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You all know the legend, of that I am sure, but what good are legends if they are not to be retold?
Anyway, it goes a little something like this...
Back in the early 90's gaming was for kids, and geeks. Gaming was something that wasn't seen as being an acceptable hobby by most of the older population, and gamers would be ridiculed for there preference of video football to the real thing.
Until Sony came along in the mid-90's with their Playstation, that apparently brought gaming to the masses, made it more socially acceptable, and created the 'casual gamer'.
But is the legend actually true?
It seems to me that Sony were just in the right place at the right time.
Arcades really started in the 70's, with the home consoles coming coming towards the end of the decade, with the Atari 2600 being vastly popular in the late 70's and early 80's.
Now if you had an Atari 2600 when you were young, say between 5 and 10, then when the Playstation was released in the UK in 1995, you would have been in your late teens or early twenties.
If your gaming history begins with the NES, again, you would have been in your teens by the time that the Playstation was released.
And early Playstation games such as Tekken and WipEout were sure to appeal to gamers that may have felt that they had outgrown gaming on the Nintendo or Sega consoles, had outgrown Sonic and Mario.
The games available on the Playstation were not the games that would necessarily appeal to those that were happy with their Sega's or Nintendo's but those that wanted something different from the trademark characters, and childish games.
But weren't there these kind of games available on the existing systems?
Splatterhouse had been in the arcades for several years. A game in which a chunky guy wearing a hockey mask attacked various beats with a meat cleaver, in a scrolling platformer. This game was available on the Megadrive.
Mortal Kombat, and it's sequel had both been released, into the arcades, and onto the Megadrive and SNES.
So there was no shortage of these more mature titles, that apparently the PSX made popular.
And the thought that Sony made gaming more popular?
Sales figures for consoles and games had been rising for years, it was just a case of the Playstation release coinciding with this, rather than being a cause of this.
So why is it generally thought that Sony is responsible for these things?
Well with the 'more mature' titles thing, it was something that Sony wanted to be noted for. The console did not want to be comparitable to the SNES, or the Saturn, or the soon to be released N64, so it made a point of it's more mature titles. Nintendo wanted to keep a clean, family console image, so it's Donkey Kong games were more noted that the Killer Instinct ones.
What the Playstation did do, however, was offer the developer a better deal, so the console had tremendous support, and a huge amount of games released fr it.
So yes, in one respect Sony did revolutionise gaming. Developers have gotten a beeter deal from console games ever since the playstation came along, but the popularity of the industry was not down to the Playstation, but down to gamers growing up, and having more disposable income, and more adult titles being released was again down to gamers growing up, and wanting something more that cuddly bunnies on fluffy pink clouds! But hey, what's wrong with cuddly bunnies?
Anyway, it goes a little something like this...
Back in the early 90's gaming was for kids, and geeks. Gaming was something that wasn't seen as being an acceptable hobby by most of the older population, and gamers would be ridiculed for there preference of video football to the real thing.
Until Sony came along in the mid-90's with their Playstation, that apparently brought gaming to the masses, made it more socially acceptable, and created the 'casual gamer'.
But is the legend actually true?
It seems to me that Sony were just in the right place at the right time.
Arcades really started in the 70's, with the home consoles coming coming towards the end of the decade, with the Atari 2600 being vastly popular in the late 70's and early 80's.
Now if you had an Atari 2600 when you were young, say between 5 and 10, then when the Playstation was released in the UK in 1995, you would have been in your late teens or early twenties.
If your gaming history begins with the NES, again, you would have been in your teens by the time that the Playstation was released.
And early Playstation games such as Tekken and WipEout were sure to appeal to gamers that may have felt that they had outgrown gaming on the Nintendo or Sega consoles, had outgrown Sonic and Mario.
The games available on the Playstation were not the games that would necessarily appeal to those that were happy with their Sega's or Nintendo's but those that wanted something different from the trademark characters, and childish games.
But weren't there these kind of games available on the existing systems?
