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GAMES

Specialty Definition: GAMES

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Specialty Definition: Computer game

(From Wikipedia, the free Encyclopedia)

A computer game is any sort of game that is played using a computer.

A computer game is not necessarily a video game, or vice versa; for instance a text-based role-playing game could be played verbally by a blind person, which is clearly no longer a "video" game, and the first generation of video games, such as Pong, used dedicated electronic circuitry not even remotely resembling a computer.

The usual distinction today is rather subtle; a game will be a "computer game" if it is played on a general-purpose computer, but a "video game" if it is played on a computer that is specialized for game playing. Computer games will typically feature a wider assortment of direct controls exploiting the full computer keyboard, while video games tend to use more layers of menus, or motion sequences (up-up-down-left, etc) via the game controller. The most important distinction between computer and video games arises from the fact that computers have high resolution monitors, optimized for viewing at close range by one person, while home video game consoles use a much lower-resolution commercial television as their output device, optimized for viewing at a greater distance. As a result, most computer games are intended for single-player or networked multi-player play, while many video games are designed for local multi-player play, with all players viewing the same TV set.

Formerly, video games tended to need and use less computing power than computer games, but with the increasing power of video game hardware, that distinction is nearly erased, and many games are now produced for both computers and video game systems. Video game manufacturers usually exercise tight control over the games that are made available on their systems, so unusual or special-interest games are more likely to only ever appear as games on general-purpose computers.

See also

• list of computer and video games by name
• list of computer and video games by category
• list of free game software

External links

• GameSpot: a large, corporately-owned database of gaming reviews, news, downloads, and forums
• Open Source Gaming: a database of gaming reviews, news, downloads, forums, image galleries, more specifically focused on games released under an Open Source license
• Linux Games: a news site with the latest on Linux game ports and releases.
• Download Free Games: a large freeware and shareware game download site
• Games Online: a selection of games to play free online

  Source: adapted by the editor from Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia under a copyleft GNU Free Documentation License (GFDL) from the article "Computer game."

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Game

(From Wikipedia, the free Encyclopedia)

This article is about a recreational activity, otherwise see game (disambiguation)

All through human history, people have played games. They've done so mostly to entertain themselves and others. Games are a form of self-expression, and also a means of training young people, and of reminding adults of the preferred values of the society in which they live.

Games can involve one person acting alone, but more often involve competition among two or more persons with differing goals. Philosopher David Kelley, in his popular introductory reasoning text The Art of Reasoning, defines the concept "game" as "a form of recreation constituted by a set of rules that specify an object to be attained and the permissible means of attaining it."

This covers most cases well, but does not quite fit with things like war games and sports that are often done not for entertainment but to build skills for later use. In Philosophical Investigations, philosopher Ludwig Wittgenstein argued that the concept "game" could not be defined. Stephen Linhart said, "People say you have to choose between games and real life. I think this claim that there's a dichotomy is very dangerous."

Many technical fields are often applied to the study of games, including probability, statistics, economics, and game theory.

Types of Games

• Board games
• Car games
• Card games
• Casino games
• Computer games or Dojin games
• Counting-out games
• Dice games
• Drinking games
• Educational games
• Game shows
• Games of logic
• Games of physical activity
• Games of physical skill
• Games of chance
• Games of skill
• Games of strategy
• Games of status
• Group-dynamic games
• Guessing games
• Letter games
• Mathematical games
• Online skill-based games
• Open gaming
• Party games
• Pencil and paper games
• Play by mail games
• Puzzles
• Quiz
• Role-playing games, MMORPGs
• Spoken games
• Table-top games
• Tile-based games
• Unclassified games
• Video games
• Word games

See also: List of game topics, Game classification, Game Theory, Play, Toy

Source: adapted by the editor from Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia under a copyleft GNU Free Documentation License (GFDL) from the article "Game."

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Game theory

(From Wikipedia, the free Encyclopedia)

Game theory, a branch of mathematics, operations research and economics, analyzing interactions with formalized incentive structures ("games"). The predicted and actual behavior of individuals in these games are studied, as well as optimal strategies . Seemingly different types of interactions can be characterized as having similar incentive structures, thus all being examples of one particular game.

Game theory is closely related to economics in that it seeks to find rational strategies in situations where the outcome depends not only on one's own strategy and "market conditions", but upon the strategies chosen by other players with possibly different or overlapping goals. It also finds wider application in fields such as political science and military strategy.

The results can be applied to simple games of entertainment or to more significant aspects of life and society. An example of the application of game theory to real life is the prisoner's dilemma as popularized by mathematician Albert W. Tucker; it has many implications for the nature of human cooperation. Biologists have used game theory to understand and predict certain outcomes of evolution, such as the concept of evolutionarily stable strategy introduced by John Maynard Smith in his essay Game Theory and the Evolution of Fighting. See also Maynard Smith's book Evolution and the Theory of Games.

Other branches of mathematics, in particular probability, statistics and linear programming, are commonly used in conjunction with game theory to analyse games.

