A Brief History of how video games came about! Part 3

The history of computer games - 2000's - Now

So we’ve seen how gaming had developed from being just an experiment by university students as their hobby to becoming one of the world’s most successful businesses with arcades and now home consoles. By the 2000s everyone knew what gaming was and it really did take off with home console gaming and PC gaming.

The Dreamcast

The new 6^th gen consoles were released in the early 2000’s it was opened with Dreamcast in 1998 and was the first console to have a built in internet modem! It was initially very successful but it declined due to Sega’s bad reputation from previous failures, as well as the anticipation of the Playstation 2, everyone was saving up and waiting for the PS2.

Playstation 2

The next big console that was released was the Xbox, and it was released by Microsoft, and it was luckily saved by the Halo Series in November 2001 as they were selling the consoles at a loss. Halo still is one of the most successful console game shooters, Oh I remember playing Halo on our old school computers on LAN servers, the good old days.

Though as time went on the development costs for games started to increase exponentially as games were getting longer, larger in size and more advanced with better graphics as well as being more than just linear, multiplayer was becoming very popular. In 2004 with the release of Halo 2 they had over 190 people in the credits and the game had taken 3 years just to complete with a cost of $40 million! 

People were beginning to have access to high speed broadband internet, this meant a whole new generation of Massive multiplayer online games, while they were few and far between they were one of the genres that were extremely successful, especially World of Warcraft, which had sold millions of copies, with a monthly subscription fee to top it all off, though it had taken the company 7 years just to complete developing the game. It was these types of MMO games that were different from the rest, there was an ongoing game play so the game would never have a true ending, which left a lot of people addicted.

Mobile gaming was also coming around in the early 2000s though it wasn’t as popular as console games, as it was running old arcade games which no one really cared about anymore. Mobile games were used more as a time killer than a recreational game. Though it is starting to change nowadays with the release of new advanced smart phones and the IPhone, which really has stirred interest from businesses.

Mobile gaming today

From 2005 onwards the 7^th generation consoles were starting to be released, it was opened by handheld consoles first, such as the Nintendo DS and the PSP, while the PSP had much better graphics and power, it was the charm of Nintendo’s dual screen handheld which sold to an entirely new audience of gamers with their release of Nintendogs and Brain Age series, which attracted female middle aged and young audiences compared to the usual male teenagers. 

 

Microsoft soon released their current console, the Xbox 360 in 2005 November, and similarly Sony would also release the PS3 a few months later.  They both featured brilliant HD graphics and integrated networks such as Xbox Live, and the PS Network. They were both very competitive when it came down to their specs, however Sony had priced their console about $200 more expensive than Microsoft’s which had made it the most expensive games console to be sold on the market.

After the PS3’s launch Nintendo did try something completely new and very risky, releasing the Wii at the end of 2006. Which was a motion controlled console, it had lower technical specs and the games on the Wii were no where near as good as PS3 or Xbox games, so Nintendo still remain 3^rd. However the console did become the world’s fastest selling games console, just out of sheer curiosity

Xbox 360, PS3 and the Nintendo Wii

Along with all these new consoles and technological developments, games took a whole new shape and form, full of incredible detailed environments and accurate 3D models with complex textures, the styles of games that would be released would all have Cut-scenes. It was all about the story and lore of the game more than the actual game play now. Games had such a greater meaning to us than just mere hack and slash shoot em up quick entertainment. They were like interactive movies. Which made them incredibly awesome if I do say so myself.

 Cut-scenes are core part of all the modern day games we see today as they would even go to such an extent to use motion capture with real life actors in suits which could capture facial expressions and movement accurately.

Cut-scenes in modern games - Starcraft 2

Gaming has taken a massive step in this modern day era, it has become a full-fledged extremely competitive industry. It has evolved so much and games have become a lot more expensive and time consuming to develop and create due to the competitive nature of the market and change in social attitudes towards gaming. It’s all about the big releases now, and all the small games companies which don’t get as much sales as they needed often end up being bankrupt. Which is sad because there’s less room for innovation if the same big companies keep making the same types of games.

Graph showing an estimate of development costs in games

Well that concludes gaming history so far, I hope you have learned lots about where games initially came from and how they developed over the years. If you are still reading this much of course, next time I shall talk about my personal gaming history.