"If, when walking down the halls of MIT, you should happen to hear strange cries of 'No! No! Turn! Fire! ARRGGGHHH!!', do not be alarmed. Another Western is not being filmed - MIT students and others are merely participating in a new sport, Spacewar." - One of the first media descriptions of gamers, 1962
@@BurntMike26 as much as I like this channel, its videos don't have to be continuously good. Please stop being such comment cliches and be always more critic , it's the proper way to help the creators. It might turn out to be wonderful, but posting a cliche comment calling wonderful a video two minutes after it being uploaded is just to farm likes or useless for everyone, not even amusing. Come on bois you can do better.
This came up at a "pub quiz" during fresher's week at my uni halls a couple years ago... My table wanted to guess Pong, but I knew that wasn't right, so I strongly suggested we guess something like Computer Space instead (not the oldest, but closer and it's all that came to mind). The answer they wanted was Pong. I was not a popular man that evening.
@@thotusmaximus971 oh dude trust me as soon as they read out that answer I literally leapt to my own defense. Before the poor girl could finish annunciating the "G" and before I even fully registered what was happening, a "NO IT ISN'T" erupted from my lips as I stood up at my table with such velocity as to spill two of the drinks on it. They wouldn't have it. Bastards.
@@ChrisStoneinator aw that sucks, I mean, stating/claiming something probably isn't enough evidence xD refer to the real answer clearly and if asked for sources just give them the video lol idk :/ Kinda sucks tho, but hey, you did what you could, it's all fine in the end
@@ChrisStoneinator Of course they wouldn’t, because when they have written an answer, hot dammit, then that’s final, no ifs or buts. Sigh, not only are videogames still a very frowned upon market, especially among adults, but this clearly shows how ignorant non gamers are about the medium. You did what you could mate, but we lost as a community that day.
It was a magazine for Commodore computers, so the title was a play on the word Commodore, as a commander of a fleet of ships. I had a Vic-20, C-64, and later Amiga, so we had piles of these and other magazines around. The days of free software, if you were willing to type it in by hand from the back of a magazine. I think there's an archive online somewhere (Archive.org).
So basically, science. But the cool thing about science is, we become gradually more of exactly WHAT it is we don't know, so we can ask better and better questions! :)
Calling pong the first game is like calling the Ford model T the first car, it was the first popular and easily accessible car, but like atari with pong, it was not even fords first car, let alone the first motor vehicle on wheels...
My dad had told me about the history of video games. He told me about the Brown Box... or Magnavox Odyssey. Originally I thought Pong was the first game too, but that was back in 2014. When I learned about the Magnavox that alone had amazed me. I delved into this extreme retro (in some cases just oldie games!) phenomenon. There I learned about Space War. Then other things like the Nintendo Color TV and many old early consoles, Microvision and etc. I kept researching this until I found Tennis for Two, and OXO. Finally, I found a website that listed the 'entire' history of games. Dating earliest to 1940; the Cathode Ray Amusement Device. Googling this device I found this video, which opened up so many earlier devices that could have been possibly used for some prototype version of gaming. It just amazes me how much people don't know about this stuff! When there are still many who say Pong is the absolute first game.
This channel is the definition of the saying “Quality over Quantity” When I say that I am referring to their upload schedule. slow, but worth it so much.
Funny you say that, I was just starting to wonder how far I'd gotten in the episode and turns out I wasn't past the halfway mark... This could really do with a lot of tightening up and editing to shorten it.
@@Naeddyr I have to disagree. The details are important and the whole video has a plot, or it rather aims on a goal. Sure, it coud be told shorter,but it wouldn't be ahoy....
This is a documentary, with evidence and research presented the whole way through, not an unsourced Facebook post or a RUclips top ten list or some other crap. If that’s what you want, there’s tons of places to find them.
@@apotheosis21 oh yes. And I always ask myself, where the heck all the information, Charts, graphs and evidence comes from. The research effort is immense. Then all that condensed in one video with different perspectives and alternate thoughts.
@Ninety5tag My only issue with it being an hour long is that I know that if I start watching this I won't be able to stop until the video is finished....
I will never tire of your approach to "quality vs quantity" You demand so much of my time but in hindsight, you have taken so little and every second has been worthwhile.
I love how this is better than quite a margin of documentaries, done only by a guy (or multiple, don't know if he has people editing stuff for him) that do it in a much more creative and interesting way, that keeps you watching for it's entirety and wanting more.
And my light bulb has a remote control. I can change the colors, the brightness, and the speed it transitions or rate it changes. People last century would be having a blast playing simon says on this... lol
That creeping realisation that the beautiful “cold-war military briefing” look isn’t After Effects but is instead countless pieces of actual footage of him placing and removing negative transparencies on a projector. And they’re all smoothly blended meaning he sweetened every cut individually. To quote Ian Malcom in Jurassic Park: “You did it. You crazy son of a bitch, you did it.”
The son of a bitch did it! Still a lot of after effects involved here! I’m trying to figure out ways it could be done. One way could be making trackable shots of placing a sheet on the projector. And then track the surface and displacement of the sheet creating a plate for for textures. That way you need around 20 shots to create the illusion of constant variations combining this with serval key real slides to put in the edit really sells the effect. But for now I’m to deep in the suspension of disbelief to know for sure. As someone who does vfx and motion graphics everyday that really impressive for me! Tip of the hat to this amazing creator!
"Darling, you better stop all processes on that cathode-ray tube amusement device and come down for dinner." "But MOM! It's a real-time transcontinental cooperative simulation! I can't just stop it!"
@@screamsinrussian5773 I've always related it to marketing for Timesplitters 2 but after a few minutes rumiging through google I can't find the thing I imagine. Timesplitters 2 was released 2 years before the Prodigy song though. Maybe a weird marketting tie- in?
@@Mgrow I thought of TS-2 when I read it. But then again, I have never heard of Pordigy other than their song Smack My Bitch Up and Firestarter. I thought they disappeared after those came out. I really hope they make a TS-4.There are rumours it's coming out on the PS5. I bet it will be in 2025...that be 20 years after TS-3.
I remember playing Space War at university in the early 70's! It was certainly a challenging game, and the first time I'd seen anything like it. After a few career diversions I was lucky enough to end up spending half my working life developing games. Things have changed a lot over those 50-ish years... 🙂
My first games job was at DMA Design, and my first games credit was in GTA 1 🙂 I spent a few great years there, and after they were bought by Rockstar I moved around various other companies. Fun times but it's a very demanding business, and I eventually switched to a job in embedded/real-time systems development.
Oh the knowledge and wisdom you must have.. might be thinking I'm kidding but you have so much experience you are the kind of person I'd kill to have conversations with
The amount of effort that must've went into making all of those retro-styled slides and basically sliding them by hand... like, holy shit, this is the work of a god
It is in fact done by hand. Source: Patreon Edit: To elaborate, he set up a camera in his garage, made the OHP slides, pointed the cam at the projection, had at it, and inverted the footage, IIRC. Game footage etc., of course, is edited in. If you see this, sorry for spilling some secrets, Stu, but I felt like explaining to make the point of how much work went into this clear.
@@DatBisa I knew this looked too good to be a special effect. I guess it makes sense: if you want to make something look real make it real. Gotta applaud Stuart for his dedication
Dude just watch any other documentaries from this channel and believe me you won't regret. Hence this is the first video in 7 months, when I saw the notification I quickly grabbed some juice and chips and sat comfortably in my chair to enjoy.
I was kinda annoyed like we know it’s the first game bro why you gotta have me watch 45 more minutes just to find out “Oh maybe its not the first game, and also, a game is a *insert lots of words here* so yeah. Like I would say it’s a game played on a screen and I’d be done
I know, right? Also kind of fits the technology of the times he's talking about, 'cos like, the Magnavox Odyssey had no graphics--you had to put a transparency of the "board" over your TV. Yeah, that was a hair later, but it still kinda works...
Everyone is going on about the detail and quality of this video (as well they should, because it's amazing), but I want to throw out some extra appreciation for the overhead-projector style presentation. I don't know why or how, but it seems to suit this subject material extremely well.
@@aurimasvasiliauskas6920 It looks like he printed out the information onto paper, filmed himself putting down and picking up each piece of paper with an overhead camera, made the video monochromatic and inverted it then cleaned it up and added text in editing. I could be wrong but that's my best guess.