Types of games and examples

Game theory classifies games into many categories that determine which particular methods can be applied to solving them (and indeed how one defines "solved" for a particular category). Some common categories are:

Zero-sum games are those in which the total benefit to all players in the game adds to zero (or more informally put, that each player benefits only at the expense of others). Chess and Poker are zero-sum games, because one wins exactly the amount one's opponents lose. Business, politics and the prisoner's dilemma, for example, are non-zero-sum games because some outcomes are good for all players or bad for all players. It is easier, however, to analyze a zero-sum game, and it turns out to be possible to transform any game into a zero-sum game by adding an additional dummy player often called "the board," whose losses compensate the players' net winnings.

A convenient way to represent a game is given by its payoff matrix. Consider for example the two-player zero-sum game with the following matrix:

                                Player 2 

                    Action A    Action B    Action C

          Action 1    30         -10          20 
Player 1
          Action 2    10          20         -20

This game is played as follows: the first player chooses one of the two actions 1 or 2, and the second player, unaware of the first player's choice, chooses one of the three actions A, B or C. Once these choices have been made, the payoff is allocated according to the table; for instance, if the first player chose action 2 and the second player chose action B, then the first player gains 20 points and the second player loses 20 points. Both players know the payoff matrix and attempt to maximize the number of their points. What should they do?

Player 1 could reason as follows: "with action 2, I could lose up to 20 points and can win only 20, while with action 1 I can lose only 10 but can win up to 30, so action 1 looks a lot better." With similar reasoning, player 2 would choose action C (negative numbers in the table are good for him). If both players take these actions, the first player will win 20 points. But how about if player 2 anticipates the first player's reasoning and choice of action 1, and deviously goes for action B, so as to win 10 points? Or if the first player in turn anticipates this devious trick and goes for action 2, so as to win 20 points after all?

The fundamental and surprising insight by John von Neumann was that probability provides a way out of this conundrum. Instead of deciding on a definite action to take, the two players assign probabilities to their respective actions, and then use a random device which, according to these probabilities, chooses an action for them. The probabilities are computed so as to maximize the expected point gain independent of the opponent's strategy; this leads to a linear programming problem with a unique solution for each player. This method can compute provably optimal strategies for all two-player zero-sum games.

For the example given above, it turns out that the first player should chose action 1 with probability 57% and action 2 with 43%, while the second player should assign the probabilities 0%, 57% and 43% to the three actions A, B and C. Player one will then win 2.85 points on average per game.

Non Zero-Sum game The most famous example of a non-zero-sum game is the Prisoner's dilemma, as mentioned above. Any gain by one player does not necessarily correspond with a loss by another player. Most real-world situations are non zero-sum games. For example, a business contract ideally is a positive-sum game, where each side is better off than if they didn't have the contract. Most games that people play for recreation are zero-sum.

Cooperative games are those in which the players may freely communicate among themselves before making game decisions and may make bargains to influence those decisions. Monopoly can be a cooperative game, while the Prisoner's dilemma is not. However, Monopoly is a zero-sum game as there can be only one winner, whereas the Prisoner's dilemma is a non-zero-sum game.

Complete information games are those in which each player has the same game-relevant information as every other player. Chess and the Prisoner's dilemma are complete-information games, while Poker is not. Complete information games are rare in the real world, and are usually used only as approximations of the actual game being played.

Risk aversion

For the above example to work, the participants in the game have to be assumed to be risk neutral. This means that, for example, they would value a bet with a 50% chance of receiving 20 'points' and a 50% chance of paying nothing as being worth 10 points. However, in reality people are often risk averse and prefer a more certain outcome - they will only take a risk if they expect to make money on average. Subjective expected utility theory explains how a measure of utility can be derived which will always satisfy the criterion of risk neutrality, and hence is suitable as a measure for the payoff in game theory.

One example of risk aversion can be seen on Game Shows. For example, if a person has a 1 in 3 chance of winning $50,000, or can take a sure $10,000, many people will take the sure $10,000.

Games and numbers

John Conway developed a notation for certain games and defined several operations on those games, originally in order to study Go endgames. In a surprising connection, he found that a certain subclass of these games can be used as numbers, leading to the very general class of surreal numbers.

History

Though touched on by earlier mathematical results, modern game theory became a prominent branch of mathematics in the 1940s, especially after the 1944 publication of The Theory of Games and Economic Behavior by John von Neumann and Oskar Morgenstern. This profound work contained the method for finding optimal solutions for two-person zero-sum games alluded to above.

Around 1950, John Nash developed a definition of an "optimum" strategy for multi player games where no such optimum was previously defined, known as Nash equilibrium. This concept was further refined by Reinhard Selten. These men were awarded The Bank of Sweden Prize in Economic Sciences in Memory of Alfred Nobel in 1994 for their work on game theory, along with John Harsanyi who developed the analysis of games of incomplete information.

Conway's number-game connection was found in the early 1970s.

See also Mathematical game; Artificial intelligence; Newcomb's paradox; Game classification.

