THE EVOLUTION OF THE

VIDEO GAME
By Micah Fisher
http://www.museumofplay.org/about/icheg/video-game-history/timeline
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/History_of_video_games
 LIST OF VIDEO GAMES IN THE
CONSIDERED GOLDEN AGE 1997 TO
1999
Space Invaders 1978 Mortal Combat 1993
Pac-Man 1980 Warcraft 1994
Donkey Kong 1981 Tomb Raider 1996
M.U.L.E 1983 Zelda Ocarina of Time 1998
Tetris 1984 Ever quest 1999
Legend of Zelda 1987
John Madden Football 1988
Microsoft solitaire 1990
Sonic 1991
Dune 2 1992
1940
Edward U. Condon designs a
computer that plays the game Nim,
thousands of people play this game
and they lose 90% of the time.
1947
Thomas T. Goldsmith Jr. and Estle Ray Mann
file a patent for a device called the
“cathode ray tube amusement device” This
game could be considered the first, shooter
game because players are supposed to
shoot targets. The cathode ray tube is
connected to an oscilloscope display.
1950
First Chess playing computer game made by
Alan Turing and Claude Shannon they also
lay out guidelines for programming one
yourself in an article in a newspaper
1952
A.S Douglas makes a computer that plays tic
tac toe to expand on his experiments on
human interaction with computers.
1957
Alex Bernstein writes a chess program that is
able to calculate 4.5 moves ahead. He does
this and an IBM-704 computer.
1958
Willy Higginbotham creates a tennis game
on an oscilloscope. This is the basis for the
famous Pong game. It is dismantled 2 years
later and forgotten from its original home in
Brookhaven National Library
1962
Steve Russell, a student at MIT, invents
Spacewar! This is the first computer based
video game an becomes widespread all
over America.
1967
The “Brown Box” is made by Ralph Baer. This
prototype allowed people to play tennis
along with some other games.
1972
Nolan Bushnell and Al Alcorn from the Atari
develop an arcade table tennis game. This
arcade legend called pong is one of the
most well known arcade games in history.
1974
The ‘prequel’ to Doom, Maze Wars
introduces people to first person shooters.
This game takes place in a labyrinth and is
made from wire frame graphics.
1978
Space Invaders was one of the most popular
games ever. People were spending millions
of quarters on it all over the America. This is
what really sets of the arcade industry and
really starts off the golden age of video
games.
1980
Pac Man is made when Toru Iwatani is
missing a slice of pizza it becomes a hit on
the Atari 2600 and in the arcade then Ms.
Pac Man comes out and strikes a blow for
gender equality.
1970S AND 80S
Gaming gets the most popular. The use of
Joysticks, Arcade Games, Gaming Consoles,
Buttons, Controllers, Computer Games, and
Improved graphics are what improved an
expanded the industry.
1978-1982
Video Arcades and affordable home
consoles improved and became better.
1980S
Computer games and online video games
are made and become more popular and
more accessible.
1983
The invention of 8 bit video games like the
original Zelda.

“8-bit color graphics is a method of storing

image information in a computer's memory or in
an image file, such that each pixel is represented
by one 8-bit byte. The maximum number of
colors that can be displayed at any one time is
256” https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/8-bit_color
1987
The invention of 16 bit video games like
Undertale
1990S
Improved handheld gaming, invention of 3d
gaming, and more wide spread PC gaming.
Like Doom.
1993 TO 2006
The advancement to 32 bit
and then 64 bit
2000S
Better gaming consoles
Nintendo: Wii, Wii U, Switch, DS, …
Microsoft: Xbox
Sony: PlayStation
2010
Mobile games come out and become more
popular over time.
 BIBLIOGRAPHY
• Strong, The. “Video Game History • Wikipedia. “History of Video
Timeline.” The Strong, The Strong, 24 Games.” Wikipedia, Wikimedia
Mar. 2016, Foundation, 18 Sept. 2018,
www.museumofplay.org/about/ich en.wikipedia.org/wiki/History_of_vid
eg/video-game-history/timeline. eo_games.
• Wikipedia. “8-Bit Color.” Wikipedia,
Wikimedia Foundation, 22 Apr. 2018,
en.wikipedia.org/wiki/8-bit_color.