Featured articles represent some of the best content on the English Wikipedia.
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Single-player cabinet
Computer Space is a space combatarcade video game released in 1971. Created by Nolan Bushnell and Ted Dabney in partnership as Syzygy Engineering, it was the first arcade video game as well as the first commercially available video game. Computer Space is a derivative of the 1962 computer game Spacewar!, which is possibly the first video game to spread to multiple computer installations. It features a rocket controlled by the player engaged in a missile battle with a pair of hardware-controlled flying saucers set against a starfield background. The goal is to score more hits than the enemy spaceships within a set time period, which awards a free round of gameplay. The game is enclosed in a custom fiberglass cabinet, which Bushnell designed to look futuristic.
Bushnell and Dabney designed the game in 1970–71 to be a coin-operated version of Spacewar!. After the pair were unable to find a way to economically run the game on a minicomputer such as the Data General Nova, they hit upon the idea of instead replacing the central computer with custom-designed hardware created to run just that game. While they were working on an early proof of concept, Bushnell found a manufacturer for the game in Nutting Associates. Working in partnership with Nutting, the pair completed the game and ran their first location test in August 1971, a few months prior to the display of a similar prototype called Galaxy Game, also based on Spacewar!. It was first shown to industry press and distributors at the annual Music Operators of America (MOA) Expo in October. With encouraging initial interest, though mixed responses from distributors, Nutting ordered an initial production run of 1,500 units, anticipating a hit game.
While the game was successful and validated Syzygy's belief in the future of arcade video games, selling over 1,000 cabinets by mid-1972 and ultimately 1,300–1,500 units, it was not the runaway success that Nutting had hoped for. The game spawned one clone game, Star Trek (1972), and Nutting produced a two-player version of Computer Space in 1973 without involvement from Bushnell and Dabney. The pair left Nutting in June 1972 and incorporated Syzygy as Atari, launching the successful Pong (1972) as their next arcade game. Computer Space's release marked the ending of the early history of video games and the start of the commercial video game industry. (Full article...)
The song received positive reviews. Chuck Taylor from Billboard said it was "absolutely enchanting" and would appeal to both young and mature listeners. It reached number 2 in Norway, number 4 in both Australia and New Zealand, number 16 in the UK and number 21 on the US Billboard Hot 100. It was certified gold in the US and Australia and remained M2M's biggest hit. M2M performed the song on episodes of the television series One World, Top of the Pops and Disney Channel in Concert. Two similar music videos were released for the song, with one showing clips from Pokémon: The First Movie. (Full article...)
After the Sequel was inspired by Sonic Heroes and other games both inside and outside the Sonic series, and it was developed with Sonic Worlds, an engine based in Multimedia Fusion 2 that reduces the amount of computer programming involved in game creation. It was released as a free download for Windows personal computers on June 15, 2013. The game was very well received by video game journalists, who lauded its preservation of retro Sonic gameplay and its 1990s-style soundtrack. The trilogy of Before the Sequel, After the Sequel, and their successor Sonic Chrono Adventure performed unusually well for fangames, having been downloaded 120,000 times by March 2014. (Full article...)
The game takes place in the kingdom of Valendia and the ruined city of Leá Monde. The story centers on Ashley Riot, an elite agent known as a Riskbreaker, who must travel to Leá Monde to investigate the link between a cult leader and a senior Valendian Parliament member, Duke Bardorba. In the prologue, Ashley is blamed for murdering the duke and the game discloses the events that happen one week before the murder.
Vagrant Story is unique as a console action role-playing game in that it features no shops and no player interaction with other characters; instead, the game focuses on weapon creation and modification, as well as elements of puzzle-solving and strategy. The game received critical acclaim from gaming publications, with some calling it one of the greatest games ever made. (Full article...)