External links and references

• Paul Walker, An Outline of the History of Game Theory.
• Oskar Morgenstern, John von Neumann: The Theory of Games and Economic Behavior, 3rd ed., Princeton University Press 1953
• Alvin Roth: Game Theory and Experimental Economics page, http://www.economics.harvard.edu/~aroth/alroth.html Comprehensive list of links to game theory information on the Web
• Mike Shor: Game Theory .net, http://www.gametheory.net Lecture notes, interactive illustrations and other information.
• Maynard Smith: Evolution and the Theory of Games, Cambridge University Press 1982
• Don Ross: Review Of Game Theory.

  Source: adapted by the editor from Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia under a copyleft GNU Free Documentation License (GFDL) from the article "Game theory."

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Summer Olympic Games

(From Wikipedia, the free Encyclopedia)

International multi-sport event held every four years, organised by the International Olympic Committee. The Olympics are the most prestigious such event in the world, with a larger range of sports than other such events, and most of those considering Olympic victory the most prestigious achievement in their field. However, to claim it as the largest or most prestigious sporting event in the world is (often Amerocentric) exaggeration, as the football World Cup attracts far wider global interest, indicated for example by the far wider global television audience. Competitors represent their countries of origin, with Gold medals being awarded for first place, silver for second and bronze for third, a tradition which started in 1904.

The modern Olympic Games were founded in 1894 when Pierre Fredi, Baron de Coubertin, who sought to promote international understanding through the sporting competition. The first games held in Athens in 1896 attracted just 245 competitors of whom more than 200 were Greek, and 14 countries were represented. However, no international events of this magnitude had been organised before.

Four years later (in 1900) the Paris games attracted more than four times as many atheletes, including 11 women, who were allowed to compete for the first time, in croquet and tennis. The Games were integrated with the Paris World's fair and lasted over 5 months. It is still disputed which events exactly were Olympic, since few or none event were advertised as such at the time.

Although numbers fell again for the 1904 Games in St. Louis, USA, due in part to the lengthy transatlantic boat trip required of the European competitors and the integration with the Louisiana Purchase Exposition World's fair, which again spread the event out over an extended period. In contrast with Paris 1900, the word Olympic was abused for many contests, such as those for school boys or Irish Americans.

There followed a smaller "tenth birthday" games in Athens in 1906. This celebration is not commonly accepted as being Olympic Games, but they certainly positively contributed to the success of future games after the less successful 1900 and 1904 Games.

The 1908 London Games saw numbers rise again, as well as the first running of the marathon over its now-standard distance of 26 miles 385 yards. The final yards were added on at the request of British royal family in order to improve the view of the finish from their box. The finish itself was worth seeing. The Italian runner Dorando Pietri was first to enter the stadium but he was clearly in some distress and collapsed of exhaustion before he could complete the event. Helped over the finish line by concerned race officials, he was later disqualified and the gold medal awarded to John Hayes, who had trailed him by around 30 seconds.

The Games continued to grow, attracting 2,500 competitors to Stockholm in 1912, including the great all-rounder Jim Thorpe who won both the Decathlon and Pentathlon. Thorpe, however, had played professional baseball and later had his medals stripped for this breach of amateurism. They were reinstated in 1983, 30 years after his death.

The scheduled Berlin Games of 1916 were cancelled following the onset of World War I.

The 1920 Antwerp Games, in war ravaged Belgium were a subdued affair but again drew a record number of competitors. It was a record which would only stand till 1924 when the Paris Games would involve 3,000 competitors, the greatest of whom was undoubtedly Paavo Nurmi. Nurmi, known as "The Flying Finn", won three team gold medals and the individual 1,500 and 5,000 metres, the latter two on the same day.

The 1928 Amsterdam Games were notable for being the first games which allowed females to compete at track & field athletics and benefitted greatly from the general prosperity of the times. This was in stark contrast to 1932 when Los Angeles' games were affected by the Great Depression, which contributed to the fewest competitors since the St. Louis games.

The 1936 Berlin Games were seen by the German government as a golden opportunity to promote their fascist ideology. The ruling Nazi Party commissioned film-maker Leni Riefenstahl to film the games. The result was a masterpiece of propaganda, despite Hitler's theories of Aryan racial superiority being repeatedly shown up by non-Aryan athletes. In particular, the black sprinter and long jumper Jesse Owens won 4 gold medals. The tale of Hitler snubbing Owens at the ensuing medal ceremony is, however, apocryphal.

The Games of 1940 and 1944 were cancelled, due to World War II.

The first postwar Games were held in 1948 in London, with both Germany and Japan excluded. Dutch sprinter Fanny Blankers-Koen won four gold medals on the track, emulating Owens' achievement in Berlin.

The 1952 Games, in Helsinki made a legend of an amiable Czech army lieutenant named Emil Zátopek, who was intent on improving on his single gold and silver medals from 1948. Having first won both the 10,000 and 5,000 metre races he also entered the marathon, despite having never previously raced over the distance. Calculating his pace by chatting with the other leaders, Zátopek led from about half way, slowly dropping the remaining contenders to win by 2 and a half minutes, and complete a trio both of wins and Olympic records.

The 1956 Melbourne Games were largely successful, barring a water polo match between Hungary and the Soviet Union, which political tensions caused to end as a pitched battle between the teams.

