“Barbie Fashion Designer became a jumping-off point for the girls’ games movement and shook up the software and gaming scene,” collections manager Kristy Hisert said. The game not only expanded the audience for video games but also began a discussion about gender and stereotypes in gaming that continues today, according to the Hall of Fame. It quickly took off, selling more than 500,000 copies in two months after its 1996 release by Digital Domain/Mattel Media. The games that we’d now call video games were still mostly locked away on computers in university and research labs, inaccessible to the public,” Jeremy Saucier, assistant vice president for interpretation and electronic games at The Strong, said in a news release.īarbie Fashion Designer was the first video game to target girls, letting them design and print clothes for their Barbie dolls. “There was no video game industry in 1970.

It didn’t garner the kind of commercial success that would bring video games to the masses, according to the hall, but it did lay the foundation for the gaming industry: The developers went on to establish the gaming giant Atari Inc. Nutting Associates’ coin-operated Computer Space appeared in 1971 as the first commercial video game and was recognized for proving that video games could reach paying audiences outside of the labs where they were being developed.

The winners were voted in by a panel of experts from a field of finalists that also included Age of Empires, Angry Birds, Call of Duty 4: Modern Warfare, FIFA International Soccer, Goldeneye 007, NBA 2K, Quake and Wizardry. This year’s additions bring to 40 the number of games to be enshrined since its opening at The Strong museum in 2015. The Hall of Fame honors arcade, console, computer, handheld and mobile games that have influenced popular culture or the video game industry. (AP) - The first commercial video game and the first one marketed to girls are headed to the World Video Game Hall of Fame, alongside a post-apocalyptic nail-biter and a system that made gamers out of grandparents.Ĭomputer Space, Barbie Fashion Designer, The Last of Us and Wii Sports were announced Thursday as the Hall of Fame’s class of 2023.

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