Some say that it was Ralph Beer who invented video games consoles in 1949 when he designed a system for playing games inside a television. Nevertheless, it was not for a further 18 years that Beer's concept began to get the recognition it deserved. It was then, using a kind of an oscilloscope, that Willy Higginbotham created a game similar to tennis which could be played on something similar to today's TV. Realizing this was a great idea, very quickly lots of people got in on the act, developing all kinds of video games. It wasn't to be long before entrepreneurial companies started to see the potential of these games. Soon, video games were being mass-produced. One of the original and most celebrated of these video games consoles was the American company Atari. The hugely successful Sega was to originate in that era also, as did Nintendo, one of the most successful video games consoles manufacturers ever. It was not to be long before a new era of video games technology was to begin. This new era was to be marked by the dawn of the video games system. Video games consoles, also known as video games systems, are bits of high-end electronic technology that are designed specifically to do one thing - play video games using TV or computer screen. With a video games system, the main input device is known as the controller and comes in all kinds of forms from steering wheel to joystick, from light ray to gun, and/or paddle. There have been any number of types of controllers. They are all used to direct the action of the video game. It was in 1972 that video games consoles began to take a hold of the market. Coleco Telstar and Magnavox Odyssey were two leading lights in those days, but it would not be long before the Atari 2600 transformed the video games consoles industry with their cartridge based 8-bit console systems. Under pressure from competition that included Intellivision and Vectrex, there was soon to be another big jump in technological advancement when the Sega Nomad was released. This 16-bit system became 'the daddy' for a while despite intense competition from such excellent bits of kit as the Phillips CD-I and Supervision. This reign lasted until the release of the 32/64 bit consoles of the Nintendo 64DD and the ill-fated Apple Pippin. Hand-held video games consoles were becoming more and more popular as the big boys of the industry began to take control. Soon 'the majors' were stepping in. Microsoft, Sega and Sony were beginning to take control with their Xbox 2001, Dreamcast and PlayStation respectively. This is swiftly taking us all the way up to the present day with the technology of the modern portable video games consoles. These days, Microsoft's Xbox-360 and the Sony PlayStations rule the roost, arriving fully loaded with increasingly stronger, larger, faster, in-built hard drives. As these units get more and more powerful, so the video game designers can do even more incredible things with the medium. We are now in the era of the Xbox Elite and the PlayStation 3 video games consoles. It is almost impossible to choose between these two great video games consoles. The end of this article is not the place to start in on that subject. Suffice it to say, these cutting edge devices that take no prisoners. So, if you are about to buy a new version of one of these two video games consoles, lock and load and get ready for the ride of your life!
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