@@aurimasvasiliauskas6920 Given some of the slides overlapped, we can see that the black areas are transparent and the white areas are opaque. This tells us the material is printed on transparent media, most likely acetate sheets for OHP use. It is likely these were printed with black ink using a laser printer, as is typical for OHP acetate sheets, meaning that the picture we see is inverted, as we can also see from some of the news article images. The sharpness of the image and the completely white appearance of Stuart's hand also indicate the contrast has likely been increased in post processing, but not to a huge extent, as we see grey 'shadows' where two sheets are overlaid and around the edges of the sheet, particularly as they are placed down. The physical apparatus used includes a light box, either one for tracing drawings (as often used by artists and animators) or the light box of an OHP, with a fresnel lens focusing light into a cone; it is difficult to tell which is the case from the video, as the lighting appears very uniform, but this may be due to increased contrast. A camera is placed above this, probably where the lens and mirror are on an OHP. The exposure on the camera is locked as we don't see any flaring (which would manifest as darkening) when the sheets are swapped. This all leads to a very refined and impressive effect, and works really well with the numerous old articles in the video. I want to say thank you to Stuart for such an excellent video, both in research and presentation.
Have you guys not tought about AfterEffects? For me, I'm more interested how did he draw those plans of the machines, but they were probably effected on. Even so, good video.
Imagine being married to this guy... "Hey honey, remember our first date?" *"To do that, we have to go back to the beginning, starting with defining what a date is, and what it isn't."*
"Stu, can you pick up the groceries?" "To do that, we have to go back to the beginning, starting with defining what fresh produce is, and what it isn't."
Surely you would have to define what the meaning of time is before you can work out a date. As before the georgian calendar you had many others which did them vastly differently.
50:03 I think we blew past the importance of Strachey's love letter algorithm. Noah Wardrip-Fruin of Grand Text Auto cites it as a 1952 program. It randomly generated satirical love poems, which you could loosely interpret as interactive by needing a user to initiate the random generation in the first place. While not strictly a video game, an argument can easily be made for the love poem algorithm being the first piece of interactive fiction. So it's possible that the first video game and the first interactive fiction stood side by side, created one after the other, from the same source. That they were sister mediums all this time. And that's kind of poetic.
Ok hold on I dunno if I'm willing to count "requires user input to initiate program function" as any more interactive than the example of starting a film on a DVD. "loosely" is doing a lot of work here
I wonder how much time he made to produce this video.. Seems to have a lot of research.. And he did all in slides put one by one by hand.. another piece of detail.. Not to mention the background music he arrange in the video that brings enthusiasm and suspense at the same time. All ahoy videos are awesome..
@@HueghMungus D'you know what? I will. He bloody well deserves it, he makes great content for a platform that, infamously, is uninterested in supporting creators of his kin, but someone should. So I'll go support his Patreon.
@@RichConnerGMN In fact I did. At $5/month. For the record, I was drunk at the time, but I'm not taking it back. I will apologize to my poor college student wallet later.
@@WoodyTrombone His interactivity requirement also disqualifies most quick time event games, since they're pretty much like watching a movie on your computer that's set to sleep every 5 minutes. Except the quick time event is there to keep *you* from falling asleep.
can i just say you're a friggin incredible musician? i had no clue you produced all the music in your videos until i came to your bandcamp. incredible stuff.
I don't think it's by hand. The hand that pulls the cards look like a simple hand-like shape. Rather than printing a full set of cards and finding a clean method of recording, I think he just put an obscene amount of time into the edit.
When you mentioned that OXO's controls were poor, my first thought was, "this wouldn't be the first video game with poor controls." But then I realized that, yes, it might well be.
I'm so proud of OXO, holding on just barely throughout all the tests. Three years later: My opinion has changed upon rewatching. I firmly believe that the first video game is Tennis for Two. While Draughts and OXO did come first, they were simply digital recreations of something anyone can do reasonably in real life.
Really love the slide negatives on this one. Totally fits the huge amount of time spent in the 40's and 50's. Yet another fantastic documentary by Ahoy!
@@azrael6280 It wasn't so much that. They focussed on call quality, battery life and so on. Completely missing the emerging importance of the mobile internet and touch screens. Symbian OS did not have a touch screen interface. The Sony Ericsson P900 and P990 did have such an interface called UIQ. Nokia should have bought UIQ and integrated it into Symbian.
Fond memories. In the 1970s when I was about 10, I was visiting a friend whose family was well off, and they had Pong hooked up to their TV. It looked cool, but simplistic, and I thought it was a lot of money for such a boring game.
I think we all to some degree project an almost caveman-like “wonder and awe” (read: easily amused and simple) attitude onto people in the past seeing a now-common technology; which is why I love your comment, and the fact that even then people looked at pong and thought it was kinda boring/lame
*Ahoy:* To land at a satisfactory answer to our original question we must first answer another: *Me:* What _is_ a video game? *Ahoy:* What _is_ a video game? *Me:* Hoo boy this'll gonna be one hell of a ride.
Without properly defining the terms being discussed, constructive analysis cannot take place. Simple dialogue can be reduced to futile quarrelling if both parties unknowingly use different definitions of a same word.
When he mentioned DVD menus as being part of interactivity, I got a massive nostalgia rush remembering the Shrek and Madagascar interactive menus with the unique original character animations and voice lines.
_This Disney DVD is enhanced with Disney's FastPlay. Your movie and a selection of bonus features will begin automatically. To bypass Fast Play, select the Main Menu button at any time. Fast Play will begin in a moment…_
I have some vague memory of a VeggieTales DVD with Larry The Cucumber helping you find the meaning of different idioms, like "Noah's boy on a raft" meaning a ham sandwich
The first video game was "Change the Lightbulb" If you did good, the spherical diagnostic display would light up to signal the dextrous proficiency of the player's input.
Fun Fact: There is a Ralph Baer statue in Manchester, NH on the riverfront in the Millyard. It's neat. Cause it's sitting on a bench. So you can basically sit next to Ralph Baer.
It's a bloody shame this masterpiece of a video got fewer views despite the MASSIVE effort you've put in. Games history is such an important topic to be covered.
I'm here, and this is a great video through and through. the effort he puts in is amazing, research and presentation. I appreciate and I am glad that he made this video and put it out for our entertainment, and that he continues to.... But I would hesitate to call video game history "an important topic"
@@selfmadegrammarnazi6916 Me putting a sexy anime girl in the thumbnail, and naming the video shitpost status will easily fetch me that many views in a day. This isn't 2011 when 1 million was actually a big deal. Even the most mundane and meaningless shit gets tens of millions of views. A high quality video like this deserves far more than a million views.
@@santhoshsridhar5887 It's an hour long. It won't compete with piano cat. The views are on the lower end for Ahoy, but it's a million people watching for an hour. One million nerds all staring at the same screen for an hour, think of the pocket protector profits!
I just started watching, but 2 minutes in... why does the tone and the music make me feel like I'm about to watch a documentary about a strange unsolved murder mystery or a dark conspiracy?
@@gnarlin4964 the patent system is meant to be there to protect small individuals, inventors, artists, etc from being bullied and overrun by huge corporations. Some scummy companies abuse the patent system sure but that isn't a reason to abolish the thing entirely, because if that happened then artists and inventors and scientists and engineers are then being pressured into not even bothering to create new and wonderful things, as what would be the point if they immediately lose it and any potential to earn money from it? Plus you know who was a patent clerk? Albert Einstein. He was a smart lad, and the patent system is also smart. If its not perfect and can be abused, change the patent system, make it better, change the rules to block scummy companies from abusing it. Don't abolish it. The attitude of "oh this thing isn't 100% perfect so fuck it let's just get rid of it" seems so unnecessary and wasteful of an attitude. It's lazy. Instead of trying to improve things you want to just throw the baby out with the bathwater because you can't be arsed to try and make the thing better. The copyright system is there for the same reasons, to protect small individual artists when they create a new work of art whether it be books, games, paintings, music or whatever. And similarly that systemcan and has been abused by big corporations (looking at you, Disney). But that's not a reason to get rid of it entirely, it's a reason to improve it. Look what happens when you get rid of these protections for artists. China. You get China. A huge cyberpunk dystopian hell scape where art is controlled and censored and potential beautiful things don't get created because it's impossible to protect your intellectual property from being stolen by anybody else. Do you want that? Really?
Feel like anyone else would have condensed this into 15min. To stretch it out over an hour without me losing interest is impressive. More quality than anything youd find on a major tv network.
