CHEGheads Blog

We Extend Our Deepest Condolences

Posted by Marc Check - 02/26/10 at 01:02 pm

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 Mark’s foresight and understanding of an industry where software and hardware share an evolutionary symbiosis:

Consumer taste is so varied that to find one thing that appeals to millions of people would be difficult. To find a market that big, you’d need, for one thing, to have many more computers in the home. But that’s a double-edged sword. To get more computers into the home you need better software that appeals to more people. As entertainment software becomes better, more people will become interested in computers.

Mark helped transform entertainment software, and this evolution of games drove the home PC and console market through decades of growth and societal penetration.

In a 2007 interview from gamesindustry.biz, Mark, then leading Capcom’s European arm, continued to explain the relationship between console platforms and entertainment software, this time adding new considerations concerning the role of platforms in international markets:

Q: As a publisher, when do you start deciding which platforms to offer stronger support for?

A: 24 to 36 months in advance [laughs]. We have to make those calls well before we know how things are going to progress, and quite honestly that’s why you’re seeing Capcom move to a more multi-platform strategy. Not only is there some question as to who’s going to be most successful, but there’s some question as to who’s going to be most successful in each market. It’s entirely possible that the ranking of the three systems in North America will be different from the ranking of the three systems in Europe. I’m actually expecting that will probably be the case, and it will be different again in Japan. So by going multi-platform we hedge our bets; it gives us an opportunity to move with the marketplace.

It is easy to overlook how young the electronic games industry is and how quickly it has evolved. Mark’s passing reminds us of that. It also reminds us of the tremendous impact that he and other industry leaders have had not only on the industry itself, but also on our culture, affecting how we play, how we learn, and how we connect with each other. And it reminds us of the responsibility we have to preserve the history of that legacy. NCHEG recognizes and appreciates the contributions of Mark and his contemporaries, and we will continue to work to preserve their legacy.

February 26, 2010 | Leave a Comment

CHEGheads Find World Championship Cartridge

Posted by Eric Wheeler - 02/16/10 at 11:02 am

The CHEGheads have found and acquired a rare and unique Nintendo World Championships 1990 gray cartridge!

NWC cart

Collectors, in general, love that which is rare. Sports memorabilia aficionados covet the T206 Honus Wagner baseball card, comic book fanatics seek out Superman’s first appearance in Action Comics #1, and stamp collectors covet a chance to lay their eyes on an Inverted Jenny. Few collectors witness, much less acquire, such uncommon gems.

Those of us who prize electronic games have our treasured pieces as well. Classic arcade collectors, for instance, search out working copies of the first coin-operated game, Computer Space (1971), like the one (pictured below) that resides in the NCHEG Game Lab. A game that is both historically significant and limited in number (less than 1,500 were produced), Computer Space always finds itself atop arcade video game lists on gamer Web sites and in collector’s guides. Like Computer Space, Nintendo World Championships 1990 cartridge perennially tops the lists too. That’s why I’m particularly excited that NCHEG acquired this game cartridge to share with researchers and guests alike.

computer space final

How is it that this cartridge came to be coveted by game enthusiasts, including yours truly? In 1990, Nintendo sponsored a gamer competition that toured 30 U.S. cities. The specially designed gray cartridges, which combined a triathlon of play with Super Mario Bros, Rad Racer, and Tetris, were produced for, and used in, this tournament.

Players in each of three age groups (11 and under, 12-17, and 18 and over) tested their gaming prowess in a six-minute sprint to score as many points as possible against other contestants. Finalists in each age bracket at every venue received prizes, including a copy of the gray Nintendo World Championships 1990 cartridge.

NWC1990 Only 90 such cartridges are extant, and so both their rarity and their unique provenance make them highly desirable. These Nintendo World Championships 1990 grays and 26 venerated golds (awarded through a contest in Nintendo Power magazine) are often referred to as the “Holy Grails” of video game collecting.

Until our unique gray appears in a major new exhibit—eGameRevolution—opening here in the fall, I will guard the piece with all of my might. Unless, of course, my fellow CHEGheads convince me to fire up a Nintendo Entertainment System to see who among us is the champ.

February 16, 2010 | View Comments

Four Decades on the Oregon Trail

Posted by Jon-Paul C. Dyson - 02/08/10 at 09:02 am

If one sign of a great game is staying power, then The Oregon Trail stands out for over forty years of enduring popularity. The game has also outlasted many different platforms.

If, like me, you played it growing up, you remember that the game challenges players to guide their wagon party across the great American West in 1848. To successfully traverse the continent, you must choose supplies, set your travel speed, cross rivers, trade with Native Americans, hunt for animals, survive disease and storms, and make wagon repairs. Choose poorly, and one or more of your party dies along the trail.

OregonTrailScreenshot

Three Carleton College students invented the game in 1971, when student teacher Don Rawitsch asked fellow seniors Paul Dillenberger and Bill Heinemann, “Can’t we do something with the computer in my history class?” They developed a text-based version of The Oregon Trail, and later, when Rawitsch joined the Minnesota Educational Computer Consortium (MECC), he made the game available to students throughout the state. The game play was primitive. Students dialed in on teletype machines and hunted by typing in “BANG.” Players who spelled the word correctly got the award message, “Good Eatin’ Tonight,” and some food for their travel party.

