Whilst many people think that online gaming is something that was invented with Doom and Warcraft, this is actually far from the case, its history goes back much further than this.

The first networked gaming experience was implemented by Rick Blomme in 1969, who wrote a two-player version of the popular Spacewar! for PLATO, which by around 1972 was capable of hosting somewhere in the region of 1000 users.

Spacewar! 1969

Following the success (or relative in terms of how many systems could cope with large amounts of gamers playing against each other) of Spacewar! several multi-player games soon followed including a Star Trek game and an early version of Dungeons and Dragons.

Eventually, by the end of the 70s, the first Multi-User Dungeon (MUD) was developed at Essex University in the UK which would become one of the most popular multi-user games on campuses around the globe.

Whilst early use of MUD would remain on campus for many years, eventually a commercial version was released – Islands of Kesmai stayed around for 13 years after its release and cost gamers $12 an hour to play in 1984. Indeed, a version of the game Legends of Kesmai is still available to play today, for the more hard-core gamers who enjoy a little reminiscence.

Legends of Kesmai

Maze War was also a major influencer in the mix and first emerged in 1977 as the first true 3D game and is considered by many to be the first FPS (first person shooter) and peer-to-peer game available.

Conceived by Steve Colley at NASA, Maze War is also thought to be one of the most influential games in the genre’s history and was the first to allow more than two players to game at any one time.

This version of Maze War was created by programmer Chris Johnson and uses modern web technologies, it’s available to download  and play on SourceForge today.

Maze War

These early games weren’t limited to shoot ‘em ups and D&D games however, sports also got a look in and the first computer baseball game emerged as early as 1971.

Pomona College in California hosted the game in which players could manage individual games or entire seasons. The baseball game was written by Don Daglow, who would later go on to design Weaver Baseball which was published by Electronic Arts in 1987.

In the early 90s, the first graphical “massively multiplayer online role-playing game” (MMORPG) was released for PC owners on Quantum Computer Services, now known as AOL – Neverwinter Nights was the internet’s first online player-versus-player game.

Neverwinter Nights

In following years, internet service providers relaxed their somewhat limiting usage policies, and companies began to release games for deployment online. This resulted in a surge in popularity for online gaming and paid-for games began to become relatively prolific.

One of the first internet MMORPGs was Meridian 59, which was launched in 1996 by 3DO and allowed players to view the world through the eyes of their characters. The game also charged a flat monthly subscription fee, rather than charging by the hour like many previous games.

Quake was also released in this year and other genres began to offer internet gaming such as Blizzard’s Warcraft series and Microsoft’s Age of Empires. One of the most popular games, Lineage, had more than four million subscribers at one point and remains one of the most popular MMORPGs in the world today. Lineage was released in 1998 and still has more than 2.25 million global users.

Lineage

In the past decade or so, social online gaming has, in one form or another, become one of the most popular past times for game enthusiasts and casual players alike.

Consoles and social media platforms are just a couple of the forms that the medium take which can be accessed and played online with other people across the world.

Whatever your interest, there is a game for you, be it fashion, fantasy or sport and this is not likely to wane in the years to come.

In fact, it’s very likely that social gaming will continue to evolve and the future looks set to be exciting as we see the medium take different forms in which people from all walks of life can immerse themselves in.

ZX Spectrum

The ZX Spectrum wasn’t the first games console, strictly speaking, and back then wasn’t even referred to or known as a console, according to ex-Sinclair employee Rupert Goodwins, who is now ZDNet UK’s editor.

“I started off working on the Spectrum 128. My first job was to take the original Spectrum ROM — the source code — and make it work again, because it had stopped working. It was a stop-gap product, as Sinclair was having trouble with money after the launch of the QL and the C5, lots of money had been spent on products that weren’t making any money, so Sinclair was getting a bit nervous,” Goodwins told ZDNet’s Luke Westaway.

However, it seems that the Spectrum didn’t help as such on the money making front; 25% of the machines had problems that proved costly to the company in repairs and replacements. The Spectrum did prove hugely popular though, as it was the first computer games machine on the market that could be snapped up for a mere £125 (around $200) when it first launched in the UK.

The very first console was the ‘brown box’(1967), which as the name implies was a brown device with two knobs that allowed gamers to chase each other as square icons on the screen. This was invented by German-born Ralph Baer and eventually added a light gun and 12 games to the fun.

Pong, 1971

Pong introduced the sports game to the console, although it had very little in common with sport in the real world. Tennis was a firm favorite and as you can see from the image, graphically, things have improved quite a lot over the course of the past 40 years.

Infographic courtesy of Rounds

These games really introduced the idea of social gaming via an electronic device to the world; a concept that as we now know would grow to become and remain hugely popular the world over …and has now evolved to include numerous platforms for gaming; Xbox, PS3, mobile apps and gaming, TV and PC gaming as well as various handheld devices such as the DS.

The gaming market doesn’t look to be slowing down any time in the future even and many people now use platforms such as Facebook for games, although the actual social aspect to this form of gaming is negligible! The name social gaming in this case really just refers to the social networking platform as players rarely play each other or meet face-to-face.

Gaming really began life in amusement arcades in earnest and this had a decidedly social aspect to it. Not only could arcade visitors meet and compare scores at these places, they could also indulge in the more physical social games such as air hockey and football tables.

Games where players looked into each other’s faces and tried to read each other’s intentions as they played competitively, not at a computer screen.

The Wii and Xbox Kinect have gone a long way towards combining the physical aspects with the electronic and can certainly give something of a workout to the players, depending on the game selected.

Sports such as cricket and boxing can be played on the above consoles as multiplayer games, something that along with the handheld controllers and physical aspect gave a new dimension to gaming consoles.

However, they come up short against a true sporting experience: they don’t provide you with the ability to gauge an opponent’s mood or their next move. After all you can’t read their body language when you’re looking at the flat screen, instead of them.

Watch this space for a new product coming onto the market later this year that is sure to herald a new beginning in social gaming!