope for me, and just goes to show that no matter how “serious” someone or their profession may seem, everyone wants to have a little bit of fun every once in a while.

Lets all be truly thankful that these extremely intelligent people did mess about a bit, otherwise we may not have been experiencing video games in the way that we do now!

New Games Journalism (Me Rambling & Struggling to Articulate Myself)

omg.

Its Christmas morning 2010, and I have three hours to kill before my father’s side of the family join us for the annual mouth-watering dinner. I decide to try out one of my new games in order to stave off thoughts of hunger and distract myself from my grumbling stomach (stupid pigs in blankets leading me astray).

Anyway, initially I decided to try my hand at Elder Scrolls: Oblivion since many people had told me how wonderful and expansive it was, and so after spending half an hour using a character creator that seemed determined to produce the least aesthetically pleasing results possible, I then proceeded to stand about listening to some old king ramble on about something uninteresting before fannying about in some underground dungeons for about twenty minutes. It was at this point that I realised perhaps this game was not quite Christmas Morning material. I wanted to be sucked into another world; I wanted a game that actually made me consider missing out on my once-a-year plateful of deliciousness, so I then turned my attention to a game that I had purchased the week before, knowing little to nothing about it save for the fact that it was a fantasy RPG and that it featured a dragon both in its title and its box art. Dragons + Fantasy = overexcited inner nerd.

(Although I was never a huge fan of Oblivion; this bits pretty funny)

Embarrassed, as I am to admit that I purchased a game because of the mythological winged reptile depicted on the cover, that erratic decision might have ended up being one of the best choices I ever made in my gaming history.

So I strip off the clingfilm and pop the disc into my PS3 (may he rest in peace) and upon selecting “New Game” I’m thrown into an opening cinematic that proceeds to explain the plight of this order called the “Grey Wardens” who were engaged in battle with the barbaric Darkspawn. The graphics weren’t stunning and the story seemed about as standard fantasy as you could get, but the strong, important sounding voice of the narrator and the booming soundtrack caught my interest right away.

Soon after I find myself looking at my second character creation screen of the morning. Immediately I immerse myself in it, tweaking and toggling minute details to my hearts content, selecting gender, race, class, back-story and all the while imagining my character’s personality and lifestyle, right down to what foods they liked or what weather they preferred. Again this character creator wasn’t fabulous, I was unable to tweak body shape and the eyebrows always had this weird downward sliding aesthetic; as though my character were particularly perplexed by a difficult riddle or some such. Also no matter how much I tried to ignore it, I couldn’t escape the fact that the width of my dainty elven lady’s shoulders was the same as that of a rather more athletic elven man. However, the prospect of beginning one of “oh my god SIX whole different opening origins!” completely overshadowed any negative thoughts at this point; and so Emirah the Dalish Elf Rogue was born.  I press begin game.

I really like the music that plays during character creation too

Again comes the pleasing voice of my narrator, telling me a little more of my origin as the camera pans through some trees. I see a group of men running through the forest; I wonder what they’re running from. An elven man that my narrator informs me is my childhood friend “Tamlen” aims a bow at them. They have an exchange, during which I gather that elves and humans don’t exactly get along well, “there’s a surprise” I think to myself. Elf/human racism isn’t exactly a new aspect of the fantasy genre. Again, this does nothing to deter me “keep throwing me all of these fantasy clichés Dragon Age!” I think to myself.

Then something wonderful happened.

Emirah walks on screen, I note to myself that perhaps the other hairstyle would have suited her character better, but no time to dwell on that, as Tamlen has just addressed her directly. Expecting either the good old Legend of Zelda silent protagonist “Yes/No” checkbox or the unfitting preset script read of a voice actor; I instead found myself unbelievably surprised.

An options box appeared, filled with RESPONSES.

Ohhh my gosh, a whole selection of different replies, each reflecting different personalities! Excitement bubbled up within me; could games even do this? Did they even do this? Since when did they do this? WHY DIDN’T MORE GAMES DO THIS?! I carefully considered the choice that would best suit my cheeky, sceptical Dalish elf. Would she kill them outright? Would she want to spare getting into trouble? I eventually decided that Emirah was the curious type, always wanting to know more about things (nosy in other words) and so I picked the “lets find out what they’re doing here” option.

oh, Oghren

AND WHEN I PICKED IT, NO FOREIGN, ALIEN VOICE READ ALOUD MY CHOSEN REPLY. I was free to imagine my own voice for Emirah, attaching me even more to this character that had only just been born within my mind this very morning. I chose to imagine that she had quite a low, drawling voice for a petite female, with a somewhat croaky squeak inflection at the end of some words, showing the youthful, fun-loving side of her personality. Throughout this I was making myself painfully aware of what a character whore I am, unable to help myself from being reminded of days sat playing on The Sims and imagining exactly how each and every one of them would be in real life.

