Portal:Video games
(Redirected from P:Arcade Games)
The Video Games Portal
A video game, also known as a computer game or just a game, is an electronic game that involves interaction with a user interface or input device (such as a joystick, controller, keyboard, or motion sensing device) to generate visual feedback from a display device, most commonly shown in a video format on a television set, computer monitor, flat-panel display or touchscreen on handheld devices, or a virtual reality headset. Most modern video games are audiovisual, with audio complement delivered through speakers or headphones, and sometimes also with other types of sensory feedback (e.g., haptic technology that provides tactile sensations). Some video games also allow microphone and webcam inputs for in-game chatting and livestreaming.
Video games are typically categorized according to their hardware platform, which traditionally includes arcade video games, console games, and computer (PC) games; the latter also encompasses LAN games, online games, and browser games. More recently, the video game industry has expanded onto mobile gaming through mobile devices (such as smartphones and tablet computers), virtual and augmented reality systems, and remote cloud gaming. Video games are also classified into a wide range of genres based on their style of gameplay and target audience. (Full article...)
Featured articles –
Featured articles are displayed here, which represent some of the best content on English Wikipedia.-
Super Smash Bros. Melee is a 2001 crossover fighting video game developed by HAL Laboratory and published by Nintendo for the GameCube. It is the second installment in the Super Smash Bros. series. It features characters from Nintendo video game franchises such as Mario, The Legend of Zelda, Star Fox, Pokémon, and Donkey Kong among others. The stages and gameplay modes reference or take designs from these franchises as well.
Melee includes all playable characters from the first game and also adds characters from additional franchises such as Fire Emblem, of which no games had been released outside Japan at the time, in addition to new stages and gameplay modes. Like other games in the Smash Bros. series, Melee's gameplay system offers an unorthodox approach to the fighting game genre, with a counter that measures damage with increasing percentages, representing the knockback the character will experience, rather than a depleting health bar seen in most fighting games.
Melee was first released in Japan in November 2001, in the Americas in December 2001, and in Europe and Australia in May 2002. The game received widespread acclaim from critics, earning praise for its visuals, simple controls, gameplay, and orchestrated soundtrack, as well as several awards and acknowledgments from various publications; it is now considered one of the greatest video games ever made. It achieved strong sales upon its release, becoming the GameCube's best-selling title, with over seven million copies sold by 2008. Considered one of the most competitively viable Smash Bros. games due to its fast-paced and aggressive gameplay, Melee has been featured in many competitive gaming tournaments, boasting a dedicated grassroots fan community which has kept its competitive scene alive well beyond the game's original lifespan. It was followed by Super Smash Bros. Brawl for the Wii in 2008. (Full article...) -
The Last of Us is a 2013 action-adventure game developed by Naughty Dog and published by Sony Computer Entertainment. Players control Joel, a smuggler tasked with escorting a teenage girl, Ellie, across a post-apocalyptic United States. The Last of Us is played from a third-person perspective. Players use firearms, improvised weapons, and stealth to defend against hostile humans and cannibalistic creatures infected by a mutated fungus. In the online multiplayer mode, up to eight players engage in cooperative and competitive gameplay.
Development of The Last of Us began in 2009, soon after the release of Naughty Dog's previous game, Uncharted 2: Among Thieves. For the first time in the company's history, Naughty Dog split into two teams; while one team developed Uncharted 3: Drake's Deception, the other half developed The Last of Us. The relationship between Joel and Ellie became the focus, with all other elements developed around it. Actors Troy Baker and Ashley Johnson portrayed Joel and Ellie, respectively, through voice and motion capture, and assisted creative director Neil Druckmann with the development of the characters and story. The original score was composed and performed by Gustavo Santaolalla.
