1. Ross Loynd
GameDen Game console Timeline
The Arcade Era
1971-Original Cabinet GamesThe earliest known Arcade game was ‘The Galaxy Game’ it is the original coin
operated arcade game created on the campus of Stanford University
The coin operated arcade game era started from its release and its business
model, inserting change into an arcade machine whether it is for more lives or
the activation of the game.
1972-The creation of Atari
Atari using the business model of a coin operated arcade machine designed
the game ‘Pong’ ‘The first successful ping pong game’ which became popular
within the gaming history and was the first arcade game that became more
available to play to players
But other companies attempted to produce their own arcade games after the
amount of popularity that Pong had received, stopping Atari from being the
biggest producer of arcade games.

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1980- The making of Space Invaders
Taito (Taito is best known for producing hit arcade games, such as Space
Invaders and Bubble Bobble.)
Released the game ‘Space Invaders’ a pixelated game about shooting columns
of aliens as they approach faster each time.
Due to its succession, stores began to have ‘corner arcades’ which was just a
corner, with arcade systems to play.
Video game arcades began to be more common in large outlet stores and as
individual stores
Popular arcade games included Galaxian, Pacman and Battlezone, games which
led to the gaming industry being worth $8,000,000
1980+ Arcades competing against home consoles
late eighties to early nineties was the time of side-scrolling brawlers like
Double Dragon and one-on-one fighters such as Street Fighter II drew punters
back to the arcades in droves. Whether playing Golden Axe co-operatively, or
Mortal Kombat against another individual, the definitive way to experience
these games was standing shoulder-to-shoulder with the other player in front
of a genuine coin-co cabinet.

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Arcade game Decline
The creation of 16-bit games became more popular to home consoles due to
their capacity of being able to run the games
Unable to offer superior hardware, coin-ops were no longer publishers' first
port of call when it came to new releases, and their profitability took a
downturn. The advent of online play meant that gamers no longer had to leave
their homes to compete against complete strangers, so arcades' social appeal
also diminished making video game revenues drop to around $2.1 billion.
Modern Arcades
In the US, there are a fraction as many arcade parlours as there were back in
their heyday, while in Japan, the majority of them now house pachinko
machines (although this market is also in decline). Here in the UK, they still
adorn seaside resorts.
What remains of the movement by the time the current hardware generation,
arcades stood little chance of competing against the likes of Kinect and PS
Move technology, but it remains on ‘life support’ thanks to a dedicated niche
community.

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Arcade gaming Technology
Arcade games have more interactive controls than home game consoles do,
this is what gives them their individual values, and there are arcade controllers
that are far more interactive than the average handheld controller, like so;
Some arcade games included fully enclosed dynamic cabinets to thrill the user,
adding further edge to the arcade era, things that couldn’t be found in homes,
such as rear-projection displays, reproductions of automobile or airplane
cockpits, motorcycle or horse-shaped controllers, or highly dedicated
controllers such as dancing mats and fishing rods.
Vector graphics is the use of geometrical primitives such as points, lines,
curves, and shapes or polygon(s), which are all based on mathematical
expressions, to represent images in computer graphics.
Arcade games such as Battlefront and Star Wars typically used wire frame
vector based graphics to create 3D motion.

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Limitations
No online support or Multiplayer
Very large & hardware Dependant
Older hardware than what’s used today
Can crash a lot of the time
Rarely used anymore besides dedicated arcades
Games are created for them anymore unless they're arcade based
Can't save games
Basic Graphics (Low quality)
Game cannot be changed, one machine per game
Emulation
Emulators such as MAME, Kawaks, Zinc and Nebula all dedicate emulators
to playing old arcade games, such as Asteroids, Pac-Man and Missile
Command
Other PC Emulators such as ePSXE (PS1 Emulator) Porject64 (N64
Emulator) aim to bring back the old console games to emulation on the
PC.
After the release of Playstation Network and Xbox Live, old Arcade games
have been revamped to be available on home systems with basic
handheld controllers.

