What was the first video game?

The first video game was "Tennis For Two," which was invented at Brookhaven National Laboratory. The two-player tennis game was first shown publicly on Oct. 18, 1958. Its inventor was nuclear scientist William Higinbotham.

"Tennis For Two" was played on an analog computer using controllers. Because the game predated modern computer screens, it utilized an oscilloscope screen as a display. The game was inspired by instructions used to model object trajectories and wind resistance on the oscilloscope. These same modeling processes were used to create a tennis game that calculated the speed of the ball, the boundaries of the court and the location of the net.