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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.
Chicago Coin was one of the early major manufacturers of pinball tables founded in Chicago, Illinois. The company was founded in 1932 by Samuel H. Gensburg and Samuel Wolberg to operate in the coin-operated amusement industry. In 1977, Gary Stern and Sam Stern purchased the assets of the Chicago Coin Machine Division as it was then called to found Stern Electronics, Inc. They also produced various arcade games during the 1960s to 1970s.
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The following article is a broad timeline of arcade video games.
1976 had new titles such as Road Race, Night Driver, Heavyweight Champ, Sea Wolf and Breakout. The year's highest-grossing arcade games were Namco's F-1 in Japan and Midway's Sea Wolf in the United States.
1975 saw several critical influences in the history of video games, including the first commercial games utilizing large-scale integrated circuits and microprocessors, as well as the first role-playing video games.
1974 saw the expansion of technology and public awareness of video games in all sectors. A proliferation of companies creating commercial video games in the coin-operated sector attracted attention from mainstream press and prompted the diversification of games beyond strict Pong derivatives. The first three-dimensional games were developed for linked graphical terminals which would not be widely commercialized. Some of the first efforts to create video game consoles after the release of Magnavox's Odyssey became available in the United States and Europe.
The year 1973 saw a substantial increase in the number of video games created and distributed in multiple sectors. In coin-operated games, a craze for Pong-style games ignited the first fad for video games both in the United States and other countries such as Japan and the United Kingdom. Time-sharing networks saw greater proliferation of popular programs through type-in listings. The PLATO network played host to some of the earliest massively multiplayer games.
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Death Race is an arcade driving video game developed and released by Exidy in the United States, first shipping to arcade distributors in April 1976. The game was a modification of Exidy's 1975 game Destruction Derby in which players crashed into cars to accrue points. In Death Race, the objective became to run into "gremlins" to gain score. The game could be played with one or two players controlling different cars. The original working title for the game which appeared on some early advertisements was Death Race 98.
Ramtek Corporation was a California-based manufacturer of computer display terminals founded in 1971. Co-founders Charles E. McEwan and John W. Metzler had previously worked together at the computer graphics division of Data Disc, Inc., and founded Ramtek to create devices for displaying information from computer systems. Their major business was in medical monitors, as well as creating high-end graphical terminals for industrial and academic use. In 1973, they became one of the earliest manufacturers of video games, and manufactured coin-operated games until 1979. They became a publicly traded company starting in 1979. In 1981, it was reported Ramtek was the top company in the field of raster graphics display terminals.
An arcade video game is an arcade game where the player's inputs from the game's controllers are processed through electronic or computerized components and displayed to a video device, typically a monitor, all contained within an enclosed arcade cabinet. Arcade video games are often installed alongside other arcade games such as pinball and redemption games at amusement arcades. Up until the late 1990s, arcade video games were the largest and most technologically advanced sector of the video game industry.
An arcade game or coin-op game is a coin-operated entertainment machine typically installed in public businesses such as restaurants, bars and amusement arcades. Most arcade games are presented as primarily games of skill and include arcade video games, pinball machines, electro-mechanical games, redemption games or merchandisers.
References
- ↑ Calfee, Richard W.; Hatley, E. Troy; Kauffman, Pete (1970-11-09). "Need accurate recordings of fast transients? Try disks". Electronics. 43 (23): 82–85.
- ↑ Ellis, David (August 2006). "The Wayback Machine: Of Mouse Traps and Crossbows: The Exidy Story". GameRoom.
- ↑ Articles of Incorporation, Exidy, Inc., October 30, 1973
- 1 2 3 Meyers, Richard (December 1982). "The Exidy Experiment". Videogaming Illustrated: 38–41.
- ↑ Chapman, Chris (2018-06-01). "The Media vs. Death Race". Video Game History Foundation. Retrieved 2024-02-22.
- ↑ "Exidy's Introduces Four "First Star" Games In Massive Display A.O.E. Show". Canadian Coin Box: 18. March 1984.
- ↑ Compasio, Camille (1985-01-19). "Around the Route". Cash Box. 47 (30): 29.
- ↑ Mean Hamster Software
- ↑ CollectorVision Games
- ↑ "Obituary: Exidy founder Pete Kauffman". Gamasutra. 2015-07-06. Retrieved 2018-07-24.