The 1960 Rome Games saw the first arrival on the world scene of a young light heavyweight boxer named Cassius Clay, later Muhammad Ali, who would later throw his gold medal away in disgust after being refused service in a "whites only" restaurant in his home town. Other performances of note included Wilma Rudolph, a gold medalist in the 100m, 200m and 4x100m relay events.

Performances at the 1968 Mexico City games were affected, to a greater or lesser extent by the altitude of the host city. No event was affected more than the long jump. In a previously tight competition US athlete Bob Beamon jumped 8.90m, destroying the world record and, in the words of fellow competitor and reigning champion Lynn Davies "making the rest of us look silly." Beamon's World Record would stand for 23 years. Also of note was the medal ceremonies of Tommie Smith and John Carlos who each gave the "Black Power" salute on the podium. Their protest brought rapid condemnation from the US Team and the International Olympic Committee, but generated much sympathy elsewhere.

Politics again intervened at Munich in 1972, but with far more lethal consequences. An extreme Palestinian terrorist group named Black September invaded the Olympic village and held several members of the Israeli weightlifting team hostage, and killed two of them. The terrorists demanded that Israel release numerous Arab prisoners and when the Israelis refused to make concessions a tense stand off ensued while negotiations continued. Eventually the captors, still holding their hostages, were offered safe passage and taken to an airport, where they were ambushed by German security forces. In the firefight that followed 15 people, including the remaining 9 Israeli athletes and all but one of the terrorists were killed. After much debate, it was decided that the Games continue, but proceedings were obviously dominated by the earlier events. Some memorable athletic achievements did occur during these game, notably winning of a record seven gold medals by United States swimmer Mark Spitz, and the winning of three gold medals by 16-year-old Soviet gymnast Olga Korbut.

There was, fortunately, no such tragedy in Montreal in 1976. However, bad planning led to the games cost far exceeding the budget and it looked for a time that the Olympics may no longer be a viable financial proposition. There was also a boycott by African nations protesting a recent tour of apartheid South Africa by a New Zealand rugby side. The Romanian gymnast Nadia Comaneci won every individual women's artistic gymnastics gold medal with a succession of perfect scores.

Following the Soviet Union's invasion of Afghanistan many western nations, most notably the United States boycotted the games held in Moscow. This contributed to the 1980 Games being slightly low key affair, dominated by the host country.

In 1984 the Soviet Union, and much of Eastern Europe, reciprocated by boycotting the Los Angeles games. These games were, perhaps, the first games of the new era. The replacement of de Coubertin's original idealism by Tinseltown's commercial concerns would set the tone for all the later Games. Again, however, the games inevitably lost a deal of their appeal by the omission of a one of the world's superpowers.

Sadly, abiding memories of the 1988 Seoul games were negative, while many competitors' drug tests were not. Despite many splendid drug-free individual performances, the shadow of the number of people who failed screenings for illegal performance-enhancing chemicals fell over the games. The outcry reached its zenith when Ben Johnson, the Canadian winner of the mens 100m sprint, was discovered to be a steroid user and disqualified. There was an additional scandal in the boxing ring, over Korean fighters being given dubious decisions by the judges, culminating in local light middleweight Park Si-hun being shamefully awarded the gold medal despite being comprehensively outboxed in the final by American Roy Jones. This decision in particular would lead to a total overhaul of the judging process before the next games.

On the bright side it did, however, seem that the drug testing and regulation authorities were at last catching up with the cheating that had been widely to be endemic in athletics for some years, and it was generally held that the 1992 Barcelona Games were cleaner, although not without incident. Also in evidence was increased professionalism amongst Olympic atheletes, exemplified by US basketball's "Dream Team". 1992 also saw the reintroduction to the Games of many smaller European states, which had been subsumed inside the USSR since the War, but were again independent since the fall of the Iron Curtain.

By now the process awarding of the games themselves had become a commercial concern and allegations of corruption rocked the International Olympic Committee, in particular with reference to Salt Lake City's bid to host the Winter Olympic Games. It was also widely rumoured that the Coca-Cola company was highly influential in the 1996 Games being hosted by their home city of Atlanta, Georgia. In the stadium, the highlight was probably 200m runner Michael Johnson annihilating the World Record in front the home crowd. There were also emotional scenes when Muhammad Ali, clearly affected by Parkinsons Disease lit the Olympic torch and received a replacement medal for the one he had discarded in 1960. It is worth noting the latter event took place not at the boxing ring but the basketball arena, at the demand of US television. The atmosphere at the Games was marred, however, after a bomb exploded during celebration in Centennial Park. In June 2003, the principal suspect, Eric Robert Rudolph, was captured.

The most recent Games, in Sydney, Australia in 2000 were widely held to be the best yet. Supremely well organised by the hosts, no-one personified the Games better than Ian Thorpe, whose dominating performances in the pool set the tone for the Games, Briton Steven Redgrave who won a rowing Gold medal in an unprecedented fifth consecutive games and Cathy Freeman, whose triumph in the 400m united the packed stadium and seemed to symbolise a new understanding between white and aboriginal Australians. No-one except, perhaps, Eric Moussambani, a swimmer from Equatorial Guinea, whose memorably slow 100m freestyle swim showed that even in the commercial world of the twentieth century some of de Coubertin's original vision still remains.

