Table of Contents First generation: 1972 – 1983 Second generation: 1976 – 1985 Third generation: 1983 – 1990 Fourth generation: 1987 – 1996 Fifth generation: 1993 – 2002 Sixth generation: 1998 – 2005 Seventh generation: 2005 – 2013 Eighth generation: 2012 – 2020 Ninth generation: 2020 – present
Video games are still a young medium in the grand scheme of things, but have been around for well over 50 years now. After the arcade boom in the 70s, home consoles slowly took over the gaming landscape with Nintendo’s NES leading the charge. The NES is one of the best video game consoles of all time, but it was far from the first console and certainly not the last with the likes of the PS5, Xbox Series X, and Switch 2 currently fighting for market dominance. Currently, we’re in the ninth generation of consoles but how exactly did we get here, and what consoles were in the eight prior generations? Let’s rewind time and look at what defined every console generation from the first up to today.
If you want to look even further ahead, we can also tell you about every upcoming video game console and upcoming video game.
Recommended VideosNote that generations weren’t as clearly defined for the first several decades so the specific years some generations start or end is up for debate and many generations will overlap. We will also only list well-documented consoles released in each generation to avoid bloating the list with one-off systems no one purchased.
RelatedGoing all the way back to the origins of home consoles, we are at a point where most games don’t even resemble the experiences we have today. The most recognizable game in this era was one of the best games of all-time, Pong. In this generation, consoles were essentially smaller arcade machines in the sense that most could only play one or two games. The main
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