Portal:Games

The Games Portal

A game is an activity defined by a challenge and a set of rules, typically done for enjoyment, competition, or development. Games may be played informally or in professional competitive settings before audiences. Popular formats include board games, card games, video games, and sports, distinguished from unstructured play by having rules. Scholars have long debated the essence of games, with no single definition achieving universal acceptance.

Games are a universal feature of human culture. The Royal Game of Ur and Senet are among the oldest known games, dating back to at least 2600 BCE. Throughout history, games have served as tools for entertainment, teaching, ritual, and socialization. In the modern era, the global video game industry has grown to surpass both film and music in annual revenue, reflecting how central games have become to contemporary life.

Philosophically, games have attracted attention as a test case for the nature of rules and meaning. Psychologists link play to cognitive development in children and to the intense, satisfying concentration called flow in adults. Game theory uses the structure of games to model decision making in fields such as economics and evolutionary biology. (Full article...)

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Top: North American Super NES with controller
Middle: Japanese Super Famicom with controller
Bottom: PAL-region Super NES with controller
Other variations are pictured in Casing section.

The Super Nintendo Entertainment System (Super NES or SNES) is a home video game console developed and marketed by Nintendo. It was released as the Super Famicom, in Japan on November 21, 1990, as the Super NES in North America on August 23, 1991, and internationally throughout 1992. It was Nintendo's second programmable home console, following the Nintendo Entertainment System (NES). A fourth-generation console, the Super NES primarily competed with Sega's Genesis in the console war, a fierce battle for market share in the United States and Europe.

Masayuki Uemura, a Nintendo engineer, designed the 16-bit Super NES in response to the introduction of the Genesis and NEC's TurboGrafx-16. The Super NES had advanced graphical and sound capabilities compared to its competitors, with features such as Mode 7 to simulate 3D perspective and eight-channel ADPCM audio. Its CPU was designed to accommodate ongoing technological innovations by allowing it to interface with enhancement chips, such as Super FX, integrated into game cartridges. Its controller built on the NES's with additional face buttons and two shoulder buttons. Nintendo released many accessories, including the Super Game Boy adapter to play Game Boy games and the Japan-only Satellaview modem peripheral. (Full article...)

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...that Tom Hanks was in a 1982 TV movie called Mazes and Monsters about a group of college students and their interest in the eponymous role-playing game?
...that the golden age of arcade video games began with the release of Space Invaders in 1978?
...that the most famous boardwalk in the United States is probably the one in Atlantic City, New Jersey, thanks to its association with the Monopoly board game?
...that Pepsi offered a Harrier fighter jet in their Pepsi Billion Dollar Sweepstakes game and the Pepsi Stuff game?
...that 1956 was the first time when a computer was able to play a chess-like game, Los Alamos chess (pictured)?

General images

The following are images from various game-related articles on Wikipedia.

Image 1Bridge is a popular plain-trick game (from Card game)
Image 2Ancient Egyptian senet game board inscribed for Amenhotep III with separate sliding drawer, from 1390 to 1353 BC, made of glazed faience, dimensions: 5.5 × 7.7 × 21 cm, in the Brooklyn Museum (New York City). (from Game)
Image 3A ball-in-a-maze puzzle requires fine motor skills. (from Game of skill)
Image 4MUD interface for Furcadia (from Role-playing game)
Image 5Parcheesi is an American adaptation of a Pachisi, originating in India. (from Game)
Image 6Playing Cards, by Theodoor Rombouts, 17th century
Image 7Young girls playing a board game^[which?] in a library at Iisalmi, Finland, 2016 (from Board game)
Image 8Two Qataris playing the traditional board game of damah (from Board game)
Image 9The stage for the 2017 League of Legends World Championship Finals in Beijing (from Game)
Image 10People playing durak, a beating and shedding game (from Card game)
Image 11Association football is a popular sport worldwide.
Image 12The number of board games published by year (1944–2017), as listed on BoardGameGeek. Expansion sets for existing games are marked in orange. (from Board game)
Image 13A person holding Austrian-style tarot cards (from Card game)
Image 14The modern German board game Catan is printed in 30 languages and sold 15 million by 2009. (from Board game)
Image 15Backgammon is a game of skill. Strategy can give players advantages, but there is also an element of chance. (from Game of skill)
Image 16Uno is a popular commercial shedding game (from Card game)
Image 17A game of Go in progress (from Game)
Image 18Mamluk playing card (king of cups), c. 15th century (from Card game)
Image 19People playing Magic: The Gathering (from Card game)
Image 20Chinese mother-of-pearl gambling tokens used in scoring and bidding of card games (from Card game)
Image 21Charles Nelson Reilly holds a hand of cards (from Card game)
Image 22Mehen game with game stones, from Abydos, Egypt, 3000 BC, Neues Museum (from Board game)
Image 23Visitors at a desktop flight simulator (from Game)
Image 24Tug of war is an easily organized, impromptu game that requires little equipment. (from Game)
Image 25A Friend in Need, from the Dogs Playing Poker series by C. M. Coolidge (from Card game)
Image 26An adventurer finds a teleportation portal while exploring a dungeon in the role-playing video game Falcon's Eye. (from Role-playing game)
Image 27Hanafuda cards developed their unique design due to laws passed banning playing cards (from Card game)
Image 28A group playing a tabletop RPG. The GM is at left using a cardboard screen to hide dice rolls from the players. (from Role-playing game)
Image 29Trionfi sheet (from Card game)
Image 30Preferans, a trick-taking card game version popular in Croatia (from Card game)
Image 31Timeline of board game history, based on the Wikipedia articles Board Game, Hasbro, Board Game Cafe, Tabletop Simulator, and Monopoly as of 24 November 2024 (from Board game)
Image 32The Card Players, 17th-century painting by Theodoor Rombouts (from Card game)
Image 33A man dealing cards to the other players before a game (from Card game)
Image 34Royal Game of Ur (from Game)
Image 35A selection of pieces from different games. From top: Chess pawns, marbles, Monopoly tokens, dominoes, Monopoly hotels, jacks and checkers pieces. (from Game)
Image 36Boys playing soccer in Tirana, Albania (from Game)
Image 37Historically, card games such as whist and contract bridge were opportunities for quiet socializing, as shown in this 1930s magic lantern slide photo taken in Seattle, Washington. (from Card game)
Image 38In gin rummy, players assemble groups of the same rank, or runs within a suit (from Card game)
Image 39The board game Monopoly is licensed in 103 countries and printed in 37 languages. (from Board game)
Image 40Painting in tomb of Egyptian queen Nefertari (1295–1255 BC) playing senet (from Board game)
Image 41A fantasy LARP group (from Role-playing game)
Image 42Students in Laos using dice to improve numeracy skills. They roll three dice, then use basic math operations to combine those into a new number which they cover on the board. The goal is to cover four squares in the row. (from Game)
Image 43François Rabelais’s giant Gargantua is depicted as a great player of card games (from Card game)
Image 44A person performing a standard riffle shuffle (from Card game)
Image 45 Men Playing Board Games, from The Sougandhika Parinaya Manuscript (from Board game)
Image 46Happy Families cards (from Card game)
Image 47Digital Klondike solitaire (from Card game)
Image 48Sabacc at Star Wars: Galaxy's Edge. (from Card game)
Image 49A backgammon board from Lebanon. (from Game)