7 classic games which are older than you are

7 classic games which are older than you are

7Remote-Control Toys

It’s generally assumed the first remote-control toys were produced in the 1960s, after the Italian toy company Elettronica Giocattoli produced the first remote-control car (a 1:12 scale model of a Ferrari 250LM) in 1966.

However, the first remote-control toy was actually invented in the late 1890s by—and this might not come as a huge shock to some people—famed inventor and Edison punchbag Nikola Tesla. At the 1898 Electrical Exhibition in Madison Square Garden, Tesla unveiled a remote-control boat outfitted with functioning lights, rudders, and a propeller.

6The Sims

The Sims (2000) is the classic video game where your only task is guiding your personalized character through a life fraught with love, career changes, infinite amounts of decorating, inexplicable house fires, and mysteriouslydisappearing pool ladders.

With the exception of the latter two, those were also the objectives of the1985 video game Little Computer People. Like The Sims, players had the ability to customize their houses and command their characters to perform actions (like watching TV, reading, playing poker, etc). You also had the ability to communicate with your character directly; for instance, you could order them to play a specific song on the piano, play a board game with you (because they heard you like games), or send you messages.

5Paintball

The game of paintball that we know and love was invented in the 1970s by two friends, Charles Gaines and Bill Gurnsey, who found an alternative (and painful) use for the paint-pellet guns that until then had only been used by farm workers to mark livestock.

But, if you’d lived in the early 1900s, you might have played an earlier form of paintball known as wax dueling: a sport where men would partake in duels using pistols that fired wax bullets. Competitors were required to wear specialist armor to (ideally) protect them from any serious injury. Indeed, an issue of the Pittsburgh Press (dated August 1908) describes how one player had “the soft piece of flesh connecting the thumb and forefinger” of his right hand shot out, and also warned that spectators risked being blinded byricocheting rounds. Nevertheless, this sport soon became so popular that it even made an appearance at the 1908 Olympic Games in London.

4Snakes And Ladders

The only way someone wouldn’t know about Snakes and Ladders would be because they’re more familiar with it as Chutes and Ladders.

But we’re betting that you didn’t know that the game has existed in some form since the 16th century. Originating in India, the objective for players back then was still the same—reach the end of the board by climbing ladders and avoiding snakes—but in this version, the ladders symbolized the virtues of faith, reliability, generosity, knowledge, and asceticism. Meanwhile, the snakes symbolized vices such as vanity, theft, rage, greed, pride, murder, and lust. The game aimed to teach players that in order to reach salvation (the end of the board), they must perform virtuous acts throughout their lives, as opposed to indulging in the aforementioned vices. For this reason, there are more snakes/sins on the board than ladders/virtues. The makers wanted to reinforce the idea that a virtuous life was harder to attain—and therefore more worthwhile—than a life of vice.

3Cap Guns

You might think that cap guns are a relic of the 1940-50s. After all, that was the great age of the cowboy movie, when children clamored to relive the adventures of onscreen cowboys such as Roy Rogers, The Lone Ranger, and Hopalong Cassidy.

Actually, cap guns have a history that predates the American Civil War. In 1859, the J & E Stevens Company—a toy manufacturer that specialized in the production of cast-iron toys—released a firecracker pistol similar in design to the modern-day cap gun. Several years later, and after achieving great success with this product, Stevens began producing novelty cap guns in the 1890s, including a model shaped like a sea serpent (which, on pulling the trigger, detonated a cap placed on its jaw) and another shaped like a monkey, which would trigger the cap by slamming a coconut-shaped hammer into it.

2Monopoly

Monopoly, for those of you who have actively avoided all forms of popular culture, is the fun, hyper-capitalistic game that’s been tearing families apartsince 1934.

However, Monopoly was itself inspired by a 1904 board game called The Landlord’s Game. Created by Elizabeth Magie, The Landlord’s Game was intended to teach people about how property owners at the time made vast fortunes at the expense of tenants like themselves, many of whom were already a hairs-breadth away from poverty. Magie hoped that any children who played the game would recognize the inherent unfairness of this system and be able to protect themselves against it in later life.

Magie later sold the patent to the company Parkers Brothers in 1934, who obviously abandoned her initial goals. The major company had recently acquired the rights to produce Monopoly and wished to gain ownership of any patents which could prove problematic in the future.

1Duck Hunt

Duck Hunt is regarded by many as being one of the greatest games ever. Released in 1984, it pits players against an army of (admittedly harmless) ducks to shoot—as well as a dog that will taunt you into your grave. Luckily, players were armed with a lightgun: a gun-shaped controller that mimics any real-life movements onscreen and allows wannabe hunters to blast any wayward ducks.

Incredibly, this wasn’t the first time that people had the opportunity to shoot fictional ducks with imitation firearms for the purposes of entertainment; that honor instead goes to 1936’s Ray-O-Lite Rifle. Created as an arcade game, punters were handed a lightbeam-firing rifle and tasked with shooting as many wooden ducks as they could within a given time. To add an extra element of difficulty to the proceedings, the ducks were also able to move around the shooting gallery courtesy of a hidden conveyor belt. The makers, Seeburg, also created several other varieties of this game, where targets included bears, chickens, and—in an edition made in 1942—even Adolf Hitler himself.