PlayStation celebrates its 29th birthday and these are its best curiosities

The console that marked a before and after in desktop platforms is approaching its thirtieth year as one of the most nostalgic for millennials.

It's 29 years since the first PlayStation was released. The console that marked a before and after in the history of digital entertainment arrived in Europe on 3 December 1994 with several curious details that make Sony's most primitive platform even more mystical if possible.

First of all, its birth stemmed from the rupture between Nintendo and Sony. The cession of the Big N's mascots to Sony was not particularly gratifying, and with the clause in serious doubt, the agreement was broken. 

The separation of the two brands led to the reformulation of PlayStation and its logo, which went through more than 20 different designs until the classic one we know today, combining the P and the S of the word.

As for the buttons, we all quickly identified which controller it was by its logos, but what did each one mean? The circle and the cross (because no, it's not an X) stood for yes and no, respectively, while the square refers to the map and the triangle to the camera or perspective.

Another interesting curiosity was the black discs and a different size from one country to another. Without making the discs more resistant or preventing scratches, Sony produced these discs in order to prevent piracy of its games. On the other hand, the first PlayStation controllers did not have joysticks and, in addition, they had a different size depending on the country where they were bought, being 15% smaller in Japan than in America, as the Japanese had smaller hands.

In terms of catalogue and sales, it's no mean feat. Its more than 2,400 titles (with Gran Turismo 1 being the best-selling with 11 million copies) and its more than 100 million consoles sold made it the first to sell that amount back in 1994.

Finally, PlayStation can boast of having had new games well into the 2000s. One of the last games to be released for the original was FIFA 2005, something we now see as normal for examples such as PS4, which is still releasing titles after 10 years on the market.