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44-663: The launch of Video-Ace Dendy in 1993 came at a time when Russian markets were for the first time experiencing video game sales similar to those experienced by Western countries in the post-1983 video game revival . With the collapse of the Soviet Union and the subsequent raise of capitalism, Chinese manufacturers brought the Dendy home console (an unlicensed Nintendo Entertainment System hardware clone ) to Russian gamers and before long sales were reaching 100,000 units per month. In this economic climate, conditions were just right for

88-514: A cult classic . Following a dispute over recognition and royalties, several of Atari's key programmers split and founded their own company Activision in late 1979. Activision was the first third-party developer for the Atari 2600 . Atari sued Activision for copyright infringement and theft of trade secrets in 1980, but the two parties settled on fixed royalty rates and a legitimizing process for third parties to develop games on hardware. In

132-424: A "Fun-Club Competition" (Issue 19, August 1995), and a crossword puzzle section (Issue 20, October 95). The magazine also began to release short Drakon Plus (Russian: Dракон плюс ) supplementals of fewer than 20 pages, and released a number of books detailing ratings for different games reviewed in the past. The magazine would run for another several years producing 65 issues in total by 2003 and finally

176-499: A boom in the arcade video game business with the golden age of arcade video games , the Atari 2600 's dominance of the home console market during the second generation of video game consoles , and the rising influence of home computers . However, an oversatuation of low quality games led to an implosion of the video game market that nearly destroyed the industry in North America. Most investors believed video games to be

220-560: A bug. Since the start of the video game industry, clones of successful concepts and games have been common. The first influential first-person shooter , Doom , led in the 1990s to the creation of a new genre dubbed as Doom clones . In the 2000s, the open world action-adventure Grand Theft Auto inspired the creation of many Grand Theft Auto clones . Remakes of software are revivals of old, obsolete, or discontinued software. A good share of software remakes are fangames of computer games and game engine recreation made by

264-483: A fad that had since passed, up until Nintendo 's success with its Nintendo Entertainment System (NES, Famicom) revived interest in game consoles and led to a recovery of the home video game industry . In the remaining years of the decade, Sega ignites a console war with Nintendo, developers that had been affected by the crash experimented with PC games , and Nintendo released the Game Boy , which would become

308-415: A limited fashion. Nintendo also took measures to prevent another crash by requiring third-party developers to adhere to regulations and standards, something that has existed on major consoles since then. One requirement was a "lock and key" system to prevent reverse engineering . It also forced third parties to pay in full for their cartridges before release, so that in case of a flop, the liability will be on

352-399: A program's appearance and behavior. The reasons for software cloning may include circumventing undesirable licensing fees, acquiring knowledge about the features of the system or creating an interoperable alternative for an unsupported platform . GNU , a clone of UNIX , was motivated by a need of the free software movement for an operating system composed of entirely free software . In

396-436: Is The Secret of Monkey Island: Special Edition . A database clone is a complete and separate copy of a database system that includes the business data, the database management system software and any other application tiers that make up the environment. Cloning is a different kind of operation to replicate and backup , in that the cloned environment is both fully functional and separate in its own right. Additionally,

440-413: Is always available through a series of cloud servers. Unlike remote management software, clone computing has no dependency on the host computer. Disk cloning is the process of copying the contents of one computer hard drive to another disk or to an "image" file. Typically, the contents of the first disk are written to an image file as an intermediate step, and the second disk is loaded with the contents of

484-471: The Sanyo MBC-550 and Data General/One , while not infringing on copyrights and adding innovations, tended to fail some compatibility tests strongly dependent upon detailed hardware compatibility (such as ability to run Microsoft Flight Simulator , or any software that bypassed the standard software interrupts and directly accessed hardware at the expected pre-defined locations, or—in the case of

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528-559: The fan community as part of retrogaming , to address e.g. compatibility issues or non-availability of the original, e.g. a shutdown server gets substituted with a server emulator . Since the 2000s there has been an increasing number of commercial remakes of classical games by the original developer or publisher for current platforms as the digital distribution lowers the investment risk for niche releases. When enhanced in some way (audio, graphics, etc.) new releases might be called "high definition" release or "special edition"; an example