Following its announcement in December 2011, The Last of Us was widely anticipated. It was released for the PlayStation 3 in June 2013 to acclaim for its narrative, gameplay, visuals, sound design, score, characterization, and portrayal of female characters. The Last of Us became one of the best-selling video games, selling over 1.3 million units in its first week and 17 million by April 2018. The game won year-end accolades, including Game of the Year awards from several gaming publications, critics, and awards ceremonies. It has been ranked as one of the greatest video games ever made. (Full article...) -
Shovel Knight Showdown is a 2019 fighting video game developed and published by Yacht Club Games. It is an add-on to the platform game Shovel Knight. Players battle using one fighter from among a roster of twenty characters, each with various movesets and fighting styles. The game features several modes, such as "Treasure Clash", where players battle one another to collect the most gems, to a free for all battle to the death. In the story mode, a single player battles against AI-controlled opponents across several stages before facing a boss. Completing this mode with each fighter allows the player to unlock new stages and characters.
Yacht Club Games envisioned Showdown as a small minigame similar to modes in Mega Man 7 (1995) and Super Mario Bros. 3 (1988). The developers gradually built a more expansive title which they compared to a party game. Showdown was released for Windows, macOS, Linux, PlayStation 3, PlayStation 4, Nintendo Switch, Xbox One, and Wii U on December 10. It was launched alongside the Shovel Knight downloadable content (DLC) campaign King of Cards. The game received average reviews on release, with praise towards its characters and multiplayer gameplay. The single-player mode received a negative response, with many reviewers criticizing its difficulty balancing. (Full article...) -
Ninja Gaiden, released in Japan as Ninja Ryūkenden and as Shadow Warriors in Europe, is a 1988 action-platform game developed and published by Tecmo for the Nintendo Entertainment System. Its development and release coincided with the beat 'em up arcade version of the same name. It was released in December 1988 in Japan, in March 1989 in North America, and in August 1991 in Europe. It has been ported to several other platforms, including the PC Engine, the Super NES, and mobile phones.
Set in a retro-futuristic version of 1988, the story follows a ninja named Ryu Hayabusa as he journeys to America to avenge his murdered father. There, he learns that a person named "the Jaquio" plans to take control of the world by unleashing an ancient demon through the power contained in two statues. Featuring side-scrolling platform gameplay similar to Castlevania, players control Ryu through six "Acts" that comprise 20 levels; they encounter enemies that must be dispatched with Ryu's katana and other secondary weapons.
Ninja Gaiden has an elaborate story told through anime-like cinematic cutscenes. It received extensive coverage and won several awards from video gaming magazines, while criticism focused on its high difficulty, particularly in the later levels. Director Hideo Yoshizawa named Ninja Gaiden as his most commercially successful project. The game continued to receive acclaim from print and online publications, being cited as one of the greatest video games of all time. It was novelized as part of the Worlds of Power game adaptations written by Seth Godin and Peter Lerangis. The game was followed by Ninja Gaiden II: The Dark Sword of Chaos (1990) and Ninja Gaiden III: The Ancient Ship of Doom (1991). A manga-styled comic book, Ninja Gaiden '88, published by Dark Horse Comics, continued the narrative of the five original games. (Full article...) -
Teardown is a 2022 sandbox–puzzle video game developed and published by Tuxedo Labs. The game revolves around the owner of a financially stricken demolition company, who is caught undertaking a questionable job and becomes entangled between helping police investigations and taking on further dubious assignments. Teardown features levels made of destructible voxels, and the player follows the campaign through consecutive missions. In most missions, the player must collect or destroy objects connected to a security alarm that triggers a timer. The player has unlimited time to prepare and is given upgradable tools, vehicles, and explosives to create a path within the level that allows them to complete the objectives and reach a getaway vehicle before the timer runs out.
Teardown uses a proprietary game engine developed by Dennis Gustafsson, who began developing the technology after winding down his previous company, Mediocre, in 2017. He initially implemented destructible voxels with ray tracing and, after several discarded designs, conceived the two-phase heist concept. While working closely with the former Mediocre designer Emil Bengtsson, Gustafsson regularly shared development updates via Twitter and the resulting popularity led him to not pursue traditional marketing for Teardown. The game was announced in October 2019 and an early version was available through early access from October 2020, with the full game's release in April 2022.
