Most years when we pick the finalists for the World Video Game Hall of Fame—and then when our International Selection Advisory Committee and fans help determine the inductees—there is controversy over one of the picks. Our very first year in 2015, for example, we named Angry Birds as a finalist along with eventual inductees Doom, Pac-Man, Pong, Super Mario Bros., Tetris, and World of Warcraft. Hardcore gamers were outraged, even after it wasn’t selected— “Angry Birds does not deserve to […]
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“Play Like a Man!”: How Atari Gave Adults Permission to Play
“Hey, you! Greenhorn. Come on out and play like a man!” challenged the dozen cowboys staring me down from an ad in an issue of Electronic Games magazine. This rhetoric surprised me in 2023, but I imagine it would have been even more jarring for readers in 1981 when the ad for Activision’s Stampede first appeared. “Play like a man!” seemed unusual, because playfulness is so rarely connected to conventional forms of American masculinity as a key trait. Yet here […]
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The Game Show…Show
By Adam Nedeff, researcher for the National Archives of Game Show History
Here at the National Archives of Game Show history, we like to explore the history and culture of game shows. Happily, we are not alone. Beginning on May 10, 2023, ABC will devote four Wednesday evenings to exploring and celebrating the genre with “The Game Show Show,” a documentary miniseries. (Two of the people involved with the National Archives of Game Show History will be featured on the show!)
Opening […]
Lawn Games: From Croquet to Jarts
How we play sometimes depends on where we play. Activities indoors are often constricted by space, crowding, and the presence of breakable objects. “Go outside and play,” is a cry of desperation uttered by a frustrated parent whose rambunctious kids have been cooped up inside too long. But where does that play take place?
For most of human history, kids spent their free time in the half-cultivated land around settlements or the adjacent fields or woodlots. As cities grew and more […]
Game Influencer: The Career of Arnold Hendrick
Game design is learned by doing. Get a game with a level editor or a scenario maker or whatever and create something. Get some friends to try it. Don’t TELL them how to play. Instead, watch them and see what happens.—Arnold Hendrick
Granting a rare interview in 2009 and reflecting on his career, Arnold Hendrick (1961–2020) described his passion for wargaming and then for game design. His first published game appeared as the game supplement in the wargaming magazine Strategy & […]
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From Backstage to the Spotlight
By Adam Nedeff, researcher for the National Archives of Game Show History
This year, Game Show Network is treating fans to a blast from the past—the channel is launching a revival of Split Second, a tough Q&A game that enjoyed a three-year run on ABC with host Tom Kennedy in the 1970s. Split Second returned in the 1980s with executive producer Monty Hall pulling double duty as host. While it ran for only one season in first-run broadcasts, Hall’s version […]
Create Your Own Story: Tabletop Roleplay Games without the Game Master
Every player of tabletop roleplay games (TTRPGs) can agree on two things. First, scheduling games can be your worst nightmare since no one ever seems to be available at the same time. And second, finding someone willing take on the role of Dungeon Master (DM) or Game Master (GM) seems just as difficult. Playing this coordinating role can require extra work, planning, and effort, which sometimes none of the group are willing to tackle. Thankfully, on those days when you’re […]
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Pins and Pixels: A Brief History of Home Video Game Bowling
There has always been a close connection between bowling and video games for me. As a kid, I spent many nights playing with one of my brothers at our local candlepin bowling center. While my father hurled softball-sized balls down the bowling alley’s lanes, my brother and I often rolled digital bowling balls on a video game in the alley’s arcade. What I didn’t realize then was that while many of the first commercial video games of the 1970s centered […]
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The Lonely Doll and Unconventional Connections
Born in 1914, Dare Wright spent her early childhood with her mother, famed portrait artist Edith (Edie) Stevenson Wright. Edie treated Dare like a companion and the pair often created imaginary worlds through reading, writing, drawing, carpentry, and sewing. Dare loved to read Robin Hood, Grimms’ fairy tales, and The Lovely Garden, and she spent countless hours occupied by her dolls. Following Dare’s enrollment at Laurel boarding school in the fourth grade, Edith purchased Dare a 22-inch-tall Lenci doll on […]
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