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Abbeville Press

Video Games: From Pong to the PS5 (A Visual History of Video Games and Consoles)

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Description

Celebrate five decades of gaming with this beautifully illustrated tribute to the consoles, culture, and creativity of video games―from Pong to the PlayStation 5. A must-have coffee table book for anyone who loves video games, pop culture, or digital history―created by a passionate gamer (and founder of a video game museum) for his fellow fans. Packed with vibrant color photography and rare retro images, this book takes readers on a nostalgic journey through every generation of gaming. From the arcade classics of the 1970s to the modern multiplayer worlds of today, it highlights iconic titles, game-changing hardware, and the stories behind the screens. With chapters covering every console generation, plus features on legendary games, developers, and subcultures, this is the perfect gift for gamers of all ages―whether you grew up with Atari, mastered Mario, or are just joining the world of Twitch and the PS5. Read more

Publisher ‏ : ‎ Abbeville Press


Publication date ‏ : ‎ November 12, 2024


Edition ‏ : ‎ Bilingual


Language ‏ : ‎ English


Print length ‏ : ‎ 224 pages


ISBN-10 ‏ : ‎ 0789214857


ISBN-13 ‏ : ‎ 50


Item Weight ‏ : ‎ 2.7 pounds


Dimensions ‏ : ‎ 8.6 x 1 x 10.5 inches


Best Sellers Rank: #112,594 in Books (See Top 100 in Books) #236 in Popular Culture in Social Sciences #280 in Computer & Video Game Strategy Guides #282 in Video & Computer Games


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Top Amazon Reviews

    • Great short history of video games with awesome pictures
Review Image by Tim Tim
Review Image by Tim Tim
Review Image by Tim Tim
This is a nice quality book with some great pictures and I think the overall history is a good overview of video games. There are plenty of great games covered to give you some ideas of new things to play and pretty much all the major consoles are covered along with plenty of obscure things which is nice to see. Reading through this definitely makes me want to try some things I never played. The quality of the paper and binding seems good. Some of the photos are a little dark but that might just be what they had to work with. There are a fair number of cool historical photos that I had never seen before. Lots of the book is nice and vibrant and colorful. Price seems fair for the quality. I think any video game lover would enjoy this. ... show more
Reviewed in the United States on January 9, 2025 by Tim Tim
    • Good coffee table book
This is a nice coffee table book. Not exactly hard-hitting journalism, but it's a decent read that provides a good overview of the subject, with lots of pictures to admire in between the blurbs of text. The cover is very stylish, further lending itself to being a coffee table book. If you're looking for a book to have sitting around for houseguests to admire, this one might be a winner. If you're expecting in-depth, detailed information about all the ins and outs of the history of video gaming, including minutia and scandals and things clearly directly investigated by the author... keep looking. It all depends what you're after. ... show more
Reviewed in the United States on December 3, 2024 by Avery
    • A look back for all young developers
My son wants to be an animator/coder so this book is perfect for him to know the history of video games. He loves the old devices and it gives him an appreciation of the games he plays today.
Reviewed in the United States on January 27, 2025 by Cris Nella
    • Coffee table book for gamers
This is an extensively illustrated history of video games with quality photos of hardware, ads, and box labels, and with good, if brief, descriptions of video game history. It is a book that a computer gamer can display on his coffee table: cloth-bound and nicely printed on glossy pages. There is typically a half-page or so of text along with a photo or two for each topic. It is mostly about the games, but it touches on players and their devotion to gaming, about economics and the development of in-game purchases, and a bit about the psychology of video gaming and its place in society. It briefly discusses the developers of games, but this is a book about the games themselves and people are seldom discussed at length. The text is written to be interesting to a lay reader as well as a gaming enthusiast. There are very few screen shots, and the book does not go into depth about software development or actual game play. Keeping to its video game topic, it also does not cover text-based computer games such as the classic "Colossal Cave Adventure." While there are photo credits and an index, there are no references nor a bibliography. The book is an enjoyable reminiscence of gaming by someone who knows the subject and writes well about its concepts, attractions, and development. The reader won't learn to program, build, or play video games, but there is nostalgia and enthusiasm for the subject that is contagious. ... show more
Reviewed in the United States on November 26, 2024 by Laser Larry
    • More of a focus on the devices than the games themselves
This is a great coffee table book for gamers. We remember when even the earliest of these gaming devices came out and can now prove to our kids that what were are telling them is true. I had Channel F growing up and even it is documented in this book where it is hard to find proof of its existence anywhere else. One thing that I would have liked to see more of in this book is a bit of a catalogue of more of the early games. We remember certain games but can't remember what they were called, so that would have been a great addition because it only has mention of a few select games that went with each device. Also, although the dates are in there, I would have loved more of an obvious visual representation of the dates in one of the top corners of the book so you could flip through more easily by time. All in all, it isn't terribly in-depth about the games themselves, as examples are only given here and there of what the graphics looked like. I can only guess that this was done for copyright reasons, but it would have really been cool to see a page comparing side by side how the graphics evolved over time. ... show more
Reviewed in the United States on November 16, 2024 by Ode to Onion Rings
    • Gave this to my son for Christmas
I have a 10 year old and being 45 myself, this allows me to relate to him how video games were when I was a child. How I got addicted to games because of their substance.
Reviewed in the United States on January 20, 2025 by A. Dorman
    • Great history book.
It's hard for me to call this a history book as all but the first few years of it happened in my lifetime, but it's a great book all about the history of gaming. It hits the highlights, but goes in detail in many places as well, especially the older years. It doesn't talk about VR very much, barely mentions the PS4 VR, and doesn't mention the PS5 VR2 at all. There isn't even much mention about the PS5 or XBox X/S. One thing I found interesting was on the title page right in the front of the book; this was "transcribed from the Italian". The book has nice weight pages, a properly comfortable font size like books used to have anyway, great illustrations and photography properly placed to go with the narrative, and a nice heavy weight (a little too heavy to just hold and read for very long, you'll want to set it on a table or your lap if you intend to read a while). Great book, and terrific for any gamer who cares about how games, and consoles have changed over the years. ... show more
Reviewed in the United States on November 15, 2024 by Scarlytt
    • Some nice pictures but not particularly in-depth
This is an entertaining book and the photos included in it were great. The translation was good as far as I can tell from my initial reading of it (none of the grammar caused any confusion). Physically, the binding and printing are nice though it does result in some gutter loss on some of the spreads. In terms of the content of the book, I thought it was okay but nothing too in-depth. It's not a comprehensive history of video games but rather kind of a stroll through the history with someone dropping little tidbits of information here and there. That's not a bad thing, but I kind of expected a little bit more. Overall, it's a nice book that looks nice on the coffee table, but I think that if you're even a moderate fan of video games than you'll likely know a lot of the information in it already. ... show more
Reviewed in the United States on November 20, 2024 by Wesley Wong

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