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THE HISTORY OF VIDEOGAMES PART 12 - December 1999

So far in the history of videogames, it’s been all violence, violence, violence. Distressed by the smell that was being generated by the gangs of sweaty and excited young boys who exclusively inhabited arcades, Sega designers decided to try to attract a new element to videogaming, and so, in 1980, the "cute" game was born. The first in what would become a huge tidal wave of pretty, brightly-coloured and slightly twee games was Carnival, a fairground shooting game played against a constant background of cheesy calliope music. (Doubtless an element added to fiendishly make the game harder – you could switch the music off if, or rather when, it was driving you mad, but it cost you one of your limited supply of precious bullets, and involved a risky trip right over to the far side of the screen.)

To counter its cuteness, Carnival also featured a gratuitously cruel bonus screen between stages, where you had to shoot at a big bear with a target painted on its side. Every time you hit the bear, it would let out a yowl of pain and attempt to walk off the screen, but every time you shot it it had to turn and walk the other way. Evil players could thus torment it for lengthy periods before the bear finally escaped. The bastards.

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