Teardown saw positive reactions leading up to and during its early access phase, and it received favourable reviews upon release. Critics praised the game's physics, interactivity, graphics implementation, art style, and music. Mixed opinions were voiced regarding the campaign progression and story, while some control elements were criticised. The game's support for mods was cited as a major factor for its potential longevity. Teardown had sold 1.1 million copies by August 2022, and the game's success led to Tuxedo Labs being acquired by Saber Interactive under Embracer Group. PlayStation 5 and Xbox Series X/S ports, published by Saber Interactive, were released in November 2023, upping the player count to 2.5 million. (Full article...) -
Radical Dreamers is a 1996 text-based visual novel adventure video game developed and published by Square for the Satellaview, a satellite peripheral for the Super Famicom. It forms part of the Chrono series, acting as a side story to the 1995 game Chrono Trigger. A version of the game is included with Chrono Cross: The Radical Dreamers Edition, which was released worldwide on April 7, 2022, for Windows, the Nintendo Switch, the PlayStation 4 and the Xbox One.
The game centers around an infiltration carried out by the titular thief gang led by Kid; aided by Serge and Magil, she seeks an artifact called the Frozen Flame and revenge on its keeper Lord Lynx. Players navigate the mansion's environments and impact the story's progression through text choices. Chrono Trigger writer Masato Kato both directed and wrote the main scenario. Due to his attitude at the time, the plot and tone were considerably darker than Chrono Trigger, though the additional scenarists wrote alternate scenarios with comedic tones. The music was scored by Yasunori Mitsuda, who had worked on Chrono Trigger. Production was completed in three months, and Kato was left unsatisfied with its quality.
As with most Satellaview titles, Radical Dreamers did not receive a lasting commercial release at the time, and was exclusive to Japan. Attempts to bundle the game with the PlayStation port of Chrono Trigger were stopped by Kato due to quality concerns. The ROM for the game was released onto the web, allowing for the production of an English fan translation. While limited, the original's coverage in news and fan sites have praised its narrative and tone. Kato would use plot elements from Radical Dreamers in his next game Chrono Cross. (Full article...) -
Metroid Prime is a 2002 action-adventure game developed by Retro Studios and published by Nintendo for the GameCube. Metroid Prime is the fifth main Metroid game and the first to use 3D computer graphics and a first-person perspective. It was released in North America in November 2002, and in Japan and Europe the following year. Along with the Game Boy Advance game Metroid Fusion, Prime marked the return of the Metroid series after an eight-year hiatus following Super Metroid (1994).
Metroid Prime takes place between the original Metroid and Metroid II: Return of Samus. Players control the bounty hunter Samus Aran as she battles the Space Pirates and their biological experiments on the planet Tallon IV. Metroid Prime was a collaboration between Retro in Austin, Texas, and Japanese Nintendo employees, including producers Shigeru Miyamoto and Kensuke Tanabe. Miyamoto suggested the project after visiting Retro's headquarters in 2000. Since exploration takes precedence over combat, Nintendo described the game as a "first-person adventure" rather than a first-person shooter.
Metroid Prime sold more than 2.8 million copies worldwide. It won a number of Game of the Year awards and is regarded by many as one of the greatest video games ever made, remaining one of the highest-rated games on Metacritic. (Full article...) -
Deathrow is a 2002 sports video game developed by Southend Interactive and published by Ubi Soft for the Xbox as an exclusive. Deathrow's development began in May 1999 as an online PC game. In early 2001, Southend transitioned to an Xbox console release, which let the team use pixel shaders, bump mapped textures, and specular lighting. Deathrow was built on an in-house 3D game engine and was Southend's first full release.
The game is based on the fictional extreme sport Blitz, a futuristic full-contact hybrid of hockey and basketball played with a flying disc. Two teams of four players attempt to move the disc through their opponent's goal, and teams can either win on points or by knocking out their opposing team. There are 150 individual characters across 18 thematic teams. The single-player campaign's plot is set in the 23rd century, when Blitz is a popular, televised sport and the teams battle to scale the ranks and win the championship. Players earn credits from their goals scored, opponent knockouts, and crowd-pleasing to be spent on player upgrades, bets, and new teammates. The game also supports split-screen and System Link multiplayer for up to eight players across up to eight Xbox consoles.
