Introducing action games

There are two kinds of games that humans have been playing for centuries: the first is card/board amusements or puzzles, and the second is more active games such as sporting competitions of different types. Archery and darts can be easily considered as an early prototype of a shooting game. The main objective is to hit a target, and players get special rewards for their accuracy.

One of the advantages of active games is that the simplicity of rules, goals, and mechanics is pretty visible. No wonder early video game systems mostly tried to recreate common sports games in a digital form rather than puzzles. The list of games for Magnavox Odyssey, which was the very first gaming console for home use introduced in 1972, consisted of titles such as table tennis, baseball, soccer, hockey, and so on. They were easier to develop (of course, in a very minimalistic form), and it was easier to convince the audience to begin playing with them because the gaming principles were...