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Beneath Apple Manor (1978) by Don Worth is one of the first RPGs for the Apple II and one of the first roguelikes, though it predated Rogue by two years. It's also one of the first games to use procedural generation. You could even choose between B&W text or color! (an infinite dungeon thread)

submitted 3 hours ago • 1 comment

WE ARE READY TO GO AGAIN www.twitch.tv/play_history The readthrough you've all been waiting for! Be there or be an equal length side quadrilateral with right angled corners.

submitted 5 hours ago • 0 comments

Sega - the American one - made a go at home games after ejecting their Gremlin subsidiary with a multiplatform assault of arcade ports. They stayed in for about a year, porting the likes of Congo Bongo and Tapper, before Gulf + Western closed the whole thing.

submitted 7 hours ago • 1 comment

We're putting on a show tonight at 7PM CST on Twitch! Join our continuing, epic readthrough of The Book. Catch up to where we are with the latest video covering up to Chapter 39. www.youtube.com/watch?v=yVgL...

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Having somehow attained the Marvel license, Adventure International came to the 1984 Winter CES with high hopes for their new Questprobe series of games. Alas, the characters did not save the innovative but antiquated games. Scott Adams wrapped the company up soon after.

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Who was the first Space Age coin-op company? Just before video games arrived on the scene, Cointronics was one of the companies that pushed the boundaries of electro-mechanical tech. This is the tale of the company that brought us Lunar Lander - but not what you're thinking!

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Play Meter – Volume 14, Number 6 – July 1988 has been scanned in 600DPI. Enjoy! www.gamingalexandria.com/wp/2025/04/p...

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Learn about all these crazy Home Pong systems I saw at MGC through the latest episode of @theycreateworlds.bsky.social ! www.youtube.com/watch?v=TcC5... (These are way more interesting than their gameplay suggests)

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At the Winter 1984 Consumer Electronics Show, Mattel Electronics had a huge booth to show retailers that they had weathered the disastrous Crash. It was all a ruse. Mattel did this purely to get buyers to pay their orders before they dissolved the division a few weeks later.

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It's a big one, folks! show Kevin some support.

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Programmer, artist: Alexey Pajitnov.

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Happy weekend! If you've enjoyed the Space Invaders Retronauts episode, have I got an article for you: delving into the history of the original game and the 2600 port, which I consider to be just about as important to the medium's history. www.atariarchive.org/blog/space-i...

submitted 5 days ago • 2 comments

While interest in space is usually paired with the Apollo moon landings, a decade before the climax of the 60s, Sputnik fever turned pop culture's attention to the heavens. Here are a few examples of late 50s space-obsessed games. Next week we'll look at the first Space Age amusement company.

submitted 6 days ago • 0 comments

タイトー初期のテーブル筐体、手前がT.Tウエスタンガンで左奥がT.Tバリケードと思われるけど、右奥の白い天板は何の機種だろう…タイトーっぽいけど…(タイトー1977年会社情報より) #Taito #WesternGun #1977

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This guy, Toshiro Hibino, was involved in a lot of Nintendo's technology. His patents include the Famicom to NES pin adapter, several CD-ROM technologies (probably intended for the ill-fated addon), and the Satellaview. Someone find him!

submitted 7 days ago • 0 comments

We were just talking last night about how people completely overlook the arcade era of Nintendo. (Save for @sega-16.bsky.social ) Most don't even seem to know there was a team of engineers who helped convert their games to the Playchoice-10. No one's curious about their story?

submitted 7 days ago • 2 comments

I hope you had a chance to watch this lil time capsule of gaming history. My fav segment featured here is "The Pac-Man Zone", both for the story itself & the ridiculous journey it took for me to even post it. This 🧵 is the tale of a multi-year journey about restoring a 2-minute local news segment.

submitted 8 days ago • 1 comment

You don't need Wild Gunman to play out your high noon shootout fantasy. Southland Engineering's Championship Fast Draw enabled one player or two to relive the climax of any sunbaked Western in the arcade. Are you ready to- DRAW!

submitted 8 days ago • 1 comment

Played it two years in a row at MGC! Great work.

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We've finished scanning CD-ROM Today! This was an influential magazine from the height of the multimedia era, and a great record of what was happening in the computer games/software industry in the mid-90s archive.gamehistory.org/folder/f8071...

submitted 9 days ago • 5 comments

while I was in Milwaukee for MGC I carved out some time to visit the library to trawl their microfilm library of the Journal to look for missing columns by Ed Semrad that weren't in the Newsbank digital archive. This one from June 28, 1986 notes the NES was not actually selling all that hot yet!

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A nice overview of an obscure dedicated Pong system, really giving you a look at how hobbyist this whole market was. www.youtube.com/watch?v=fi-0...

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They even had the original Video Action, which by our research was the second released console which wasn't an Odyssey clone. Granted, it was a repackaging of Allied Leisure's Tennis Tourney for $499 (with TV included), but it's still exceptionally rare!

submitted 9 days ago • 0 comments

At MGC, we had the opportunity to play a really interesting early pinball table: Genco's Spit Fire. It's very fast and open for a mechanical game. At the time, it was advertised for its lack of pins! In that way, it's a lot closer to modern pinball.

submitted 10 days ago • 1 comment

Ever wanted the currently highest quality NES/Famicom manuals collected in one place for you to download? Now you can, check out our article on RessurectionX's release of nearly the entire system and then some in several formats. Enjoy! www.gamingalexandria.com/wp/2025/04/r...

submitted 10 days ago • 11 comments

Another MGC visit! Friends, games, and more!

submitted 11 days ago • 1 comment

This week on The Digital Antiquarian: "The End of Sierra as We Knew It, Part 1: The Acquisition" www.filfre.net/2025/04/the-...

submitted 12 days ago • 0 comments

Now up on YouTube: youtu.be/XqiyIVLj8Qs An explainer of these videos, including a sort of love letter to Kellyn Beeck, the man responsible for many of these & so much more: ballzapalooza.livejournal.com/72210.html Videos that didn't make the cut due to their poor condition: youtu.be/vZev1EFfxG8

submitted 13 days ago • 2 comments

Electric shock machines were real, and they didn't go away for a long while. Get a taste of amperage when you grab the Mills Novelty Firefly machine. It's all for the health benefits, you see... Electricity is Life!

submitted 13 days ago • 2 comments

Going to be at Midwest Gaming Classic on Saturday! A great yearly tradition - get to meet up with acquaintances like @atariarchive.org @nathaniellockhart.bsky.social @mrtalida.bsky.social @bclarkomp.bsky.social and @jparish.bsky.social Let me know if you're there!

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In the latest Game History Hour podcast, VGHF's Phil Salvador and lawyer Kendra Albert digest, discuss, and dissect the 2024 DMCA exemption petition to make it easier for libraries and archives to preserve video games: gamehistory.org/episode-128-...

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A collection of retro newcasts on computers, arcades, and consoles!

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Back to 1992! We read through the computer gaming rags of the second half of the year, seeing if we can get to the bottom of the huge transition in PC gaming. www.twitch.tv/play_history

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I answered some questions on Reddit relating to game history and its current standing in academia. Some might disagree on my assessment of the latter, but I think this topic needs to always be open: What is our relationship to professionals and vice versa? www.reddit.com/r/AskHistori...

submitted 15 days ago • 4 comments