Wikipedia:Featured and good topic candidates/Early history of video games/archive1

Early history of video games
The history of video games spans a period of time between the invention of the first electronic games and today, covering a long period of invention and changes. Video gaming would not reach mainstream popularity until the 1970s and 1980s, when arcade video games, gaming consoles and home computer games were introduced to the general public. Since then, video gaming has become a popular form of entertainment and a part of modern culture in most parts of the world. The early history of video games, therefore, covers the games released in the period of time between the first interactive electronic game with an electronic display in 1947 and the first true video games in the early 1950s, and the rise of early arcade video games in the 1970s (Pong and the beginning of the first generation of video game consoles with the Magnavox Odyssey, both in 1972). During this time there were a wide range of devices and inventions corresponding with large advances in computing technology, and the actual first video game is dependent on the definition of "video game" used.


 * Contributor(s): PresN

It's long been annoying to me that the articles on the early history of video games and the foundational games therein were in pretty awful shape, and starting this past November I decided to do something about it. 6 months, several books, countless web searches and 12 articles later, I present to you a completed good topic on the early history of video games, covering the time span from the initial protogames of 1947-51 through to the first spark of commercial video games in 1971, ending just before 1972 when Pong showed that the commercial arcade game was a real thing, and the Magnavox Odyssey showed that playing games on your TV was a possible and profitable idea. Included in this topic is every article we have on a 1971 or earlier video game, with the from-scratch early mainframe games scooping up some of the smaller ones. It's a little-known area of video game history—most books breeze past the whole 25 year period on their way to the better-documented 1972—but an important starting point for a ton of game developers in the 70s and 80s. Special thanks to, who GA reviewed all but one of these, holding my feet to the fire on being clear and precise in my language when trying to simplify complex development histories and pointing me at great resources when the easy sources contradicted each other. -- Pres N  03:40, 15 May 2016 (UTC)
 * Support - Once again, a topic pulled from total obscurity and shined to beautiful Green plus signs by . Strong support for articles all of us video game readers and those interested in history should learn from. Judgesurreal777 (talk) 18:22, 15 May 2016 (UTC)
 * Support - Don't know if my GA reviews preclude me from voting, but I just wanted to take the opportunity to express my admiration for all PresN has done to turn Wikipedia into perhaps the best source for early video game history not just on the Web, but in any media format. Indrian (talk) 22:12, 15 May 2016 (UTC)


 * The quivalent would be "History of the earliest VG", but I am happy to support the topic in the current format. Just reported the entries in the template a bit to be more balanced. Nergaal (talk) 14:33, 15 June 2016 (UTC)


 * Included the navbox above, which helps break down the contents better than the featured topic box. As acknowledged, this "early history" as a nebulous scope and it's tough to draw scope boundaries, though I echo Indrian that PresN has done a fine job of doing so. As far as I know, we don't have a singular source that delineates the most important individual projects from this era, so I can't speak to "completeness" of the topic—for instance, is our coverage American-centric? Are we missing any major projects from the UK, Russia, or non-Western cultures? Does "early history" really span the pre-American arcade period, or what about primitive electronic games as other regions began to develop an industry? I'm comfortable with the scope as is and congratulate PresN on the accomplishment. I originally had a few of these on my list and am glad to see them finished (and which such alacrity!) I'd be happy to collaborate on cleanup for featured nominations. Support. czar  22:57, 20 July 2016 (UTC)
 * The sources are a little American-centric, though in the pre-1962 time period there would have been very little outside of America due to where the few computers were (though OXO is British) and from 1962-72 most games would still have been made in America, but primarily the sources are just missing: most video game history books start at 1972, and most of the rest just throw in a brief intro for Tennis for Two and Spacewar. Hamurabi gets an article because there's sources on it, but there's a hundred other piddly little BASIC mainframe games from that decade, from both America and Europe, that just don't have any sources whatsoever. Games that made it into the (American) 101 BASIC Games or were later on (America) BBSs are the ones with sources, sadly. 1972 (roughly) really was a tipping point everywhere, though- arcade video games became a thing in America, Europe, and Japan very quickly after Pong, microcomputers became a thing at the same time and opened up computer programming to an exponentially increasing number of people worldwide, dedicated consoles proliferated, especially in Europe... Anyways, yeah, I'd love to take these to FAC, though there's one source that I'm not sure on, and likely more books that I'd need to hunt down; if I do I'll hit you up, or if one catches your eye just let me know. -- Pres N  00:25, 21 July 2016 (UTC)
 * I meant more that "early history" shifts between cultures. So countries that received mainframe computers after the United States might have also had an early history of video games (pre-arcade) but possibly during a different span of years, depending on whether we know about it. (This is also the main criticism of the "console generations" model Wikipedia helped to proliferate—it's based around the console war mentality and single-timeframe histories. For example, where does the British home computer timeline intersect with the Americanized console timeline.) Anyway, I think it's safe to say that these articles reflect the most prominent sources on the topic. I can help find/scan sources too—just let me know what you're thinking czar  00:34, 21 July 2016 (UTC)


 * Support - I think the delineation is proper, given what I came to read up on whenI worked on the Ralph Baer article last year after his death, who is credited with the Magnavox Odyssey. Both that and Pong are the first clearly-established home and arcade game, so all titles before that can easily be classified as "early video games". --M ASEM (t) 16:41, 21 July 2016 (UTC)


 * Support I'm happy that these articles cover the topic of early video games, and I've been following these for quite a while. Amazing work! JAG  UAR   11:45, 23 July 2016 (UTC)


 * Closed with a consensus to promote to Good Topic. - GamerPro64  23:16, 22 August 2016 (UTC)