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On the last episode of Ephemiral, we traced the dynamic history of video games.

Starting with arcades, we looked at how games like Pong and Donkey Kong

changed the entertainment industry forever.

And eventually, how those games left the arcades and landed in the homes of consumers across

the globe.

Here, our producer Max Williams picks up the story.

In the 1980s, home consoles like the Super Nintendo and the Atari 2,600, revolutionize the gaming market.

And in the late 80s and early 90s, the competition between these companies started to heat up.

In 1989, Sega released their mega-hit console, The Sega Genesis.

The Sega Genesis has blast processing.

Super Nintendo doesn't.

So what's blast processing do?

And here's where it gets narrowed, because now all of a sudden, if we have a really competitive console.

You still had Atari bumbling along. They had a thing called the Jaguar.

Which they maintained was the first 64-bit system,

and it never got off the ground.

Then there was the 3DO, which was too expensive.

This is video games writer Stephen L. Kent, who we talked to in the last episode.

Neo Geo had a home console.

That wasn't really competitive.

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