Home Video Game Console
Home Video Game Console
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A home video game console is a video game console that is designed to be connected
to a display device, such as a television, and an external power source as to play
video games. Home consoles are generally less powerful and customizable than
personal computers, designed to have advanced graphics abilities but limited memory
and storage space to keep the units affordable. While initial consoles were
dedicated units with only a few games fixed into the electronic circuits of the
system, most consoles since support the use of swappable game media, either through
game cartridges, optical discs, or through digital distribution to internal
storage.
There have been numerous home video game consoles since the first commercial unit,
the Magnavox Odyssey in 1972. Historically these consoles have been grouped into
generations lasting each about six years based on common technical specifications.
As of 2020, there have been eight console generations, with the current leading
manufactures being Sony, Microsoft, and Nintendo; past console manufacturers have
included Atari, Fairchild, Intellivision Entertainment, Coleco, Sega, NEC, 3DO, and
SNK.
Contents
1 Overview
2 History
3 List of home video game consoles
4 See also
5 Notes
6 References
Overview
Main article: Video game console
Earlier home consoles were typically built from a selection of standard and highly
customized integrated computer chips, packaged onto circuit boards and cases. Over
time, home console design has converged to a degree with personal computers, using
similar component and system design, including standardization with main computer
chip architecture. Consoles remain as fixed systems, lacking the customization
options that personal computer components have, and most consoles include
customized components to maximize space and reduce power consumption to provide the
best performance for game playing, while lowering costs with reduced storage and
memory configurations.[1]
Home video game consoles typically can play a multitude of games, offered either as
game cartridges (or ROM cartridges), on optical media like CD-ROM or DVD, or
obtained by digital distribution. Early consoles, also considered dedicated
consoles, had games that were fixed in the electronic circuitry of the hardware.
Some facets may be controlled by switching external controls on the console but the
games could not be changed themselves.
Most home consoles require a separate game controller, and may support multiple
controllers for multiplayer games. Some console games can only be played with
special, unconventional game controllers, such as light guns for rail shooters and
guitar controllers for music games. Some consoles also possess the ability to
connect and interface with a particular handheld game system, which certain games
can leverage to provide alternate control schemes, second screen gameplay elements,
exclusive unlockable content or the ability to transfer certain game data.
History
Main articles: History of video game consoles and Home video game console
generations
The first commercial video game console was the Magnavox Odyssey, developed by
Ralph H. Baer and first released commercially in 1972. It was shortly followed by
the release of the home version of Pong by Atari Inc. in 1975 based on the arcade
game. A number of clones of both systems rushed to fill the nascent home console
market and the video game industry suffered a small recession in 1977 due to this.
The Fairchild Channel F, released in 1976, was the first console to use game
cartridges, which was then used by the Atari VCS and several other consoles of the
second generation and led to a second boom in the video game industry in the United
States and around the globe. During this time, Atari Inc. had been sold to Warner
Communications, and due to a change of leadership, several programmers left the
company and founded Activision, becoming the first third-party developer.
Activision's success led to a rush of new developers creating games without any
publishing controls for these systems. The market became flooded with poor quality
games, and combined with the rising popularity of the personal computer and the
economic recession of the early 1980s, led to the video game crash of 1983 in the
U.S. market. Nintendo, which had released its Famicom console in Japan that year,
took several cautionary steps to limit game production to only licensed games, and
was able to introduce the Famicom, rebranded as the Nintendo Entertainment System
(NES) in 1985 into the U.S. market. The NES helped to revive the console market and
gave Nintendo dominance during the late 1980s.
Sega took advantage of the newfound U.S. growth to market its Sega Genesis against
the Super Nintendo Entertainment System in the early 1990s in the so-called
"console wars" and emphasized the notion of "bits" as a major selling point for
consumers. The consumer adoption of optical discs with larger storage capacity in
the mid-1995 led many console manufactures to move away from cartridges to CD-ROMs
and later to DVDs and other formats, with Sony's PlayStation line introducing even
more features that gave it an advantage in the market; the PlayStation 2, released
in 2000, remains the best-selling console to date with over 155 million units sold.