@@buenogoodlive I still think its Pong. He has the right factors but his explanation and understanding of them are limited. Pong has the intent to be a commercial, entertainment, interactive video game for public use. All the others were some sort of science experiment, mathematical thesis or engineering acomplishment. The only one which you could verse to go against Pong is Spacewar! But then you need to go into level engineering and what the video game is telling you to do and input. For instance a lot of these "games" are not even two-button. However, it's the intent factor that I have a gripe with. I don't think any of them had the intent of making entertainment for the public (except of cause the conflict with spacewar! as I mentioned) than Pong did and they (the company) continue to do.
Lol excellent. The device is a cubicle with a human in it who is forced to do physical comedy routines for the benefit of an attached cathode ray tube.
well fallout is a world where the microprocessor was never invented and the world stayed in the 40-50's american culture until eternity. hell, even the transistor might not even exist in fallout. it's disputed whether it was invented in 2067 in fallout's universe, or was never invented at all.
there were at least two times where i was like "oh so we have an answer :)" the first time was 14 minutes in, less than a quarter. the second was 40 minutes in, only about 2/3. and i loved every second of it. this video is a gift that keeps on giving
He is making a very simple question overly complex. Tennis for Two is the first video game. If you start counting tic tac toe, you have to include this: /watch?v=senG1HmruAo This was developed int he 1930s. It features a screen with light generated jet planes and clouds that move in the background. If light-bulbs are a video screen, so is this. This is MUCH closer to a video game than light-bulbs and a real world game like tic-tac-toe. Minus the actual screen not being a CRT, this is far more video game like than ANY of the early 1950s games. It "feels" like a video game in a way that tic-tac-toe does not.,
@@tarstarkusz I know you were trying to disprove the video's point here, but I think you may have ironically just expanded upon it. This could very well considered the first videogame.
This was a rabbithole I went down whilst writing my Master's thesis and...it nearly destroyed me. I settled on Tennis For Two, but the conclusion you make at the end of this video is so much more beautiful than anything I wrote as a result of my research. Actually teared up a little. Thank you, Stuart.
Imagine you're on some kind of quiz show and the million dollar question is "what was the first video game?". Considering the guy asking the question is some boomer you know they think it's Pong. Do you say Pong or try to argue what it actually is?
@@SG-bp4lg While watching the end of the video, I was imagining the question being asked at a pub quiz. And I would be argumentatively asking "according to whom?" before handing in an answer.
Damn, I just discovered this channel. An absolutely brilliant historian with videos that are perfect in their design and aesthetic. Thank you for this great content.
I recall playing space war in an arcade, think it was a later adaptation of the classic version. Fun bending shots around the black hole to shoot the other space ship. A fascinating look at the early history of computer gaming
This is such a cool way to make a video, it made me feel like I was an important player in the 1960s government watching a report from a three letter agent in a dark room with other monsters smoking cigars
I agree. I love that Ahoy, who has absolutely mastered his previous style, is experimenting with a new design language, one that fits the theme of this video perfectly.
This video honestly makes me very happy to be apart of gaming. seeing where it came from, how far we come and how much thing's changed and it's influences just creates a respective proud feeling in me for some reason. and alot of that is furthered helped by the amazing writing and music "what we know as video games don't have a single origin. they're a constellation" beautiful line
Yeah, it really is brilliant. I thought at first he was simulating the effect with motion graphics but he really designed, printed, and filmed himself hand placing every page. This was him intentionally challenging himself to do something truly unique. It’s so impressive that I bet most people didn’t even compute what they were seeing.
damn, i did a research paper on video games in high school, and i only ever got as far back as Tennis for Two. very daunting to see that there's still a VAST majority of the video left after that game gets name dropped! i'm excited to update any future ramblings about video game history with the new info i gain from this video lol
When I saw that hour long timestamp, I just knew my cursory grasp on the origin of the video game, "Tennis for Two," was going to be more than likely blown out the water.
I was watching this with my professor. Even my old professor who's extremely passionate in video games didn't know about anything before space war. This... This, video was sooo well researched. Quality over quantity really bears fruit to masterpieces. Love your works Stuart!
in new zealand theres motat, meuseum of transport and technology, back in about 1991 i went there and saw they had video games , very very old , i called them video games but technicaly they probably wernt, you could play them and you had to put coins in them, they looked kind of like pinball machines but they wernt, they were even much more mechanical, i think some didnt even use electricty , they had paddles and flaps that displayed numbers and scores , like pin ball game but no pins or any ball, other stuff happened instead, i saw them as worst ever games in the world , some lit up score boards and made sound some rang bells and shit,
59:20 "Computer games" is still the definitive term in many European countries. It is partially because the arcade machines never saw the popularity spike like in the US.
That's so interesting. It's almost like Americans experienced a completely different history that most people in Europe. I was even surprised to hear that consoles like the NES or milestone games like, for example, Chrono Trigger weren't even released in Europe at first.
@@noisykestrel I may be wrong but Asia also had a different history with games. Here in south America, the arcades or "maquinitas" were huge for a long time, computer games were the most accessible option while consoles were famous but not that available as arcades or pc games. I don't know about Oceania or Africa but it definitely seems like there were breaches in the experience
@@noisykestrel This is exactly the case, the International market didn't really exist until the late 80s/early 90s, and even then the different markets saw different products. Look at Japanese games that never made it out of their market, games like Princess Maker would have been massively popular in other markets, although the oddly ephebophilic overtones would probably have to be removed, and that was a reasonably late game, and there are many others. As I understand it arcades were massive in the States in the 1980s where videogames only became popular in the UK in the home environment, on home microprocessors. From my own anecdotal experience I only saw arcade machines boom here in the late 90s, and mostly around holiday camps. Dedicated arcades were for gambling
@@adriandurn5903 Japan's arcade industry was quite vibrant as well, and featured the additional aspect of European computer gaming in that they didn't experience the crash of the US. A lot of the crash here is very muddled and simply referred to as 'the crash'. Reaganomics notwithstanding, a lot of people believe arcades dried up in 83-88 because of 'the crash', but it was a combination of cultural lashback on arcades (with some documentation of news segments about it on yt with original footage archived) as well as the fact that the industry itself overestimated possible growth. Realistically, arcades in high foot traffic areas had a much more sustainable location but a lot of arcades popped up where there simply wasn't a customer base to support it and all around the same time, inflating the value of arcade manufacturers. A lot of people like to point out that shit games caused the crash, but it was really lack of regulation and over saturation. This was the same thing that killed the home market as well, with far too many games on shelves and brick and mortar stores having to eat the losses, basically making them look at video games as a product that wouldn't sell. ET really didn't have anything to do with it, but it makes for an fun narrative. ET itself was just the symptom of what the video game industry at the time was doing: overestimating growth and especially speed of growth and the amount of money in people's pockets to buy 50$ carts each financial quarter. I think that's a large reason why Europe markets didn't crash: the games were priced to move and done so in an economically viable way with cassettes. Couple that with the push for computers in popular culture by the government, and you got a sustainable industry that doesn't even need arcades or consoles to thrive. Also as far as Japan's arcade ecosystem goes, it appears from a distance (no expert here) that arcades were treated like social gatherings, like we Americans treat going to the bar/Europeans going to the pub, going to a club, etc. There's just a different atmosphere around arcades socially which I think probably did a lot to maintain their popularity over time while America was shooting itself in the dick.
I really appreciate the YT algorithm every 6-7 months I get recommended every long form video you've uploaded and I cannot stress how awesome they are both for being able to sleep to and still being massively interesting even after watching them over for the 500th time, your voice, editing, hell the whole structure and delivery of your content is unrivaled in quality. Crack on chief.
Ahoy: “Under any reasonable definition, I think that qualifies as a video game. It might even be the first.” Me: “Wait, what do you mean ‘might’?” *looks at timestamp* “Holy shit.”
You can't just casually reveal that you're named after an old magazine like that!
Expendable Indigo thought I was the only one...... feels like a secret like the ugly child in the attic
Except his original name was Xbox Ahoy
They're likely unrelated.
@@hydrochloricacid2146 I doubt that. They both have the exclamation point and it's literally a channel about game history.
@@JJAB91 TIL. Thank you.
"I think that qualifies as a video game. It might even be the first."
There's 24 minutes left - here we go boiiiiiis
+
Just got to that bit
"Oh, there is more.... "
"first, it must exist" even when it's another video Ahoy keeps roasting Polybius...
I didn’t think of this, but I hope this roasting continues.