6. Ross Loynd
Console Gaming
The 8 Generations
First Gen
Although the first video games appeared in the 1950s, they were played on
vector displays connected to massive computers, not analog televisions. Ralph
H. Baer conceived the idea of a home video game in 1951. In the 1960s he
created a working video game console at Sanders Associates, but struggled for
years to find a television manufacturer willing to produce the console.
In 1972 Magnavox’s Ralph Baer created the ‘Magnavox Odyssey’ the original
home game console which could be hooked up to the average TV set, the
initial design had a large collection of switched that changes components in
the console due to the low CPU.
it was not until Atari's arcade game Pong popularized video games, that the
public began to take more notice of the emerging industry. By the autumn of
1975 Magnavox, bowing to the popularity of Pong, cancelled the Odyssey and
released a scaled down version that played only Pong and hockey, the Odyssey
100. A second, "higher end" console, the Odyssey 200, was released with the
100 and added onscreen scoring, up to four players, and a third game—Smash.

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Second Gen
in 1976 fairchild released the VES (Video entertainment system) which
contained a programmable microprocessor so its cartridges only needed a
single ROM chip to store microprocessor instructions which led to RCA and
Atari to creating their own Cartridge-based consoles.
The First Video Game Crash of ‘77
With the lack of production of consoles, Pong imitators started to stopped
Fairchild and RCA producing more console, leaving only Atari and Magnavox in
the console market.
The Rebirth of the home console market
VES continued to gain profit throughout the entire home system crash and
Magnavox brought their own programmable cartridge-based consoles to the
market but it wasn’t til’ Atari released a home version of the hit arcade game
‘Space invaders’ that the home console industry was revived.
Many consumers bought the Atari consoles based on the fact they could play
‘Space Invaders’ given any time of the day, its success spurred the trend of
console manufacturers, who tried to claim rights over many other arcade titles,
although there were many other consoles with higher specs than the Atari
2600, it still remained top of the market.

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Video Game crash of 1983
The video game business suffered a severe crash. Due to low quality video
games by smaller companies trying to get in on the video game market,
Atari hyping games such as E.T and Pac-man that were poorly developed and
resembles nothing of the arcade versions
A growing number of PC users caused consumers and retailers to lose faith in
video game consoles, Most video game companies filed for bankruptcy or
moved into other industries, abandoning their game consoles. A group of
employees from Mattel Electronics formed the INTV Corporation and bought
the rights for the Intellivision.
Third generation
In 1983, Nintendo released the Family Computer (or Famicom) in Japan.
The Famicom supported high-resolution sprites, larger color palettes, and tiled
backgrounds. This allowed Famicom games to be longer and have more
detailed graphics. Nintendo began attempts to bring their Famicom to the U.S.
after the video game market had crashed.
Also in 1983, brought the release of the NES which showed 8-bit graphics and
dominated the gaming industry, returning faith back into the console market
with Super Mario which brought attraction towards Nintendo gaming

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Sega's Master System was intended to compete with the NES, but never gained
any significant market share in the US or Japan and was barely profitable. It
fared notably better in PAL territories. In Europe and South America, the
Master System competed with the NES and saw new game releases even after
Sega's next-generation Mega Drive was released.
Fourth Gen
NEC (Nippon Electric Company) brought the first fourth generation console to
market with their PC Engine Hudson had previously approached Nintendo, only
to be rebuffed by a company still raking in the profits of the NES
NEC advertised their console as "16 bit" to highlight its advances over the NES.
This started the trend of all subsequent fourth generations’ consoles being
advertised as 16 bit. Many people still refer to this generation as the 16 bit
generation, and often refer to the third generation as 8 bit.
The fourth generation graphics chips allowed these consoles to reproduce the
art styles that were becoming popular in arcades and on home computers.
These games often featured lavish background scenery, huge characters,
broader color palettes, and increased emphasis on dithering and texture.

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Fifth Generation
The original fifth gen consoles were the 3DO and Atari Jaguar, although more
powerful than the fourth gen systems, neither could match the popularity of
Sega or Nintendo.
Atari cancelled their line of home computers, the Atari Portfolio, Stacy laptop
and their Atari lynx were all retracted from production when they released the
Jaguar. It was a gamble of all or nothing
And to retaliate, Nintendo released the ‘Donkey Kong Country’ which displayed
a large range of tones which was by limiting the number of onscreen hues.
Nintendos’ game Starfox used an extra chip within the cartridge to display
polygonal graphics which inspired Sega to release Virtua Racing which used the
same type of polygonal display.
Nintendo was the last to release a fifth gen console, coming in with the
staggering N64 which was the original 64-bit console, its graphics had been
unseen and with games such as Mario 64 and Legend of Zelda Ocarina of time,
it was the highlight of the generation.
Sixth Gen
Sixth generation began a move towards PC-like gaming consoles as well as
using CD’s and DVD’s to programme games into.
Sega released the Dreamcast in 1998 which implemented a type of media
known as the GD-Rom created to stop software piracy.
Sony’s Playstation 2 was released in 2000, with the ability to play DVD’s and
run games on CD’s all in the same slot, it was a rather big selling point and as of
2011, 150 Million units were sold.

