Blog

Over the past year and a half, I’ve had the privilege of cataloging more than 10,000 electronic games for ICHEG. As a gamer, I’ve found this a great way to learn about the various genres and mechanics that make up the history of electronic games.
 One of my favorite games is Final Fantasy XI (ファイナルファンタジーXI, or FFXI,), a massively multiplayer online role-playing game (MMORPG) published by Square Enix. Like World of Warcraft and EverQuest, FFXI is composed of multiple online servers […]

Continue Reading about A Final Fantasy and International Gaming Revolution Published on:
March 8, 2010

A few days ago a researcher in our ICHEG lab sparked a rich conversation about her favorite childhood gaming platform, the Nintendo Entertainment System (NES). Like so many gamers in the late 80s, she spent endless hours assuming the role of Mario and squashing Goombas in the Mushroom Kingdom. Her memories of Super Mario Bros. and NES brought up the system’s groundbreaking predecessor. 
Several years before the phenomenally successful NES launched in the United States in 1985, the Nintendo Family Computer—known […]

Continue Reading about First There Was Famicom Published on:
March 5, 2010

At Strong National Museum of Play, home of NCHEG, we recently installed an exhibit that allows the public to experience one of my all-time favorite games, Crayon Physics Deluxe. It derives from the original Crayon Physics, which a co-worker got me hooked on a few years ago. The museum is a natural home for the game because of the whimsical nature of the graphics and musical soundtrack, and because (Crayola) crayons were inducted into our National Toy Hall of Fame in […]

Continue Reading about Let’s Get Physical! NCHEG Home Plays Finnish Game Published on:
March 4, 2010

Tetris is a great example of how simple ideas often inspire the best video games. In my recent conversation with Alexey Pajitnov, he recounted how a simple wooden puzzle game inspired him to create Tetris.
Pajitnov was working at the computer center of the Russian Academy of Sciences in 1984 when the thought came to him that Pentominoes would make a great computer game. Pentominoes are a mathematical puzzle in which players need to place 12 different shapes made of 5 […]

Continue Reading about Russian-born Tetris Illustrates Good Design Published on:
March 3, 2010

One of our most exciting recent acquisitions came from the family of Ruth Rosenfeld. Ruth was an avid miniaturist and world traveler, both factors that obviously influenced her fascinating collection of dollhouses, miniature rooms, and small (and some large) souvenirs from all over the world.
Ruth Rosenfeld began collecting small things and assembling dollhouses and miniature rooms in the mid-1970s. For her first project, she created a general store furnished with floor-to-ceiling shelves stocked with merchandise. In Ruth’s 30 years of […]

Continue Reading about A Big Collection of Little Things Published on:
March 2, 2010

Over the last few weeks my e-mail  filled up with friends and other electronic games enthusiasts bringing to my attention a couple of eBay  auctions. Amused at first, I quickly saw a collectors’ chain reaction happening.
These auctions centered on the rare and elusive Stadium Events video games by Bandai, a Japanese toy making company founded in 1900. The first e-mail I received referred to an auction on eBay for an “Old Nintendo NES system and five games” that sold for […]

Continue Reading about Japanese Jewels Excite E-Bidders Published on:
March 2, 2010

Aside from gaming, my other passion is baseball—wherever I can find it and in whatever form. Since my youth I have struggled to fill the void between the final game of the World Series and the return of baseball on opening day each spring. To get through the offseason months I have developed a large number of coping mechanisms, including reading individual player and team histories, replaying great games from past seasons, and taking a yearly winter trip to the […]

Continue Reading about Electronic Yakyuu (Baseball) Published on:
March 1, 2010

We at NCHEG extend our deepest condolences to the family and colleagues of Mark Beaumont, who suffered a fatal heart attack during the early hours of February 23. Mark was an industry veteran and visionary who began his career at Atari in 1982 and at the time of his death served as Capcom’s COO for North America and Europe. Previously he held various positions with Activision, Time Warner Interactive, Data East, Mindscape, and Psygnois. 

A 1987 interview in Compute! Magazine demonstrates […]

Continue Reading about We Extend Our Deepest Condolences Published on:
February 26, 2010

Watching the Winter games in Vancouver has me thinking about that cowboy Bode Miller, America’s best and most versatile skier ever, and what his riotous style says about play and competition at the highest levels.

Miller has chalked up an unmatched list of victories in each of the different alpine events— 32 World Cup trophies at latest count and bronze, silver, and gold medals at this winter Olympics. His record is especially remarkable because the skills that slalom requires (technique) and […]

Continue Reading about Bode’s Wild Play: Skiing in a Whirlwind Published on:
February 24, 2010