"If, when walking down the halls of MIT, you should happen to hear strange cries of 'No! No! Turn! Fire! ARRGGGHHH!!', do not be alarmed. Another Western is not being filmed - MIT students and others are merely participating in a new sport, Spacewar."
- One of the first media descriptions of gamers, 1962
Glad to hear nothing’s changed in over half a century
Where's the quote from?
"on me on me on me fuck i'm dead" - Overheard at MIT 1962
I think I've shouted the exact same thing a few times
Teabagging back in those archaic times must have been spectacular.
36:20 “oxo may even be the first video game”
Me: *sees 24 minutes left in the video*
I guess not
fuck you spoiled me
@@TopBurger239 Never read the comments on a video that poses a question until the very end!
*OxO* , notices your traces of Vector, graphic, dots.
It's like when you check the time watching an hour long crime show
I see why this took so long.
Another Wonderful documentary
You saw the complete doc in two minutes?
Edouardo Apellidos of course not.
@@edugarcia001 It's an Ahoy video, they're always wonderful
@@BurntMike26 as much as I like this channel, its videos don't have to be continuously good. Please stop being such comment cliches and be always more critic , it's the proper way to help the creators. It might turn out to be wonderful, but posting a cliche comment calling wonderful a video two minutes after it being uploaded is just to farm likes or useless for everyone, not even amusing. Come on bois you can do better.
@@edugarcia001 You care way too much about RUclips comments dude
“First, it must exist”
The rule to existing confirmed by Ahoy.
dang, guess I cant be a video game
Nerf it.
I exist, therefore I am.
Gooby I’ll see what I can do for you bruv
ur mom Who disqualified you? I’ll try and help you start existing
This came up at a "pub quiz" during fresher's week at my uni halls a couple years ago... My table wanted to guess Pong, but I knew that wasn't right, so I strongly suggested we guess something like Computer Space instead (not the oldest, but closer and it's all that came to mind). The answer they wanted was Pong. I was not a popular man that evening.
Argue the truth! Tell them if the previous games that existed that could be qualified as video games!
@@thotusmaximus971 oh dude trust me as soon as they read out that answer I literally leapt to my own defense. Before the poor girl could finish annunciating the "G" and before I even fully registered what was happening, a "NO IT ISN'T" erupted from my lips as I stood up at my table with such velocity as to spill two of the drinks on it.
They wouldn't have it. Bastards.
@@ChrisStoneinator aw that sucks, I mean, stating/claiming something probably isn't enough evidence xD refer to the real answer clearly and if asked for sources just give them the video lol idk :/
Kinda sucks tho, but hey, you did what you could, it's all fine in the end
@@ChrisStoneinator Of course they wouldn’t, because when they have written an answer, hot dammit, then that’s final, no ifs or buts. Sigh, not only are videogames still a very frowned upon market, especially among adults, but this clearly shows how ignorant non gamers are about the medium. You did what you could mate, but we lost as a community that day.
@@PikaLink91 Honestly man, they didn't say Super Mario so we gotta take the Ws we can get
Mom said it's my turn on the Cathode Tube Ray Amusement Device!
Mom said it was my turn to sue magnavox
Not sure if i spelled that right lol
“Amusement device” sounds like something that would come out of Aperture Laboratories
@@gblawrence034 i can agree with that one 🤣
Arlo Plow thats what i was thinking
@@mythicalplow8191 And magnavox won(again)
I didn't know there used to be a game magazine called "Ahoy!", but a nice name origin.
this channel used to be called XboxAhoy and did call of duty gun guides
@@inverlock those were darker times
@@cheesychipmunk8382 nah
@@cheesychipmunk8382 Those weren't dark times, they were humble beginnings.
It was a magazine for Commodore computers, so the title was a play on the word Commodore, as a commander of a fleet of ships. I had a Vic-20, C-64, and later Amiga, so we had piles of these and other magazines around. The days of free software, if you were willing to type it in by hand from the back of a magazine. I think there's an archive online somewhere (Archive.org).
"The more we uncover, the less certain we become."
- Ahoy
uncertainty principle? quantum physics? video games.
The less you know the more you know.... and the more you know the less know.
"The more you learn/uncover, the less you understand."
- Some guy
So basically, science.
But the cool thing about science is, we become gradually more of exactly WHAT it is we don't know, so we can ask better and better questions! :)
Socratic paradox
Calling pong the first game is like calling the Ford model T the first car, it was the first popular and easily accessible car, but like atari with pong, it was not even fords first car, let alone the first motor vehicle on wheels...
My dad had told me about the history of video games. He told me about the Brown Box... or Magnavox Odyssey. Originally I thought Pong was the first game too, but that was back in 2014. When I learned about the Magnavox that alone had amazed me. I delved into this extreme retro (in some cases just oldie games!) phenomenon. There I learned about Space War. Then other things like the Nintendo Color TV and many old early consoles, Microvision and etc. I kept researching this until I found Tennis for Two, and OXO. Finally, I found a website that listed the 'entire' history of games. Dating earliest to 1940; the Cathode Ray Amusement Device. Googling this device I found this video, which opened up so many earlier devices that could have been possibly used for some prototype version of gaming. It just amazes me how much people don't know about this stuff! When there are still many who say Pong is the absolute first game.
@@jaceworley Are you a kid?
Ye
The first proto-car was the Benz Motorwagen.
@@R3SerialDreams2 The French in 1668 and 1769 : are we a joke to you?
This channel is the definition of the saying “Quality over Quantity”
When I say that I am referring to their upload schedule. slow, but worth it so much.
Funny you say that, I was just starting to wonder how far I'd gotten in the episode and turns out I wasn't past the halfway mark... This could really do with a lot of tightening up and editing to shorten it.
@@Naeddyr I have to disagree. The details are important and the whole video has a plot, or it rather aims on a goal. Sure, it coud be told shorter,but it wouldn't be ahoy....
This is a documentary, with evidence and research presented the whole way through, not an unsourced Facebook post or a RUclips top ten list or some other crap.
If that’s what you want, there’s tons of places to find them.
@@apotheosis21 oh yes. And I always ask myself, where the heck all the information, Charts, graphs and evidence comes from. The research effort is immense. Then all that condensed in one video with different perspectives and alternate thoughts.
@Ninety5tag My only issue with it being an hour long is that I know that if I start watching this I won't be able to stop until the video is finished....
Ahoy is like a blue moon. He rarely shows himself. But when he does, everyone is at awe.
He's so thorough. It's very satisfying.
b0realis uhhh... yes, they do, they’re just not BLUE (a blue moon is the second full moon in a month[its very rare to appear, but still exists])
mini francis ITS HERE BOIS
I've never heard of anyone being in awe of a blue moon.
akai tsuki, akai tsuki
I will never tire of your approach to "quality vs quantity"
You demand so much of my time but in hindsight, you have taken so little and every second has been worthwhile.
Personally I love long ass videos. ESPECIALLY if it's Ahoy lol
I love how this is better than quite a margin of documentaries, done only by a guy (or multiple, don't know if he has people editing stuff for him) that do it in a much more creative and interesting way, that keeps you watching for it's entirety and wanting more.
@@Razer_Dash He's solo. All the music is done by him too.
CPT_Bill it really is true. I've watched the monkey island one a ton, just because they're so well done.
@@baetovenbeats I was just re-watching many of his videos because I needed a fix. The lord provided
"A video game must exist"
So, Polybius is not video game
Video games, or any name for that matter, can be used to reference both the idea, and also instances of the thing itself.
Polybius is a video game, just not existant enough to be considered legible for the list.
Well its definitely one now that its been released.
its a "virtual" videogame
I still believe.
Ahoy made it clear it was fabricated, but I want to believe.
Ahoy is like a desert flower. He only comes out on the rare occasions when it rains, but when he does, boy is it beautiful.
Ralphie Raccoon very much true.
its why I am a patreon for him. more funds enable more content! plus for even $1 a month he officially absolves you for hitting "skip ads" lol
An excellent analogy 😊
Ralphie Raccoon yes
Furry
"Along with manufacturer Nutting Associates..."
It was a different time.
Yup. Now we just call them "the boys".
Try telling that to Pirates ownership.
I... I died XD
lool
I'd be suspicious if this was a modern company.
"Hey bro nice video game" he says as he looks at your ceiling light
@@asimpledevice It is not intended for entertainment tho.
