Games
Discover facts about games. Small discoveries that change the way you see familiar things.
Games
Pool halls got their name from gambling pools
The name comes from betting pools: early billiard rooms were associated with group wagering, not just the game.
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Why broken games get the same apology graphic
After a troubled launch, studios may post somber, black-background text graphics on social media asking players for patience.
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An injured knee helped turn a kicking game into Hacky Sack
John Stalberger met Mike Marshall in Oregon in 1972 while recovering from a knee injury. Keeping a small bag in the air became both exercise and an absorbing…
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Xbox 360 external power brick is absurdly massive
The external adapter was a separate, heavy block of circuitry that took up space behind the entertainment center.
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Half-Life began with Quake's engine
Valve licensed Quake's engine, then heavily reworked it and added its own physics and AI systems to create GoldSrc, the engine behind Half-Life.
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Tekken’s bear is literally named Bear
Kuma means “bear” in Japanese, a bluntly literal name for the grizzly in Tekken’s martial arts tournament.
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Why Team Fortress 2 took nine years to arrive
Valve repeatedly scrapped and reworked the game, shifting from realistic modern warfare to an alien-invasion concept before settling on its cartoon style for…
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WASD turns four ordinary letters into a movement map
Many PC games place movement under the left hand on W, A, S, and D, leaving the right hand free for the mouse. Nearby keys can then handle jumping, reloading,…
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Super Smash Bros target tests heavily rely on pause buffers
Players tap pause to advance the game one visual update at a time, turning a fast platforming challenge into a painstaking frame-by-frame sequence.
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How a car can be steered while airborne
A ramp-launched car can still tilt and rotate while airborne, giving the driver some control over its orientation.
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Guide authors replaying identical sections until exhaustion
A guide writer may replay the same hallway 50 times to record details such as item drop rates.
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Why spades always win in Spades
Spades is always the trump suit; unlike in some other trick-taking games, it doesn’t change with the bidding.
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Sonic's comic-book life lasted 290 main-series issues
Archie's Sonic the Hedgehog ran from 1993 to 2016, building an extended comic world around Sega's game character. Its long run allowed stories and…
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Roulette wheels maintain flawless balance to avoid bias
Even tiny dust buildup can affect a wheel's spin, so mechanics use electronic laser tests to detect tilts that could favor one pocket.
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Using a steering wheel controller to play shooter titles
A steering wheel can make a shooter game absurdly difficult: every attempt to line up a sniper shot means cranking a controller built for driving.
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A chain-link fence can send bullets ricocheting
Bullets can strike the wires in a chain-link fence and ricochet off course instead of passing straight through.
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Blind pool pursuit was invented in suburban yards
Despite its name, the game has no historical link to the Venetian explorer; children made it up in suburban backyards in the 1960s.
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LucasArts was originally called Lucasfilm Games
Formed in 1982 to explore interactive media, the company was initially barred from making Star Wars games, so it created original adventures instead.
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The string trick inside Rubik's Magic
An internal loop of string lets the panels flip and fold over and over without the mechanism coming apart.
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Compass bars compress digital spaces into spinning lines
A compass bar flattens 360 degrees of geographic space into a strip, sliding objective icons left or right according to their direction—like turning the world…
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Decal systems slap flat graphical stickers onto architecture
The system adjusts each flat image to a surface's angle, letting designers add localized dirt without changing the underlying geometry.
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Pictionary started in a waiter's living room
Robert Angel got the idea while drawing dictionary words at parties. After toy companies rejected it, he assembled the first 1,000 sets by hand; the game…
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Skyrim's dragons started as giant birds
Bethesda adapted bird AI to give the dragons flight behavior, scaling up the creatures and adding fire breath.
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Why Animal Crossing's raccoon shopkeeper buys bugs
Hand over a butterfly or beetle and the shopkeeper will pay thousands of bells, without saying what he plans to do with the bugs.
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