A list of modern Summer Olympic Games:

• 1896 Summer Olympics, Athens, Greece (Games of the I Olympiad)
• 1900 Summer Olympics, Paris, France
• 1904 Summer Olympics, St. Louis, United States
  • 1906 Summer Olympics, Athens, Greece
• 1908 Summer Olympics, London, United Kingdom
• 1912 Summer Olympics, Stockholm, Sweden
  • 1916 Summer Olympics, Berlin, Germany (cancelled following the onset of World War I)
• 1920 Summer Olympics, Antwerp, Belgium
• 1924 Summer Olympics, Paris, France
• 1928 Summer Olympics, Amsterdam, Netherlands
• 1932 Summer Olympics, Los Angeles, United States
• 1936 Summer Olympics, Berlin, Germany
  • 1940 Summer Olympics, Helsinki, Finland (cancelled following the onset of World War II)
  • 1944 Summer Olympics, London, United Kingdom (cancelled following the onset of World War II)
• 1948 Summer Olympics, London, United Kingdom
• 1952 Summer Olympics, Helsinki, Finland
• 1956 Summer Olympics, Melbourne, Australia and Stockholm, Sweden (equestrian events)
• 1960 Summer Olympics, Rome, Italy
• 1964 Summer Olympics, Tokyo, Japan
• 1968 Summer Olympics, Mexico City, Mexico
• 1972 Summer Olympics, Munich, West Germany.
• 1976 Summer Olympics, Montréal, Canada
• 1980 Summer Olympics, Moscow, Soviet Union
• 1984 Summer Olympics, Los Angeles, United States
• 1988 Summer Olympics, Seoul, South Korea
• 1992 Summer Olympics, Barcelona, Spain
• 1996 Summer Olympics, Atlanta, United States
• 2000 Summer Olympics, Sydney, Australia
• 2004 Summer Olympics, Athens, Greece
• 2008 Summer Olympics, Beijing, China
• 2012 Summer Olympics, Bids are being made.

See also: Olympic Games scandals

External links

• http://www.athens2004.com Offical Site of the Summergames 2004
• http://www.olympic.org/ Official Site of the Olympic Movement
• http://www.olympic-games-chronics.com The history of the olympic games

  Source: adapted by the editor from Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia under a copyleft GNU Free Documentation License (GFDL) from the article "Summer Olympic Games."

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Video game

(From Wikipedia, the free Encyclopedia)

A video game is a game played using an electronic device with a visual display.

Often "video game" is taken in a narrow sense to mean those games played on consoles for television and similar handhelds. The term "video game" is often not considered to include computer games and coin-operated arcade games, both because historically the games in these three categories were very different, and also because the activity of playing these three types of games is different. See history of the video game for more information.

Video games are made by developers, sometimes individuals, but almost always a team consisting of designers, graphic designers and other artists, programmerss, sound designers, musicians, and other technicians. Most video game console development teams number anywhere from 20 to 50 people, with some teams exceeding 100.

From time to time the term interactive is used to describe a video game. This term is often used by people in the movie and television industry who are not comfortable with the idea that they are involved in making video games. Usage: "We're a movie production company, and we're getting into interactive."

Video Game Market

Video games are very popular and the market has grown continuously since the end of the video game crash of 1983. The market research company NPD estimated that video game hardware, software, and accessories sold about US$10.3 billion in 2002. This was a 10% increase over the 2001 figure.

The video game market changes over the years as new video game consoles are introduced. This has happened in cycles of about 5 years or so, in which multiple manufacturers release their consoles within about a year of each other, then they and the video game publishers enjoy several years of game sales until technology has improved enough for a new cycle to begin. At that point, games for the old consoles generally enjoy some residual sales, but the video game public as a whole has moved on to the new generation of machines. The current dominant consoles are:

• Sony's PlayStation 2
• Nintendo's GameCube
• Microsoft's XBox
• Nintendo's Game Boy Advance

Top Video Games

The ten best selling console video games, according to NPD, ranked by total US units (January 2003 - August 2003) were:

1. Madden NFL 2004, by Electronic Arts, for PlayStation 2
2. Pokemon Ruby, by Nintendo, for Game Boy Advance
3. Zelda: The Wind Waker, by Nintendo, for GameCube
4. Pokemon Sapphire, by Nintendo, for Game Boy Advance
5. Enter The Matrix, by Atari, for PlayStation 2
6. Grand Theft Auto: Vice City, by Take Two Interactive, for PlayStation 2
7. The Getaway, by Sony, for PlayStation 2
8. NBA Street Vol. 2, by Electronic Arts, for PlayStation 2
9. The Sims, by Electronic Arts, for PlayStation 2
10. NCAA Football 2004, by Electronic Arts, for PlayStation 2

The ten best selling console video games, according to NPD, ranked by total US units (annual 2002) were:

1. Grand Theft Auto: Vice City, by Rockstar Games, for PlayStation 2
2. Grand Theft Auto 3, by Rockstar Games, for PlayStation 2
3. Madden Football 2003, by Electronic Arts, for PlayStation 2
4. Super Mario Advance 2, by Nintendo, for Game Boy Advance
5. Gran Turismo 3: A-Spec, by Sony, for PlayStation 2
6. Medal of Honor Frontline, by Electronic Arts, for PlayStation 2
7. Spider-Man: The Movie, by Activision, for PlayStation 2
8. Kingdom Hearts, by Squaresoft, for PlayStation 2
9. Halo, by Microsoft, for XBox
10. Super Mario Sunshine, by Nintendo, for GameCube

See also 2003 in video gaming, 2002 in video gaming.

