What Killed the Light Gun Game?

The PlayStation Move and the Nintendo Wii tried their best to make some decent shooters but, in general, these games just felt off. Every game I tried felt more akin to dragging and clicking than actual aiming. It's a shame, too, because we used to have the technology for pretty decent-feeling gallery shooters, like Duck Hunt or Time Crisis. This technology was the light gun. The light gun works by receiving light from a monitor and calculating where the gun is pointed on the X,Y axis. The technology came about in the 1930s, and soon started appearing in arcades. Later, refined versions of the technology increased the accuracy and, before long, game companies like SEGA and Nintendo were introducing light gun games into player's homes. Unfortunately, due to an incompatibility with the way HD monitors refresh and the light gun, such games have largely disappeared from the market, relegated primarily to arcades.

A lot of people probably experienced their first light gun game through the Nintendo Entertainment System playing Duck Hunt. This game was released in 1984 and tasked players with shooting at ducks as they flew away. If the ducks managed to get away, the player lost a life. Losing all lives resulted in a game over screen. The game would later be packaged with Super Mario Bros., increasing it's popularity. The simple, intuitive nature of the Nintendo Zapper, which was used to play Duck Hunt, made video games more accessible to a wider demographic. This phenomenon would later be recreated on the Nintendo Wii, as its simpler games, though repetitive, allowed non-gamers to gather around a TV for Wii Sports. The Light Gun Shooter genre rose in popularity in the 90s, as the games became more intricate. The horror genre, especially, seemed to resonate with players. One of the best series to incorporate the light gun was, arguably, SEGA's The House of the Dead.