|
The Philips CD-i (Compact Disc Interactive) is an interactive multimedia CD player developed and marketed by Royal Philips Electronics N.V. This category of device was created to provide more functionality than an audio CD player or game console, but at a lower price than a personal computer with a CD-ROM drive at the time. The cost savings were due to the lack of a hard drive, floppy drive, keyboard, mouse, monitor (a standard television is used), and less operating system software. In addition to games, educational and multimedia reference titles were produced, such as interactive encyclopedias, museum tours, etc., which were popular before public Internet access was widespread. Competitors included the Tandy VIS and Commodore CDTV. CD-i also refers to the multimedia Compact Disc standard used by the CD-i console, also known as Green Book, which was developed by Philips and Sony (not to be confused with MMCD, the pre-DVD format also co-developed by Philips and Sony). Work on the CD-i began in 1984 and it was first publicly announced in 1986.〔(2005). (History of the Philips CD-i ), Philipscdi.com.〕 The first Philips CD-i player, released in 1991 and initially priced around US$700, was capable of playing interactive CD-i discs, Audio CDs, CD+G (CD+Graphics), Karaoke CDs, Photo CDs and Video CDs (VCDs), though the latter required an optional "Digital Video Card" to provide MPEG-1 decoding. Seen as a game console, the CD-i format proved to be a commercial failure.〔 The device was sold until 1998, aside claims that Philips had planned a discontinuation in 1996. The company lost nearly one billion dollars on the entire project. The failure of the CD-i caused Philips to leave the video game industry after it was discontinued. The CD-i is also one of the earliest consoles to implement internet features, including subscriptions, web browsing, downloading, e-mail, and online play. This was facilitated by the use of an additional hardware modem that Philips released in 1996 for $150.〔(【引用サイトリンク】title=New Sunday Times - Google News Archive Search )〕 While video game consoles have been made by Japanese companies (and to lesser extent American companies), the CD-i is one of the very few created by a European company. ==Applications== Early software releases in the CD-i format focused heavily on educational, music, and self-improvement titles, with only a handful of video games, many of them adaptations of board games such as ''Connect Four''. Later attempts to develop a foothold in the games market were rendered irrelevant by the arrival of cheaper and more powerful consoles, such as the Nintendo 64 and PlayStation. Earlier CD-i games included entries in popular Nintendo franchises, although those games were not developed by Nintendo. Specifically, a Mario game (titled ''Hotel Mario''), and three Legend of Zelda games were released: ''Link: The Faces of Evil'', ''Zelda: The Wand of Gamelon'' and ''Zelda's Adventure''. Nintendo and Philips had established an agreement to co-develop a CD-ROM enhancement for the Super Nintendo Entertainment System due to licensing disagreements with Nintendo's previous partner Sony (an agreement that produced a prototype console called the Play Station). While Philips and Nintendo never released such a CD-ROM add-on, Philips was still contractually allowed to continue using Nintendo characters. Applications were developed using authoring software produced by OptImage. This included OptImage's Balboa Runtime Libraries and MediaMogul. The second company that produced authoring software was Script Systems; they produced ABCD-I. Philips also released several versions of popular TV game shows for the CD-i, including versions of ''Jeopardy!'' (hosted by Alex Trebek), ''Name That Tune'' (hosted by Bob Goen), and two versions of ''The Joker's Wild'' (one for adults hosted by Wink Martindale and one for kids hosted by Marc Summers). All CD-i games in North America (with the exception of ''Name That Tune'') had Charlie O'Donnell as announcer. The Netherlands also released its version of ''Lingo'' on the CD-i in 1994. In 1993, American musician Todd Rundgren created the first music-only fully interactive CD, ''No World Order'', for the CD-i. This application allows the user to completely arrange the whole album in their own personal way with over 15,000 points of customization. CD-i has a series of learning games ("edutainment") targeted at children from infancy to adolescence. Those intended for a younger audience included ''Busytown'', ''The Berenstain Bears'', and various others which usually had vivid cartoon-like settings accompanied by music and logic puzzles. Although extensively marketed by Philips, notably via infomercial, consumer interest in CD-i titles remained low. By 1994, sales of CD-i systems had begun to slow, and in 1998 the product line was dropped. A large number of full motion video titles such as ''Dragon's Lair'' and ''Mad Dog McCree'' appeared on the system. One of these, ''Burn:Cycle'', is considered one of the stronger CD-i titles and was later ported to PC. The February 1994 issue of ''Electronic Gaming Monthly'' remarked that the CD-i's full motion video capabilities were its strongest point, and that nearly all of its best software required the MPEG upgrade card. With the home market exhausted, Philips tried with some success to position the technology as a solution for kiosk applications and industrial multimedia. 抄文引用元・出典: フリー百科事典『 ウィキペディア（Wikipedia）』 ■ウィキペディアで「Philips CD-i」の詳細全文を読む スポンサード リンク
|