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Microsoft released their first game console, the Xbox in 2001, it was the
original console to feature a hard-drive to save games onto, the first that had
an Ethernet port for playing online and the start of the Microsoft XBOX live
service
Seventh Gen
Seventh generation saw the releases of big consoles such as the Xbox 360 and
the Ps3, which supported new kinds of HD graphics and blu-ray discs.
All 7th Gen consoles had the technology to support wireless controllers, and
they had the new ‘Kinect’ for the Xbox which added more interactivity to the
Xbox, but was inspired by the release of the Wii’s wireless motion sensing
controller.
Eighth Gen
Other than usual graphic enhancements, so far the 8th generation has seen
upgrades such as stereoscopic 3d support and more interactivity with game
consoles such as the Wii U, with the PS4 adding new motion sensing
controllers and the Xbox one bringing in a new advanced CPU and hardware.

12. Ross Loynd
Limitation to all types of console
With the issues of lumbering a console around to play it elsewhere, you’d have
to be within your own home to be able to play it
Newer consoles have decided to scrap the idea of being able to play older
game gens discs in the console itself.
There is also a greater difficulty developing for consoles, which is only just
offset by the benefitof a fixed specification, in that developers can't develop
the game directly onto a console like youcan with a PC.
TV Game history
1953
A programme called Winky Dink and You, begins the move towards interactive
TV. Kids in the US buy a special transparent sheet to place over the screen and
then using ordinary crayons, help the show's characters draw things like
pathways or tools. The series is discontinued because children begin drawing
directly on the TV screen.
1959
First use of telephone call-ins during NBC's Today Show.
1964
AT&T shows the first video telephone at the New York World's Fair.

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1970
BBC technicians use the vertical blanking interval - the space between
television frames - to send messages between transmitter sites around the UK.
This technology was later developed into teletext. The technicians remain
anonymous.
1972
BBC announces Ceefax. ITV announces Oracle.
1974
The launch of Ceefax
1977
The world's first commercial interactive TV service opens in Ohio. Qube offers
30 channels divided between broadcast TV, pay-per-view and interactive
programming. Despite its popularity, it is not a commercial success.
1979
Prestel is launched in the UK. Although designed to be used on TV sets using a
special adaptor (with a modem), many users access the service via home
computers. First commercially available technology to link the TV with the
telephone.
1988
The BBC broadcasts What's your Story?, a children's TV programme presented
by Sylvester McCoy. The show asks viewers to phone in with suggestions of
what happens next. The best ideas are then used.
1993
Oracle changes its name to Teletext and uses the Fastext buttons for its quiz,
Bamboozle. The buttons enable users to navigate pages more quickly.

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1994
Channel Four programme Gamesmaster takes messages from an internet chat
room and puts them on to TV via Teletext subtitles. There are delays in the
messages appearing on screen so although popular, it only runs for one
season. Videotron pilots interactive TV in the south-east. The analogue system
allows viewers to choose content and make sports bets. Kellogg's Frosties
broadcast an interactive ad.
April 1996
BT runs an interactive TV trial in Ipswich and Colchester. Interactive ads for
Walkers Crisps allow viewers to play a quiz, watch the 10 greatest goals or play
a spot-the-bag game.
June 1996
Television Par Satellite becomes the first broadcaster to launch digital
interactive services fully. Rival Canal+ follows suit.
October 1998
Sky Digital launches its 140-channel service via satellite. The handset gives
access to TV guides on screen, though customers wait a year before the
interactive shopping service Open is available.
March 1999
NTL launches a trial interactive TV service.
July 1999
Cable & Wireless signs 10,000 subscribers. The interactive services allow access
to a range of websites. C&W is now part of NTL. Two-Way TV launches its
games and quiz service.

