Educational Toys The 1990’s saw the increasing
popularity of a new generation of electronic learn-
ing aids (ELAs). These interactive, age-specific edu-
cational toys were designed to help children learn
academic skills, such as reading, math, music, and
science. Founded in 1995 by Michael Wood, Leap-
Frog became the leader in the educational category
with its first product, Phonics Desk. Unlike the com-
puter software products available at the time, Pho-
nics Desk was a plastic toy designed for preschool
children. In 1999, the SchoolHouse division opened,
marketing directly to schools with its Leap into Liter-
acy line. The key product was LeapPad, a toy con-
taining interactive electronic books.
Video or Electronic Games During the 1990’s,
video games became established in American popu-
lar culture. As technological advances enabled more
realistic graphics, faster action, and more complex
environments, new kinds of games and themes ap-
peared.
Released in 1991,Street Fighter II, a one-on-one
fighting game for arcades, introduced advanced
controls and ultrasmooth animations. The violent
Mortal Kombat(1992) created a new realism with its
digitizing of actual actors. In 1993, Rand and Robyn
Miller released the CD-ROM gameMyst, which gen-
erated a new genre of nonviolent adventure games
for a single player. In 1993, the “first-person shooter”
subgenre was popularized with Id Software’s violent
Doom, which used immersive, side-scrolling 3-D
graphics to give the player the impression of actually
moving in an environment. Will Wright’sSimCityse-
ries popularized the “God game” genre, in which the
player directs the game from an omnipotent per-
spective. Role-playing games (RPGs) became popu-
lar again withDiablo(1996),Baldur’s Gate(1998),
andPokémon(1998), Nintendo’s RPG series for its
Game Boy. Finally, video games could be played on
the Internet. The first commercially successful mas-
sive multiplayer online game was Ultima Online
(1997), followed byAsheron’s CallandEverQuestin
1999.
Impact In the 1990’s, toys and games became a
multibillion-dollar industry in which hundreds of
new toys were introduced annually. There were
must-have toys every year, with collectibles and fads
wildly inflating prices.
The advances in technology revolutionized enter-
tainment, education, marketing, and communica-
tions. Advances in gaming hardware and software,
CD-ROM technology, the Internet, and the personal
computer enabled new kinds of toys and games, such
as massive multiplayer games on the Internet. A new
toy category was born with the creation of the world’s
first virtual pets. The gaming industry became in-
creasingly lucrative, with sales reaching $6.9 billion in
the United States in 1999. With the maturation of the
Internet, online stores proliferated, and in 1999 on-
line toy sales reached $425 million.
Subsequent Events In the twenty-first century, cor-
porate wars and phenomenal economic growth con-
tinued in the video game industry. Sony introduced
PlayStation 2 (2000) and PlayStation 3 (2006).
Microsoft entered the gaming hardware business
with Xbox (2001) and Xbox 360 (2005). Nintendo
introduced GameCube (2001) and the Wii console
(2006) with a unique wireless remote controller per-
mitting players’ physical gestures to control a game.
New titles, as well as subsequent editions of video
games developed in the 1990’s, were steadily created
for the new systems.
LeapFrog Technologies continued to expand
and develop new technology-enhanced educational
products. By 2003, their products were sold in over
twenty-five countries, and LeapFrog had become the
fourth largest toy company in the United States, af-
ter Mattel, Hasbro, and Lego. In 2007, LeapFrog
had net sales of $442.3 million.
Tamagotchi virtual pets remained popular, and
new characters and games were developed. In 2005,
Nintendo released Nintendogs, a real-time pet simu-
lation video game for the Nintendo DS handheld
video game console. The Teletubbies celebrated
their tenth anniversary in 2007, and books, DVDs,
toys, and other products continued to sell. Beanie
Babies continued to be collectibles. In 2007, almost
all of the remaining Beanie Babies were retired, and
a second generation or line called Beanie Babies 2
was introduced in 2008.
In 2007, video game industry revenues ap-
proached $40 billion worldwide, and total U.S. retail
sales of toys reached $22.1 billion.
Further Reading
Biddle, Julian.What Was Hot! A Rollercoaster Ride
Through Six Decades of Pop Culture in America. New
York: Citadel Press, 2001. This history includes
the major fads each year throughout the 1990’s.
Illustrated.864 Toys and games The Nineties in America