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Sabre Wulf is an action-adventure game released by British video game developer Ultimate Play the Game for the ZX Spectrumhome computer in 1984. The player navigates the pith-helmetedSabreman through a 2D jungle maze while collecting amulet pieces to bypass the guardian at its exit. The player does not receive explicit guidance on how to play and is left to decipher the game's objectives through trial and error. Sabreman moves between the maze's 256 connected screens by touching the border where one screen ends and another begins. Each screen is filled with colourful flora, enemies that spawn at random, and occasional collectibles.
Ultimate released the game for the ZX Spectrum at an above-average price to combat piracy. Its premium product packaging became a company standard. The developers had finished Sabre Wulf's sequels in advance of its release but—in keeping with their penchant for secrecy—chose to withhold them for marketing purposes. The sequels were swiftly released later that year. Ultimate hired outside developers to portSabre Wulf to other computing platforms: the BBC Micro, Commodore 64, and Amstrad CPC. The game was later featured in compilations including the 2015 retrospective of games by Ultimate and its successor, Rare.
Several gaming publications recommended the game, and Crash magazine readers named it the "Best Maze Game" of 1984. Sabre Wulf was a bestseller and a financial success. Though its labyrinthine gameplay was similar to that of Ultimate's previous release, reviewers preferred Sabre Wulf. They further noted its difficult gameplay and lauded its graphics. Game journalists remember Sabre Wulf among the Spectrum's best releases, and for starting the Sabreman series. (Full article...)
Katamari Damacy (lit.'Clump Spirit') is a 2004 puzzle-action video game by Namco for the PlayStation 2. Designer Keita Takahashi struggled to pitch the game to Namco's superiors, eventually seeking student aid from the Namco Digital Hollywood Game Laboratory to develop the project for less than US$ 1 million. As director, Takahashi emphasized concepts of novelty, ease of understanding, and enjoyment.
The game's plot concerns a diminutive prince on a mission to rebuild stars, constellations, and the Moon, which were inadvertently destroyed by his father, the King of All Cosmos. This is achieved by rolling a magical, highly adhesive ball called a katamari around various locations, collecting increasingly larger objects, ranging from thumbtacks to human beings to mountains, until the ball has grown large enough to become a star. Katamari Damacy's story, settings and characters are highly stylized and surreal, often both celebrating and satirizing facets of Japanese culture.
Katamari Damacy received positive reception, becoming a surprise hit and winning several awards. Its success led to the creation of the greater Katamari franchise, and inspired numerous subsequent games imitating its quirky, colorful charm. Some critics have hailed it as a cult classic and one of the greatest video games of all time, praising its gameplay, replay value, humor, originality, and Shibuya-kei soundtrack. A high-definition remaster of the game, Katamari Damacy Reroll was released on Windows and Nintendo Switch in December 2018, on PlayStation 4 and Xbox One in November 2020, and on Google Stadia in September 2021. (Full article...)
While it reprises the action role-playing elements of previous Mana games, such as real-time battle sequences, Children of Mana features an increased focus on user-friendliness. Unlike earlier Mana titles, Children is a heavily action-oriented dungeon crawler, in which the player progresses by completing randomly generated levels. Both the main plot and side-quests require the player to fight through dungeons and defeat boss monsters before returning to the central Mana Village. Like many of its predecessors, the game features a local cooperative multiplayer component.
Children of Mana was designed by series creator Koichi Ishii, directed by Yoshiki Ito, and produced by Takashi Orikata and Katsuji Aoyama. The game was a moderate commercial success: it sold 100,000 copies in its first week of release, and more than 280,000 in Japan by the end of 2006. While critics praised the graphics and music as beautiful and unique, they found the combat simplistic and repetitive, and the story insubstantial. (Full article...)
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Blast Corps is an action game developed by Rare and published by Nintendo for the Nintendo 64. In the game, the player uses vehicles to destroy buildings in the path of a runaway nuclear missile carrier. In the game's 57 levels, the player solves puzzles by transferring between vehicles to move objects and bridge gaps. It was released in March 1997 in Japan and North America. A wider release followed at the end of that year.
