Today, video games can be played anywhere and everywhere. Yet they still rely on some form of power, be it plugged into a socket, or through batteries. The days of the Game Gear eating 6 AAs in four hours are gone, but the newer devices don’t offer much more time before needing a recharge. It might be worth reading a book while they're charging up.
The best books can make the longest journeys can feel like a flicker. But while there are plenty of classic novels, how-to guides, non-fiction accounts, and more, what if video game enthusiasts want to learn more about their hobby? Here are some strong contenders for the best books on video games.
Updated November 8, 2023, by David Heath: Even if instruction manuals and strategy guides have all but disappeared, there's still a place for books about video games. If anything, they've only gotten broader in their scope. Among the tomes on company histories, the legacy of famous consoles, and how famous games are made, there are ones on weird European games, virtual tourism, virtual reality, and what it 'means' to play a video game.
Thus, this list has been tweaked a bit to feature more of the best gaming books around, and add more details on the original entries. If they catch anyone's interest, then they're just a webpage away. So, take a look at more of the best video game books around.
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15 Terrible Old Games You've Probably Never Heard Of; and Attack of the Flickering Skeletons
A Double Dose of Microcomputing's Most Notorious Games
- Released: 2015 (Terrible Old Games); 2017 (Flickering Skeletons)
- Written by: Stuart 'Ashens' Ashen
People enjoy good games, but they can also find bad games appealing. The likes of Superman 64, Bubsy 3D, and the CD-I Zelda games are as famous as Super Mario 64, Duke Nukem 3D, and the N64 Zelda games. That's why author Stuart 'Ashens' Ashen purposefully sought out lesser-known roughs among the gems released for microcomputers, and why they turned out so badly.
Terrible Old Games You've Probably Never Heard Of features SQIJ!, a ZX Spectrum game that couldn't be played until players edited the code themselves. Meanwhile, Attack of the Flickering Skeletons goes into the shady history of Hareraiser, the notorious UK equivalent of the Atari Swordquest games. It also features contributions from the likes of Jeff Minter, Larry Bundy Jr, and James Stephanie Sterling on the games that really got their goat.
14 Blood, Sweat, and Pixels
A Comprehensive History of Game Development
- Released: 2017
- Written by: Jason Schreier
Blood, Sweat and Pixels: The Triumphant, Turbulent Stories Behind How Video Games Are Made pretty much does what it says on the cover. It goes into the background of how games have been made through the past decades, from the big hits of the past to the indie darlings today.
The book goes into the crunch hours, bugs, burnout, tight schedules, and more that almost kept Dragon Age: Inquisition, Stardew Valley, Destiny, and more off the store shelves. As far as games design and creation goes, Blood, Sweat and Pixels is the first book to crack open.
13 Game Over: Press Start To Continue
The Rise of Nintendo
- Released: 1993 (original edition); 1999 (re-release)
- Written by: David Sheff, with chapters by Andy Eddy
When the book was originally published in 1993, it was called Game Over: How Nintendo Zapped a Generation, Captured Your Dollars, and Enslaved Your Children. As sensationalist as it sounds, the book is actually a neutral take on Nintendo’s rise from a card and toy company in the 1960s to the world's top video game company in the 1990s.
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Despite stopping short of the 21st century, it’s a detailed look at Nintendo’s recent past, with interviews with Shigeru Miyamoto and Tetris creator Alexey Pajitnov among others. The 1999 re-release got a more neutral title, Game Over: Press Start to Continue. This version featured additional chapters by Andy Eddy to cover the post-SNES years, alongside new photos and error corrections. As such, it's the best edition to hunt down for any Nintendo fan.
12 Service Games: The Rise And Fall Of Sega
How Sega Lost Its Groove, Then Got it Back
- Released: 2012 (original), 2013 (Enhanced Edition)
- Written by: Sam Pettus, with chapters by David Muñoz, Kevin Williams, and Ivan Barroso.
But what if the reader preferred a system that could do what Nintendo couldn’t? Service Games: The Rise and Fall of Sega goes into the company's history from their early days as Service Games in the 1950s, then changing the video game landscape with their consoles in the 1990s, before ending up as a software developer following the end of the Dreamcast.
It’s more up to date, originally published in 2012. Plus, it has an Enhanced Edition with additional content by other authors. In addition to some error corrections, it contains more photos, additional facts, and coverage on Sega’s rosier start in Europe compared to its uphill struggle in America and Japan.
11 Console Wars
How Sega Fired the First Shot
- Released: 2014
- Written by: Blake J. Harris
Most of the books here are nonfiction, focusing on investigative details rather than fantasy stories. That’s because popular novels (graphic and otherwise) like Scott Pilgrim, Ready Player One, and Slay are more stories involving games or game tropes. But that doesn’t mean there’s no room for a novel or two here.