And my light bulb has a remote control. I can change the colors, the brightness, and the speed it transitions or rate it changes. People last century would be having a blast playing simon says on this... lol
@@DwAboutItManFr yea it is. Why else would kids flip them on and off rapidly
@@iGoNorth to get the fire achievement
@@DlcEnergy you can play red light green light
That creeping realisation that the beautiful “cold-war military briefing” look isn’t After Effects but is instead countless pieces of actual footage of him placing and removing negative transparencies on a projector.
And they’re all smoothly blended meaning he sweetened every cut individually.
To quote Ian Malcom in Jurassic Park: “You did it. You crazy son of a bitch, you did it.”
im just hoping its all paper/cardboard that he will recycle, and not all plastic waste.
@@TjaVideos even if so, THATS what you're concerned about?
you dont agree that it would suck if it was all plastic sheets that he uses?
@@TjaVideos NO why care?
The son of a bitch did it! Still a lot of after effects involved here! I’m trying to figure out ways it could be done. One way could be making trackable shots of placing a sheet on the projector. And then track the surface and displacement of the sheet creating a plate for for textures. That way you need around 20 shots to create the illusion of constant variations combining this with serval key real slides to put in the edit really sells the effect. But for now I’m to deep in the suspension of disbelief to know for sure. As someone who does vfx and motion graphics everyday that really impressive for me! Tip of the hat to this amazing creator!
"Darling, you better stop all processes on that cathode-ray tube amusement device and come down for dinner."
"But MOM! It's a real-time transcontinental cooperative simulation! I can't just stop it!"
Ded before you complete the sentence
*Nukes Moscow*
Fine, i`m coming!
THE GLOCK VIDEO IS COMING BOIS
"Just pause it"
Multiplayer ?
"first, it must exist"
Hmmm, yes. Of course.
He means there must be evidence of it. But yeah, ahoy just flexin' on Greek philosophers.
"oh yeah it's big brain time"
Hmm, you reminded me of Polybius.
shots fired on Polybius
A DVD menu is not a video game, by the way.
Ahoy: Always outnumbered. Never out produced.
is that a prodigy reference
@@screamsinrussian5773 I've always related it to marketing for Timesplitters 2 but after a few minutes rumiging through google I can't find the thing I imagine. Timesplitters 2 was released 2 years before the Prodigy song though. Maybe a weird marketting tie- in?
@@Mgrow maybe, who knows
@@Mgrow I thought of TS-2 when I read it. But then again, I have never heard of Pordigy other than their song Smack My Bitch Up and Firestarter. I thought they disappeared after those came out.
I really hope they make a TS-4.There are rumours it's coming out on the PS5. I bet it will be in 2025...that be 20 years after TS-3.
@@Mgrow The Prodigy were still going when Timesplitters 2 came out??
I remember playing Space War at university in the early 70's! It was certainly a challenging game, and the first time I'd seen anything like it. After a few career diversions I was lucky enough to end up spending half my working life developing games. Things have changed a lot over those 50-ish years... 🙂
This ruclips.net/video/wtbcaWnybzs/видео.html .
They certainly have, yes.
Where did you end up working?
My first games job was at DMA Design, and my first games credit was in GTA 1 🙂 I spent a few great years there, and after they were bought by Rockstar I moved around various other companies. Fun times but it's a very demanding business, and I eventually switched to a job in embedded/real-time systems development.
Oh the knowledge and wisdom you must have.. might be thinking I'm kidding but you have so much experience you are the kind of person I'd kill to have conversations with
The amount of effort that must've went into making all of those retro-styled slides and basically sliding them by hand... like, holy shit, this is the work of a god
it looks like an effect
@@Qi1233 If it is an effect then it is a damn good effect
It is in fact done by hand. Source: Patreon
Edit: To elaborate, he set up a camera in his garage, made the OHP slides, pointed the cam at the projection, had at it, and inverted the footage, IIRC. Game footage etc., of course, is edited in.
If you see this, sorry for spilling some secrets, Stu, but I felt like explaining to make the point of how much work went into this clear.
@@DatBisa wow that's dedication
@@DatBisa I knew this looked too good to be a special effect. I guess it makes sense: if you want to make something look real make it real. Gotta applaud Stuart for his dedication
I can’t believe I watched someone define “video game” for around 30 minutes and was absolutely invested the whole time.
Welcome to Ahoy.
Dude just watch any other documentaries from this channel and believe me you won't regret. Hence this is the first video in 7 months, when I saw the notification I quickly grabbed some juice and chips and sat comfortably in my chair to enjoy.
This video is a bit longer than “30” minutes
So you didn’t watch the full vid disgusting
Dank memes ah you got me I haven’t finished the video yet, sometimes I like watching the video while looking at the comments
" Welp, 15 minutes, we have our answers, time to- "
" *What is a video game?* "
* fastens seatbelt *
Tamás Csernák this is why I love him
*Vsauce music intensifies*
vvVVVmm. Click.
27:05 Just what _is_ “evidence” anyway?
I was kinda annoyed like we know it’s the first game bro why you gotta have me watch 45 more minutes just to find out “Oh maybe its not the first game, and also, a game is a *insert lots of words here* so yeah. Like I would say it’s a game played on a screen and I’d be done
I love how the the two common early video game concepts are space and tennis
what if tennis is played in space?
nice pfp
@@ajmofficial3657 you are about 60 years late to this idea
@@jackieburkhart3268 better than no idea
@@jackieburkhart3268 roasted
I loved the use of overhead transparencies, I felt like I was in a covert government briefing.
I know, right? Also kind of fits the technology of the times he's talking about, 'cos like, the Magnavox Odyssey had no graphics--you had to put a transparency of the "board" over your TV. Yeah, that was a hair later, but it still kinda works...
Everyone is going on about the detail and quality of this video (as well they should, because it's amazing), but I want to throw out some extra appreciation for the overhead-projector style presentation. I don't know why or how, but it seems to suit this subject material extremely well.
I'm extremely interested in finding out how he did it
@@aurimasvasiliauskas6920 It looks like he printed out the information onto paper, filmed himself putting down and picking up each piece of paper with an overhead camera, made the video monochromatic and inverted it then cleaned it up and added text in editing. I could be wrong but that's my best guess.
@@aurimasvasiliauskas6920 Given some of the slides overlapped, we can see that the black areas are transparent and the white areas are opaque. This tells us the material is printed on transparent media, most likely acetate sheets for OHP use. It is likely these were printed with black ink using a laser printer, as is typical for OHP acetate sheets, meaning that the picture we see is inverted, as we can also see from some of the news article images. The sharpness of the image and the completely white appearance of Stuart's hand also indicate the contrast has likely been increased in post processing, but not to a huge extent, as we see grey 'shadows' where two sheets are overlaid and around the edges of the sheet, particularly as they are placed down. The physical apparatus used includes a light box, either one for tracing drawings (as often used by artists and animators) or the light box of an OHP, with a fresnel lens focusing light into a cone; it is difficult to tell which is the case from the video, as the lighting appears very uniform, but this may be due to increased contrast. A camera is placed above this, probably where the lens and mirror are on an OHP. The exposure on the camera is locked as we don't see any flaring (which would manifest as darkening) when the sheets are swapped. This all leads to a very refined and impressive effect, and works really well with the numerous old articles in the video. I want to say thank you to Stuart for such an excellent video, both in research and presentation.
Have you guys not tought about AfterEffects?
For me, I'm more interested how did he draw those plans of the machines, but they were probably effected on.
Even so, good video.
Lol I was just thinking about this, wondering if anyone was going to bring it up. Then I look down and see your comment
Imagine being married to this guy...
"Hey honey, remember our first date?"
*"To do that, we have to go back to the beginning, starting with defining what a date is, and what it isn't."*
Hey honey, can you pick up the kid?
"To do that, we have to go back to the beginning, starting with defining what a kid is, and what it isn't."
Hey honey, can you cook today?
"To do that, we have to go back to the beginning, starting with defining what food is, and what it isn't."
"Stu, can you pick up the groceries?"
"To do that, we have to go back to the beginning, starting with defining what fresh produce is, and what it isn't."
Surely you would have to define what the meaning of time is before you can work out a date.
As before the georgian calendar you had many others which did them vastly differently.
@@METALFREAK03 To do that, we have to go back to the beginning, starting with defining what calenders are, and what aren't.
50:03 I think we blew past the importance of Strachey's love letter algorithm. Noah Wardrip-Fruin of Grand Text Auto cites it as a 1952 program. It randomly generated satirical love poems, which you could loosely interpret as interactive by needing a user to initiate the random generation in the first place. While not strictly a video game, an argument can easily be made for the love poem algorithm being the first piece of interactive fiction.