Video Game Criticism

From time to time, video games are criticized by some parents' groups, psychologists, politicians, and some restrictive religious organizations for glorifying violence, cruelty, and crime, and exposing this violence to children. It is particularly disturbing to some adults that some video games allow children to act out crimes, and reward them for doing so. Some studies have shown that children who watch violent television shows and play violent video games have a tendency to act more aggressively on the playground, and some people are concerned that this aggression may presage violent behavior when children grow to adulthood. These concerns have led to voluntary rating systems adopted by the industry, such as the ESRB rating system in the United States, that are aimed at educating parents about the types of games their children are playing (or are begging to play).

Critics of movies, television, and books as a group look down on video games as an inferior form of entertainment. This is probably because of the accurate observation that most video games have very little plot and even less character development—although there are some wonderful exceptions to the rule. In any case, a frequent counter is that this complaint is like complaining that playing a game of football doesn't have much plot or character development—that though video games include a narrative, they are really about acting in and against the world, and this type of entertainment is not primarily about passively seeing and hearing.

See also: video game controversy

Genres

All video games fall into one or more genres. A genre is a category which classifies what kind of content and game play a game is likely to contain. For example, a first-person shooter is likely to contain a great deal of action, will require quick reflexes and may contain graphic violence.

Below is an alphabetized listing of the main genres of video games and some examples of games for each genre. This list is by no means complete or comprehensive. Many of these categories are somewhat overlapping. GTA, for example, is an adventure, a shooter and 2D or 3D depending on version.

Adventure

Adventure games cast the player as the hero (or heroine) of a story in which the player participates. These games normally require the player to solve various puzzles and find various artifacts. The earliest adventure games were textual, then a hybrid of visual display with textual input, and now rely on "point-n-click".

Adventure games began with Adventure in the 1970s, later developed into the Zork series, and rose to popularity in the 1980s and early to mid-1990s. Notable titles include Day of the Tentacle, the King's Quest series, the Legend of Zelda series, the Monkey Island games, and the Tomb Raider series.

Educational

Educational games, as the name implies, attempt to teach the user using the game as a vehicle. Most of these types of games target young user from the ages of about three years to mid-teens (past the mid-teens, subjects become so complex (for example, Calculus) that teaching via a game is impractical).

Notable games in the genre include the Carmen Sandiego series, Mavis Beacon Teaches Typing, and the The Oregon Trail series.

Programming games like Robocode and Core War may also be put in the educational category.

Fighting

Beat 'em up or fighting games emphasize one-on-one combat between two players, one of whom may be computer controlled. These games usually focus on martial arts, which are usually so dramatic and physically impossible as to be comical. Some of these games may also employ hand-held weapons in addition to or instead of performing combat gymanastics (such as some characters in Mortal Kombat). This genre arose in the mid-1980s and is still somewhat popular today.

Notable series of games include King of Fighters, Mortal Kombat, Street Fighter, Tekken, and Virtua Fighter.

First-person shooter

First-person shooters (FPS) emphasize shooting and combat from a specific perspective. Most FPS's place the player behind a gun or other weapon with the player's "hand" holding the weapon. This perpective is meant to give the player the feeling of "being there." Most FPS's are very fast-paced and require quick reflexes. Because of the perspective, these games tend to be very violent.

Recent studies have shown that these types of game actually improve user's reflexes (as in reaction time). The same study showed that little time was needed (as little as a few hours) to see improvements in reaction times.

To be an effective game, an FPS needs to be both fast and 3-dimensional, which put them out of the reach of most consumer hardware until the early 1990s. DOOM was the "breakout" game of the genre; it used a number of clever techniques to make the game fast enough to run on average machines.

See first-person shooter for more detail, and a sampling of games in this genre.

Platform

Platformers, also called side-scrollers, view the game area from a side or "cutaway" perspective. In these games, the background or playing area smoothly scrolls as the player moves about, hence the name. These games are traditionally 2D, but some have employed 3D computer graphics effectively. Traditional elements of these games include running, jumping and some fighting. Side-scrollers were some of the first types of video games and are still popular today, usually with younger players.

Notable games and series include Donkey Kong, Super Mario Brothers, Lode Runner, and Sonic the Hedgehog.

Puzzle

Puzzle gamess require the player to solve logic puzzles or even navigate complex locations such as mazes. This genre frequently crosses over with adventure and educational games.

Tetris is probably the best-known game in this genre; see list of computer puzzle games for more.

Racing

Racing games are one of the most traditional of genres. They typically place the player in the driver seat of a high performance vehicle and require the player to compete against other drivers or sometimes just time. Emerging in the early 1980s, this genre is still very popular today and continue to push the envelope in terms of graphics and performance.