The game was Rare's first game for the Nintendo 64. Its development team ranged between four and seven members, many of whom were recent graduates. The team sought to find gameplay to fit Rare co-founder Chris Stamper's idea for a building destruction game. The puzzle game mechanics were inspired by those of Donkey Kong (1994).
Blast Corps was released to critical acclaim and received Metacritic's second highest Nintendo 64 game ratings of 1997. The game sold one million copies — lower than the team's expectations — and received several editor's choice awards. Reviewers praised its originality, variety, and graphics, but some criticized its controls and repetition. Reviewers of Rare's 2015 Rare Replay retrospective compilation noted Blast Corps as a standout title. (Full article...)
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Diary of a Camper is an American short film released in October 1996 that was made using id Software's first-person shootervideo gameQuake. The film was created by the Rangers, a clan or group of video game players, and first released over the Internet as a non-interactive game demo file. The minute and a half-long video is commonly considered the first example of machinima—the art of using real-time, virtual 3D environments, often game engines, to create animated films. The story centers on five members of the Rangers clan fighting against a lone camper in a multiplayerdeathmatch.
Machinima had its roots in the demoscene of the 1980s, helping to inspire the demo recording modes of the video games Doom and Quake. Although players had previously recorded segments of gameplay, these were usually deathmatches or speedruns. Diary of a Camper was the first demo to contain a narrative with text-based dialogue, instead of merely showing gameplay. Commentators have called Diary of a Camper primitive, but acknowledge its importance in establishing video games as a medium for filmmaking; the film inspired machinima filmmakers and spurred more complex machinima works in Quake and other games. (Full article...)
... that development on the video game Expeditions: Rome was not affected by lockdowns from the COVID-19 pandemic because the developer was already split between Copenhagen and Istanbul?
... that when Kaz Ayabe pitched his video game Boku no Natsuyasumi to Sony, he said that illustrator Mineko Ueda was interested in the project even though they had never actually met?
Nobuo Uematsu (植松 伸夫, Uematsu Nobuo, born March 21, 1959) is a Japanese composer and keyboardist best known for his contributions to the Final Fantasy video game series by Square Enix. A self-taught musician, he began playing the piano at the age of twelve, with English singer-songwriter Elton John as one of his biggest influences in pursuing a musical career.
Uematsu joined Square in 1986, where he first met Final Fantasy creator Hironobu Sakaguchi. The two later worked together on many games at the company, most notably in the Final Fantasy series. After nearly two decades with Square, Uematsu left in 2004 to create his own production company and music label, Dog Ear Records. He has since composed music as a freelancer for other games, including ones developed by Square Enix and Sakaguchi's studio Mistwalker. (Full article...)
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Soule in 2010
Jeremy Soule (/soʊl/SOHL; born December 19, 1975) is an American composer of soundtracks for film, television, and video games. He has composed soundtracks for over 60 games and over a dozen other works during his career, including The Elder Scrolls, Guild Wars, Icewind Dale, and the Harry Potter series.
He became an employee of Square in 1994 after several years of private composition studies. After finishing the soundtrack to Secret of Evermore in 1995, he left to join Humongous Entertainment, where he composed for several children's games as well as Total Annihilation, his first award-winning score. In 2000, he left to form his own music production company, Soule Media, later called Artistry Entertainment. In 2005, he founded DirectSong, a record label that published digital versions of his soundtracks as well as those of classical composers. DirectSong remained active until 2019. (Full article...)
Charles Andre Martinet (born September 17, 1955) is an American actor. Martinet is known for creating the voice of Mario in the Super Mario franchise, portraying him from 1991 to 2023. He also voiced other characters in the series such as Luigi, Wario, Waluigi, and the baby equivalents of Mario and Luigi, prior to stepping down as voice actor to become an official brand ambassador for the series.
Jun Maeda (麻枝 准, Maeda Jun, born January 3, 1975) is a Japanese writer and composer. He is a co-founder of the visual novel brand Key under Visual Arts. He is considered a pioneer of nakige visual novels, and has mainly contributed as a scenario writer, lyricist, and musical composer for the games the company produces.