Deathrow received largely favorable reviews. Reviewers praised the game's fast-paced action, and surround sound, but complained of its high difficulty curve, generic soundtrack, and lack of online multiplayer. Some critics felt the game's use of profanity was excessive, while others thought it was a highlight. Reviewers considered the game's concept and mechanics similar to other series, specifically Speedball. IGN and TeamXbox both named Deathrow an Editor's Choice. The game won the TeamXbox 2002 Breakthrough Game of the Year award and the IGN 2002 Best Game Nobody Played. IGN later reported that a sequel would be unlikely due to the original's low revenue. Southend dissolved in 2013. (Full article...) -
Mario Party DS is a 2007 party video game developed by Hudson Soft and published by Nintendo for the Nintendo DS. It is the second handheld game in the Mario Party series, as well as the last game in the series to be developed by Hudson Soft, as all subsequent titles have been developed by Nintendo Cube. The game was re-released on the Virtual Console for the Wii U in 2016.
Like most installments in the Mario Party series, Mario Party DS features characters from the Mario franchise competing in a board game with a variety of minigames, many of which utilize the console's unique features. Up to four human players can compete at a time, though characters can also be computer-controlled. The game features a single-player story mode as well as several other game modes.
Mario Party DS received mixed reviews, with general praise for its minigame variety and criticism for its absence of an online multiplayer mode. The game has sold more than nine million units worldwide, making it the 11th-best-selling game for the Nintendo DS. Mario Party DS was succeeded by Mario Party 9 for the Wii in 2012. (Full article...) -
Master Chief Petty Officer John-117, colloquially known as Master Chief, is the protagonist of the Halo video game series and its spin-off media. The character first appeared in the 2001 video game Halo: Combat Evolved, a science fiction first-person shooter that became a long-running franchise. The character also appears in spin-off Halo media such as the 2012 film Halo 4: Forward Unto Dawn, the 2022 Halo television series, and several graphic novels and books.
The Master Chief is a towering supersoldier known as a "Spartan", trained from childhood for combat. The designers intended for players to be able to project their own intentions into the character and thus reduced his voiced lines and concealed his appearance under his armor. In the video games, the character is voiced by former disc jockey Steve Downes, who based his performance on Bungie's description calling for a man of few words, similar to Clint Eastwood. In spin-off media, he is portrayed by different voice and physical actors, most notably Pablo Schreiber on the 2022 live-action TV series.
A pop culture icon, Master Chief is widely regarded as one of the greatest video game characters of all time, with the character being seen as a mascot for Halo and the Xbox brand. His 2001 debut received a generally positive reception for his character design, with publications praising how the narrative allows players to inhabit the character, while others have criticized him as under characterized. In later Halo games developed by 343 Industries, the characterization of Master Chief earned praise for exploring his humanity and his relationship with Cortana. (Full article...)
Did you know... -
- ... that the video game Pyongyang Racer was developed in North Korea for Koryo Tours, which organises tours to the country?
- ... that the illustrations in the 1992 video game Tetris Classic are based on scenes from Alexander Pushkin's poem Ruslan and Ludmila?
- ... that the video game Manor Lords was wishlisted more than three million times on Steam after its developer had estimated it would receive around 14,000?
- ... that Through the Darkest of Times was the first video game published in Germany to use swastikas?
- ... that Splatoon 3 became the fastest-selling video game of all time in Japan three days after launch?
- ... that the contrabass trombone has experienced a revival in film music and video game soundtracks?
- ... that a video game consisting solely of a clickable image of a banana was briefly the second-most played game on Steam?
- ... that Paul Dini was a writer for both the animated television series Batman: The Animated Series and the video game series Batman: Arkham?
- ... that the 1987 video game Oriental Hero was panned as "so incredibly bad it's almost worth a look"?
- ... that the video game Fursan al-Aqsa received an update that allows players to reenact the October 7 attacks on Israel?
- ... that Kamibox's video game A Joke That's Worth $0.99 is permanently on special offer because Itch.io does not allow $0.99 as a regular price?
- ... that the Chicago Sun-Times credits JumpStart Toddlers as the first video game targeted towards babies?
Selected biography –
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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...) -
Ralph Henry Baer (born Rudolf Heinrich Baer; March 8, 1922 – December 6, 2014) was a German-American inventor, game developer, and engineer.