So it's possible that the first video game and the first interactive fiction stood side by side, created one after the other, from the same source. That they were sister mediums all this time. And that's kind of poetic.
Doki Doki Computer Science Club?
Ok hold on I dunno if I'm willing to count "requires user input to initiate program function" as any more interactive than the example of starting a film on a DVD. "loosely" is doing a lot of work here
What about choose your own adventure novels
@@immaterialJess I think those came later.
Me: I wonder where Ahoy went
Ahoy: **1 Hour Upload**
I wonder how much time he made to produce this video.. Seems to have a lot of research.. And he did all in slides put one by one by hand.. another piece of detail.. Not to mention the background music he arrange in the video that brings enthusiasm and suspense at the same time. All ahoy videos are awesome..
Quality > Quantity, my friend.
@@adamp.3739 I couldnt be happier
@@colorblue7018 Same here. Can't wait for the Glock video, that'll be sick!
*Ahoy
I feel like just giving this a like isn't doing it justice.
Patreon my friend.
@@J.C.Russell_96 But he won't, like 99% of the internet who just say x-thing, but doesn't actually do it. Just all talk and no bite!
@@HueghMungus D'you know what? I will. He bloody well deserves it, he makes great content for a platform that, infamously, is uninterested in supporting creators of his kin, but someone should. So I'll go support his Patreon.
@@MrGeorgeFlorcus well did you
@@RichConnerGMN In fact I did. At $5/month. For the record, I was drunk at the time, but I'm not taking it back.
I will apologize to my poor college student wallet later.
What was the first video game?
Average person: Pong
Ahoy: *Entertainment must be the principal intended purpose of interaction*
Which, ironically, discounts anything published by Electronic Arts - as their principal intended purpose is for the user to spend additional money.
@@WoodyTrombone His interactivity requirement also disqualifies most quick time event games, since they're pretty much like watching a movie on your computer that's set to sleep every 5 minutes. Except the quick time event is there to keep *you* from falling asleep.
@@gileee asuras wrath
@@blgdoesthings4122 Yep. And that game is one of the best of it's kind.
@@gileee The qte does change the outcome, it's interactive.
can i just say you're a friggin incredible musician? i had no clue you produced all the music in your videos until i came to your bandcamp. incredible stuff.
Dude's a friggin Renaissance man
Ahoy recreating his style of editing now by hand makes it even more enticing and intriguing than ever.
I don't think it's by hand. The hand that pulls the cards look like a simple hand-like shape.
Rather than printing a full set of cards and finding a clean method of recording, I think he just put an obscene amount of time into the edit.
When you mentioned that OXO's controls were poor, my first thought was, "this wouldn't be the first video game with poor controls."
But then I realized that, yes, it might well be.
Clever.
It wouldn't be the first video game without poor controls.
@Jason McCann
Yeah I think I got it from my dad today wanyway whe w
@Jason McCann
Yeah I think I got it from my dad today wanyway whe wr
@@SireSquish weekend e good night wnight good
I can't remember the last time I was this invested in an hour long slide deck.
I love how, just by compiling all of this, Ahoy has inserted himself into the annals of Video Game history.
Anal lol
*not even 16 minutes into a 1 hour video*
Ahoy: "What *is* a video game?"
"Define your terms" is the most overlooked step of essays nowadays.
Would you have it any other way?
Vsauce! Ahoy here...
"we must ask ourselves this philosophical question"
-Cyanide, 2015
Asking the real questions here...
“So we have our definition. The only thing left to do is apply it.”
*looks at timeline*
30 minutes into 1 hr video
*buckles up*
117th like letzgo
Anyone has any tips on how to like a video twice?
@@space_artist_4real138 Multiple accounts
Stuart goes balls deep.
@@RipperCyclotron what
@@shartman1247 stuart goes balls deep
so uh...
are we gonna talk about the fact that THE SOUNDTRACK IS COMPLETELY ORIGINAL AS WELL???
HOW DOES AHOY DO THIS
Wait really? Holy fuck!
@@masoclevine836 yeah! no wonder it takes time for videos to come out
Hes like LEMMiNO except without a swedish accent
Well it fuckin slams so good work Ahoy
Did not expect to bop this hard to a powerpoint presentation about the Cathode Ray Tube Amusement Device
Wow its 3am. I didnt check...
But this video simply made me happy from start to finish
50:48 “Also, Video Games are a British invention.”
You can just tell that Ahoy felt an immense amount of national pride when he makes this statement.
Making lazy people even lazier. What a lazy accomplishment.
@@skipads5141 - Thank you for applying immense productivity when applying your zero stakes, anonymous criticism. Appreciated.
"God save the queen!"
@@chemergency and the n-word regime
@@eustahijelifetips what??
I'm so proud of OXO, holding on just barely throughout all the tests.
Three years later: My opinion has changed upon rewatching. I firmly believe that the first video game is Tennis for Two. While Draughts and OXO did come first, they were simply digital recreations of something anyone can do reasonably in real life.
I was rooting for OXO so bad lol
way to kill the suspense
What about its lesser known cousion OWO
Freedoomer no.
@@degeneratemale5386 oh yes ;)
The ‘slide’ style is incredibly unique and an original way of story telling. I emphatically enjoyed the entire hour
Came here to say this
@@michaelmccray8026 Me too, an incredible amount of work!!!
Ahoy's videos are chock full of info, but their style of motion graphics is under appreciated.
It makes it look like the video was made on technology of the times he's talking about! LOVE IT.
The use of inverse video also gives it a surreal feeling, and allows the empty space to be completely black.
Really love the slide negatives on this one. Totally fits the huge amount of time spent in the 40's and 50's. Yet another fantastic documentary by Ahoy!
"Next up: Glock."
Iconic Arms is coming back, I can't wait!
I literally cant wait(the few months itll take to get this next video)
thank god!
Haven't yall seen the MP40 Vid?
@@GhostSlay3r shhhhhhhhhhhhhhh
Also that was 7 months ago
@@BenutzerWalter Wait, what? Really? Have the time gone by so fast? This is straight up scary!
"Nokia's Snake gets an honorable mention"
Me- damn right.
@Jack _ they were trying to be premium while using lower end specs, definitely yikes decisions for me
@@azrael6280 It wasn't so much that. They focussed on call quality, battery life and so on. Completely missing the emerging importance of the mobile internet and touch screens. Symbian OS did not have a touch screen interface. The Sony Ericsson P900 and P990 did have such an interface called UIQ. Nokia should have bought UIQ and integrated it into Symbian.
@The Lavian they were selling android phones for expensive prices
@@6581punk they were selling android phones for expensive prices
That was my point btw
Computers in 1951: ray tracing
Computers in 2020: ray tracing
computers in 3020: fancy ray tracing
Computers in 6969: Super Powered Ray Tracing
Computers in 78§90X: GNI(@RT-¥AR-MUTN4UQ
the 2020 ones also have intensive racing noises
Fools I am the single player gamer from the year 9 trillion years we have super invanz god mode ray-traceying
Fond memories. In the 1970s when I was about 10, I was visiting a friend whose family was well off, and they had Pong hooked up to their TV. It looked cool, but simplistic, and I thought it was a lot of money for such a boring game.
I think we all to some degree project an almost caveman-like “wonder and awe” (read: easily amused and simple) attitude onto people in the past seeing a now-common technology; which is why I love your comment, and the fact that even then people looked at pong and thought it was kinda boring/lame
This is literally an hour of arguing semantics...
And I love it
1:21 "In a 1987 issue of Ahoy!" You, uh... been doin this for a while, huh?
Yes, I remember seeing him in Dad's Army.
@@accountwontlastlong1 Don't tell 'em your name, Pike!
@@Jablicek Stupid boy.
I dunno if he's linked, but Ahoy! was an American magazine which released monthly in the 80s, last one was released in like 1989 I think...
*Ahoy:* To land at a satisfactory answer to our original question we must first answer another:
*Me:* What _is_ a video game?
*Ahoy:* What _is_ a video game?
*Me:* Hoo boy this'll gonna be one hell of a ride.
Same
Same
Without properly defining the terms being discussed, constructive analysis cannot take place.
Simple dialogue can be reduced to futile quarrelling if both parties unknowingly use different definitions of a same word.
Totallyyy haha
NØMΞЯCУ627 "this'll gonna"
When he mentioned DVD menus as being part of interactivity, I got a massive nostalgia rush remembering the Shrek and Madagascar interactive menus with the unique original character animations and voice lines.