Rhythm

Rhythm games challenge the player to follow sequences or develop specific rhythms. Some games require the player to tap out rhythms using a game controller or keyboard while others require the player to actually dance in sync to music. This genre arose in the late 1990s with the ever increasing popularity of rap music.

Notable games include Dance Dance Revolution, Space Channel 5, PaRappa the Rapper, and UmJammer Lammy.

Role-playing

Role-playing gamess (RPGs) place the player in a fantasy or science fiction setting. Most of these games are similar to traditional role-playing games played with pencil and paper (such as D&D) except, in this case, the computer takes care of all the record keeping and deterministic elements such as die rolling. Most of these games have the player acting in the role of an "adventurer" who specializes in a certain set of skills (such as combat or casting magic spells). These skill sets are normally called classes and players can normally control one or more of these characters. Since the emergence of affordable home computers coincided with the popularity of pencil and paper role-playing games, this genre was one of the first in video games and continues to be exteremely popular today.

See computer role-playing game for a list.

Serious

Recent times have seen the emergence of a new genre called serious games. Serious games are targeted at adults and teach them real-world concepts via games. These games are contracted by large companies (such as Wal-Mart) to supplement their educational budget. For example, a game that teaches a manager how to run a Wal-Mart Supercenter may cost $1 million to develop, as opposed to having all the managers attend seminars that cost $20 million. As with traditional computer games, serious games are designed to be engaging, fun and competetive so that users will be encouraged to continue playing (and therefore learning from) them.

Serious games are too new have had a significant effect on the game industry and, since most are developed specifically for one client, they are not released for retail sale to the general public. However, many large corporations are starting to leverage the educational and financial benefits of serious games over traditional professional training.

Shooters

Shooters emphasize shooting enemies, whether they be human, alien or insect. These game usually employ a top-down or fixed side perspective. These games have a fixed playing area and the player has limited mobility. Most of these games can be played (though not completed) in a matter of minutes. Some of these games do not even have a formal ending; instead they just get progressively harder. Another of the earliest genres, these types of games have fallen in popularity though they still have a strong hobbyist following.

Space Invaders is the prototypical game of the genre; other notables include Centipede and Missile Command.

Shoot 'em up

Scrolling shooters or "Shoot 'em ups" emphasize fast-paced shooting or shooting and running. The targets may be intelligent or non-intelligent (as in Asteroids). This genre is somewhat muddled. For example, at what point does a shooter become a shoot 'em up? Another very early genre which has a mixed following today.

The genre may be said to begin with Spacewar in 1962, but Asteroids is probably the most familiar.

Simulation

Some do not consider simulations to be games at all, but rather "digital toys" or "software toys." Indeed, this is how Will Wright, the designer of the most popular video game of all time, The Sims, describes his games. These games aim to similate a specific activity (such as flying an airplane) as realistically as practically possible, taking into account physics and other real-world limitations. Some require a great deal of reading before the game can even be attempted, while others include a simple tutorial. Some of these types of games, such as flight simulators, have a limited following, while others, such as The Sims have an enormous following, including those who don't consider themselves "gamers."

Flight simulators are their own well-developed subgenre of simulation, as are wargames. Games such as The Sims, SimCity, SimAnt, and SimEarth are combination of simulation and strategy.

Sports

Sports games emulate the playing of traditional physical sports such as Baseball, Soccer, American football, Boxing, Golf, Basketball, Ice hockey, Tennis, Bowling, Rugby, etc. Some emphasize actually playing the sport, while others emphasize the strategy behind the sport (such as Championship Manager). Others satarize the sport for comic effect (such as Arch Rivals). This genre emerged early in the history of video games and remains popular today and is extremely competitive, just like real-world sports.

Strategy

Strategy games focus on careful planning and skillful resource management in order to achieve victory. Classified as "thinking games," these products are targeted at teens and a more mature audience. Most of these games are turn-based as opposed to realtime, but there are some that are realtime or mix the two types of play (such as X-Com). This genre has had a consistent following since the mid-1980s.

The two main subgenres are turn-based and real-time games. Turn-based games were originally the common form of strategy game, the computers of the time being too slow for real-time interaction, and go back to Star Trek games played on teletypes. Early home computers were soon adopted for wargames, and the genre expanded from there.

Survival Horror

Survival Horror games focus on fear and attempt to scare the player via traditional horror elements such as undead, death, blood and gore. Many of these games include first-person shooter elements.

• Alone in the Dark series
• Resident Evil series
• Silent Hill series
• System Shock series

Third Person Shooters

Third Person Shooters (TPS) employ a specific perspective for the player. This is normally just behind the game character, but it is sometimes an isometric perspective. Many of these games are classified in other genres as well (such as Tomb Raider).

• Heretic II
• Jet Force Gemini
• Mafia
• Magic Carpet
• Oni
• Tomb Raider series

Traditional

Most popular board games, card games, and the like have been computerized to some degree or another. For example, more than 600 freeware board games are available written in Zillions. Computer game programs can be worthy opponents and can help you improve your skill at traditional games.

