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Although the first computer games appeared in the 50s, they used vector displays, not video. It was not until 1972 that Magnavox released the first home video game console, the Magnavox Odyssey, invented by Ralph H. Baer. The Odyssey was initially only moderately successful, and it was not until Atari's arcade game PONG popularized video games, that the public began to take more notice of the emerging industry. By the autumn of 1975 Magnavox, bowing to the popularity of PONG, cancelled the Odyssey and released a scaled down console that only played PONG and hockey, the Odyssey 100. A second "higher end" console, the Odyssey 200, was released with the 100 and added onscreen scoring, up to 4 players, and a third game - Smash. Almost simultaneously released with Atari's own home PONG console through Sears, these consoles jump-started the consumer market. As with the arcade market, the home market was soon flooded by dedicated consoles that played simple pong and pong-derived games.
Second generation
Fairchild released the Fairchild Video Entertainment System (VES) in 1976. While there had been previous game consoles that used cartridges, either the cartridges had no information and served the same function as flipping switches (the Odyssey) or the console itself was empty and the cartridge contained all of the game components. The VES, however, contained a programmable microprocessor so its cartridges only needed a single ROM chip to store microprocessor instructions. RCA and Atari soon released their own cartridge-based consoles.
lose faith and interest in video game consoles. Most video game companies filed for bankruptcy, or moved into other industries, abandoning their game consoles. Mattel Electronics sold the rights of their Intellivision system to the INTV Corporation, who continued to produce Intellivision consoles and develop new games for the Intellivision until 1991. All other North American game consoles were discontinued by 1984.
Third generation
In 1983, Nintendo released the Famicom in Japan. It supported high-resolution, full color, tiled backgrounds, and high-resolution sprites. This allowed Famicom games to be longer and have more detailed graphics. Nintendo brought their Famicom over to the US in the form of the Nintendo Entertainment System (NES) in 1985. In the US, video games were seen as a fad that had already passed. To distinguish its product from older video game consoles, Nintendo used a front-loading cartridge port similar to a VCR on the NES, packaged the NES with a plastic "robot" (R.O.B.) and a light gun (the Zapper), and originally advertised it as a toy. Nintendo also built a lockout chip into the NES. This kept third parties from producing their own cartridges and forced all developers to go through Nintendo to get NES games published. This allowed Nintendo to do things like prevent developers from releasing low-quality games and limit developers to five titles a year. Like Space Invaders for the 2600, Nintendo found its breakout hit game in Super Mario Brothers. Nintendo's success revived the video game industry and new consoles were soon introduced in the following years to compete with the NES.
Fourth generation
Sega's Master System was intended to compete with the NES, but never gained any significant market share in the US and was barely profitable. It fared notably better in PAL territories, especially Brazil. Sega regained market share by releasing their next-generation console, the Sega Mega Drive, which was released in Japan on October 29, 1988, in the US in August 1989 (renamed as the Sega Genesis) and in Europe in 1990, two years before Nintendo could release the Super Nintendo Entertainment System (SNES).
Fifth generation
Going from left to right, top to bottom: Iron Soldier (Atari Jaguar), Gex (3DO), Star Fox (SNES), Donkey Kong Country 3 (SNES), Virtua Racing (Genesis), Vectorman (Genesis). The first fifth generation consoles were the Atari Jaguar and the 3DO. Both of these systems were much more powerful than the SNES or Genesis (known as Mega Drive outside North America); they were better at rendering polygons, could display more onscreen colors, and the 3DO used CDs that contained far more information than cartridges and were cheaper to produce. Neither of these consoles were serious threats to Sega or Nintendo, though. The 3DO cost more than the SNES and Genesis combined, and the Jaguar was extremely difficult to program for, leading to a lack of games that used its extra power. The 3DO was eventually discontinued. Nintendo released games like Donkey Kong Country that could display a wide range of tones (something common in fifth generation games) by limiting the number of hues onscreen, and games like Star Fox that used an extra chip inside of the cartridge to display polygon graphics. Sega followed suit, releasing Vectorman and Virtua Racing (the latter of which used the Sega Virtua Processor.)
It was not until Sony's PlayStation, Sega's Saturn, and the Nintendo 64 were released that fifth generation consoles started to become popular. The Saturn and PlayStation used CDs to store games, while the N64 still used cartridges. All three cost far less than the 3DO, and were easier to program than the Jaguar. The Saturn also had 2D sprite handling power on par with the Neo-Geo.
THE CONSOLES OF THE FIFTH GENERATION