'Pac-Man' was the rare early video game aimed at both men and women

The design changed video games forever

Miyamoto’s direction and Kondo’s sound showed younger generations the potential of video games, inspiring a more sophisticated form that moved far beyond the one-dimensional entertainment of the arcade era.

Bowling was long male-dominated, but women pushed for change through the sport

The sport was often played on lawns attached to breweries and became a leisure activity for folks in taverns—mostly men, in the 1800s. But the game's highly communal nature attracted a more diverse set of participants who pushed for social change.

Mario's archnemesis hosted a children's show in the 1980s

"Super Mario Bros." grew so popular in the '80s, even King Koopa, the video game's villain, had his own television show, though it's been all but erased from TV history. There's good reason for that: It was a bizarre enterprise, featuring '30s cartoons, a grumpy stand-up comedian, and cheap production.

Tetris was launched in the US at Summer CES 1988

Tetris first appeared in the US at the 1988 Summer CES, where Henk Rogers—who would later publish and market the game—first encountered it. This interview revisits that moment, with creator Alexey Pajitnov and Rogers reflecting on how the game gained global recognition.

X Games emerged during “extreme” marketing boom in the 1990s

Launched as the “Extreme Games” in 1995, the event tapped into a trend from the '90s of brands labeling products and events “extreme” to appeal to youth culture—mirroring marketing in soft drinks, snacks, and video games.

Explore works by essential female pop artists

Like so many art movements, the pantheon of pop art was mostly men, despite the contributions of several important women artists to its aesthetics and history. See paintings from British pop founder Pauline Boty and several artists who worked with, or exhibited alongside, the likes of Warhol and Haring.

The Japanese folklore that inspired Pokémon

Characters from the popular video game series appear to reference the yōkai from Japanese folklore, which first became popular during the country's Edo period, when art and literature became mass-produced.

Losing the kids to video games

An estimated 60 million people suffer from internet gaming disorder worldwide, a category created by the World Health Organization in 2018 to help communities support individuals plagued by pathological play. As the world's most-played game of all...

The 1987 Nintendo video game 'Stadium Events' isn't known for being particularly fun, but its scarcity has made it a highly sought-after item that has sold for up to $35K at auction.

Guitar Hero introduced a generation of gamers to rock music

The rhythm-based video game was a surprise hit when it was released in 2005. Even more surprising was the renewed interest in classic rock hits from the likes of Black Sabbath, Queen, and David Bowie.

Men and women didn't evolve to perform segregated hunter-gatherer duties

The often-cited theory that men evolved to hunt and women evolved to gather is wrong. This article explores the origins of the "Man the Hunter" theory and the mounting evidence that undermines it. Exercise science indicates that those assigned...

'Shogun,' a 1980s TV series, helped popularize sushi in the US by stimulating an American interest in Japanese culture.

Advertisers emphasized Cupid's childlike qualities to appeal to a younger demographic

Cupid is the Roman god of desire, and was often depicted in ancient mythology as both childlike and violent. In the 1800s, however, American advertisers eager to appeal to a younger demographic leaned into the less threatening versioning, portraying him as a cherubic child.

The board game Candyland was invented for children quarantined in polio wards.

Some Gen Z men are obsessed with ‘American Psycho’

If you’ve ever spent any time on finance-themed meme pages, you’re likely already aware that today’s young men have a fascination with the serial killer main character of the movie "American Psycho." Find out what it is about the satirical representation of the late-1980s Wall Street investment banker-type that resonates with Gen Z men.

Female gladiators fought in Roman arenas, though they were rare

While most gladiators were men, a small number of women also fought in the arena. Their presence fascinated and unsettled Roman audiences, and they adopted stage names invoking Amazons and mythic heroines.

Hibachi restaurants were designed to appeal to American soldiers stationed in Japan

Hibachi-style cooking was originally used in residences, with Japanese families cooking together around the grill. That style was then refined after World War II with the teppanyaki restaurant Misono, which used more American-friendly ingredients (like steak) to appeal to American soldiers stationed in the country. Despite the differences between teppanyaki and hibachi, diners began using "hibachi" to describe the concept. Later, the Aoki family brought it to American soil with Benihana.

Before he had his own show, Pee-wee Herman appeared on 'The Dating Game'

Paul Reubens' character Pee-wee Herman would become a sensation with his 1986 children's show "Pee-wee's Playhouse," but in 1979 he appeared as the hilariously naive character on "the Dating Game." It's not clear if the show (or its audience) understood what they were seeing.

The man behind Comic Sans, the world's most contentious font

Comic Sans is often used as a joke, but it wasn't intended that way. Its creator wanted something eye-catching and original, something that reminded people of iconic comics like Batman and Watchmen. This interview details how he made that happen and how it took on a new life once it was released into the world.

Thousands of Atari cartridges were once buried in a New Mexico landfill

A waste management specialist unearthed a legendary cache of unsold games decades after they were buried, transforming one of gaming history's most famous disposal stories into an unexpected and lucrative salvage operation.