From that point on Tamlen and I conversed between ourselves and the “shems” (our name for the humans) we learned that they had found a cave, which interestingly enough contained a demon and Ancient Elvish writing; I gather from my companion that this is important. After choosing to kill one of the shems as a warning (slightly out of Emirahs character but I was feeling just a tad excitable). Next thing I know Emirah and Tamlen are running about the forest, stabbing attacking wolves and looting their bodies, Emirah also ponders why wolves are carrying about such useful items as “leather boots” and “greenstones” what use does a feral canine have for these things? Emirah tells herself that this isn’t important right now as we are nearing the mouth of the cave.

Credit to: ViNCeNT-aSMoDeus on Deviantart

Before we enter, Tamlen turns to my Dalish Rogue and enquires as to whether she’s seen this cave before, her reply is no, but that they should check it out (such is her careless explorative nature I’ve just decided that she has) and so the two elves enter in order to explore further. I think to myself that I quite like this character Tamlen and that he will be a good companion for my elven girl. The nagging voice of my mother rouses me from my fantasy world and implores the helping of table setting or drink pouring; I dismiss this with a mumbled “in a minute, two secondsss…”

 I resume playing in order to just very quickly peek inside the cave that Emirah is so curious about. Running after Tamlen and defeating the gigantic spiders that come toward her with swift backstabs and blocks, she wonders “what is this place and why does it look so much like a dungeon and so not like an ordinary cave?” Delving deeper and deeper and looting more and more treasure chests, her curiosity (and mine) continue to grow and grow.

Unfortunately though by this point I have one rather stressed mother in need of assistance, and so reluctantly I save the game and put on hold the adventures of the two Dalish elves. I’m gutted that I have to leave it for now, and itching to play more, but at least I have a huge delicious Sunday dinner waiting to be very thankfully devoured. Once I’ve sat down and begun to pile upon my plate the unbelievably yummy meal that only comes around once a year, amongst the cheery banter of my family members my mind wanders to the game, the land of Ferelden, Emirah and Tamlen; and I absent mindedly think to myself…

I wonder if elves like pigs in blankets?

Katie Rose Johnson Illustration

Clare Writes Poetry; A.K.A My Personal Gaming History

I'm a Shakespeare nerd

I really like poetry and I miss writing stupid poetry like in English in middle school so I’m going to write this entry as a poem so sorry if you don’t like poetry yay. If you (understandably) can’t be arsed to read it then just skip to the penultimate stanza and beyond.

Otherwise, enjoy:

When I was only five, maybe more
My brothers got Nintendo 64
With three controllers; yellow, green and grey

(green would’ve been mine, had I gotten my way)

But alas, ‘twas not meant to be,

as the present was theirs, and the youngest was me.

Grey became mine, much to my dismay

I would still steal the green one when Andrew was away.

The gaming console brought hours of fun,

And I loved to play (though I rarely won)

My reactions; too slow, my hands were too small
the weird controller design didn’t help me at all.

I often resigned myself to watching them play,

FATWHAP in all his glory

As long as I remained quiet, they would let me stay.
My favorite game was of course; no mystery
The Legend of Zelda series fascinated me.

I really loved Link and his pretty green dress,

My brother renamed him FATWHAP but I digress,

I loved his little brown boots and his fluffy blonde hair
he had virtually no personality but I didn’t care.

I really loved Hyrule with its different lands,
The woods of Kokiri, the Gerudo sands,
I loved all of its features, every last one,
If I’d have had to pick faults I would’ve found none.

As soon as I could, I completed it on my own
And discovered a feeling that I’d never known;

I had done it myself, finished my very first game

From that point on things were never the same.

Feeling determined, I began to pursue

A game that would make me feel that way again too.

I wanted the pride, the accomplishment,

Gratification for all of those hours I’d spent.

After Ocarina of Time I played many others
But a similar title I was yet to discover,

Until one day, following a twelve-year wait

I discovered a game that was a clear candidate.

I was sixteen and now had my own PS3,

Anything with Dragons & I'm sold

So for Christmas I wanted to play a new RPG.

I really couldn’t be arsed to read game reviews
It’d be fun for a change to just blindly choose.

One title had a dragon blazing on the cover,

It was described as “Dark Fantasy” so I was won over.

On Christmas morning 2010 I began to play,
And after only three hours “Dragon Age” blew me away.

The graphics sadly, weren’t up to much
But the characters and story were simply top notch.
It didn’t take long before I was completely hooked,
the games few faults were totally overlooked.

My fondness for this game made me realize

That characters were the most important; in my eyes

Shitty storylines and graphics could perhaps be excused

If made up for with an amazing character or two.