Microsoft, fearing that the PlayStation 2 was threatening the competitive edge of
the personal computer, entered the console space with its Xbox line in 2001.
Internet connectivity had become commonplace by the mid-2000s, and nearly all home
consoles supported digital distribution and online service offerings by the 2010s.
With Sony and Microsoft's dominance in hardware capabilities, most other major
manufacturers have since dropped out of the hardware business, but maintain a
presence in the game development and licensing space. Nintendo remains the only
competitor having taken a blue ocean strategy by offering more original console
concepts such as motion sensing in the Wii and the hybrid design of the Nintendo
Switch.
Within the home video game console market, the leading consoles have often been
grouped into generations, consoles that were major competitors in the marketplace.
There have been nine generations of consoles since the 1970s, with a new generation
appearing about every five years in accordance with Moore's law.
Overview of the console generations, including generation overlaps. Major consoles
of each generation are given for each.
There are more than 1000 home video game consoles known to exist, the vast majority
of which were released during the first generation: only 100 home video game
consoles were released between the second and current generation, 10 were
canceled . This list is divided into console generations which are named based on
the dominant console type of the era, though not all consoles of those eras are of
the same type. Some eras are referred to based on how many bits a major console
could process. The "128-bit era" (sixth generation) was the final era in which this
practice was widespread.
This list only counts the first iteration of each console's hardware, because
several systems have had slim, enhanced or other hardware revisions, but they
aren't individually listed here. The list also includes unreleased systems. If a
series of home video game consoles begins in a generation and lasts to another
generation, it is listed in the generation the series began. This list does not
claim to be complete.
This list does not include other types of video game consoles such as handheld game
consoles, which are usually of lower computational power than home consoles due to
their smaller size, microconsoles, which are usually low-cost Android-based devices
that rely on downloading, retro style consoles, or dedicated consoles past the
first generation, which have games built in and do not use any form of physical
media. Consoles have been redesigned from time to time to improve their market
appeal. Redesigned models are not listed on their own.
The list omits the more than 900 home video game consoles known to have been
released in the first generation of video game consoles - those that were generally
game consoles for a single dedicated game, such as home Pong consoles. Documented
consoles of this generation can be found at list of first generation home video
game consoles.
Name Release date Manufacturer Units sold CPU "Bits"
Fairchild Channel F November 1976 Fairchild (U.S.) ca. 250,000
RCA Studio II January 1977 RCA (U.S.) ?
Bally Astrocade 1977 Midway (U.S.)
Atari 2600 September 11, 1977 Atari Inc. (U.S.) ca. 30 million[2]
Notes
The Videopac+ G7400 was planned to be released in America as the Odyssey³ Command
Center, with a different case design, but it never occurred, although some
prototypes exist.
Although fully developed, functional, and with 2 games ready, the few Halcyon units
that exist were handmade for investors of the company to try out the product, it is
not believed that it ever went into full production or entered the market at all.
Less than 12 main control units (Halcyon 200LD, the console itself) are known to
exist, but more Halcyon branded Laserdisc players (LD-700, made by Pioneer) exist.
[citation needed]
The Кроха (Read as "Krokha", meaning "Baby") was a Soviet console that was ready to
launch in 1990, but production halted, only one game was made, and the
approximately 200 consoles were given out to employees of the factory that
manufactured it.[citation needed]
SNK created the Neo Geo CD as a much cheaper alternative to the AES, lowering the
price of games considerably, from ~300$ to ~50$ . It's essentially an AES console
with a media format change from cartridges to CDs, placing it in the fourth
generation.
Starting with Microsoft's fiscal quarter ending June 2014 (Q4), the company stopped
divulging individual platform sales in their fiscal reports and subsequent Xbox
sales are based on industry estimates.[22][23][24][25]
The Nintendo Switch was released during this period, but has been referred to
as a hybrid video game console, combining features of home and handheld systems.
This is why the Switch appears in both the list of home video game consoles and the
list of handheld game consoles.