The Oregon Trail was not the only 1970s game to simulate historical adventures. Programmers turned to the ancient camel caravan trades, the rule of Hammurabi, and Civil War battles for inspiration. But unlike most of these other games, The Oregon Trail successfully migrated from mainframe computer to the newly popular microcomputers.

Hunting In 1979 MECC ported the game to the Apple II, and players could then hunt by shooting at graphics of deer, bison, or rabbits dashing across the screen. The game’s popularity expanded enormously in school districts all over the country, and as a result, in 1985 MECC released it to the general public. You can play an emulated version here. Continuously updated, the game is still a steady seller and has even migrated to the iPhone.

The Oregon Trail succeeded because it was simple, yet challenging, but endured because MECC, a stable and committed creator of educational software titles such as Number Muncher and Lemonade Stand, invested the resources to keep it updated and fresh and get it into classrooms so that teachers could easily tie it into the American History curricula. For the majority of children who didn’t have home computers in the 1980s and 1990s, The Oregon Trail was often not only the first computer game they played, but also their first introduction to computers. For a collection of people’s memories playing the game, see Dave Lester’s 2006 Facebook survey.

Maya has Dysentery Today, there are many other historical simulations and many more opportunities for teachers to use games in the classroom. But 39 years after its creation, The Oregon Trail still stands out as one of the most effective simulation games. When children stock their supplies, load up their wagon, and head West, they start to understand the challenges of Western migration, build some valuable decision-making skills, and have fun. And hopefully no one dies of dysentery along the way.

Did you play The Oregon Trail in school? Share your memories!

February 8, 2010 | View Comments

Welcome to Farmville–Please Have Your I.D. Ready

Posted by Marc Check - 02/03/10 at 03:02 pm

Happy Aquarium

Recently, I reluctantly signed up for Facebook. The site’s grown too large for me to ignore it any longer—and Lord knows I have tried. Part of the reason I joined is because Facebook has become a huge platform for the delivery of games. Several people I know don’t consider themselves gamers, yet they play Facebook games on a regular basis, mostly to maintain their farms in Zynga’s FarmVille and aquariums in CrowdStar’s Happy Aquarium.

These real-time simulation games’ immense popularity and diverse audiences make them especially interesting to NCHEG. They mark a significant change in the way people play, learn, and relate to each other. They also represent a type of game play that has prompted numerous criticisms.

Some professional game developers have dismissed these games as glorified spreadsheets. In a recent conversation, NCHEG advisor Don Daglow half-joked with me that he could immediately cause passionate arguments at any table of game professionals by simply walking over to them and saying one word, “FarmVille”. Critics lambaste the use of virtual cash and micro transactions within the game, warning that it targets “young people to spend real money” or tricks users into subscribing to various services in return for virtual currency. The latter charge has earned FarmVille a “Controversy” content section in Wikipedia.

FarmVille

There is no doubt, though, that lots of people love these games. My eight-year-old daughter’s recent request for her own Facebook account is a case in point. It prompted a fervent discussion during which she experienced all five stages of grief within one Saturday. She spent much more time on the “anger” and “bargaining” stages than I would have preferred, but eventually we got to “acceptance.” And she now understands that Facebook is for those humans who have taken at least thirteen trips around the sun.

What is pertinent about all of that here is that she wanted a Facebook account for two reasons. First, she said she really likes to play Farmville and Happy Aquarium, which I completely understand. The themes and aesthetics of these games, which are enjoyed by players of all ages, appeal strongly to tweens. Secondly, she declared, “All my friends have Facebook.” If I were her age and I saw my mother or father or even grandmother playing these games, I’d feel short-changed as well. But in response to her request for Facebook as a necessary avenue to the games, I found myself repeating phrases I sworn I’d never use with my child: “If so-and-so’s mother let her play with razor blades….”

Kiley (she'll get over it)

Through both informal observation and surveying, I know that many children younger than thirteen years have Facebook accounts, and the reason is primarily so they can play games that are unavailable on other platforms. I understand why some parents allow this, but I chose not to capitulate for a few reasons. Although Facebook has lowered its minimum age to thirteen, it remains largely an adult social networking platform. I cannot limit the language or content my daughter would see on Facebook and I certainly cannot monitor her every interaction. I also find it unfair to expect adults to limit or monitor their conversations knowing there are “uninvited kids in the room.” Most importantly, my wife and I concur that letting our daughter lie about her age to gain access to a desirable product sets a bad precedent.

Although my daughter got over her disappointment quickly—I haven’t heard a peep about the subject since—the conversation has stuck with me. It is unfortunate that these games are not available to children under thirteen through some other means. Unlike the long-standing issue of children playing age-inappropriate games, the problem here is that these games are age appropriate but are unavailable because of age restrictions set by the delivery system.

In the future I’d love to see these games accessible through a different venue for children of all ages. Until then I’d appreciate feedback from our readers. Please answer the survey questions below (I promise anonymity!) and give us your comments and opinions on these Facebook issues.