After graduating with a degree in psychology from Chukyo University, Maeda contributed to the scripts and scores of games released under the Tactics brand of Nexton: Moon and One: Kagayaku Kisetsu e. He has contributed both to writing music and scripts to most games released under the Key brand, notably writing the majority of Air and Clannad. He also served as a screenwriter and composer for several anime series produced by P.A. Works, such as Angel Beats! and Charlotte. (Full article...)
After working at Capcom for thirteen years, he left the company to form his own studio, Whoopee Camp. His latest game was Ghosts 'n Goblins Resurrection for former employer Capcom. He is notorious for making his titles difficult for the average video game player and strict personality among peers. IGN listed Fujiwara at number 13 in its "Top 100 Game Creators of All Time" list. (Full article...)
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Mechner in 2017
Jordan Mechner (born June 4, 1964) is an American video game designer, author, screenwriter, filmmaker, and former video game programmer. A major figure in the development of cinematic video games and a pioneer in video game animation, he began his career designing and programming the bestselling 1984 martial arts game Karateka for the Apple II while a student at Yale University. He followed it with the platform game Prince of Persia five years later; it was widely ported and became a hit. Both games used rotoscoping, where actors shot on film by Mechner were drawn over to create in-game animation. Prince of Persia has become the basis for a long-running franchise, including a 2010 live-action film released by Walt Disney Pictures and an ongoing series of video games published by Ubisoft.
Mechner is the recipient of many accolades, including the 2017 GDC Pioneer Award. His works are often included in all-time lists of the game industry's best and most influential titles. (Full article...)
Tōru Iwatani (岩谷 徹, Iwatani Tōru, born January 25, 1955) is a Japanese video game designer who spent much of his career working for Namco. He is best known as the creator of the arcade gamePac-Man (1980). In 2009, he was chosen by IGN as one of the top 100 game creators of all time. (Full article...)
Ken Kutaragi (久夛良木 健, Kutaragi Ken, born 2 August 1950) is a Japanese engineering technologist and businessman, currently president and CEO of Cyber AI Entertainment. Formerly the chairman and CEO of Sony Computer Entertainment (SCE), the video game division of Sony, Kutaragi is known as "The Father of the PlayStation" having overseen the development of the original console and its successors and spinoffs until departing the company in 2007, shortly after the PlayStation 3 was released.
Mark Edward Fischbach (/ˈfɪʃˌbɑːk/FISH-bahk; born June 28, 1989), known online as Markiplier, is an American YouTuber, actor, filmmaker, and influencer. One of the most popular YouTubers on the platform, he is known for his "Let's Play" videos of indiehorror games. He was listed by Forbes as the third-highest-paid content creator on the platform in 2022, and has won four Streamy Awards and a Golden Joystick Award. He has spun off his YouTube fame into a media career, venturing into acting and filmmaking.
After joining YouTube in 2012, Fischbach became popular on the platform with Let's Plays of Amnesia: The Dark Descent (2010) and the Five Nights at Freddy's series; as of 2024, his channel had over 37 million subscribers. He signed with talent agency William Morris Endeavor in 2016. While with the agency, he released a clothing line, wrote and directed the YouTube Original series A Heist with Markiplier (2019) and In Space with Markiplier (2022), and hosted or co-hosted two podcasts which reached No. 1 on Spotify. (Full article...)
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Steve Ritchie speaks during the Atari panel at California Extreme 2009
Steven Scott Ritchie (born February 13, 1950) is an American pinball and video game designer. His career began in the 1970s. Ritchie holds the record for best-selling pinball designer in history. He has been called "The Master of Flow" due to the emphasis in his designs on ball speed, loops, and long smooth shots. Ritchie was also the original voice of Shao Kahn in the Mortal Kombat fighting game series, serving as the announcer of Mortal Kombat II (1993), Mortal Kombat 3 (1995), and the updates to Mortal Kombat 3. He is the older brother of fellow pinball designer Mark Ritchie. (Full article...)
