This week in video-game history is a non-stop rollercoaster of assassinations, births, and budding console wars.
Excuse me while I comfort my Virtual Boy. It is 15 this year and won't stop whining about how nobody loves it.
August 8
1950: The "father of the PlayStation" is born. Ken Kutaragi is credited as the motivating force behind the successful console and served as the chairman and CEO of Sony Computer Entertainment. He retired in 2007.
1997: The seemingly invincible Lord British -- the recurring ruler of Britannia in the Ultima series -- is assassinated during the beta of Ultima Online. The killer exploited a bug in the early version of the game and was later banned. Moderators claimed the punishment had nothing to do with Lord British and more to do with the outstanding list of complaints filed against the player. I really don't believe that.
August 9
1988: The Adventures of Lolo launches in Japan. Many of Lolo's 50 puzzles were based on the Japanese Eggland series. The game didn't hit North America until April 1989.
August 10
2002: The first installment of the murder-mystery visual novel/game series Higurashi no Naku Koro ni is released. If you like Persona games but dislike all those pesky role-playing elements, Higurashi drops you into the seedy world of ritualistic murders and going to high school without all that questing and fighting nonsense.
August 11
1965: Resident Evil creator, Shinji Mikami, is born. He didn't start out developing horror games. His first projects were all Disney tie-ins, including the excellent SNES version of the Aladdin game. See, he's an awesome designer.
1999: System Shock 2 goes on sale in North America. Originally it didn't tie into the story of System Shock at all, but all that changed when EA wanted the games to connect.
August 12
2008: Madden NFL 09 is the final nail in the Xbox coffin, as it is the last game ever released for the system. Prediction: Madden NFL 12 will be the last PS2 game.
2009: Game developer Grin closes its doors after going bankrupt. The poor sales of their Bionic Commando reimagining and two very unsuccessful movie tie-in games brought about their financial drain. Before they closed, Grin was supposedly developing a Final Fantasy game codenamed Fortress, but Square Enix hasn't officially commented on this.
August 13
1960: Japanese composer Koji Kondo is born. In 1984 he started working for Nintendo and is the creative force behind the Super Mario Bros. and The Legend of Zelda scores. He might be one of the most influential contemporary composers.
1991: The SNES goes on sale in North America and shipped with a copy of Super Mario World. If you own this 16-Bit system and don't have a copy of the game, you've done something catastrophically wrong.
August 14
1989: Two years before Nintendo released the SNES, Sega goes live with the Genesis. What follows is one of the most shamelessly antagonistic ad campaigns in video-game history.
1995: Nintendo's biggest console blunder launches. The Virtual Boy has a whopping 22 games in its library, only 14 of which ever went Westward. Curiously, the first-ever Shin Megami Tensei game sold in North America was Jack Bros. -- a playful platformer that took full advantage of the Virtual Boy's 3D abilities.
