Icons

During his illustrious broadcasting career, Sir Trevor McDonald has interviewed many of the top politicians of our time. In the first episode of Icons, he argues that a political leader deserves to be crowned the public's icon of the 20th Century. From the darkness of 1940s Blitz Britain to a hopeful new South Africa, Sir Trevor tells a story of four iconic leaders: Winston Churchill, Franklin D Roosevelt, Margaret Thatcher and Nelson Mandela.

The second in series charts the story of exploration in the 20th century with the public deciding who the greatest explorer was.

Exploring the achievements of the greatest figures of the 20th century. Chris Packham assesses the lives of Marie Curie, Albert Einstein, Alan Turing and Tu You You.

We kick off our new season with the real story behind the world's first truly great videogame company: Atari. Find out just how wild they got, what happened to bring it all down, and what the future holds for them.

We sit down with Tommy Tallarico, George Sanger (AKA "The Fat Man"), Clint Bajakian, Masaya Matsuura, Scott Gershin and other music makers to get their stories and learn about the history of music in gaming.

We get the lowdown from Cliffy B and show you the true story behind the creation and rise of the Unreal series. From the first Unreal to Unreal 2, see how one beautiful first-person shooter spawned a legendary franchise.

Suddenly, everyone thinks they can bust a move. In today's episode we look at the movement of Music Games. Parappa The Rapper started the fad of making a game based on music, and not the other way around. This lead to people eventually dancing not in the streets but in the arcades with Dance Dance Revolution.

We explore the rocky history of Sega's last venture into the console market. Hear from Sega insiders Bernard Stolar and Kathy Schoback about the Dreamcast's last days of life and how Sega made the leap from console maker to one of the top software publishers of today.

In 1992, games like Mortal Kombat and Night Trap pushed the envelope when it came to advancing graphic and technical capabilities... and catching the attention of the federal government. Washington officials cited these two games as the most offending examples of violence and questionable material available to youngsters at the time via electronic games. As a result, Senators Joe Lieberman and Herb Kohl called on game industry officals to come up with a ratings system for all games. The industry responded with the creation of the Entertainment Software Ratings Board. Since its inception in 1994, the ESRB has been widely praised by Washington - and Senator Lieberman - as the most comprehensive ratings system amongst all entertainment mediums.

There's no question that racing is one of the oldest and well-loved genres in the game industry, but there is one series out there that truly stands apart from the crowd in the minds of auto enthusiasts and casual gamers alike, and it is Gran Turismo. Named after the European endurance races of legend such as 24 heures du Mans and Targa Florio, Gran Turismo has dominated the racing game genre since the debut of its first game in 1998. However, the inspiration behind this game had its start long before Polyphony Digital's famous racing simulator ever hit the Sony Playstation. Racing games have been around since the very beginning of the arcade era, when casual gamers flocked to arcades to experience the thrill of playing Pole Position using a real wheel. Later on, arcades and home consoles began to carry more sophisticated racing titles such as Ridge Racer and Need for Speed, but Polys Entertainment designer Kazunori Yamauchi had dreams of creating a different kind of racing game. Yamauchi envisioned creating a game where players would drive licensed cars and win money to modify these cars as if they were the real thing; combined with realistic graphics and challenging gameplay, the game sounded like a sure bet, but his supervisors thought otherwise. Instead, Yamauchi's first game was Motor Toon Grand Prix, a game using Tex Avery-style characters that drive racing cars. However, Yamauchi used his experience designing this game to appeal to his supervisors to allow him to make Gran Turismo. Yamauchi was finally granted permission to begin work on his dream game in the early 1990s and began to seek licensed cars to use in the game. He felt that having real cars increased the appeal of the game tenfold over using generic cars, but using real cars meant that they had to handle just like the real thing. Thus, the team at what was called from then on Polyphony Digital began research for the game, taking thousands of photographs of each of the hundreds of vehicles that would be in the game and test driving them as well. When Gran Turismo was released in December 1997, it included 150 real-life cars that gamers could drive by winning races within the game. By 1999, the game had sold 6 million copies and the team prepared for a sequel. Gran Turismo 2 came out in 1999, roughly 2 years after the debut of the first game. However, upon its release it became apparent that the team had hurried through the game--though it was still beautiful, it contained many playability flaws that irked hardcore fans. But regardless of the criticism, GT2 sold 1 million copies in only six weeks. Though a sequel was initially promised for the launch of the Playstation 2, Polyphony Digital decided to learn from their mistakes and take the time to make sure that everything was going right with the next installment of the series. Plus, they had to adjust to the next-generation hardware and the capabilities it contained as well. Gran Turismo 3 became the biggest-selling PS2 game of its time when it was released in April 2001, with fans marveling at its intensely realistic graphics and superb gameplay. Soon, automakers as well began to realize the value of having their cars appear in the game, and special concept versions of the game were produced for certain lines of automobiles. Work began immediately on Gran Turismo 4, but the number of expectations put on the developers added to delays on the project, which ultimately cost the game online play. However, Yamauchi worries not--he prefers that people think of his game as an encyclopedia of cars. Indeed, with over six hundred models included in the game, one has the opportunity to unlock and drive more automobiles in the game than most people will drive in their entire lives.