Baer's family fled Germany just before World War II and Baer served the American war effort, gaining an interest in electronics shortly thereafter. Through several jobs in the electronics industry, he was working as an engineer at Sanders Associates (now BAE Systems) in Nashua, New Hampshire, when he conceived the idea of playing games on a television screen around 1966. With support of his employers, he worked through several prototypes until he arrived at a "Brown Box" that would later become the blueprint for the first home video game console, licensed by Magnavox as the Magnavox Odyssey. Baer continued to design several other consoles and computer game units, including contributing to design of the Simon electronic game. Baer continued to work in electronics until his death in 2014, with over 150 patents to his name. (Full article...) -
Nolan North (born October 31, 1970) is an American actor best known for his voice acting roles.
After his breakthrough role as Dr. Chris Ramsey on the ABC soap opera Port Charles in 1997, North moved into voice acting when the show ended in 2003 and has since become best known for his video game roles as Nathan Drake in the Uncharted series, Desmond Miles in the Assassin's Creed series, Merasmus in Team Fortress 2, the Prince in Prince of Persia, Dr. Edward Richtofen in the Call of Duty franchise, Deadpool in various Marvel Comics media, the Penguin in the Batman: Arkham franchise, Captain Martin Walker in Spec Ops: The Line, David in The Last of Us, himself as one of the voices for the player character in Saints Row IV, Tony Stark in Marvel's Avengers, and Ghost in the Destiny video game series. (Full article...) -
Richard Allen Garriott (born 4 July 1961) is a British-born American video game developer, entrepreneur and private astronaut.
Garriott, who is the son of NASA astronaut Owen Garriott, was originally a game designer and programmer, and is now involved in a number of aspects of computer-game development. On October 12, 2008, Garriott flew aboard the Soyuz TMA-13 mission to the International Space Station as a private astronaut, returning 12 days later aboard Soyuz TMA-12. He became the second space traveler, and first from the United States, to have a parent who was also a space traveler. During his ISS flight, he filmed a science fiction movie Apogee of Fear. (Full article...) -
William Ralph Wright (born January 20, 1960) is an American video game designer and co-founder of the game development company Maxis, which later became part of Electronic Arts. In April 2009, he left EA to run Stupid Fun Club Camp, an entertainment think tank in which Wright and EA are principal shareholders.
The first computer game Wright designed was Raid on Bungeling Bay in 1984, but it was SimCity that brought him to prominence. The game was published by Maxis, which Wright co-formed with Jeff Braun. Wright continued to innovate on the game's central theme of simulation with numerous other titles including SimEarth and SimAnt. (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.
Martinet is also known for his portrayal of Paarthurnax in 2011's The Elder Scrolls V: Skyrim, as well as Magenta in 2022's Dragon Ball Super: Super Hero. (Full article...) -
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...) -
Michael Morhaime (born November 3, 1967) is an American video game developer and entrepreneur. He is the chief executive officer (CEO) and founder of Dreamhaven, located in Irvine, California. Morhaime is best known as the co-founder and the former president of Blizzard Entertainment, a subsidiary of Activision Blizzard, Inc., that was founded in 1991 as Silicon & Synapse. He served on the Vivendi Games executive committee from January 1999, when Blizzard Entertainment, Inc. became a subsidiary of Vivendi Games, until July 2008. (Full article...) -
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...) -
Felix Arvid Ulf Kjellberg (/ˈʃɛlbɜːrɡ/ SHEL-burg, Swedish: [ˈfěːlɪks ˈǎrːvɪd ɵlf ˈɕɛ̂lːbærj] ; 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 has 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...) -
Koji Kondo (Japanese: 近藤 浩治, Hepburn: Kondō Kōji, August 13, 1961) is a Japanese composer and pianist at the video game company Nintendo. He is best known for his contributions for the Super Mario and The Legend of Zelda series, with his Super Mario Bros. theme being the first piece of music from a video game included in the American National Recording Registry. Kondo was hired by Nintendo in 1984 as their first dedicated composer and is currently a senior executive within their Entertainment Planning & Development division. (Full article...)
