Tuesday, March 3, 2009

Pong and PacMan and Tank, Oh My!














Before the creation of these fabulous games that I still, to this day, would chose to play over any modern day game, was the invention of the computer.  The census was what initially sparked the need for a device that would be able to compute mass amounts of numbers with flawless mathematic equations.  This resulted in the creation of the first, most primitive of computers, known as the Tabulating Machine.  Next, World War II sparked the next generation in computers.  This was created in order to break German Nazi code through radio airwaves.  Next came ENIAC and then UNIVAC.  Although this is the dumbed-down version of the evolution of the computer, it is what later led to the invention of interactive video games.

Pong was one of the very first of these primitive video games.  Initially it was played using a plastic monitor consisting of a grid that was taped onto the screen to simulate a playing field.  This later led to the integration of this playing field being programmed directly into the game,  gradually becoming what it is today.  This led to more modern and updated video games that we see and use now.

The creation of a virtual enemy first began in Space Invaders and sparked the platform for the majority of games now used.  Because of the massive popularization of these games, people, especially kids, became utterly obsessed.  Society and even the government began to get worried and attempted to control the situation by setting curfews and local laws. Just another situation that the government saw fit to monitor and attempt to take total control of.

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