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Rolfe in character as the Nerd in 2021
James D. Rolfe (born July 10, 1980) is an American YouTuber, filmmaker, and actor. He is best known for creating and starring in the comedic retrogaming web series Angry Video Game Nerd (2004–present). His spin-off projects include reviews of retro films, television series, and board games. He is considered a pioneer of internet gaming videos and is noted for his widespread influence on YouTube content after the series premiered on the platform in 2006.
Rolfe began creating homemade video productions in the late 1980s, having made more than 270 videos and short films by 2004. Among these were the first Angry Video Game Nerd episodes (originally known as Bad NES Games, and later Angry Nintendo Nerd), which were released on his Cinemassacre website in 2004. Two years later, he gained mainstream attention when the series went viral after being published to YouTube. Following its success, Rolfe released a feature-length film based on the series in 2014, which received a mixed reception. (Full article...)
In 1991, he moved to the United States and later became a U.S. citizen. In 1996, Pajitnov founded The Tetris Company alongside Dutch video game designer Henk Rogers. Despite the game's high popularity, Pajitnov did not receive royalties from Tetris prior to this time. (Soviet Union had disintegrated by 1991). (Full article...)
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Bushnell in 2013
Nolan Kay Bushnell (born February 5, 1943) is an American businessman and electrical engineer. He established Atari, Inc. and the Chuck E. Cheese's Pizza Time Theatre chain. He has been inducted into the Video Game Hall of Fame and the Consumer Electronics Association Hall of Fame, received the BAFTA Fellowship and the Nations Restaurant News "Innovator of the Year" award, and was named one of Newsweek's "50 Men Who Changed America". He has started more than 20 companies and is one of the founding fathers of the video game industry. He is on the board of Anti-Aging Games. In 2012, he founded an educational software company called Brainrush, that is using video game technology in educational software.
He is credited with Bushnell's Law, an aphorism about games that are "easy to learn and difficult to master" being rewarding. (Full article...)
A fan of arcade games in his youth, Tajiri wrote for and edited his own video gaming fanzineGame Freak with Ken Sugimori, before evolving it into a development company of the same name. Tajiri claims that the joining of two Game Boys via a link cable inspired him to create a game which embodied the collection and companionship of his childhood hobby, insect collecting. The game, which became Pokémon Red and Pokémon Green, took six years to complete and went on to spark a multibillion-dollar franchise which reinvigorated Nintendo's handheld gaming scene. Tajiri continued to work as director for the Pokémon series until the development of Pokémon Ruby and Sapphire, when he changed his role to executive producer, which he holds to this day. (Full article...)
Following disputes with Carmack, Romero was fired from id in 1996. He co-founded a new studio, Ion Storm, and directed the FPS Daikatana (2000), which was a critical and commercial failure. Romero departed Ion Storm in 2001. In July 2001, he and another former id employee, Tom Hall, founded Monkeystone Games to develop games for mobile devices. (Full article...)
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Daigo Umehara in 2018
Daigo Umehara (Japanese: 梅原 大吾, Hepburn: Umehara Daigo, born 19 May 1981) is a Japanese esports player and author who competes competitively at fightingvideo games. He specializes in 2D arcade fighting games, mainly those released by Capcom. Known as "Daigo" or "The Beast" in the West and "Umehara" (ウメハラ, written in katakana instead of kanji) or "Ume" in Japan, Daigo is one of the world's most famous Street Fighter players and is often considered its greatest. His longevity is seen as an incredibly rare thing in the world of competitive video games. He currently holds a world record of "the most successful player in major tournaments of Street Fighter" in the Guinness World Records and is a six time Evo Championship Series winner.
Before properly being called a pro gamer from signing a sponsorship deal with Mad Catz, Japanese media usually referred to Daigo as "the god of 2D fighting games" (2D格闘ゲームの神, 2D Kakutō Gēmu no Kami). (Full article...)