Luckily Dragon Age had plenty of these,
A variety of companions to come questing with me.
Each with their own back-story, dreams, hopes and fears,

This was the game that I had wanted for years.

However now, it seems that I am back to square one,

Although I can’t see how that feeling can be outdone. 
Dragon Age 2 didn’t even come close;
The whole experience left me feeling morose.

go away Merrill you look like a hairy
breadstick

My new companions were still interesting and fun,

But so much environment recycling just shouldn’t be done!

Not only that but the story wasn’t really up to a lot

I was left -sadly- uninterested, more often than not.

My party members though, and the familiar lore,

Do keep me replaying the games more and more.
I’d be lying if I denied the huge part of me

That is absolutely buzzing for Dragon Age 3.

So here’s hoping that Bioware gives me what I want,

Lots of interesting new friends, on a merry little jaunt!

Only maybe not so merry, and kinda filled with peril

With just as good teammates (and less like Merrill)

You’ll be happy to know that soon ends my rhyme

If you didn’t bother to read, or did not have the time

Kindly provided just a few lines below

Is a summary of anything that you might want to know.

And so there it is; though it may be quite shit

I hope that my poem amused you for a bit

Just one of the weird ideas formed in my brain

To explain “Clare’s History of Video Games”.

In summary;

When I was younger I played a lot of NES, SNES & Nintendo 64.

As I said in the above hilariously crap poem, I played a lot of Legend of Zelda; from the original NES game up to Majoras Mask (the last N64 Zelda Game) I also played on the Oracle of Seasons Gameboy Games. I blame Zelda for my love of elves and old fantasy lore things and forests and rivers and all that rubbish/good stuff. It really was my main influence in terms of video games, I was ridiculously into this series.

Competitive games like Mario Kart and WWF games (now WWE, of which I am still an unashamed fan harhar) are also a big part in my childhood as I used to play them with my brothers. Shawn Michaels the HBK pulls a baseball bat out of his arse on the SNES game, which is pretty funny.

He's just a sexy boy

Quick little list of other games I remember most from this age: 
Goldeneye –N64
Perfect Dark –N64
The Mario Games – N64/SNES/NES

Mission Impossible –N64 (only to punch the pianist though)

Donkey Kong –SNES

Pokemon Blue/Gold –Gameboy

Etc etc etc.

My old room when I was like 13; complete with N64,
HD TV, stitch teddies & copious amounts of anime/manga.
Oh dearr hahaha.

As I got older (between 8-14) my best friend and I developed a huge obsession for the Resident Evil games, even though I’m a massive wimp. Our favorites were Resident Evil: Remake for the Gamecube and Resident Evil 4 for the PS2. It would be interesting/horrifying to find out how many hours of our lives we wasted on these games. This is one of the few games with really awfully bland, badly written characters that I’ve actually enjoyed. Around this time I was also hating LOZ:Windwaker and loving LOZ:Twilight Princess. Also I did not buy a Wii because they are shit and I’m too lazy to jiggle about loads when playing a game; ruins the immersion for me. Just makes me think of chubby bored housewives desperately using the Wii Fit or playing Wii sports with their children in hopes of losing weight/filling in the hours while their kids are at school (no offence to housewives or Wii owners).

14 year old Clare on Christmas Day HAHA

I had a hilarious obsession with Guitar Hero, and it was one of the reasons that I purchased my PS3. Guitar Hero 3 usually had me up until ridiculous hours of night around Christmas, along with DRAGON AGE wooohoooo; Elder Scrolls Oblivion and Devil May Cry 4; a game that I enjoyed at the time but in retrospect is overwhelmingly style over substance.

When my PS3 eventually broke I gave in to the Xbox 360 hype and enjoyed games such as Fable (Hahahahahahaha just kidding) no but seriously I played a lot of Left 4 Dead, Prototype, Skyrim and Dragon Age 2.

Since working for a year last year and being at university this year I’ve actually not had a chance to really play much, plus the TV in my uni room is postage stamp size; so hopefully I’ll be able to get into a few games over the summer, who knows?

Rambling About Myself.

SPIDERMANNN

My name is Clare Mitchell; I am 5ft1 and a half inches tall, nineteen years old, currently studying Game Art Design at De Montfort University Leicester and I really, really hate writing about myself. However, I do love to write and even though my much-loved English Literature teacher would probably be vomiting at how horrific my grammar and writing style has gotten over the past year, I’m glad that these blog tasks exist to help me get back in touch with my internal English geek. As you can probably tell I adore books and adore the poetry of Alfred Lord Tennyson. His use of language to create imagery in The Lotos-Eaters and Choric Song (one of my favorite poems of his) is so beautiful and extremely inspiring. I could probably ramble on about that for ages so moving swiftly on…

View of Bedlington from
the Pit Heap

For the past 19 years of my life I have lived in a small mining town in the North-East of England called Bedlington, it’s about a twenty-minute drive north from Newcastle (if there’s no traffic, which is rare).  I haven’t really travelled much in my life, so I always knew that I wanted to choose a University far away from my roots. Now I’m here, away from home and absolutely loving it, but Bedlington holds a huge place in my heart, and –much to my mam’s delight- my accent doesn’t seem to be going anywhere. True to the Geordie stereotype I am generally loud, outgoing and partial to a drink (winey wine wine not Broon Ale, the standard drink of the Northerners.)

