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Replay cover art

Replay

By: Tristan Donovan, Richard Garriott
Narrated by: Gary Furlong
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Summary

A riveting account of the birth and remarkable evolution of the most important development in entertainment since television, Replay is the ultimate history of video games. From its origins in the research labs of the 1940s to the groundbreaking success of the Wii, Replay sheds new light on gaming's past. Along the way it takes in the spectacular rise and fall of Atari, the crazed cottage industry spawned by the computers of Sir Clive Sinclair, Japan's rapid ascent to the top of the gaming tree, and the seismic impact of Doom. Replay tells the sensational story of how the creative vision of game designers across the globe gave rise to one of the world's most popular and dynamic art forms. Based on extensive research and more than 140 interviews, Replay includes insights from video game legends such as Atari founder Nolan Bushnell, Will Wright - the creator of The Sims , Doom designer John Romero, and Hironobu Sakaguchi of Final Fantasy fame. Replay also includes a foreword by Richard Garriott (AKA Lord British).

©2010 Tristan Donovan (P)2017 Tantor

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What listeners say about Replay

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  • Overall
    4 out of 5 stars

it's pronounced Zed Ex.. not Zee Ex. garrrrrrggghh

zed.. zed.. not zeeeeee.. goodness, you'd think a professional could at least pronounce words correctly.

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21 people found this helpful

  • Overall
    3 out of 5 stars
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    3 out of 5 stars
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    5 out of 5 stars

ZED ZED ZED not zee X Spectrum !

Enjoyed but the narrators saying Zee X Spectrum and Zee X 81 just annoyed me. He pronounces other names fine but why not ZED ?

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10 people found this helpful

  • Overall
    4 out of 5 stars
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    5 out of 5 stars
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    5 out of 5 stars

Interesting to any retro gaming fan

I really enjoyed this book, has lots of great information, however, it did take a while to get used to the narrators voice and especially the pronunciation of the Zee X Spectrum which he must have said about 100 times.

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5 people found this helpful

  • Overall
    5 out of 5 stars
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    4 out of 5 stars
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    5 out of 5 stars
  • GS
  • 22-01-18

Great book, a little American

If you could sum up Replay in three words, what would they be?

ZEE EX Spectrum

Any additional comments?

Really enjoyed this fascinating look across the history of video games. Interesting American-centric fairly comprehensive and nicely divided into areas of gaming history. Pity the narrator cant pronounce sinclairs ZED X Spectum properly.. although sadly the UK machines are not covered enough to make this too grating,

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5 people found this helpful

  • Overall
    5 out of 5 stars
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    5 out of 5 stars
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    5 out of 5 stars

Best "history of gaming" I've heard.

I've enjoyed many others, as they've drilled down into the personal stories of companies and their individual employees - but this is different.

Aim of this book is "gaming" - and it does its best to cover it all. All genres, all companies, all platforms and what I appreciated especially is all countries. When it covers the UK I can remember it as a consumer - but now I get the global context that caused it (with maybe some bonus Russian and French content which is initially interesting, but then culminates in explaining personal recollections).

What I really appreciated was how this book stitches together so many other stories I was aware of into a coherent whole.
Of course it can't be definitive - but closest I've seen anybody come so far.

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1 person found this helpful

  • Overall
    5 out of 5 stars
  • Performance
    5 out of 5 stars
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    5 out of 5 stars

A Fascinating History

A real Gem of a Book.

Encompassing both Hardware and Software developments from way back when, through the fledgling 70’s of Arcades and early Home Consoles, to the Creative Expansion of the 1980’s into the PlayStation and Nintendo consoles of the 90’s and into the second decade of the 21st Century.

And as a European gamer, it was great to hear how the UK, Spain, France, Germany, Netherlands, Italy and even Russia brought colour and creativity to all platforms of gaming through this timescale.
And of course, the Japanese and American markets are also included.

Just a really good listen.
But…. Zee X Spectrum? Really?

Recommended and a fine light Irish Narration helps it along nicely. 5 Stars

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  • Overall
    4 out of 5 stars
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    4 out of 5 stars
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    4 out of 5 stars

Informative but dry

Very informative with many unique points I was unaware of even as someone with interest in the subject. Narration was very good but a bit dry at times. I could have done without the chapter or segment about Japan's more unsavoury tastes. Not what I signed up for to listen to in bed.

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  • Overall
    4 out of 5 stars
  • Performance
    4 out of 5 stars
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    5 out of 5 stars

Game history focusing on innivations and outliers

This being the 5th book I listened to on the subject, it's nice to have a different perspective. since the topic is vast, it is not easy to provide a good summary, only if you focus on a niche area, which this book does well.
The reading is nice and enjoyable, though the accent can sometimes be misleading to a not native speaker, like myself, but it is not the reader's fault.
IMHO, this book is to those who have a general knowledge about video game history but need to have certain milestones to hold on to in order to have a better structure of the truly rich history of video games.

I really liked it and recommend it to all gamers out there who need that extra bit of wisdom.

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  • Overall
    5 out of 5 stars
  • Performance
    5 out of 5 stars
  • Story
    5 out of 5 stars

At Last A Comprehensive History of Video Games

I loved this because the book covers things like the games scene outside of the USA, (such as UK gamers using the Spectrum, the Amiga etc. It also goes into each topic thoroughly, I learned loads of new stuff about every major game and platform and the memories came flooding back. Well written, well performed. 5 Stars all round.

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  • Overall
    3 out of 5 stars
  • Performance
    3 out of 5 stars
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    3 out of 5 stars

Enjoyable

I thought it would be quite dry and boring at the start, but it was pretty interesting, it picks up the more it goes on, I'd recommend this to video game fans for sure!

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