History Of Early Video Games

Largely based on my notes from my Introduction to Mass Media class at Stony Brook University.

Diffusion Of Innovations

A model that attempts to describe how novel products, practices, or ideas are adopted by members of a social system.

Innovators, Early Adopters, Early Majority, Late Majority, Laggards

The five categories in the diffusion of innovations model, in order.

Everett Rogers

Prominent American theorist, sociologist, and communication researcher who developed the theory "Diffusion Of Innovations.”

Tennis For Two

Considered to be one of the first video game in history, this game was developed in 1958 by William Higinbotham and simulates a game of tennis. The game used tools such as an analog computer and an oscilloscope.

Ralph Baer, Brown Box

In 1967, the inventor________developed an early prototype of a device that allowed for home video gaming, which was known as the “________”

1972, Atari, Allan Alcorn

The early popular video game “pong” was first developed in the year______by the video game company______and their engineer_______

Gun Fight

Released in 1975, this was the first video game to use a microprocessor instead of TTL, and is also the first game to feature human to human combat.

Puck Man, Paku Paku Taberu, Gobbling

Pac-Man was originally referred to as “________” in Japan, which is derived from the Japanese phrase “_____________,” which refers to_______something up.

Another Opponent, Computer, Goal

One of the key aspects of Super Mario Brothers and other Nintendo games was that it wasn’t a game where you faced off against__________, but instead faced off against the__________itself in order to achieve a____________