References
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"AtGames to Launch Atari Flashback 4 to Celebrate Atari's 40th Anniversary!" (Press
release). PR Newswire. November 12, 2012. Archived from the original on November
27, 2012. Retrieved April 11, 2014.
Add-on to Famicom - Japan only.
"Connor VideoSmarts, ComputerSmarts, and VideoPhone (partially lost VHS-based and
cartridge-based edutainment games; 1986-1990) - The Lost Media Wiki".
lostmediawiki.com. Retrieved August 1, 2020.
"Family Driver by Sega – The Video Game Kraken". Retrieved August 3, 2020.
"Archived copy". Archived from the original on February 20, 2020. Retrieved
February 20, 2020.
"Picno by Konami – The Video Game Kraken". Retrieved August 1, 2020.
"Wowow: The 1990s Taito Console That Never Was". Den of Geek. August 12, 2015.
Retrieved August 1, 2020.
Blake Snow (May 4, 2007). "The 10 Worst-Selling Consoles of All Time". GamePro.com.
Archived from the original on September 5, 2008. Retrieved October 20, 2018.
"EDGAR Pro". google.brand.edgar-online.com.
Numérique, Planète (January 27, 2021). "DVD Kids : une télécommandes et des jeux
intéractifs pour jeunes enfant en DVD-Video signé Berchet !". Planète Numérique.
Retrieved January 27, 2021.
"VP Final - MP4". December 20, 2008. Retrieved August 14, 2012.
"Earnings Release FY13 Q4". Microsoft. Retrieved May 7, 2014.
"Earnings Release FY14 Q1". Microsoft. Retrieved May 7, 2014.
"Earnings Release FY14 Q2". Microsoft. Retrieved May 7, 2014.
"Earnings Release FY14 Q3". Microsoft. Retrieved May 7, 2014.
"PlayStation 3 Sales Reach 80 Million Units Worldwide". Sony Computer
Entertainment. Retrieved November 6, 2013.
"IR Information: Sales Data - Hardware and Software Sales Units". Nintendo Co.,
Ltd. December 31, 2016. Retrieved January 31, 2017.
"IR Information: Sales Data - Hardware and Software Sales Units". Nintendo Co.,
Ltd. Retrieved February 10, 2017.
Star, Gunz (March 31, 2021). "Cumulative Worldwide Hardware Unit Sales (Sell-in)".
www.sie.com.
"Xbox One Sales Reportedly Pass 41 Million as PS4 Nears 100 Million".
"Earnings Release FY14 Q3". Microsoft. April 24, 2014. Retrieved April 24, 2014.
"Microsoft sold in 2.0 million Xbox console units, including 1.2 million Xbox One
consoles."
"Earnings Release FY14 Q4". Microsoft. July 22, 2014. Retrieved August 13, 2014.
"We sold in 1.1 million consoles in the fourth quarter, as we drew down channel
inventory, compared to 1.0 million consoles during the prior year."
Futter, Mike (October 22, 2015). "[Update] Microsoft Will Focus Primarily On Xbox
Live Usership, Not Console Shipments". Game Informer. Retrieved October 22, 2015.
"Microsoft Annual Meeting of Shareholders". Microsoft. December 3, 2014. Retrieved
January 31, 2015. "Finally, our gaming business is thriving with the Xbox One
hitting 10 million units sold. I am thrilled to welcome Mojang and Minecraft
community to Microsoft."
"Consolidated Financial Highlights - Q4 FY2021" (PDF). Nintendo. May 6, 2021.
Retrieved May 6, 2021.
Gurwin, Gabe (February 4, 2021). "Xbox Series X|S Sales Not Far Behind PS5, Analyst
Says". GameSpot. Retrieved February 4, 2021.
Hood, Vic; Pino, Nick; June 2021, Adam Vjestica 01. "Xbox Series X review".
TechRadar.
"Xbox Series S specs list". September 8, 2020.
Robinson, Andy (April 28, 2021). "Sony reports 7.8m PS5s shipped in 'PlayStation's
best year ever'". Video Games Chronicle. Retrieved April 28, 2021.
"PS5 review".
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