Patent · US Expired

Apparatus for generating enhanced interactive video game playfield environments

US4890833A · kind A · utility

49Cited by
4References
9Claims
0Family size

Assignee

Inventors

Key dates

Filing dateApr 18, 1988
Grant dateJan 2, 1990
Priority date
Expiry dateApr 18, 2008

Classification

  • Technology area (CPC H)Electricity
  • CPC primaryH04N9/22
  • WIPO fieldAudio-visual technology
  • WIPO sectorElectrical engineering

Abstract

A video game or the like including a real-time interactive video disk game-play background generation system. The disk player incorporates track skipping capability which is under the direct control of the game processor, on a frame-by-frame basis, whereby substantially instantaneous jumps to alternative video scenes can be effected in response to changing game play. Video scene data is stored on the disk in horizontally compressed format. A video expander/scroller effectively stretches the compressed video from the disk by a factor of two and selects, under game processor control, one frame width, or one-half the expanded background scene, for display. A color programmable read-only-memory (PROM) having at least two pre-programmed color pallets is provided to redefine color relationships of game symbols stored in read-only-memory (ROM) thereby reducing the storage of redundant game symbol data in this ROM.

Source: USPTO / EPO open patent data. Objective bibliographic and citation counts.