The Young Science

I figure if boxing's supposed to be 'the sweet science', then videogames can be 'the young science'.

The thing is, I end up feeling old, all because I remember 'it's the 2600 from A-ta-ri!' And back when the NES was brand new, and everybody in the neighborhood called it 'Intendo'. And the actual Game Boy. No, not the ones with different case colors. Or the one that showed colors on its screen. And definitely not the one known as Advance. Like the actual actual original Game Boy.

Lookie here for a succinct layout of gaming's history.

As old as I feel, I just know there's some guy smacking his gums and reminiscing about the first time he unwrapped a Magnavox Odyssey.

And behind that guy, there's another guy snorting derisively, bragging about how he taught a Q-32 machine on ARPA to play paper-rock-scissors.

And somewhere behind him Charles Babbage is snickering about his plans to have his Difference Engine calculate the rendering of ten colored squares every four hours, allowing his input to react to proposed chess moves based upon simple rules and render the movement of pieces on a simplified board over the period of several months.

But really, gaming is young because of its mass popularity in our culture. It is now a fixture rather than a fad (though some may disagree).

It is a medium in its own right.