A platformer is a sub-genre of action video games in which the core objective is to move the player character between points in an environment. Platform games are characterized by levels that consist of uneven terrain and suspended platforms of varying height that require jumping and climbing to traverse. Other acrobatic maneuvers may factor into the gameplay, such as swinging from vines or grappling hooks, jumping off walls, air dashing, gliding through the air, being shot from cannons, using jet packs, or bouncing from springboards or trampolines. Games where jumping is automated completely, such as 3D games in The Legend of Zelda series, fall outside of the category.
Shoot 'em ups are a sub-genre of action games. There is no consensus as to which design elements compose a shoot 'em up; some restrict the definition to games featuring spacecraft and certain types of character movement, while others allow a broader definition including characters on foot and a variety of perspectives.
Racing games are a video game genre in which the player participates in a racing competition. They may be based on anything from real-world racing leagues to fantastical settings. They are distributed along a spectrum between more realistic racing simulations and more fantastical arcade-style racing games. Kart racing games emerged in the 1990s as a popular sub-genre of the latter. Racing games may also fall under the category of sports video games.
Yu Suzuki is a Japanese game designer, producer, programmer, and engineer, who headed Sega's AM2 team for 18 years. Considered one of the first auteurs of video games, he has been responsible for a number of Sega's arcade hits, including three-dimensional sprite-scaling games that used "taikan" motion simulator arcade cabinets, such as Hang-On, Space Harrier, Out Run and After Burner, and pioneering polygonal 3D games such as Virtua Racing and Virtua Fighter, which are credited with popularizing 3D graphics in video games; as well as the critically acclaimed Shenmue series. As a hardware engineer, he led the development of various arcade system boards, including the Sega Space Harrier, Model 1, Model 2 and Model 3, and was involved in the technical development of the Dreamcast console and its corresponding NAOMI arcade hardware.
Out Run is an arcade driving video game released by Sega in September 1986. It is known for its pioneering hardware and graphics, nonlinear gameplay, a selectable soundtrack with music composed by Hiroshi Kawaguchi, and the hydraulic motion simulator deluxe arcade cabinet. The goal is to avoid traffic and reach one of five destinations.
After Burner is a rail shooter arcade video game developed and released by Sega in 1987. The player controls an American F-14 Tomcat fighter jet and must clear each of the game's eighteen unique stages by destroying incoming enemies. The plane is equipped with a machine gun and a limited supply of heat-seeking missiles. The game uses a third-person perspective, as in Sega's earlier Space Harrier (1985) and Out Run (1986). It runs on the Sega X Board arcade system which is capable of surface and sprite rotation. It is the fourth Sega game to use a hydraulic "taikan" motion simulator arcade cabinet, one that is more elaborate than their earlier "taikan" simulator games. The cabinet simulates an aircraft cockpit, with flight stick controls, a chair with seatbelt, and hydraulic motion technology that moves, tilts, rolls and rotates the cockpit in sync with the on-screen action.
Phantasy Star II is a science fantasy role-playing video game developed and published by Sega for the Sega Genesis. It was released in Japan in 1989, North America in 1990, and in Europe in 1990. It was later ported to a variety of different platforms. An updated remake, Phantasy Star Generation 2, was released for the PlayStation 2 in 2005 in Japan.
Hack and slash, also known as hack and slay or slash 'em up, refers to a type of gameplay that emphasizes combat with melee-based weapons. They may also feature projectile-based weapons as well as secondary weapons. It is a sub-genre of beat 'em up games, which focuses on melee combat, usually with swords. Third-person hack and slash games are also sometimes known as character action games and spectacle fighters.
In computer graphics, a sprite is a two-dimensional bitmap that is integrated into a larger scene, most often in a 2D video game. Originally, the term sprite referred to fixed-sized objects composited together, by hardware, with a background. Use of the term has since become more general.
Strider, released in Japan as Strider Hiryū, is a hack-and-slash platform game released in arcades in 1989 by Capcom. Set in a dystopian future where Earth is ruled by the tyrannical Grandmaster Meio, it follows the titular Strider named Hiryu as he attempts to end his tyrannical reign for good. The game resulted from cooperation between Capcom and manga publisher Moto Kikaku. It marked the video game debut of Strider Hiryu, after the character was introduced in the 1988 manga Strider Hiryu.
Tactical role-playing games, also known as strategy role-playing games and in Japan as simulation RPGs, are a video game genre that combines core elements of role-playing video games with those of tactical strategy video games. The formats of tactical RPGs are much like traditional tabletop role-playing games and strategy games in appearance, pacing, and rule structure. Likewise, early tabletop role-playing games are descended from skirmish wargames such as Chainmail, which were primarily concerned with combat.
Golden Axe is a side-scrolling hack-and-slash video game released by Sega for arcades in 1989, running on the Sega System 16B arcade hardware. Makoto Uchida was the lead designer of the game, and was also responsible for the creation of the previous year's Altered Beast. The game casts players as one of three warriors who must free the fantastical land of Yuria from the tyrannical rule of Death Adder, who wields the titular Golden Axe.
Michael Jackson's Moonwalker is the name of several video games based on the 1988 Michael Jackson film Moonwalker. Sega developed two beat 'em ups, released in 1990; one released in arcades and another released for the Sega Genesis and Master System consoles. U.S. Gold also published various games for home computers the same year. Each of the games' plots loosely follows the "Smooth Criminal" segment of the film, in which Jackson rescues kidnapped children from the evil Mr. Big, and incorporates synthesized versions of some of the musician's songs. Following Moonwalker, Jackson collaborated with Sega on several other video games.
Numerous video games based on the Jurassic Park franchise have been released. Developers Ocean Software, BlueSky Software and Sega produced various games in 1993, coinciding with the first film, Jurassic Park. In 1997, several developers, including DreamWorks Interactive and Appaloosa Interactive, produced various games for nine different platforms to coincide with the release of the film The Lost World: Jurassic Park.
A side-scrolling video game is a game viewed from a side-view camera angle where the screen follows the player as they move left or right. The jump from single-screen or flip-screen graphics to scrolling graphics during the golden age of arcade games was a pivotal leap in game design, comparable to the move to 3D graphics during the fifth generation.
Mario & Sonic at the Olympic Games is a 2007 crossover sports and party game developed by the Sega Sports R&D Department. It is the first installment on the Mario & Sonic series. It was published by Nintendo in Japan and by Sega in other regions, and released on the Wii in November 2007 and the Nintendo DS handheld in January 2008. The first official video game of the 2008 Summer Olympic Games, it is licensed by the International Olympic Committee (IOC) through exclusive licensee International Sports Multimedia (ISM), and is the first official crossover game to feature characters from both the Mario and Sonic the Hedgehog series.
Ever since Pole Position in 1982, Formula One (F1) has always played a part of the racing genre in video games. Early Formula One games were typically arcade racing games, before Formula One Grand Prix (1991) popularized Formula One racing simulations on home computers.
Video games are a major industry in Japan, and the country is considered one of the most influential in video gaming. Japanese game development is often identified with the golden age of video games, including Nintendo under Shigeru Miyamoto and Hiroshi Yamauchi, Sega during the same time period, Sony Computer Entertainment when it was based in Tokyo, and other companies such as Taito, Bandai Namco Entertainment, Capcom, Square Enix, Konami, NEC, and SNK, among others.