Splatterhouse had been in the arcades for several years. A game in which a chunky guy wearing a hockey mask attacked various beats with a meat cleaver, in a scrolling platformer. This game was available on the Megadrive.
Mortal Kombat, and it's sequel had both been released, into the arcades, and onto the Megadrive and SNES.
So there was no shortage of these more mature titles, that apparently the PSX made popular.
And the thought that Sony made gaming more popular?
Sales figures for consoles and games had been rising for years, it was just a case of the Playstation release coinciding with this, rather than being a cause of this.
So why is it generally thought that Sony is responsible for these things?
Well with the 'more mature' titles thing, it was something that Sony wanted to be noted for. The console did not want to be comparitable to the SNES, or the Saturn, or the soon to be released N64, so it made a point of it's more mature titles. Nintendo wanted to keep a clean, family console image, so it's Donkey Kong games were more noted that the Killer Instinct ones.
What the Playstation did do, however, was offer the developer a better deal, so the console had tremendous support, and a huge amount of games released fr it.
So yes, in one respect Sony did revolutionise gaming. Developers have gotten a beeter deal from console games ever since the playstation came along, but the popularity of the industry was not down to the Playstation, but down to gamers growing up, and having more disposable income, and more adult titles being released was again down to gamers growing up, and wanting something more that cuddly bunnies on fluffy pink clouds! But hey, what's wrong with cuddly bunnies?
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You all know the legend, of that I am sure, but what good are legends if they are not to be retold?
Anyway, it goes a little something like this...
Back in the early 90's gaming was for kids, and geeks. Gaming was something that wasn't seen as being an acceptable hobby by most of the older population, and gamers would be ridiculed for there preference of video football to the real thing.
Until Sony came along in the mid-90's with their Playstation, that apparently brought gaming to the masses, made it more socially acceptable, and created the 'casual gamer'.
But is the legend actually true?
It seems to me that Sony were just in the right place at the right time.
Arcades really started in the 70's, with the home consoles coming coming towards the end of the decade, with the Atari 2600 being vastly popular in the late 70's and early 80's.
Now if you had an Atari 2600 when you were young, say between 5 and 10, then when the Playstation was released in the UK in 1995, you would have been in your late teens or early twenties.
If your gaming history begins with the NES, again, you would have been in your teens by the time that the Playstation was released.
And early Playstation games such as Tekken and WipEout were sure to appeal to gamers that may have felt that they had outgrown gaming on the Nintendo or Sega consoles, had outgrown Sonic and Mario.
The games available on the Playstation were not the games that would necessarily appeal to those that were happy with their Sega's or Nintendo's but those that wanted something different from the trademark characters, and childish games.
But weren't there these kind of games available on the existing systems?
Splatterhouse had been in the arcades for several years. A game in which a chunky guy wearing a hockey mask attacked various beats with a meat cleaver, in a scrolling platformer. This game was available on the Megadrive.
Mortal Kombat, and it's sequel had both been released, into the arcades, and onto the Megadrive and SNES.
So there was no shortage of these more mature titles, that apparently the PSX made popular.
And the thought that Sony made gaming more popular?
Sales figures for consoles and games had been rising for years, it was just a case of the Playstation release coinciding with this, rather than being a cause of this.
So why is it generally thought that Sony is responsible for these things?
Well with the 'more mature' titles thing, it was something that Sony wanted to be noted for. The console did not want to be comparitable to the SNES, or the Saturn, or the soon to be released N64, so it made a point of it's more mature titles. Nintendo wanted to keep a clean, family console image, so it's Donkey Kong games were more noted that the Killer Instinct ones.
What the Playstation did do, however, was offer the developer a better deal, so the console had tremendous support, and a huge amount of games released fr it.
So yes, in one respect Sony did revolutionise gaming. Developers have gotten a beeter deal from console games ever since the playstation came along, but the popularity of the industry was not down to the Playstation, but down to gamers growing up, and having more disposable income, and more adult titles being released was again down to gamers growing up, and wanting something more that cuddly bunnies on fluffy pink clouds! But hey, what's wrong with cuddly bunnies?
