Back to the Future: Why a Gamer From the ’80s Would Be Surprised by 2015

It's been 26 years since Marty McFly traveled to our time in his flux capacitor equipped Delorean. Arriving on October 21st, 2015 he was met by hover boards, bizarre fashion, and holographic displays.

Today, we are fortunate enough to witness what 2015 is actually like versus what was projected a long time ago. Although that period of time might not seem like much in the grand scheme of things, a remarkable amount of transformation has occurred in many markets. Surprisingly, Back to the Future was right on a fair number of things, although wrong in others. What it got wrong more than anything else was the evolution of the video game industry and what it would become in just three decades.

Let's look back at what someone living in the 80's likely would have expected to see from gaming in 2015 versus what we actually have.

 

Arcades

Atari's Star Wars would win best arcade game at the Arcade Awards in 1985. It stood among dozens of titles that were popular in the early 80's, including Space Ace, Paperboy, Out Run, and Marble Madness.

Arcades were all the rage leading up to the mid 80's. It was common for many video game fans to not own a platform at home, such as the Atari 2600, but instead head to a local Dave and Busters or Ground Round to play in a social environment. For a coin or two they could compete for high scores alone or with friends.

Arcades were in decline in the mid-to-late '80s, but still a multi billion dollar industry.

What many people saw as the future of gaming was demonstrated during the cafe scene of Back to the Future 2. Two young boys, one of which was a seven year old Elijah Wood, were shown getting ready to play an arcade game called Wild Gunman. While Marty shows off his plastic handgun skills, the two kids joke about him using the gun instead of his hands. The expectation was that not only would we eventually be able to use our body as input for games, but we would still be visiting arcades for entertainment.

The release of the Nintendo Entertainment System in 1985 would be the beginning of a dramatic shift from gaming being arcade-centric to existing primarily in the living room. However,it would take a number of years for the market to shrink as consumers transitioned to primarily using consoles and PC for their gaming entertainment. In 2015, the arcade industry is around a quarter the size of what it was in the early 80's despite the growing popularity of gaming. Someone traveling forward in time might be shocked to witness just how difficult it is to find an arcade in today's day and age, let alone a good one.

Big Games

While a lot of time has passed, people care just as much about a game being great as they did in the 80's. What has changed is how visually complex even the least popular games are. Gamers could only dream of playing games as realistic and beautiful as what we have today.

While a game like Super Mario Bros. ran on hardware that had 8-bit memory, what we have today is beyond the imagination of even the sharpest engineers of the 80's. For the same price as a Nintendo Entertainment system, which was revolutionary in 1985, today you can get something that's hundreds of times more powerful.

Resurrection

In the mid '80s the video game industry was resurrected by an ambitious Nintendo. The release of the NES was a pivotal moment in the entertainment industry as revenues dropped over 97% just two years prior. The carefully constructed and marketed Nintendo Entertainment System was impactful enough to reinvigorate the market.

With the surge of popularity produced from the resurgence of gaming, new companies were born that looked to explore the potential of the medium. Two of these newly founded companies were Bethesda and Square Co. which formed in 1986.

Three decades ago most consumers would be unaware of what these two companies were. Today they are among the most powerful corporations in entertainment. Bethesda is known for its best-selling Fallout and The Elder Scrolls IPs which sell tens of millions of copies. Because of its financial success, it can employ hundreds of workers and invest upward of $85 million toward the production of games such as The Elder Scrolls V: Skyrim.

Meanwhile, Square Co.'s birth would prompt the development of Final Fantasy, a franchise that would become one of the most revered during the coming years. After some restructuring yeras later it would become Square Enix, and it employs more than 3,500 people around the globe. These numbers simply aren't something an 80's consumer could even fathom.

Mario

Super Mario Bros.’ debut was one that the industry would never forget. Its charming presentation and compelling platforming gameplay would lead to a multi-decade legacy that shows no end in sight.

The Mario franchise's console debut in 1985 came after a wildly successful arcade release in Japan during 1983. While its arcade iteration would make a strong impression in Japan, its home console release is what would revolutionize the industry.

Mario is the world's most popular video game character. His evolution during the past 30 years has been a reflection of how far technology and game design have come.

The game would go on to sell more than 40 million copies. 30 years later there have been more than 100 games featuring Mario. Perhaps unsurprisingly, the Mario franchise is the best-selling in the industry with over 509 million sales to-date.

30 years later we've seen beautiful 3D Mario games (i.e. Super Mario Galaxy) and even been given the opportunity to create and share Mario worlds of our own using Mario Maker. These are things that were simply unpredictable at a time when games were 2D, internet was on the horizon, and a game was considered successful if it totaled 100,000 units sold. It's a testament to how far we've come, and how fortunate we are to be alive during this moment in time.