Revealed: The computer, videogame, and handheld platforms covered in the upcoming Vintage Game Consoles book!
Vintage Game ConsolesAlthough we're still a few months away - February or March 2014 - from the worldwide release of Vintage Game Consoles in full color paperback and ebook formats (Amazon pre-order), our publisher's Website, Focal Press, has posted the Table of Contents. This is a big milestone because it officially publicly reveals the 20 computer, videogame, and handheld platforms we identified as most significant. As with the previous book in the series, Vintage Games, which primarily covered 35 of the most influential games (and those they influenced) of all time, from our industry's beginnings right up to the book's publication, Vintage Game Consoles does the same for the platforms they're actually played on. The only constraints we placed on our choices were that the platforms had to no longer be sold commercially (eliminating all systems released from the start of the Nintendo DS and Xbox 360 eras and beyond) so the complete story could be told (with the obvious exception being PC Windows Computers) and that we kept the focus on primarily North America (our particular expertise, though obviously we discuss all regions throughout the course of the book). This still led to some tough decisions (like not covering platforms that featured similar games to another slightly more popular platform already in the book), but I think you'll find the list fair. If not, let us know, though of course I'd love you to reserve final judgment until you actually have the book in your hands.
Here's the Table of Contents (note, there is also an extensive Forward and Preface, and each Generation sets the scene for that particular section of the book--oh, and there are 400 images as well!):