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August 1999
Interactive football makes its debut on Sky Digital. Viewers of the Arsenal v
Manchester United game can view highlights during the game, access statistics
and select different camera angles.
2000
ONdigital launches ONnet, a system that it says allows full internet access via a
set-top box.Sky's first interactive ad, for Domino's Pizza.
Autumn 2000
Telewest's Active Digital shopping platform finally goes live after being
launched nearly a year before. Services to be rolled out in 2001 include video
on demand. NTL rolls out its internet TV service.
March 2001
The Advertising Standards Authority rules that an ONdigital ad "misleadingly
exaggerated" its claim that its interactive TV service offered "full internet
access".
April 2001
Newham Council in east London announces plans to issue set top boxes to
council tenants to report faults.’
‘http://www.theguardian.com/technology/2001/apr/05/onlinesupplement5’

16. Ross Loynd
Handheld Gaming
Handheld games
A handheld video game console is a lightweight, portable electronic device
with a built-in screen, game controls, speakers and replaceable and/or
rechargeable batteries or battery pack. Handheld game consoles are smaller
than home video game consoles and contain the console, screen, speakers,
and controls in one unit, allowing people to carry them and play them at any
time or place.
In 1976, Mattel introduced the first handheld electronic game with the release
of Auto Race. The oldest true handheld game console with interchangeable
cartridges is the Milton Bradley Microvision in 1979.
Nintendo is credited with popularizing the handheld console concept with the
release of the Game Boy in 1989 and as of 2011 continues to dominate the
handheld console market with their DS, DSI and 3DS systems. However,
Nintendo's latest handheld, the Nintendo 3DS, has been their largest handheld
or video game console investment success in 30 years.
The early years.
The idea of handheld video games with interchangeable cartridges wouldn’t
take hold for about another decade, but Mattel managed to pry video games
away from quarter-swallowing arcades and dim televisions with their
successful line of LED-based, single-game handhelds. Most people today will
remember Football, but the company also released the creatively-titled
Basebal and Basketball, as well as the non-sports titles Missle Attack, Armor
Battle, and Sub Chase. Mattel also managed to jump on the retro-chic
bandwagon, re-releasing Football and Baseball in 2000.
The Game & Watch series was a handheld electronic games made by Nintendo
and created by its game designer Gunpei Yokoi from 1980 to 1991. Most
featured a single game that could be played on an LCD screen, in addition to a
clock and an alarm. Most titles had a 'GAME A' and a 'GAME B' button. Game B
is usually a faster, more difficult version of game A.

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The Game Boy was first introduced in 1989 as a pretty big, pretty plain,
colorless portable game console. Four AA batteries got this puppy going for
almost 20 hours of gameplay. And the only way to get stereo sound off the
Game Boy was if you plugged in some headphones (only has one tiny speaker).
Game Boy's software library included some of the best games of all time
though like Tetris and Pokémon.
The Lynx was a handheld game console released by Atari in 1989. The Lynx
holds the distinction of being the world's first handheld electronic game with a
colour LCD display. The system is also notable for its forward-looking features,
advanced graphics, and ambidextrous layout. The Lynx was released in 1989,
the same year as Nintendo's (monochromatic) Game Boy. However, the Lynx
failed to achieve the critical mass required to attract quality third party
developers, and was eventually abandoned.
Work began on the console in 1989 under the codename "Project Mercury", as
per Sega's policy at the time of codenaming their systems after planets. The
system was released in Japan on October 6, 1990, in North America and
Europe in 1991, and in Australia in 1992. The launch price was $149.99. Over
250 titles were released worldwide for the Game Gear, although at the time of
the console's launch there were only six software titles available. Sega made
sure that a wide variety of video game genres were represented on the system,
in order to give it a broad appeal. Prices for game cartridges initially ranged
from $24.99 to $29.99 each.