A 1954 Senate subcommittee investigated the comics industry

Comic books were wildly popular in the '50s, especially with children, whom some politicians believed were being corrupted by crime and horror comics. A subcommittee convened and eventually determined that “this Nation cannot afford the calculated risk involved in the continued mass dissemination of crime and horror comic books to children.” The government didn't endorse censorship, but the comics industry did, creating its own Comics Code Authority.

Many early computer viruses were not created for malicious purposes

Besides those authored in research labs as proofs of concept for self-replicating software, hobbyists would create malware that played music or displayed text and animations that intentionally revealed the infection as a means of showing off, rather than hiding their spread.

Mid-century modern graphic designers, known for their bright colors and bold lines in advertising, also found success with children's books.

Wataru 'Wat' Misaka was the NBA's first player of color

Japanese-American Wataru "Wat" Misaka was a star basketball player for the University of Utah, claiming championships in 1944 and 1947 after serving during World War II. After stellar performances at Madison Square Garden, the New York Knicks drafted him.

Processed foods were marketed to busy wives in the 1950s

In the 1950s, they were marketed as time-saving conveniences for young families, especially those living in the rapidly expanding suburbs, who could easily find them in local supermarkets, making them a seemingly sensible alternative to fresh foods.

Explore an emulated demo of Windows 95 Microsoft Plus!

The operating system went on sale on August 24, 1995, and was the first to feature the Start menu. Through this emulation, try your hand at Solitaire, 3D Pinball Space Cadet, and other classic Windows applications.

The early Los Angeles punk scene found a home in Chinatown

Acts like Black Flag, X, and Circle Jerks performed in unconventional venues like Madame Wong’s and the Hong Kong Cafe—restaurants in the city’s Chinatown neighborhood that became an integral part of the nascent scene.

Learn how Japan used the jet stream to launch attacks on US soil during World War II

In the final two years of the war, over 9,000 Fu-Go balloon bombs were launched from Japan, with about a thousand estimated to have reached North America. Six civilians killed by a Fu-Go bomb in Bly, Oregon, on May 5, 1945, became the only known deaths on American soil by enemy action during the war.

A vending machine run with Anthropic's AI went out of business after it was convinced to give away items for free and sell a video game console.

At the beginning of the 20th century, a group of young men ate standard American food—replete with food additives like borax and formaldehyde—as part of government research to better understand food safety.

The first robot in literature may have been a 'mechanical man' in 1907's 'Ozma of Oz,' a book in L Frank Baum's 'Wizard of Oz' series.

Walt Disney's early film 'Alice's Wonderland' was a groundbreaking innovation in the silent film era

Exploring the Larry Bird punch that almost changed March Madness

The name 'Silicon Valley' arose from the founding of Shockley Semiconductor Laboratory in Fairchild Semiconductor in 1956-57, founded near Stanford University in Palo Alto

Prince's sexually explicit 1984 track 'Darling Nikki' attracted the ire of the Parents Music Resource Center, an advocacy group that inspired the Parental Advisory sticker, even though the song ends with a Christian message.

Play the role of a student in a game where you try to navigate college and remain debt-free, selecting different income levels, high school experience, race, ethnicity, and more.

Before humans, the Soviet Union and the United States sent animals—including apes, dogs, and cats—to space during the Space Race.

The hormonal disorder PCOS was renamed PMOS in 2026, a move designed to improve care and research by shifting the focus to the hormonal causes of this condition that affects 1 in 8 women.

Some Pokémon have been named after real and fictional organisms, while some real-world species have been named after Pokémon, such as Chilicola charizard and Binburrum zapdos.

The word 'jazz' evolved from 'jasm,' 19th-century American slang for 'energy'

The Beatles' US label rejected the band's first two singles, 'Please Please Me' and 'From Me to You,' with one executive calling the band 'dead in the water.'

Fast-casual restaurant Chili's is experiencing a resurgence, with its parent company recently reporting a nearly 32% increase in sales, thanks to passionate Gen Z fans on TikTok.

While atoms are normally made of protons, neutrons, and electrons, exotic ones have been built with antimatter—alternate versions of normal matter that live for fractions of a second and are about a billion times as rare.

Sony set the standard for cylinder-shaped batteries when it repurposed manufacturing equipment used to make rolls of magnetic recording tape.

20,000 letters to the advice columnist 'Dear Abby' provide insight into prevailing sex, religion, and LGBTQ fears, anxieties, and concerns from the 1950s onward.

The identity of the Tank Man in the iconic photo from the 1989 Tiananmen Square protests remains unknown and was possibly killed.

When you complete a CAPTCHA on a website to prove you are human, you may be unknowingly training algorithms for self-driving cars, whose systems require training data to help identify crosswalks, bicycles, and other outdoor objects.

Graffiti dates back to at least ancient Pompeii, where citizens scrawled messages to one another on public walls

Warren Buffett's former professor Benjamin Graham is known as the 'father of value investing,' a strategy in which investors seek to buy stocks trading below their intrinsic worth.

While El Niño moves warm Pacific Ocean waters east along the equator, La Niña moves them west, shifting where rainfall will become more common for months.