Console Wars: Sega, Nintendo, and the Battle That Defined a Generation follows how Sega rivaled Nintendo from the perspective of then-Sega of America CEO Tom Kalinske. Although it's a novel, it uses real events to form its story, like when Kalinske pitched Sonic the Hedgehog as a Genesis pack-in game over Altered Beast. There's also a TV miniseries adaptation of the book currently in the works with Seth Rogen as executive producer, and Jordan Vogt-Roberts as director.
10 The Untold History of Japanese Game Developers
The Inside Scoop on How Japanese Developers Worked
- Released: 2014
- Written by: John Sczepaniak
Nintendo and Sega may be big household names, but they still needed third party support to get their machines off the ground. Japanese companies like Capcom, Konami, Squaresoft, Enix, and more made their names on the NES, Genesis, the arcades, and other machines. But what was it truly like to work within these companies during their heyday? John Sczepaniak goes been into The Untold History of Japanese Game Developers.
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He spoke to 36 interviewees, including Keiji Inafune (Mega Man) and Yuzo Koshiro (Streets of Rage), to cover a range of behind-the-scenes topics. Like how Konami almost released their own video games console, the politics behind Enix's secret programming contests, how games are preserved, and what Japanese gaming culture is like. It has everything people wanted to know about Japanese game development and more.
9 Masters Of Doom
How Hell Broke Loose
- Released: 2003.
- Written by David Kushner.
Masters of Doom: How Two Guys Created an Empire and Transformed Pop Culture sounds like author David Kushner is promising a lot. Yet that's exactly what happened when Johns Romero and Carmack met, founded id Software, and created Doom. The book has a novel-like approach a la Console Wars, yet is ultimately a journalistic look at Romero, Carmack, and Doom.
The game’s influence on first-person shooters is well-known, along with the craze of people getting it to run on any tech available. However, Masters of Doom itself is also famous for inspiring the formation of Oculus VR and Reddit, as their founders were inspired by its coverage of Carmack and Romero's rise to give their goals a shot. The book received an audiobook followup in 2016 called Prepare to Meet Thy Doom that continues where the first book left off.
8 Jacked: The Outlaw Story Of Grand Theft Auto
Rockstar's Gaming Revolution
- Released: 2012.
- Written by: David Kushner
There is also a miniseries of Masters of Doom in the works, though it won’t be the first such adaptation of a Kushner work. The BBC beat them to the punch in 2015 with The Gamechangers, which was largely inspired by Kushner’s Jacked: The Outlaw Story of Grand Theft Auto. Both went into how Sam and Dan Houser founded Rockstar Games and dealt with the highs and lows of GTA’s fame.
It’s a strong book, going in-depth into how the company got the game series and took it to new heights. The only drawback is that it feels more limited, since Rockstar are less willing to provide direct insight than Romero, Carmack, and id Software are. The company ended up suing the BBC for making The Gamechangers without their involvement, so the chances of Kushner providing a follow-up to Jacked aren't likely.
7 The History of the Future
How Virtual Reality Became Reality
- Released: 2020
- Written by: Blake J. Harris
Blake J. Harris returns from Console Wars to write The History of the Future: Oculus, Facebook, and the Revolution That Swept Virtual Reality. Like his prior book, it's a novel-like approach to how Palmer Luckey founded Oculus VR, got Facebook's attention, and brought VR back into the spotlight.
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Aside from Luckey's own inspirations and rise through the ranks, it also goes into the tech, and how it improved over prior attempts to make virtual reality liable. That's not to mention legal trouble. The book goes into the lawsuit that Oculus received from ZeniMax Media, and Luckey's own polarizing positions. People looking for a book on VR may get more than they bargained for.
6 The Games That Weren’t
How Some Games Never Made It to Stores
- Released: 2020
- Written by Fred Gasking
For every game that makes it onto shelves and hard drives, there are many more that were abandoned mid-production. Back in the day, an issue of UK-based mag Commodore Force went into unreleased Commodore 64 games in a feature called “That Was The Game That Wasn’t.” One reader, Fred Gasking, found it interesting enough to track down these unfinished entries.
In 1999, he set up a website, GamesThatWerent.com, dedicated to these MIA entries. Then he turned it into a book, The Games That Weren't, in 2020. It covers abandoned games for all systems from the Atari 2600 to the PS4. What happened to the Game Boy Color port of Resident Evil? Or Opa-Opa’s Space Harrier-inspired pseudo-3D sequel Super Fantasy Zone? The book has their stories and more.