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The Watara Supervision is a monochrome handheld game console, originating
from Hong Kong, and introduced in 1992 as a cut-price competitor for
Nintendo's Game Boy. It came packaged with a game called Crystball, which is
similar to Breakout.
The console has a slightly larger screen and larger buttons, and its games sold
for far less than the Game Boy's. The games were simpler than the Game
Boy's, and the console did not sell well. The original design for the console
changed significantly through several iterations, and the last Supervisions were
sold in 1996.
Nintendo's Virtual Boy was the first portable game console capable of
displaying "true 3D graphics." Most video games are forced to use monocular
cues to achieve the illusion of three dimensions on a two-dimensional screen,
but the Virtual Boy was able to create a more accurate illusion of depth
through an effect known as parallax. In a manner similar to using a headmounted display, the user places their face inside a pair of rubber goggles on
the front of the machine, and then an eyeglass-style projector allows viewing
of the monochromatic (in this case, black and red) image. It was released on
July 21, 1995 in Japan and August 14, 1995 in North America and at a price of
around US$180. It met with a lukewarm reception that was unaffected by
continued price drops. Nintendo discontinued it the following year.

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The Neo Geo Pocket was SNK's first hand held video game system, released in
Japan in late 1998. However lower than expected sales resulted in its
discontinuation in 1999, and was immediately succeeded by the Neo Geo
Pocket Colour. The system only had a retail release within the Japan and Hong
Kong market.
The Game.com was a handheld game console released by Tiger Electronics in
September 1997. It featured many new ideas for handheld consoles and was
aimed at an older target audience, sporting PDA-style features and functions
such as a touch screen and stylus. However, Tiger hoped it would also
challenge Nintendo's Game Boy and gain a following among younger gamers
too. Unlike other handheld game consoles, the first game.com consoles
included two slots for game cartridges and could be connected to a 14.4 kbit/s
modem. Later models reverted to a single cartridge slot.
The Game Boy Colour was a response to pressure from game developers for a
new and much more sophisticated system of playing, as they felt that the
Game Boy, even in its latest incarnation, the Game Boy Pocket, was
insufficient. The resultant product was backward compatible, a first for a
handheld console system, and leveraged the large library of games and great
installed base of the predecessor system. This became a major feature of the
Game Boy line, since it allowed each new launch to begin with a significantly
larger library than any of its competitors.
The processor, which is an 8080 workalike made by Sharp with a few extra (bit
manipulation) instructions, has a clock speed of approx. 8 MHz, twice as fast as
that of the original Game Boy. The Game Boy Colour also has four times as
much memory as the original.

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Wonder Swan is a handheld game console released in Japan by Bandai in 1999.
It was developed by the late Gunpei Yokoi's company Koto and Bandai. The
Wonder Swan was made to compete with the Neo Geo Pocket Colour and the
market leader Nintendo's Game Boy Colour (even though the developer for the
Wonder Swan, Gunpei Yokoi, developed the original Nintendo Game Boy).
The Wonder Swan was later replaced by the WonderSwanColor. Although
some Wonder SwanColor games are compatible with the original
WonderSwan, many are designed exclusively for the WonderSwanColor and
show a message such as "This cartridge is for Wonder SwanColor only" when
run on the original WonderSwan.
Game Boy Advance (GBA) is much faster, has better graphics and better sound
(hence the name Advance, you catchin’ on?) And you can network up to four
Game Boy Advance units together for multiplayer gameplay on one shared
cartridge. What’s not new (and that’s a good thing) is the wide selection of
Game Boy games. Since the Game Boy Advance system is backwardscompatible, it can play its own line of games like Super Mario Advance, as well
as all games that have already been released for the Game Boy system.
The N-Gage is a mobile telephone and handheld game system based on the
Nokia Series 60 platform. It started selling on October 7, 2003. It attempted to
lure gamers away from the Game Boy Advance by including cell phone
functionality. This was unsuccessful, partly because the buttons, designed for a
phone, were not well-suited for gaming and when used as a phone the original
N-Gage was described as resembling a "taco".
In 2005, Nokia announced that it would move its N-Gage games capabilities
onto a series of smartphones. These devices are available since early 2007, and
games will be ready for download from the official web site starting from
November.