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Alfonso John Romero (born October 28, 1967) is an American video game developer. He co-founded id Software and designed their early games, including Wolfenstein 3D (1992), Doom (1993), Doom II (1994), Hexen (1995) and Quake (1996). His designs and development tools, along with programming techniques developed by the id programmer John Carmack, popularized the first-person shooter (FPS) genre. Romero is also credited with coining the multiplayer term "deathmatch".
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...) -
Markus Alexej Persson (/ˈpɪərsən/ PEER-sən, Swedish: [ˈmǎrːkɵs ˈpæ̌ːʂɔn] ; born 1 June 1979), also known as Notch, is a Swedish video game programmer and designer. He is the creator of Minecraft, which is the best-selling video game in history. He founded the video game development company Mojang Studios in 2009.
Persson began developing video games at an early age. His commercial success began after he published an early version of Minecraft in 2009. Prior to the game's official retail release in 2011, it had sold over ten million copies. After this point Persson stood down as the lead designer and transferred his creative authority to Jens Bergensten. In September 2014 Persson announced on his personal website that he had concluded he "[didn't have the connection to his fans he thought he had]", that he had "become a symbol", and that he did not wish to be responsible for Mojang's increasingly large operation. He left Mojang in November of that year, selling his company to Microsoft reportedly for US$2.5 billion. The acquisition made Persson a billionaire. (Full article...) -
Todd Andrew Howard (born 1970) is an American video game designer, director, and producer. He serves as director and executive producer at Bethesda Game Studios, where he has led the development of the Fallout and The Elder Scrolls series. He was also the game director for Starfield. (Full article...) -
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...) -
Gunpei Yokoi (横井 軍平, Yokoi Gunpei, 10 September 1941 – 4 October 1997), sometimes transliterated as Gumpei Yokoi, was a Japanese toy maker and video game designer. As a long-time Nintendo employee, he was best known as creator of the Game & Watch handheld system, inventor of the cross-shaped Control Pad, the original designer of the Game Boy, and producer of a few long-running and critically acclaimed video game franchises such as Metroid and Kid Icarus. (Full article...)
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Satoshi Tajiri (Japanese: 田尻 智, Hepburn: Tajiri Satoshi, born August 28, 1965) is a Japanese video game designer and director who is the creator of the Pokémon franchise and the co-founder and president of video game developer Game Freak.
A fan of arcade games in his youth, Tajiri wrote for and edited his own video gaming fanzine Game 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...) -
Hironobu Sakaguchi (坂口 博信, Sakaguchi Hironobu, born November 25, 1962) is a Japanese game designer, director, producer, and writer. Originally working for Square (later Square Enix) from 1983 to 2003, he departed the company and founded independent studio Mistwalker in 2004. He is known as the creator of the Final Fantasy franchise, in addition to other titles during his time at Square. At Mistwalker, he is known for creating the Blue Dragon and Terra Battle series among several standalone titles, moving away from home consoles and creating titles for mobile platforms.
Originally intending to become a musician, he briefly studied electronics and programming, joining Square as a part-time employee, then later a full-time employee when Square became an independent company in 1986. He led the development of several titles before helping to create the original Final Fantasy, which proved highly successful and cemented his status within the company. Following the financial failure of Final Fantasy: The Spirits Within, his debut as a film director, Sakaguchi withdrew from Square's management and eventually resigned in 2003. He continued his game career through Mistwalker, first co-developing projects through external partners and then smaller in-studio mobile projects. (Full article...) -
Jennifer Hale is a Canadian-born American voice actress. She is best known for her work in video game franchises such as Baldur's Gate, Mass Effect, Metal Gear Solid, BioShock Infinite, Metroid Prime, Halo, Overwatch, and Star Wars: Knights of the Old Republic. In 2013, she was recognized by Guinness World Records as the most prolific video game voice actor.