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Kjellberg in July 2019
Felix Arvid Ulf Kjellberg (/ˈʃɛlbɜːrɡ/SHEL-burg, Swedish:[ˈfěːlɪksˈǎrːvɪdɵlfˈɕɛ̂lːbærj]ⓘ; born 24 October 1989), better known as PewDiePie (/ˈpjuːdiːpaɪ/PEW-dee-py), is a Swedish YouTuber known for his comedic videos. Kjellberg's popularity on YouTube and extensive media coverage have made him one of the most noted online personalities and content creators. He has been portrayed in media as a figurehead for YouTube, especially in the genre of gaming.
Born and raised in Gothenburg, Kjellberg registered his YouTube channel "PewDiePie" in 2010, primarily posting Let's Play videos of horror and action video games. His channel gained a substantial following and was one of the fastest growing channels in 2012 and 2013, before becoming the most-subscribed on YouTube on 15 August 2013. From 29 December 2014 to 14 February 2017, Kjellberg's channel was also the most-viewed on the platform. During this period, his content shifted focus from Let's Plays and diversified to include vlogs, comedy shorts, formatted shows, and music videos. (Full article...)
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Nolan North (born October 31, 1970) is an American actor best known for his voice acting roles.
Hideo Kojima (小島 秀夫, Kojima Hideo, born August 24, 1963) is a Japanese video game designer. Regarded as one of the first auteurs of video games, he developed a strong passion for film and literature during his childhood and adolescence, which in turn has had a significant influence on his games. In 1986, Kojima joined Konami, for which he directed, designed and wrote Metal Gear (1987) for the MSX2, the game that laid the foundations for the stealth genre and the Metal Gear franchise, his best known and most acclaimed work. At Konami, he also produced the Zone of the Enders series, as well as designing and writing Snatcher (1988) and Policenauts (1994), graphic adventure games regarded for their cinematic presentation.
Kojima founded Kojima Productions within Konami in 2005, and he was appointed vice president of Konami Digital Entertainment in 2011. Following his departure from Konami in 2015, he refounded Kojima Productions as an independent studio; his first game outside Konami, Death Stranding, was released in 2019. (Full article...)
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Lim Yo-hwan in 2021
Lim Yo-hwan (Korean: 임요환; Hanja: 林遙煥, born September 4, 1980), known online as SlayerS_'BoxeR' (usually shortened to BoxeR), is a former professional player of the real-time strategy computer game StarCraft. He is often referred to as "The Terran Emperor", or simply "The Emperor", and is widely considered to be one of the most successful players of the genre as well as a pop culture icon.
Lim won his first StarCraft: Brood War tournament in 1999. From 2001 to 2002, he won multiple major championships, including two OnGameNet Starleague titles and two World Cyber Games gold medals. In 2002, he also created the team Team Orion, which later became SK Telecom T1 (SKT T1) in 2004. He began his compulsory military service in 2006, where he played on South Korea's newly formed Air Force esports team Airforce Challenge E-sports. In late 2010, he retired from StarCraft: Brood War and founded the StarCraft II team SlayerS. He then briefly returned to SKT T1 as a coach in 2012 before retiring due to health related issues. Lim finished his playing career with a record of 603 wins and 430 losses (58.4%). (Full article...)
In 2012, Sarkeesian was targeted by an online harassment campaign following her launch of a Kickstarter project to fund the Tropes vs. Women in Video Games series. The threats and harassment generated widespread media attention, and resulted in the project far exceeding its funding goal. The media coverage placed Sarkeesian at the center of discussions about misogyny in video game culture and online harassment. She has spoken to TEDxWomen, XOXO Festival, and the United Nations' Broadband Working Group on Gender, and appeared on The Colbert Report discussing her experiences of harassment and the challenge of attempting to improve gender inclusivity in gaming culture and the media. (Full article...)
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