History of Game Design: Prehistory to the late 1980s

This course will be retired on September 30, 2023.

Want to take a fascinating journey through the history of gaming? Then this course is for you.

Our journey begins with an exploration of how ancient board games evolved into modern board games and arcade games. Then we will explore the development of first- and second-generation video games, and finally, innovative third-generation game technology.

In this course, you will learn about the history of game design, features and applications of the earliest video games and the second-generation video game consoles developed in the 1970s and 1980s. You will also discover how the American video game industry crash of 1983 paved the way for game developers and game companies around the world—particularly Nintendo and Sega from Japan—to dominate the video game market of the late 1980s and develop the third generation of consoles.

Topics covered include:

• Pre-electronic games
• Birth of an industry
• Explosion and crash
• Rebirth of an industry

Module 1: Pre-electronic games

• Ancient games

• Commercialization

• The dawn of computers

Module 2: Birth of an industry

• Early computer games

• The Magnavox Odyssey

• Atari

• The Pong era

• Computer games of the 1970s

Module 3: Explosion and crash

• 1976-1983 in video games

• Second-generation consoles and games

• Arcade boom

• The rise of the personal computer

• The crash of 1983

Module 4: Rebirth

• 1984-1989 in video games

• Rumblings overseas

• The 8-bit era

• Ground-breaking console games