• Chess, Checkers, Othello (a.k.a. Reversi), and Backgammon have world class computer programs.
• Mah-jongg and related games are immensely popular in Japan.
• I-go, popular in Asia.
• Magic: The Gathering has had computer versions for some time.

Notable People

• Ralph Baer -- Inventor of the Magnavox Odyssey, the first video game console
• John Carmack -- Wolfenstein 3D, Doom, Quake, ... (Id Software)
• Chris Crawford -- Eastern Front (1941), Balance of Power, founder of the Computer Game Developers' Conference, pioneer of interactive storytelling
• Richard Garriott (a.k.a. Lord British) -- creator of Ultima series and founder of Origin Games
• Satoru Iwata -- president of Nintendo
• Hideo Kojima -- Metal Gear Solid series, Boktai: The Sun is in Your Hands (Konami)
• Koji Kondo -- music composer for Mario and Legend of Zelda series (Nintendo)
• Ken Kutaraji -- President of Sony Computer Entertainment, Inc.
• Sid Meier -- Civilization series, Railroad Tycoon, Alpha Centauri, SimGolf
• Shigeru Miyamoto -- Donkey Kong, Mario, Legend of Zelda, ... (Nintendo)
• Hironobu Sakaguchi -- Final Fantasy series, and Chrono Trigger (Square Enix)
• Kou Shibusawa -- producer of Sangokushi series and Nobunaga_no_ yabo series
• Warren Spector -- System Shock series, Thief series, Deus Ex, (Origin Games, Looking Glass Studios, Ion Storm)
• Koichi Sugiyama -- music composer for Dragon Quest series (Square Enix)
• Hirokazu 'Hip' Tanaka -- President of Pokemon Co. and music composer for Metroid, Kid Icarus, and Super Mario Land
• Toshiro Tsuchida -- Front Mission series
• Yuka Tsujiyoko -- music composer for Fire Emblem series, Paper Mario, and part of Tetris Attack (Nintendo, Intelligent Systems)
• Nobuo Uematsu -- music composer for Final Fantasy series and Ehrgeiz (Square Enix)
• Will Wright -- programmer and game designer of SimCity series and The Sims series (Electronic Arts)
• Hiroshi Yamauchi -- former president of Nintendo and predecessor of Satoru Iwata
• Gunpei Yokoi -- inventor of the Gameboy and Wonderswan

See also

• video game console
• console manufacturer
• Videogame Timeline
• video game controversy
• console emulator
• MAME
• ZSNES
• fan translation
• list of NES games
• list of SNES games
• video game developer
• video game publisher
• video game music
• game programmer
• game designer
• list of computer and video games by name
• list of computer and video games by category
• list of free game software
• enhanced remake

External links

• Open Gaming Center: the Wikipedia of Computer Gaming (NEW) http://open-gaming-center.com
• A Game Documentation and Review Project: http://www.mobygames.com/
• BBCNews, 28 May, 2003, Video games 'good for you'. Keen video gamers now have one more excuse to keep on playing
• Video game developer e-zine: http://www.gamasutra.com/
• Open Gaming Foundation: http://www.opengamingfoundation.org/
• http://www.download-game.com
• NPD Video games industry sales studies, press releases: http://www.npd.com/press/press_releases.html

  Source: adapted by the editor from Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia under a copyleft GNU Free Documentation License (GFDL) from the article "Video game."

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Photo Album: GAMES

Thumbnail	Description & Credit	Thumbnail	Description & Credit
	Paralympic athlete Lauren McDevitt Howard, bronze medal winner, 1996 Paralympic Games. From the book,"Portrait of Spirit: One Story at a Time" by Billy Howard and Maggie Holtzberg. Credit: CDC.		Annual outdoor games of the Hester Street Athletic Association. Credit: Library of Congress.
	I guess games in gardens ain't so awful healthy for somebody, said Yetta. Credit: Library of Congress.		Critical moments. Pa and Ma arrive unexpectedly just in time for one of the college games --. Credit: Library of Congress.
	XVII Olympic Games in Rome, during boxing competitions in Palazzo dello Sport. Credit: Library of Congress.		Olympic games at Amsterdam, Holland. The finish of the 100 meter dash finals, won by Percy Williams. Credit: Library of Congress.
	Basketball games at annual field day at the FSA (Farm Security Administration) farmworkers community, Yuma, Arizona. Credit: Library of Congress.		Migratory agricultural workers at Picket's Landing, Virginia. Card games are frequent but money seldom used. Credit: Library of Congress.
	African American child singer for singing games, Eatonville, Florida. Credit: Library of Congress.		Night view of rides, games of skill, etc., at the Glen Echo amusement park in Maryland, near Washington, D.C. Credit: Library of Congress.
Source: pictures compiled by the editor from various references; see picture credits.

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Digital Photo Gallery: GAMES
 

"Games Warehouse" by Ryan Glanzer Commentary: "An employee in the Valleyfair Games department stocks the game with donkey prizes in the morning."	"Teen firemen in group" by Liz Allen Commentary: "Teen guys at fire games."
Source: photographs selected by the editor, with permission from the photographers.

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Source: compiled by the editor from several corpora; see credits.

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Source: compiled by the editor from Icon Group International, Inc.

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