So those menus were actually intended to be entertaining? So, a video game? Just kidding... Unless...
_This Disney DVD is enhanced with Disney's FastPlay. Your movie and a selection of bonus features will begin automatically. To bypass Fast Play, select the Main Menu button at any time. Fast Play will begin in a moment…_
I have some vague memory of a VeggieTales DVD with Larry The Cucumber helping you find the meaning of different idioms, like "Noah's boy on a raft" meaning a ham sandwich
@@katatat2030 Yeah, just imagine the person who gets entertainment out of DVD menus. The DVD menu fanboi, LOL
My mind went to the Harry Potter dvds I used to love playing the games in the first 2 movies!
*"It's trickier than they think."*
- Stuart Brown, 2019
50:48 "Also, Video games are a British invention"
I can imagine the little smirk Ahoy had when he said that
**British Anthem Starts Playing Loudly**
It's Stewart Brown, buy the way.
@@seanburbank5657 and it's *by* the way, not buy the way
I had a big smirk as I heard it and saluted the flag for the 27th time that day.
@@PonzooonTheGreat better have had some tea afterwards.
The first video game was "Change the Lightbulb"
If you did good, the spherical diagnostic display would light up to signal the dextrous proficiency of the player's input.
If you did bad, it results in permadeath.
Fun Fact: There is a Ralph Baer statue in Manchester, NH on the riverfront in the Millyard. It's neat. Cause it's sitting on a bench. So you can basically sit next to Ralph Baer.
THE MAN, THE MYTH, THE LEGEND. HE HAS RETURNED
It's a bloody shame this masterpiece of a video got fewer views despite the MASSIVE effort you've put in.
Games history is such an important topic to be covered.
Idk about when this comment was made, but it has 1 million views.....
@@selfmadegrammarnazi6916 bro look right next to his name, don't you see it?
I'm here, and this is a great video through and through. the effort he puts in is amazing, research and presentation. I appreciate and I am glad that he made this video and put it out for our entertainment, and that he continues to....
But I would hesitate to call video game history "an important topic"
@@selfmadegrammarnazi6916 Me putting a sexy anime girl in the thumbnail, and naming the video shitpost status will easily fetch me that many views in a day.
This isn't 2011 when 1 million was actually a big deal. Even the most mundane and meaningless shit gets tens of millions of views. A high quality video like this deserves far more than a million views.
@@santhoshsridhar5887 It's an hour long. It won't compete with piano cat. The views are on the lower end for Ahoy, but it's a million people watching for an hour. One million nerds all staring at the same screen for an hour, think of the pocket protector profits!
I just started watching, but 2 minutes in... why does the tone and the music make me feel like I'm about to watch a documentary about a strange unsolved murder mystery or a dark conspiracy?
You're probably having flashbacks to the Polybius video
let's be real you can't say it turned out different from those expectations.
How the fuck should we know? lol
50:10 The music really helps this moment feel like climax we'd been waiting for. Such a cool sound!
just notice it is from nuclear fruit
Biggest takeaway: Magnavox was an early example of patent scumming.
Yeah I don't think I'll be able to look at Magnavox the same way again
Certainly not the first, but may be the best modern example which can resonate to the masses
Honestly, I think the whole patent system should be abolished. It's nothing but a blight on the human civilization.
Now I have sour taste about Ralph Baer and the infamous Magnavox Lawsuit.
Time for me to rethink about first video game.
@@gnarlin4964 the patent system is meant to be there to protect small individuals, inventors, artists, etc from being bullied and overrun by huge corporations. Some scummy companies abuse the patent system sure but that isn't a reason to abolish the thing entirely, because if that happened then artists and inventors and scientists and engineers are then being pressured into not even bothering to create new and wonderful things, as what would be the point if they immediately lose it and any potential to earn money from it?
Plus you know who was a patent clerk?
Albert Einstein. He was a smart lad, and the patent system is also smart. If its not perfect and can be abused, change the patent system, make it better, change the rules to block scummy companies from abusing it. Don't abolish it.
The attitude of "oh this thing isn't 100% perfect so fuck it let's just get rid of it" seems so unnecessary and wasteful of an attitude. It's lazy. Instead of trying to improve things you want to just throw the baby out with the bathwater because you can't be arsed to try and make the thing better.
The copyright system is there for the same reasons, to protect small individual artists when they create a new work of art whether it be books, games, paintings, music or whatever. And similarly that systemcan and has been abused by big corporations (looking at you, Disney). But that's not a reason to get rid of it entirely, it's a reason to improve it.
Look what happens when you get rid of these protections for artists. China. You get China. A huge cyberpunk dystopian hell scape where art is controlled and censored and potential beautiful things don't get created because it's impossible to protect your intellectual property from being stolen by anybody else. Do you want that? Really?
"What was the first video game?"
Me, after this video: some British dude made checkers on a computer.
Me being lazy: p o n g
SPOILER ALERT!!! Ah, it's too late for that, isn't it?
I feel like I should be paying for this
Their Patreon is linked in the description.
do it c:
same
You technically are.
@@glerbus9561 not really
Feel like anyone else would have condensed this into 15min. To stretch it out over an hour without me losing interest is impressive. More quality than anything youd find on a major tv network.
(in the description) "Next up: Glock."
that sounds like a threat
Me: Well that would probably be tennis for two
Ahoy: Well.....
*1 hour later*
Me: God save the Queen
I believed for years it's tennis for two
@@Sonjayu yeah me too
my thoughts too.
I still believe it to be Tennis for Two. The two precedents are more akin to board games.
@@buenogoodlive I still think its Pong. He has the right factors but his explanation and understanding of them are limited.
Pong has the intent to be a commercial, entertainment, interactive video game for public use.
All the others were some sort of science experiment, mathematical thesis or engineering acomplishment. The only one which you could verse to go against Pong is Spacewar!
But then you need to go into level engineering and what the video game is telling you to do and input. For instance a lot of these "games" are not even two-button.
However, it's the intent factor that I have a gripe with. I don't think any of them had the intent of making entertainment for the public (except of cause the conflict with spacewar! as I mentioned) than Pong did and they (the company) continue to do.
"Cathode-ray tube Amusement Device" sounds like something straight out of Aperture Science's labs xD
Loll
Lol excellent. The device is a cubicle with a human in it who is forced to do physical comedy routines for the benefit of an attached cathode ray tube.
I was thinking Alien Amusement tech from UFO: Enemy Unknown
Never seen this style on RUclips. It's so sick dude, wish RUclips gave out awards.
1:21
*when they say the name of the movie in the movie*
"Roll credits" *ding*
God damn it is refreshing to see thorough citation on the internet.
As if you're one to talk.
@@Hallowed_Ground ??
"Cathode-ray tube amusement device" just sounds like something made up for Fallout.
well fallout is a world where the microprocessor was never invented and the world stayed in the 40-50's american culture until eternity.
hell, even the transistor might not even exist in fallout. it's disputed whether it was invented in 2067 in fallout's universe, or was never invented at all.
CRTAD: After the death of CRT
THE GLOCK VIDEO IS COMING BOIS
there were at least two times where i was like "oh so we have an answer :)"
the first time was 14 minutes in, less than a quarter.
the second was 40 minutes in, only about 2/3.
and i loved every second of it. this video is a gift that keeps on giving
When you're 4 itterations deep into obscure games older then pong, but there's 55 minutes of video left.
That's exactly where I've paused the video just to process the same thought xD
ik
He is making a very simple question overly complex. Tennis for Two is the first video game. If you start counting tic tac toe, you have to include this:
/watch?v=senG1HmruAo
This was developed int he 1930s. It features a screen with light generated jet planes and clouds that move in the background. If light-bulbs are a video screen, so is this. This is MUCH closer to a video game than light-bulbs and a real world game like tic-tac-toe. Minus the actual screen not being a CRT, this is far more video game like than ANY of the early 1950s games. It "feels" like a video game in a way that tic-tac-toe does not.,
Yes. Most of this video was pedantry. The actual useful information content could've been presented in a much shorter one.
@@tarstarkusz I know you were trying to disprove the video's point here, but I think you may have ironically just expanded upon it. This could very well considered the first videogame.
This was a rabbithole I went down whilst writing my Master's thesis and...it nearly destroyed me. I settled on Tennis For Two, but the conclusion you make at the end of this video is so much more beautiful than anything I wrote as a result of my research. Actually teared up a little. Thank you, Stuart.
