2. The History of VideogamesΒΆ
Those who cannot remember the past are condemned to repeat it.
-George Santayana
Learning how something developed is often key to developing a full understanding of it - this is certainly true of video games. Knowing the history of the industry equips us to more easily recognize the important features of video games. We can follow the development of genres, ideas and techniques through the decades to better understand why the games of today look, feel and play the way they do.
Furthermore, as we sit down to design our own games, we can mine our understanding of history for ideas and guidance. Decades of developers have identified and solved problems as well as made mistakes - without a knowledge of all that work, we are doomed to reinvent the wheel and fall into the same traps.