Zelda II: The Adventure of Link: How Nintendo Reinvented Zelda for Its First Sequel
When Nintendo returned to Hyrule after the success of The Legend of Zelda, it did something that would be almost […]
Game Histories
Video Game History
Explore the history of video games and the industry that created them. This section covers individual games, developers, development studios, publishers, gaming publications, companies, technologies, and other people and organizations that shaped the growth of interactive entertainment.
Game Histories
Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles: How Konami’s 1989 NES Game Began the Turtles’ Video Game Era
By the summer of 1989, four mutated turtles named after Renaissance artists were rapidly becoming some of the most recognizable […]
Gaming Publications
Archie Comics: How Sonic and Mega Man Gave Riverdale’s Publisher a Place in Video Game History
By 1980, Archie Andrews, Betty Cooper, Veronica Lodge, Jughead Jones, and their friends were living through the same arcade craze […]
Game Histories
Super Mario Bros. 2: How Doki Doki Panic Became Nintendo’s American Mario Sequel
When American players opened Super Mario Bros. 2 in 1988, almost everything familiar about Mario seemed to have changed. Instead […]
Game Histories
Metal Gear (1987): How Hideo Kojima Turned Hardware Limits Into Stealth Gaming
On July 13, 1987, Konami released a new game for the MSX2 home computer in Japan. Its cover promised soldiers, […]
Game Histories
Strider: How Capcom Turned a Futuristic Ninja into an Arcade Classic
When Strider reached arcades in 1989, it seemed to be in a hurry. Its hero dropped into a futuristic city, […]
Game Histories
Eye of the Beholder: How Westwood and SSI Reinvented Computer Dungeons & Dragons
The adventure begins not in a distant wilderness or ruined castle, but beneath one of the most famous cities in […]
Game Histories
The Legend of Kyrandia: How Westwood Turned a BBS Fantasy into a Point-and-Click Classic
In 1992, computer players entering the forest of Kyrandia found a fantasy world filled with talking trees, magical gemstones, strange […]
Game Developers, Gaming Industry Figures
Patrick Offord: The Westwood QA Tester Behind Red Alert, Blade Runner, and Retro Gaming
When the credits rolled on some of Westwood Studios’ biggest games of the 1990s, the most recognizable names belonged to […]
Game Developers, Gaming Industry Figures
Joseph B. Hewitt IV: The Westwood Artist and Designer Behind Eye of the Beholder, Dune II, and Command & Conquer
In 1985, Joseph B. Hewitt IV began making computer games at a time when the job of “game designer” was […]
Game Developers, Gaming Industry Figures
Glenn Sperry: The QA Director Behind Westwood Studios’ Greatest Games
When people remember Westwood Studios, certain names and images come quickly to mind. Brett Sperry and Louis Castle built the […]
Game Developers, Gaming Industry Figures
Frank Klepacki: The Composer Who Gave Command & Conquer Its Sound
Long before Frank Klepacki became associated with marching boots, distorted guitars, military radio chatter, and the sound of armies colliding […]
Game Developers, Gaming Industry Figures
Paul S. Mudra: The Audio Director Behind Command & Conquer, Spider-Man, and Marvel’s Wolverine
For players who grew up with Westwood Studios, the memories often come back as sounds. The warning voice of EVA […]
Game Developers, Gaming Industry Figures
Matt Collins: From Eye of the Beholder II and Dune II Testing to Hand of Fate Coding
Some people in video game history are remembered because their names appeared on the box. Others are reconstructed from the […]
Game Histories
Command & Conquer: How Westwood Studios Helped Define Real-Time Strategy
When Command & Conquer arrived in 1995, it did not invent real-time strategy from nothing. Westwood Studios had already helped […]
Game Histories
Dune II: How Westwood Built the Blueprint for Modern Real-Time Strategy
In late 1992, players who loaded Dune II: The Building of a Dynasty onto an IBM-compatible computer found themselves looking […]
Game Developers, Gaming Industry Figures
Brett Sperry: The Game Designer Who Helped Define Real-Time Strategy
Brett W. Sperry spent much of his career trying to make complicated games feel immediate. As a programmer, designer, producer, […]
Game Developers, Gaming Industry Figures
Marc Cram: The Westwood Writer and Designer Who Helped Shape Dune II and House Ordos
Marc Cram is one of those figures in early video game history whose influence becomes easier to see the deeper […]
Game Developers, Gaming Industry Figures
Louis Castle: The Westwood Co-Founder Behind Command & Conquer
Long before Louis Castle became one of the figures most closely associated with Command & Conquer, he was trying to […]
Game Developers, Gaming Industry Figures
Marco Herrera: The Westwood Programmer Behind Pac-Mania, DragonStrike, and Warriors of the Eternal Sun
Before Westwood Studios became famous for Dune II, Command & Conquer, Lands of Lore, and some of the most influential […]
Development Studios, Publishers
Strategic Simulations, Inc.: The History of SSI from Computer Bismarck to the Gold Box and Panzer General
In the late 1970s, home computer gaming was still an industry waiting to be defined. The Apple II had only […]
Game Developers, Gaming Industry Figures
Joel Billings: The SSI Founder Behind Computer Bismarck, Gold Box, and Panzer General
Long before Joel Billings became one of the pioneers of computer strategy gaming, he was a child looking for someone […]
Publishers
FCI: How Fujisankei Brought Ultima, Dungeons & Dragons, and Japanese Games to Nintendo
For Nintendo players in the late 1980s and early 1990s, the letters FCI appeared on an unusually varied collection of […]
Development Studios
Westwood Studios: From a Las Vegas Garage to Command & Conquer
In the mid-1980s, Las Vegas was known around the world for casinos, hotels, neon, and entertainment, but almost no one […]
Game Developers, Gaming Industry Figures
David R. Dettmer: The Westwood Programmer Who Helped Build Command & Conquer
Some of the people who helped build the defining computer games of the 1990s became public faces of the industry. […]
Game Developers, Gaming Industry Figures
Jimmy Maher: The Video Game Historian Behind The Digital Antiquarian
In March 2011, Jimmy Maher opened a new blog with a joke about the internet needing yet another blog. He […]
Gaming Publications
Computer Gaming World: How a Kitchen-Table Magazine Helped Define PC Gaming
In the spring of 1981, Russell Sipe was driving down the Orange Freeway near Anaheim Stadium with a computer game […]
Gaming Publications
Game Players Nintendo Guide: How an Unofficial Nintendo Magazine Guided the NES and SNES Generations
Before walkthroughs could be searched online and long before a player could pull up a video showing exactly how to […]
Game Developers, Gaming Industry Figures
Colin Gordon: From Choice Software and Ocean to Boss Game Studios and Valcon Games
Colin Gordon’s career stretches across several distinct eras of video game history. He began when commercial games could still be […]
Gaming Publications
Super Play: How Britain’s SNES Magazine Opened a Window into Japanese Gaming
In the autumn of 1992, a British Super Nintendo owner who wanted to know everything happening on Nintendo’s new 16-bit […]