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The GameKing is an 8-bit handheld game console produced by the Chinese
company TimeTop since 2003. It is based around a 65C02 CPU running at 6.0
MHz and exists in two variations, the original GameKing and the GameKing II,
with mostly aesthetic and ergonomic differences.
The consoles have above-average sound circuitry capable of multi-channel
music and digital sound playback, but have quite inexplicably been equipped
with an incredibly poor quality black and white LCD screen, only supporting
four shades of grey and having a very low (48 by 32 pixels) resolution,
combined with a slow refresh rate, poor readability and adjustments,
compared to the original Game Boy.
The quality of its games, graphics wise, can be compared to some of the best
built-in cell phone games (excluding Java games), while their playing speed
(scrolling etc.) and audio is far superior to those found on cell phones (multichannel music and digitized samples and voices are quite common in
GameKing games).
In November 2003, Nintendo announced that it would be creating a new
console for release in 2004. It said that it would not be the successor to the
Nintendo GameCube or the Game Boy Advance SP. On January 20, 2004, the
console was announced under the codename "Nintendo DS". Nintendo chose
to release very few details at that time, only saying that the console would
have two separate 3 in. TFT LCD display panels, separate processors, and up to
1 gigabit of semiconductor memory. Nintendo president Satoru Iwata said "We
have developed Nintendo DS based upon a completely different concept from
existing game devices in order to provide players with a unique entertainment
experience for the 21st century." In March, the codename was changed to
"Nitro" and a document containing most of the console's technical
specifications was leaked. In May, the codename was changed back to
"Nintendo DS" (DS standing for Dual Screen) and the console was shown in
prototype form at E3. All of the features of the console were released by
Nintendo at E3. On July 28, 2004, Nintendo revealed a new design, one that
was described as "sleeker and more elegant" than the one shown at E3. The
codename "Nintendo DS" became the official name of the console that day.

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The PlayStation Portable is a handheld game console released and currently
manufactured by Sony Computer Entertainment. Its development was first
announced during E3 2003, and it was officially unveiled on May 11, 2004 at a
Sony press conference before E3 2004. The system was released in Japan on
December 12, 2004, the United States and Canada on March 24, 2005 and in
Europe and Australia on September 1, 2005. It is considered the first handheld
video game system to use an optical disc format (Universal Media Disc).
A new slimmer and lighter version of the PlayStation Portable, titled Slim and
Lite, was announced on July 11, 2007 and Sony's press conference at E3 2007.
It will be available in the US, Europe and Japan in September 2007 with various
colours and a very different box packaging to the current PSP. Among these
versions three were physically shown at E3 2007: a white version with a Star
Wars imprint, a piano black version and an ice silver version.
The Gizmondo was a handheld gaming console with GPRS and GPS technology,
which was manufactured by Tiger Telematics. Launched in 2005, the Gizmondo
sold poorly, and by February of 2006 the company discontinued the Gizmondo
and was forced into bankruptcy. Gizmondo was overshadowed by Stefan
Eriksson's involvement in organized crime.
The Gizmondo includes a GPS module for in-car navigation which could also be
used to track player movement in real-time for multiplayer games. It also
contains a 0.3 Megapixel VGA camera mounted on the rear of the device. The
Gizmondo can play MP3/WAV/MIDI music, WMV/MPEG4 videos and a variety
of 2D/3D games. It can send email and even SMS/MMS messages, although it
lacks the ability to send or receive voice calls.

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Released on November 10, 2005 in South Korea, the GP2X was designed to
play video and music, view photos, and play games. It has an open architecture
(Linux based), allowing anybody to develop and run software. Also, there is the
possibility for additional features (such as support for new media formats) to
be added in the future due to the upgradeable firmware.
A popular use of the GP2X is to run emulators, which allow one to use software
from another system on the GP2X.
http://gaming.wikia.com/wiki/History_of_handheld_game_consoles

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PC Gaming
Home computers were a class of microcomputers entering the market in 1977,
and becoming common during the 1980s
In the late 1970s and early 1980s, from about 1977 to 1983, it was widely
predicted that computers would soon revolutionize many aspects of home and
family life as they had business practices in the previous decades. Mothers
would keep their recipe catalogue in "kitchen computer" databases and turn to
a medical database for help with child care, fathers would use the family's
computer to manage family finances and track automobile maintenance.
Children would use disk-based encyclopaedias for school work and would be
avid video gamers. Home automation would bring about the intelligent home
of the '80s
The most popular home computers in the USA up to 1985 were: the TRS-80
(1977), various models of the Apple II family (first introduced in 1977), the
Atari 400/800 (1979) along with its follow up models the 800XL and 130XE, and
the Commodore VIC-20 (1980) and the Commodore 64 (1982)
The original home computer designed for home usage such as storing data and
messages was the Apple II released in 1977.
‘The Apple II series is a set of 8-bit home computers, one of the first highly
successful mass-produced microcomputer products, designed primarily by
Steve Wozniak, manufactured by Apple Computer (now Apple Inc.) and
introduced in 1977 with the original Apple II.’
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Apple_II_family