What was your thesis title?
^^^^ spread that knowledge brother
Imagine you're on some kind of quiz show and the million dollar question is "what was the first video game?". Considering the guy asking the question is some boomer you know they think it's Pong. Do you say Pong or try to argue what it actually is?
@@SG-bp4lg While watching the end of the video, I was imagining the question being asked at a pub quiz. And I would be argumentatively asking "according to whom?" before handing in an answer.
I'd say tennis for two was the first REAL TIME video game.
Next up: Glock.
O H B O Y can't wait
50 years later
YEEEEE DOGGY
New Antarctictangle/JoMiMi This is actually a veiled threat, not a new Iconic Arms.
@@baronofbahlingen9662 haha nice
YES BOYS COME ON YES!
Damn, I just discovered this channel. An absolutely brilliant historian with videos that are perfect in their design and aesthetic. Thank you for this great content.
"Good things come to those who wait" has never been more true
Right?
Oh look Ahoy made a video!
*Length if video is 1 hour*
"This puts a smile on my face."
25:30
Someone’s never witnessed the DVD icon when it bounces perfectly into a corner
I spent many a drunk night on my brother's couch in the dark waiting for that sweet moment,
I recall playing space war in an arcade, think it was a later adaptation of the classic version. Fun bending shots around the black hole to shoot the other space ship. A fascinating look at the early history of computer gaming
This is such a cool way to make a video, it made me feel like I was an important player in the 1960s government watching a report from a three letter agent in a dark room with other monsters smoking cigars
Mosad has joined the chat
CIA has joined the chat
😐😄
I agree. I love that Ahoy, who has absolutely mastered his previous style, is experimenting with a new design language, one that fits the theme of this video perfectly.
"So, Tennis for Two"
Why did we have another 45 minutes of video if...
"But.."
WHAT.
Phoenix what are you doing here? Don't you have a date with Edgeworth? Also, stay away from Klavier, he's MINE.
What? Wasn't Larry Butz coming along as well?
bruh
Ay u luv ace attorney even me fam!
OBJECTION!!!!
This is actually the best youtube documentary I've ever seen
Seen polybius, yet?
This video honestly makes me very happy to be apart of gaming. seeing where it came from, how far we come and how much thing's changed and it's influences just creates a respective proud feeling in me for some reason. and alot of that is furthered helped by the amazing writing and music
"what we know as video games don't have a single origin. they're a constellation"
beautiful line
the "overhead projector" style of presentation for this video fits perfect with the subject matter. well done!
Yeah, it really is brilliant. I thought at first he was simulating the effect with motion graphics but he really designed, printed, and filmed himself hand placing every page. This was him intentionally challenging himself to do something truly unique. It’s so impressive that I bet most people didn’t even compute what they were seeing.
"Nutting Associates" Sounds like my kinda company.
Lmao 💀
I was about to make a similar comment.
Sounds like a good name for a 2-tone ska band.
Nutting-Orff sounds even better :-)
Eww
Ah, how I've missed the dulcet tones of your voice, Stuart.
I know its irrelevant, but nice profile pic commander 👌
I agree both of these comments quite strongly.
Vigilo Confido
damn, i did a research paper on video games in high school, and i only ever got as far back as Tennis for Two. very daunting to see that there's still a VAST majority of the video left after that game gets name dropped! i'm excited to update any future ramblings about video game history with the new info i gain from this video lol
"huh is it done already? I dont feel like we really got an answer, pretty neat tho"
"wait"
*_15 minutes into the 1 hour documentary_*
Now that's gangsta
Correct
When I saw that hour long timestamp, I just knew my cursory grasp on the origin of the video game, "Tennis for Two," was going to be more than likely blown out the water.
I was watching this with my professor. Even my old professor who's extremely passionate in video games didn't know about anything before space war.
This... This, video was sooo well researched. Quality over quantity really bears fruit to masterpieces.
Love your works Stuart!
Honorary doctorate in the mail?
in new zealand theres motat, meuseum of transport and technology, back in about 1991 i went there and saw they had video games , very very old , i called them video games but technicaly they probably wernt, you could play them and you had to put coins in them, they looked kind of like pinball machines but they wernt, they were even much more mechanical, i think some didnt even use electricty , they had paddles and flaps that displayed numbers and scores , like pin ball game but no pins or any ball, other stuff happened instead, i saw them as worst ever games in the world , some lit up score boards and made sound some rang bells and shit,
Why are you hanging around with a professor?
@@big_ry82 fuck i dont wana know everytime someone relpies too the channel comments only i want to know when they reply to my comments
this might be my favorite video essay/documentary on this entire website. i’ve rewatched it several times. your work is amazing
59:20 "Computer games" is still the definitive term in many European countries. It is partially because the arcade machines never saw the popularity spike like in the US.
That's so interesting. It's almost like Americans experienced a completely different history that most people in Europe. I was even surprised to hear that consoles like the NES or milestone games like, for example, Chrono Trigger weren't even released in Europe at first.
@@noisykestrel I may be wrong but Asia also had a different history with games. Here in south America, the arcades or "maquinitas" were huge for a long time, computer games were the most accessible option while consoles were famous but not that available as arcades or pc games. I don't know about Oceania or Africa but it definitely seems like there were breaches in the experience
Late reply but you can hear someone like Matthewmatosis still refer to video games as 'computer games' in his videos.
@@noisykestrel This is exactly the case, the International market didn't really exist until the late 80s/early 90s, and even then the different markets saw different products. Look at Japanese games that never made it out of their market, games like Princess Maker would have been massively popular in other markets, although the oddly ephebophilic overtones would probably have to be removed, and that was a reasonably late game, and there are many others.
As I understand it arcades were massive in the States in the 1980s where videogames only became popular in the UK in the home environment, on home microprocessors. From my own anecdotal experience I only saw arcade machines boom here in the late 90s, and mostly around holiday camps. Dedicated arcades were for gambling
@@adriandurn5903 Japan's arcade industry was quite vibrant as well, and featured the additional aspect of European computer gaming in that they didn't experience the crash of the US. A lot of the crash here is very muddled and simply referred to as 'the crash'. Reaganomics notwithstanding, a lot of people believe arcades dried up in 83-88 because of 'the crash', but it was a combination of cultural lashback on arcades (with some documentation of news segments about it on yt with original footage archived) as well as the fact that the industry itself overestimated possible growth. Realistically, arcades in high foot traffic areas had a much more sustainable location but a lot of arcades popped up where there simply wasn't a customer base to support it and all around the same time, inflating the value of arcade manufacturers. A lot of people like to point out that shit games caused the crash, but it was really lack of regulation and over saturation. This was the same thing that killed the home market as well, with far too many games on shelves and brick and mortar stores having to eat the losses, basically making them look at video games as a product that wouldn't sell. ET really didn't have anything to do with it, but it makes for an fun narrative. ET itself was just the symptom of what the video game industry at the time was doing: overestimating growth and especially speed of growth and the amount of money in people's pockets to buy 50$ carts each financial quarter. I think that's a large reason why Europe markets didn't crash: the games were priced to move and done so in an economically viable way with cassettes. Couple that with the push for computers in popular culture by the government, and you got a sustainable industry that doesn't even need arcades or consoles to thrive.
Also as far as Japan's arcade ecosystem goes, it appears from a distance (no expert here) that arcades were treated like social gatherings, like we Americans treat going to the bar/Europeans going to the pub, going to a club, etc. There's just a different atmosphere around arcades socially which I think probably did a lot to maintain their popularity over time while America was shooting itself in the dick.
Them: "What's the first video game?"
Me: "Do you have an hour?"
"Next up: Glock"
Thank God.
V M glock 😍
I really appreciate the YT algorithm every 6-7 months I get recommended every long form video you've uploaded and I cannot stress how awesome they are both for being able to sleep to and still being massively interesting even after watching them over for the 500th time, your voice, editing, hell the whole structure and delivery of your content is unrivaled in quality. Crack on chief.
Ahoy: “Under any reasonable definition, I think that qualifies as a video game. It might even be the first.”
Me: “Wait, what do you mean ‘might’?” *looks at timestamp* “Holy shit.”
That was perfect
No no no no no.....See, I scrolled down to read the comments, and I came across yours JUST AS HE WAS SAYING IT. THAT is "holy shit..."
Cameron Horn when does he say that
@@1steeeez 36:11
Yeal Takian Protik me at 9:51
Holy shit