572-513: The 16-bit era. During this generation, 2D graphics had improved over the previous generation and experimentation began to occur with 3D graphics, although 3D games were more prevalent on the PC at the time. The fourth generation also was the first time compact discs were considered a viable port for video game retail sales with the CD-i . Some of the most notable systems released during this generation were

616-573: The 6th issue (in March 1994) the magazine outsourced its printing duties to a Finnish company, doubling in size to 50 pages. With the arrival of imported 16-bit systems in Russia, the magazine also broadened its focus to cover systems including the Mega Drive , and expanded to accommodate its growing "Fun Club" section - a section devoted to fan letters , fan art , and competitions for the readers. By

660-413: The 8th issue (May 1994), the magazine had changed its name to Velikiy Drakon , and by the 12th issue (October 1994) the magazine again doubled in size to 100 pages allowing yet more video game coverage as well as the addition of serialized comics , gossip and rumor sections, and several more fan-oriented sections. Between the 13th and the 18th issues, writing staff struggled with which direction to take

704-550: The Family Computer (or "Famicom"; later known as the Nintendo Entertainment System in the rest of the world) by Nintendo . Although the previous generation of consoles had also used 8-bit processors, it was at the end of this generation that home consoles were first labeled by their "bits". This also came into fashion as 16-bit systems like Sega's Genesis were marketed to differentiate between

748-613: The MBC-550 for example—wrote diskettes which could not be directly interchanged with standard IBM PCs). While the term has mostly fallen into commercial disuse, the term clone for PCs still applies to a PC made to entry-level or above standard (at the time it was made) which bears no commercial branding (e.g., Acer , Dell , HP , IBM). This includes, but is not limited to, PCs assembled by home users or corporate IT departments. (See also White box (computer hardware) .) There were many Nintendo Entertainment System hardware clones due to

792-540: The North American market by releasing the Nintendo Entertainment System , or NES for short. After release it took several years to build up momentum, but despite the pessimism of critics it became a success. Nintendo is credited with reviving the home console market. One innovation that led to Nintendo's success was its ability to tell stories on an inexpensive home console; something that was more common for home computer games, but had only been seen on consoles in

836-649: The Super Famicom/ Super Nintendo Entertainment System (1990), the Sega Mega Drive/Genesis (1988), and the Neo Geo (1991). Nintendo's Game Boy was also released during the fourth generation, which would later become the most popular series of handheld gaming systems during the 1990s. A rivalry between Sega and Nintendo occurred during this generation, starting the first ever console war . In

880-586: The United States, the case of Lotus v. Borland allows the functionality of a program to be cloned so long as copyright in the code and interface is not infringed. Yet, the public interface may also be subject to copyright to the extent that it contains expression (such as the appearance of an icon). For example, in August 2012, Electronic Arts , via its Maxis division, put forth a lawsuit against Zynga , claiming that its Facebook game , The Ville ,

924-607: The World Is Carmen Sandiego? , Gauntlet , Strider , Tron , Dragon's Lair , Golden Axe , Ms. Pac-Man , Out Run , Dungeon Master , Final Fantasy , Altered Beast , Shinobi , Tempest , Lode Runner , Super Mario Land , Battlezone , Dragon Quest , Ultima IV: Quest of the Avatar , Pole Position , and Marble Madness . Starting in 1983 the third generation began with the Japanese release of

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968-433: The aftermath of the lawsuit, an oversaturated market resulted in companies that had never had an interest in video games before beginning to work on their own promotional games; brands like Purina Dog Food . The market was also flooded with too many consoles and too many poor quality games, elements that would contribute to the collapse of the entire video game industry in 1983. By 1983, the video game bubble created during

1012-404: The alias "G.Dragon" was used occasionally and the magazine made much sport of asking the readers who the mysterious G.Dragon really was. Several theories were floated throughout the course of the magazine's lifespan. 1980s in video gaming#Rejuvenation The 1980s was the second decade in the industry's history . It was a decade of highs and lows for video games . The decade began amidst