I am the proud owner of two older brothers who are 9 and 12 years older than me. I have a lot to thank them for as they’ve both influenced and supported me so much, although it is definitely their fault that I’m so manly (that, and the fact that I’ve spent my life being called “son” by my Dad). It’s probably pretty obvious at this point that I owe my initial interest in video games to them. We were a proper Nintendo family; I vaguely remember playing the NES and the SNES, but the Christmas that we unwrapped the Nintendo 64 I recall rather clearly even though I was so young. Many nights of my childhood were spent watching my brothers playing on Goldeneye, Mario Kart and of course, The Legend of Zelda: Ocarina of Time –I get the impression that many “gamers” of my generation also hold this as their nostalgic baby- until I was eventually old enough to play and complete it on my own. I even still have a book at home containing game designs from when I was 6 years old; its pretty much just Zelda with rabbits, I was young and really liked Watership Down at the time haha, sad child. So, that was my beginning, and from there my love for games just grew.

The thing I really loved about LOZ: Ocarina of Time was the illusion of vastness that the game gave me; I’d been thrown into this amazing world of fantasy and it was up to me to explore it. I loved the characters, the colours, the environments, the music; everything about this game just fascinated me. Being a very tomboyish child I always loved playing outside in the woods behind my house; running in the fields and climbing the trees and I was captivated by how in touch with Nature many of the locations in this game were; for example Kokiri Village, where the houses were built inside trees and a river ran through its heart. My young imagination just lapped up these ideas and environments.

Kokiri Village from Ocarina of Time

As for my educational background; I studied Art at GCSE and at A level, however, the course was very relaxed and independent and I was largely allowed to do as I pleased. As a result of this, I continuously picked subjects that kept me within my comfort zone, usually opting to draw people from photographs or my imagination and often adopting an anime style. My interest in this initially came from watching Dragon Ball Z, Beyblade, Outlaw Star and Pokémon as a child and teaching myself how to draw in such a way. Although the style is generally frowned upon on this course (to put it lightly) I learned a lot of what I know about anatomy from studying my own body or reading books when I was searching for reference for my drawings, so I am thankful for that even though I’m now trying to iron that style out in favour of something more individual.

My love for Pokemon hasn't died with age

I was accepted into De Montfort University with an unconditional offer, but after deciding that I wanted to develop my artistic skills, I deferred my entry and got myself a place on an Art Foundation course at Newcastle College. I stayed on the course for 3 months, but I found the teaching somewhat pretentious. It frustrated me that I would spend hours on a painting, worrying about colour choice, anatomy and style, only for it to be skimmed over in favour of someone who’d blown their nose on a bit of tissue and handed that in as a final piece (or something similarly ridiculous) No offence to Fine Artists, I’m sure that there was loads of hidden meaning behind that snotty tissue.  In any case, annoyance, lack of any real guidance and an Operation that caused me to leave the course for a few months lead me to decide to drop the course and concentrate on working to save for university over the next 9 months. For me, this decision really paid off’. Not only did I earn a substantial amount and get a taste of working for a living, it also gave me time to clear my head and think about the choices I’d made concerning University, moving away, et cetera.  After being determined to get onto this course ever since finding it when I was fourteen, the fact that I would be starting it in a mere few months was suddenly very daunting to me. So now here I am, and you’ve read about my very boring journey to get here.

Lovely Rainy Bradgate

So far, I’m absolutely loving this course; it’s everything that I wanted it to be, none of it has disappointed me. 3DS Max is a massive pain in the arse but I’m sure that in time I’ll learn to love it (hahahahaha) and hopefully create something that I can be proud of. In the future –although it terrifies me to think ahead- I would truly love to be designing characters for a games company like Bioware, or even working in animated film. Just the idea that something I had imagined could be given life and loved or hated by others, to me that is utterly amazing. There’s definitely a very long path ahead of me before I even get to that stage though, but it excites me to think of what I’ll be capable of at the end of this course (wishful thinking!).

Apologies for my tendency to ramble and my love of overusing punctuation (especially the wonderful semicolon) In any case, thank you for putting up with me so far and for the next 3 years!