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The first range of computers
The first computer in general other than for home uses was the KonradZuse Z1 computer
The Z1 was the first freely programmable computer in the world which used
Boolean logic and binary floating point numbers, however it was unreliable in
operation.
On October 1977 The Commodore PET (Personal Electronic Transactor) was a
home/personal computer produced by Commodore International. A top-seller
in the Canadian and United States educational markets, it was Commodore's
first full-featured computer, and formed the basis for their entire 8-bit product
line.
Gaming on PC’s
Recognised games in the PC industry include
Tennis for Two
Tennis For Two was an electronic game developed in 1958 on a Donner Model
30 analog computer, which simulates a game of tennis or ping pong on an
oscilloscope. Created by American physicist William Higinbotham for visitors at
the Brookhaven National Laboratory, it is important in the history of video
games as one of the first electronic games to use a graphical display.
Spacewar
Spacewar is one of the earliest known digital computer games. It is a twoplayer game, with each player taking control of a spaceship and attempting to
destroy the other. A star in the center of the screen pulls on both ships and
requires manoeuvring to avoid falling into it. In an emergency, a player can
enter hyperspace to return at a random location on the screen, but only at the
risk of exploding if it is used too often.

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Mazewar
Maze War originated or disseminated a number of concepts used in thousands
of games to follow, and is considered one of the earliest examples of, or
progenitor of, a first-person shooter
Dungeons of Daggorath
Dungeons of Daggorath is one of the first real-time, first-person perspective
role-playing video games. It was produced by DynaMicro for the Tandy
(RadioShack) TRS-80 Color Computer in 1982.
Manic Mansion
Maniac Mansion is a 1987 graphic adventure game developed and published
by Lucasfilm Games. Initially released for the Commodore 64 and Apple II, it
was Lucasfilm's foray into video game publishing.
Elite
Elite was one of the first home computer games to use wire-frame 3D graphics
with hidden line removal. Another novelty was the inclusion of The Dark
Wheel, a novella by Robert Holdstock which influenced new players with
insight into the moral and legal codes to which they might aspire.
Doom
Doom is a science-fiction/horror first-person shooter developed and published
by id for the PC on December 10, 1993

27. Ross Loynd
Warcraft
World of Warcraft is a massively multiplayer online role-playing game
(MMORPG) created by Blizzard Entertainment. It is the fourth released game
set in the fantasy Warcraft universe, which was first introduced by Warcraft:
Orcs& Humans in 1994.
Online and Offline
The terms "online" and "offline" (also styled as "on-line" and "off-line") have
specific meanings in regard to computer technology and telecommunications.
In general, "online" indicates a state of connectivity, while "offline" indicates a
disconnected state.
offline storage is computer data storage that is not "available for immediate
use on demand by the system without human intervention." Additionally, an
otherwise online system that is powered down is considered offline.
Social Gaming
With current technology we can stream movies and pictures from the internet
and now it’s possible to stream games
We can now play games with people around the world due to companies like
Steam and onlive, who give you the change to choose your own username and
what games you want to play and purchase with others, Steams popularity is
rising due to the amount of PC gamers rising.

28. Ross Loynd
Coding Home PC’s
An early example of coding a home PC was the ZX spectrum
The Spectrum was among the first mainstream audience home computers in
the UK, similar in significance to the Commodore 64 in the USA
This became re-coded in order for Matthew smith to create the game ‘Manic
Miner’
Manic Miner is a platform game originally written for the ZX Spectrum by
Matthew Smith and released by Bug-Byte in 1983. It is the first game in the
Miner Willy series and among the early titles in the platform game genre. The
game itself was inspired by the Atari 800 game Miner 2049er.
Limitations
A constant usage of wired internet is needed to access its full potential
It can’t be taken around like laptops can
It’s difficult to fix an issue with the amount of different types of PC’s. all PC’s
are individual and have different uses, purchasing one sometimes doesn’t give
you all the details.