1056-936: The best-selling handheld gaming device for the next two decades. Other consoles released in the decade included the Intellivision , ColecoVision , TurboGrafx-16 (PC Engine) and Sega Genesis (Mega Drive). Notable games of the 1980s included Super Mario Bros. , Duck Hunt , Metroid , Elite , Tetris , SimCity , Galaga , Contra , Pitfall! , Frogger , Mike Tyson's Punch-Out!! , Defender , Missile Command , Mega Man 2 , The Legend of Zelda , Castlevania , Ghosts 'n Goblins , Super Mario Bros. 2 , Bubble Bobble , Double Dragon , Final Fight , Ninja Gaiden , Adventure , Joust , Robotron: 2084 , Pac-Man , Dig Dug , Arkanoid , Populous , Zelda II: The Adventure of Link , R-Type , Donkey Kong , Centipede , Super Mario Bros. 3 , Prince of Persia , Sid Meier's Pirates! , Where in

1100-499: The cloned environment may be modified at its inception due to configuration changes or data subsetting. Since 2010, clone computing, in the sense of replicating a session on a host computer in a virtual instance in the cloud , has been introduced. This allows the user to have access to a copy of their PC's desktop on any other computing device such as a tablet computer , a personal computer running any operating system, WebOS, smartphones , etc. The clone computer replicates, runs, and

1144-676: The deserts of New Mexico . The brunt of the crash was felt mainly across the home console market. Home computer gaming continued to thrive in this time period, especially with lower-cost machines such as the Commodore 64 and ZX Spectrum . Some computer companies adopted aggressive advertising strategies to compete with gaming consoles and to promote their educational appeal to parents as well. Home computers also allowed motivated users to develop their own games, and many notable titles were created this way, such as Jordan Mechner 's Karateka , which he wrote on an Apple II while in college. In

1188-439: The developer and not the provider. Notes: The following titles were the highest-grossing arcade video games of each year in the 1980s, in terms of coin drop earnings. The following table lists the top 20 best-selling home video games of the 1980s. Note that video game sales numbers were not as widely reported during the 1980s, with the exception of titles published by Nintendo and Atari, Inc. The following table lists

1232-525: The early-1980s, arcade games were a vibrant industry. The arcade video game industry in the US alone was generating $ 5 billion of revenue annually in 1981 and the number of arcades doubled between 1980 and 1982. The effect video games had on society expanded to other mediums as well such as major films and music. In 1982, " Pac-Man Fever " charted on the Billboard Hot 100 charts and Tron became

1276-494: The emergence of video game journalism and the first 24-page issue of Video-Ace Dendy would mark Russia's first foray into magazines devoted solely to video games and video game culture. The 24-page format was followed for the first 5 issues - a period during which the nascent company struggled to meet publication deadlines and financial obligations. Due to financial pressures, the magazine formed marketing alliances with and became sponsored by Dendy manufacturer, Steepler, and by

1320-775: The generations of consoles. In the United States , this generation in gaming was primarily dominated by the NES/Famicom. Other notable consoles included Sega's Mark III, also known as the Master System . Starting in 1987 with the PC Engine in Japan and ending in 1996, with the last console being the Neo-Geo in 1991, the fourth generation of video game consoles consisted primarily of games and systems programmed for

1364-502: The golden age had burst and several major companies that produced computers and consoles had gone into bankruptcy . Atari reported a $ 536 million loss in 1983. Some entertainment experts and investors lost confidence in the medium and believed it was a passing fad. A game often given poster child status to this era, E.T. the Extra-Terrestrial had such bad sale figures that the remaining unsold cartridges were buried in

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1408-469: The image. A cloned drive can replace the original, rather than simply containing backup copies of files. Cloning software replicates the operating system, drives, software and patches of one computer for a variety of purposes, including setting up multiple computers, hard drive upgrades, and system recovery in the event of disk failure or corruption. In computer programming , particularly object-oriented programming , cloning refers to object copying by

1452-495: The late 1980s, IBM PC compatibles became popular as gaming devices, with more memory and higher resolutions than consoles, but lacking in the custom hardware that allowed the slower console systems to create smooth visuals. By 1985, the home market console in North America had been dormant for nearly two years. Elsewhere, video games continued to be a staple of innovation and development. After seeing impressive numbers from its Famicom system in Japan, Nintendo decided to jump into

