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Super Nintendo Entertainment System
Action: Super Mario World
Super Mario World, sequel to Super Mario Brothers 3, was Mario's first appearance on the Super Nintendo Entertainment System.
The capabilities of the Super NES allowed for larger and more detailed sprites, or 2D animations, dynamic background landscapes, and responsive sound effects.
Designer Shigeru Miyamoto included many of the same elements as in previous Mario games, but provided additional ways for players to interact with the environment… And he added a new character, the dinosaur Yoshi.
Miyamoto wanted to include a pet dinosaur from the very beginning of the Super Mario series, but only now was the technology sophisticated enough to incorporate this additional feature.
The musical score, composed by Koji Kondo, became an integral and interactive part of the game play. Most of the music is a variation on the same familiar melody, but the composer made slight changes to the tempo and instrumentation in order to conjure different environments and actions.
Target: Star Fox
Competition was fierce during the Bitwars Era, as companies fought to keep up with the rapidly advancing technology in order to bring the newest, fastest, most advanced game to the public.
The release of Star Fox marked a significant change in video game design as developers began to experiment with 3-dimensional graphics.
This epic target game, set in space, followed the adventures of Fox McCloud as he battled against an evil force trying to take over the universe.
New technologies in the computer world introduced polygons, which could render characters and worlds in 3 dimensions.
Designer Shigeru Miyamoto had high expectations for Star Fox and, as a result, the design team distributed a powerful processor along with the game in order to give the Super NES the ability to display 3D graphics at the speeds required for the game.
The ability to revise and include new technology with the game cartridge itself gave artists a new sense of freedom as they explored the rapidly-changing landscape of digital graphics.
Adventure: The Legend of Zelda: A Link to the Past
The Legend of Zelda: A Link to the Past was the third installment in the Zelda series by Shigeru Miyamoto. The advanced technology of the Super NES allowed the designers to use expressive graphics, employ advanced mechanics, and introduce new concepts…
Players gained more control over the main character, Link. Now he could walk diagonally, run, and swing his sword sideways as well as forward.
Link's world was bigger and far more complex, with numerous multi-level dungeons and an alternate, or parallel world for him to explore.
In A Link to the Past, Nintendo established an iconic style for the characters and environments that appeared in all subsequent Zelda games.
Tactics: SimCity
The idea for SimCity came to designer Will Wright after he had created a mapping tool for a target-based game, Raid on Bungeling Bay.
The tool, which allowed him to quickly build environments from an aerial point of view, fascinated him more than the game had. So he decided to create a new game based around the concept of urban planning.
SimCity was originally intended to be an open-ended simulation. However, the final version did include specific goals for players to work towards. Many of these scenarios took place in real world cities or were based on real world events…
Others were a little more fanciful.
SimCity laid the groundwork for all subsequent city-building and life simulation games. |