Tuesday, November 29, 2011

How Video Games Revolutionized The Gaming Industry

By Adam Russel


The gaming industry has shown inexorable progress over the years. Time and time again, we see game titles that are so innovative that they revolutionized the gaming sector to a great degree. The racing games we have today for example are a far cry from Taito's black-and-white Speed Race released in the seventies. A number of these car games already have the ability to realistically recreate damage to cars, in both cosmetic and performance perspectives. These racing games have really remarkable physics engines as well. They are so well-made that even professional race car drivers say that these car games match closely with real life racing. Music video game titles like Dance, Dance Revolution and Guitar Hero have also changed the gaming industry dramatically because they helped bring video gaming to a broader audience. The introduction of these games has transformed adults and women who were once leery of playing video games into enthusiasts. Role playing games as well have characters, environments, and storylines that rivals that of animated films.

More importantly, video games provide a different kind of social experience especially with the introduction of massively multiplayer online games. With most of the missions in these online games too difficult to tackle alone, they encourage cooperative play to an extent unbeknown before. Playing games online encourage communication in and out of the game, eventually giving rise to subcultures.

Gaming platforms have also improved dramatically to accommodate the spur of gaming software development. Reviewing the development strategies pursued by the three major game consoles, it's quite obvious that Sony and Microsoft are focusing their efforts to provide gaming systems which are both powerful and have top quality graphics. While Nintendo, on the other hand, concentrates its energies in making their consoles more interactive. Nintendo's Wii covers a wider demographic than the other two, primarily because of their intuitive gameplay and low cost of ownership.

Xbox's greatest strength is their demo game feature, allowing players to test out nearly all available games online prior to buying. PlayStation, aside from being an eye-candy, has impressive proprietary non-gaming features. With these platforms essentially turning into specialized computers with several connectivity options, playing online has become more and more popular. Microsoft and Sony have online gaming and digital distribution networks, and these are Xbox Live and PSN, respectively.

The growth of the video gaming industry is so far reaching that it has brought forth several job disciplines and employs hundreds of people worldwide. Gamers can start as beta game testers, and move up to become test leads, programmers, and eventually producers. These occupations call for lengthy hours at work, and probably have many sleepless nights. But with the sheer enjoyment and bragging rights of being compensated handsomely to play day in and day out, it is no surprise why those employed in the gaming industry are willing to overlook those not-so-good aspects of their jobs.




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