Before talking about the game, the history of the term phantasmagoria should be discussed. In the 17th century, a German Jesuit scholar by the name of Athanasius Kircher teamed up with Dutch scientist Christiaan Huygens to create the magic lantern. The device used candlelight to project images using lenses and mirrors. By the 18th century, following the French Revolution, the French took the tool to the extreme in the name of art.
Before long, skeletons were magically dancing on walls as an early form of theater and became known as phantasmagoria. Over time it developed into the precurser of the horror movie genre.
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Michael Thomasson is one of the most widely respected videogame historians in the field today. He currently teaches college level videogame history, design, and graphics courses. For television, Michael conducted research for MTV's videogame related program Video MODS. In print, he authored Downright Bizarre Games, and has contributed to nearly a dozen gaming texts. Michael’s historical columns have been distributed in newspapers and magazines worldwide. He has written business plans for several vendors and managed a dozen game-related retail stores spanning three decades. Michael consults for multiple video game and computer museums and has worked on nearly a hundred game titles on Atari, Coleco, Sega and other console platforms. In 2014, The Guinness Book of World Records declared that Thomasson had “The Largest Videogame Collection” in the world. His businesses sponsor gaming tradeshows and expos across the US and Canada. Visit www.GoodDealGames.com.