1496-525: The machines cloned. The use of the term "PC clone" to describe IBM PC compatible computers fell out of use in the 1990s; the class of machines it now describes are simply called PCs, but the early use of the term "clone" usually implied a higher level of compatibility with the original IBM PC than "PC-Compatible", with (often Taiwanese) clones of the original circuit (and possibly ROMs) the most compatible (in terms of software they would run and hardware tests they would pass), while "legitimate" new designs such as

1540-449: The magazine have been noted to lack production quality, the later issues improved on this and expanded the magazine. Staff members of Velikiy Drakon magazine had amusing aliases. The following are some known members of Velikiy Drakon : Non-aliased writing staff included authors like Vladimir Suslov (Russian: Владимир Суслов ), Roman Eremin (Russian: Роман Еремин ), and Maksim Alaev (Russian: Максим Алаев ). In addition,

1584-550: The magazine, simultaneously releasing both a shorter version of Video-Ace Dendy and a lengthier Velikiy Drakon . Although discussions took place concerning whether or not to devote Velikiy Drakon entirely to coverage of the Super NES or entirely to coverage of the Mega Drive, a compromise was settled on where the magazine's coverage would be split exactly in half between these platforms. The 18th issue of Video-Ace Dendy

1628-605: The original and trying to participate in their success. When IBM announced the IBM PC in 1981, other companies such as Compaq decided to offer clones of the PC as a legal reimplementation from the PC's documentation or reverse engineering . Because most of the components, except the PC's BIOS , were publicly available, all Compaq had to do was reverse-engineer the BIOS. The result was a machine with similar performance and lower price than

1672-404: The original system is usually the explicit purpose of cloning hardware or low-level software such as operating systems (e.g. AROS and MorphOS are intended to be compatible with AmigaOS ). Application software is cloned by providing the same functionality. Commercially-motivated clones are made often during a competitor product's initial successful commercial run, intentionally competing with

1716-533: The popularity and longevity of the Nintendo Entertainment System . Examples for hardware remakes include recent home computer remakes. A special kind of hardware remakes are emulators which implement the hardware functionality completely in software. For instance, the WinUAE emulator software tries to behave exactly like a physical Amiga . Software can be cloned by reverse engineering or legal reimplementation from documentation or other sources, or by observing

1760-405: The publisher closed its doors in 2004 as stiff competition from competitor magazines drove the magazine to bankruptcy. Former Velikiy Drakon staff writers went their various ways with a number taking up work with competitor magazine, Strana Igr , and a small group helping to found the fan-based production of GDD: Great Dragon's Dale , a spiritual successor of sorts. Work on GDD resulted in

1804-435: The publishing of a handful of issues before it too went defunct in late-2010. In April 2013 project restart on www.gdragon.ru. The magazine remains notable today for being Russia's first video game magazine and it has gained a level of notoriety among fans who value its sincere and ingenuous coverage of third and fourth generation pirate cartridges, unlicensed multicarts , and illegal clone hardware. While early issues of

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1848-701: The top 20 best-selling home systems in the 1980s, including home video game consoles , handheld game consoles , handheld electronic games , and personal computers . The following gallery highlights hardware used to predominantly play games throughout the 1980s. Clone (computing) In computing , a clone is hardware or software that is designed to function in exactly the same way as another system. A specific subset of clones are remakes (or remades ), which are revivals of old, obsolete, or discontinued products. Clones and remakes are created for reasons including competition, standardization , availability across platforms, and as homage . Compatibility with

1892-472: Was a 2-part issue and would be its last as the 8-bit coverage was dropped and attention switched to the 16-bit and 32-bit era and beyond. Dendy manufacturer, Steepler, responded by pulling its funding of the magazine, but Velikiy Drakon was allowed to continue using the Dendy elephant mascot. As Velikiy Drakon established itself during the next few issues, the magazine added a "Picture Gallery" section and

1936-634: Was a direct clone of EA's own Facebook game, The Sims Social . The lawsuit challenges that The Ville not only copies the gameplay mechanics of The Sims Social , but also uses art and visual interface aspects that appear to be inspired by The Sims Social . The two companies settled out of court on undisclosed terms in February 2013. Examples of software cloning include the ReactOS project which tries to clone Microsoft Windows , and GNU Octave , which treats incompatibility with MathWorks MATLAB as

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