This chapter covers
- The Nintendo Entertainment System
- Our goal for this book
- NES architecture overview
- The structure of a game
- The game loop
Starting from the late 1970s with the release of the groundbreaking game Space Invaders, video games gained widespread popularity, and whole arcades were dedicated to just offering Space Invaders for patrons to enjoy. Soon a host of other arcade games followed, bringing us classics such as Donkey Kong, Pac-Man, Galaga, and many, many more.
Riding on this wave of popularity, home consoles such as the Atari 2600 and Intellivision entered people’s homes, bringing simplified versions of arcade games to consumers. These early consoles (and many home computers) started the process of people gaming at home. Meanwhile, in Japan, Nintendo, a toy company that had been creating small handheld video game units, entered the market in 1983 with the Famicom (Family Computer). This small but quite powerful 8-bit system burst onto the local market and introduced gamers to Super Mario Bros, using the Mario character from the arcade game Donkey Kong, along with a fast horizontal scrolling array of platforms and quirky characters.