Hale is featured in animation such as The Real Adventures of Jonny Quest, The Powerpuff Girls, Codename: Kids Next Door, The Grim Adventures of Billy & Mandy, Brandy & Mr. Whiskers, Totally Spies!, Avatar: The Last Airbender and its continuation The Legend of Korra, Where on Earth Is Carmen Sandiego? and Star Wars: The Clone Wars. She also voices Thorn of the Hex Girls in various Scooby-Doo movies and TV episodes, as well as Cinderella and Princess Aurora in various Disney Princess media of the 2000s and 2010s. She is also known for voicing Jean Grey in a variety of Marvel media, most recently in X-Men '97. (Full article...) -
Sidney K. Meier (/ˈmaɪər/ MIRE; born February 24, 1954) is an American businessman and computer programmer. A programmer, designer, and producer of several strategy video games and simulation video games, including the Civilization series, Meier co-founded MicroProse in 1982 with Bill Stealey and is the Director of Creative Development of Firaxis Games, which he co-founded with Jeff Briggs and Brian Reynolds in 1996. For his contributions to the video game industry, Meier was inducted into the Academy of Interactive Arts and Sciences Hall of Fame. (Full article...) -
Ken Kutaragi (久夛良木 健, Kutaragi Ken, born 2 August 1950) is a Japanese engineering technologist and businessman. He is the former chairman and CEO of Sony Interactive Entertainment (SIE), the video game division of Sony Group Corporation, and current president and CEO of Cyber AI Entertainment. He is known as "The Father of the PlayStation", as he oversaw the development of the original console and its successors and spinoffs, including the PlayStation 2, PlayStation Portable, and the PlayStation 3. He departed Sony in 2007, a year after the PlayStation 3 was released.
He had also designed the sound processor for the Super Nintendo Entertainment System. With Sony, he designed the VLSI chip, which works in conjunction with the PS1's RISC CPU to handle the graphics rendering. (Full article...) -
Satoru Iwata (Japanese: 岩田 聡, Hepburn: Iwata Satoru, December 6, 1959 – July 11, 2015) was a Japanese businessman, video game programmer, video game designer, and producer. He was the fourth president and chief executive officer (CEO) of Nintendo from 2002 until his death in 2015. He was a major contributor in broadening the appeal of video games by focusing on novel and entertaining games rather than top-of-the-line hardware.
Born in Sapporo, Iwata expressed interest in video games from an early age and created his first simple game while in high school. He majored in computer science at the Tokyo Institute of Technology. In 1980, he joined the game developer HAL Laboratory while attending the university. At HAL, he worked as a programmer and closely collaborated with Nintendo, producing his first commercial game in 1983. Games to which he contributed include EarthBound and many games in the Kirby series. Following a downturn and near-bankruptcy, Iwata became the president of HAL in 1993 at the insistence of Nintendo president Hiroshi Yamauchi and brought financial stability. In the following years, he worked in the development of the Pokémon and Super Smash Bros. series. Iwata joined Nintendo as the head of its corporate planning division in 2000. (Full article...) -
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...) -
Mark Edward Fischbach (/ˈfɪʃˌbɑːk/ FISH-bahk; born June 28, 1989), known online as Markiplier, is an American YouTuber, actor and filmmaker. One of the most popular YouTubers on the platform, he is known for his "Let's Play" videos of indie horror 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...) -
John D. Carmack II (born August 21, 1970) is an American computer programmer and video game developer. He co-founded the video game company id Software and was the lead programmer of its 1990s games Commander Keen, Wolfenstein 3D, Doom, Quake, and their sequels. Carmack made innovations in 3D computer graphics, such as his Carmack's Reverse algorithm for shadow volumes.
In 2013, he resigned from id Software to work full-time at Oculus VR as their CTO. In 2019, he reduced his role to Consulting CTO so he could allocate more time toward artificial general intelligence (AGI). In 2022, he left Oculus to work on his AGI startup, Keen Technologies. (Full article...)
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Collection of Sony PlayStation video game systems.
Recent video game-related events
- September 12, 2024 – 2023–2024 video game industry layoffs
- Microsoft announces that it will lay off 650 Microsoft Gaming employees as part of cuts to its workforce. (Variety)
- August 15, 2024 –
- American video game magazine Game Informer discontinues publication after 33 years. The magazine's website is also shut down. (BBC News)
- May 24, 2024 – Uvalde school shooting
- Families in Uvalde, Texas, U.S., file a lawsuit against Daniel Defense and Activision Blizzard for creating the DDM4 V7 gun and promoting the weapon through the game Call of Duty, respectively. They also sue Meta Platforms for owning Instagram, which was used by the gunman. (AP)
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