In contrast to the smooth and suave spies of lore, Sam Fisher is a grizzled, middle-aged ex-Navy SEAL who has seen and done it all, but is nevertheless a cool character that players would empathize with. As a member of the super-secret government faction Third Echelon, Fisher is the titular Splinter Cell, a lone operative charged with taking down terrorist cells with stealth and efficiency, but he still needed a strong voice, so the producers signed on renowned thespian Michael Ironside to voice Fisher. With additional advising from Clancy himself on everything from the characters to the goggles used in the game, the Ubisoft team released the original Splinter Cell title in November 2002 and it went on to sell over 1 million copies in its first six months of release.

Fans of Frank Miller's Sin City have been for years bedazzled by the comics' bold, hard-boiled look and the gritty tales told within, but many folks are just now coming to see the mastery of Miller's work through the film version of the comic. Miller spent years working on Sin City independently, but creating comic books wasn't always so easy. Growing up in Vermont, Frank Miller started drawing comics at home at the age of six, using typing paper stapled together to make comic books following a fascination with Batman. Though he'd eventually become a comic book legend, when he traveled to New York to try to break into the comic industry, there were many hurdles he'd face before getting his first real job with a pencil. While working menial and sometimes dangerous jobs, Miller polished his skills under the tutelage of Neil Adams; after being told repeatedly that his work was terrible, Adams found him a job drawing Twilight Zone comics, and his career took off. After a slow start, Miller found himself drawing Spectacular Spider-Man, which eventually landed him a job drawing Daredevil for Marvel. In 1979, Miller became the principal artist for the series, eventually taking over writing duties as well and transforming the series. With the creation of Daredevil's love and enemy Elektra, Miller reinvented the series as his own. In 1983, Frank Miller left Marvel and created Ronin for DC Comics, which was regarded as strange at the time due to its sci-fi, anime-esque influence. Following Ronin, Miller agreed to work on a project that he'd been both anxious and hesitant about for a long time--Batman. However, instead of continuing along the path of the obvious, Miller opted to tell a different tale of Batman, one that set Batman past middle age instead of his eternal age of 29. The Dark Knight Returns was a solid hit and established Miller not merely as a comic book artist, but as an icon. Following the success of Dark Knight Returns, Miller decided it was time for a change of pace and moved out to California. While there, he found work writing the sequels to Robocop, but found himself dissatisfied with the Hollywood process. After firmly extracting himself from the film industry, Miller decided it was time to work on a project he truly loved--Sin City. After the publication of Sin City by Dark Horse Comics, Miller received many offers from filmmakers to do a film version of his masterpiece, but he always declined, fearing the disappointment of an adaptation that didn't live up to his expectations. It was not until Robert Rodriguez (El Mariachi, Once Upon a Time in Mexico) approached the artist with an offer to create an amazingly faithful version of Sin City that Miller even considered allowing the project. However, once Miller laid his eyes on Rodriguez' demo that reproduced the graphic novel frame-by-frame, he was sold. Despite his reluctance to allow the film to be made at all, Frank Miller learned to trust the film industry again by working with the best.