Anyway, it goes a little something like this...
Back in the early 90's gaming was for kids, and geeks. Gaming was something that wasn't seen as being an acceptable hobby by most of the older population, and gamers would be ridiculed for there preference of video football to the real thing.
Until Sony came along in the mid-90's with their Playstation, that apparently brought gaming to the masses, made it more socially acceptable, and created the 'casual gamer'.
But is the legend actually true?
It seems to me that Sony were just in the right place at the right time.
Arcades really started in the 70's, with the home consoles coming coming towards the end of the decade, with the Atari 2600 being vastly popular in the late 70's and early 80's.
Now if you had an Atari 2600 when you were young, say between 5 and 10, then when the Playstation was released in the UK in 1995, you would have been in your late teens or early twenties.
If your gaming history begins with the NES, again, you would have been in your teens by the time that the Playstation was released.
And early Playstation games such as Tekken and WipEout were sure to appeal to gamers that may have felt that they had outgrown gaming on the Nintendo or Sega consoles, had outgrown Sonic and Mario.
The games available on the Playstation were not the games that would necessarily appeal to those that were happy with their Sega's or Nintendo's but those that wanted something different from the trademark characters, and childish games.
But weren't there these kind of games available on the existing systems?
Splatterhouse had been in the arcades for several years. A game in which a chunky guy wearing a hockey mask attacked various beats with a meat cleaver, in a scrolling platformer. This game was available on the Megadrive.
Mortal Kombat, and it's sequel had both been released, into the arcades, and onto the Megadrive and SNES.
So there was no shortage of these more mature titles, that apparently the PSX made popular.
And the thought that Sony made gaming more popular?
Sales figures for consoles and games had been rising for years, it was just a case of the Playstation release coinciding with this, rather than being a cause of this.
So why is it generally thought that Sony is responsible for these things?
Well with the 'more mature' titles thing, it was something that Sony wanted to be noted for. The console did not want to be comparitable to the SNES, or the Saturn, or the soon to be released N64, so it made a point of it's more mature titles. Nintendo wanted to keep a clean, family console image, so it's Donkey Kong games were more noted that the Killer Instinct ones.
What the Playstation did do, however, was offer the developer a better deal, so the console had tremendous support, and a huge amount of games released fr it.
So yes, in one respect Sony did revolutionise gaming. Developers have gotten a beeter deal from console games ever since the playstation came along, but the popularity of the industry was not down to the Playstation, but down to gamers growing up, and having more disposable income, and more adult titles being released was again down to gamers growing up, and wanting something more that cuddly bunnies on fluffy pink clouds! But hey, what's wrong with cuddly bunnies?
I think sony did do the gaming industry good. Well for the gamers anyway. They provided competition that made the likes of nintendo and sega who usually run the show stand and take notice.
This caused them to try work harder, make better consoles and games to compete, also lowered prices of games.
They also made a console that appealed to a much wider age group which allowed them to have a huge amount of sales as nintendo and sega were branded with a "kiddie" image.
think what could have happened if the PSX hadn't been released. What would things be like now?
This caused them to try work harder, make better consoles and games to compete, also lowered prices of games.
They also made a console that appealed to a much wider age group which allowed them to have a huge amount of sales as nintendo and sega were branded with a "kiddie" image.
think what could have happened if the PSX hadn't been released. What would things be like now?
Yeah i think thats true if Sony hadn't released the PLaystation then gaming would probably not be as socieably accepted.
does it really matter if it is socially acceptable or not? personally i dont care what other people think. I've been playing computer games long before sony entered the market.
Yeah same here but thats the only major impact the playstation has had to make gaming more socially acceptable, i wouldnt say that theyve revolutionised gaming.
i suppose it did revolutionise racing games in the form of gran turismo. nothing is on par wiht that game, nothing really comes close.
it wasnt really what i call revoutionising gaming, just taking an old concept (driving games) and taking it a step further.
i ment revolutionisng driving games. not gaming in genaral.
I think you should win a GAD for that !! it was cool.
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