Minesweeper
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Originally sold as part of a âbig boxâ bundle of simple games, Minesweeper became a cornerstone of the Windows experience when it was pre-installed with every copy of Windows 3.1 and decades of subsequent OS updates. Alongside fellow Windows gaming staple Solitaire, Minesweeper wound up on more devices than nearly any other video game in history.
Sweeping through a minefield of explosive storylines, Journalist Kyle Orland reveals how Minesweeper caused an identity crisis within Microsoft, ensnared a certain Microsoft CEO with its addictive gameplay, dismayed panicky pundits, micromanagers, and legislators around the world, inspired a passionate competitive community that discovered how to break the game, and predicted the rise of casual gaming by nearly two decades.
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Kyle Orland got his start writing about video games at the age of 14, when he founded â90s fan site Super Mario Bros. HQ on his parentsâ AOL web space. Since then heâs somehow put together a career writing and saying millions of aggregate words about games for dozens of outlets ranging from NPR and MSNBC to Electronic Gaming Monthly and Paste Magazine. Heâs been the Senior Gaming Editor at Ars Technica since 2012. Kyle is the author of Wiley Publishingâs Wii for Dummies and Farmville for Dummies, as well as two collections of reporting and criticismâThe Game Beat and Save Pointâboth published by Carnegie Mellonâs ETC Press.
