The first succesful 2D computer game was Pong for the Atari, created in 1972 by Atari Inc. Pong is a first generation video game, a term used to describe the video game industry between 1972 and 1977, we are now in the seventh generation.
2D game engines are used to create single perspective games, normally viewed from the top or side. At the time when they were first created it would have been impossible to make a 3D game engine because of the amount of memory available (the snes cartridge’s normally contained around 500kb of data, sometimes pushed to 1mb most other consoles had even less)They are no where near as complicated as they used to be.
Filed under: Games research
