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Earliest gaming memories - what tripped the switch?

S

Sea-Dragon

Member
A lot of our memories acquire rose-colored glasses upon reflection; maybe that band wasn't so great, maybe that movie wasn't the testament to cinematic brilliance we thought it was, maybe the auther of that book didn't really put all of his contemporaries to shame as he did in our tiny world at the time.

But the games... the games. I can still remember my first exposure to video games, the switch that was flipped, the thing that accelerated my interest into the time-consuming beast it is today.

Jailbreak. Late 1985, maybe early 1986. In a cheap little pizza joint, as a kid of 9 or 10. I heard "The warden has been taken hostage. Free him, no matter what the cost." Eyes opened, my hobbies took on a decidely digital slant from that day forth.

What's yours? Was it Super Mario Brothers, was it Chrono Trigger, was it Castlevania: Symphony of Night? Or maybe Blue Shark or Rally X...
 
Edutainment games for the Commodore 64. I remember having some sort of pad peripheral for 'em. After that, it was on to my TI-99/4A with such classics as Burgertime and Hunt the Wumpus!
 
i remember playing pole position when i was really little and crashing the car on purpose. i also distinctly remember playing the dragon's lair ld game and not knowing what i was supposed to do. the first videogame i liked was super mario brothers. i think i was 6.
 
Wizards & Warriors 3. Oh yeah, never got that far in the game because you couldn't save (to my knowledge), but it rocked. So hard.
 
arcade games during summer holidays at the seaside. Two in particular.

Firstly, battlezone. I remember having to stand on a step to play it, and it took 2x5p instead of 1x10p. I loved the binocular view and the dual stick controls.

The other was this 'space pirates' game that I've never seen since. You had a vector tank (2D top down) and had a bunch of triangle 'fuel tanks' in the middle. bad guys came on and tried to tow away the fuel tanks and you have to stop them. Loved it.
 
Aside from some generic Amiga games from the 80s (I was born in 85) I remember Mario Bros. as the first. What really hooked me though, was Sonic for my shiny plastic MegaDrive.

<3
 
After that, it was on to my TI-99/4A with such classics as Burgertime and Hunt the Wumpus!
Click to expand...

Oh man, I do remember the TI-99/4A. My friend had one... some soccer game that I remember wanting with a frenzy, and also... the beloved Microsurgeon. We spent hours with that game trying to save the hapless patients with their blocky assorted illnesses. Hunt the Wumpus... I recall trying to tell my parents about it in breathy, excited tones. They merely nodded in a parental fashion and asked if I wanted to play lawn darts. Hmm....
 
I played Pong at my grandmother's home when I was 4 or 5.

Arcades were big for me early on and my Atari 2600 saw a lot of playtime, Joust being my favorite. I also played Intellivision while at my cousin's house (those D&D games rocked). When I eventually stumbled across Super Mario Bros. coin-op in a bowling alley, I was floored and hopelessly addicted. Then, when my friend had "some game" called The Legend of Zelda that I tried out one summer afternoon... that was it, there was no turning back.

Other NES notables: Metal Gear (which I received for Xmas along with LoZ and my NES), Final Fantasy I, Wizardry, SMB3, and Double Dragon II.

Early PC notable: Pirates! I watched my cousin play that game for hours on end on his Tandy 1000. Once I sat down at thekeyboard, I never wanted to stop playing. Still fun today.
 
Throwing a knife in Ultima 3, which I then bought a sling in Ultima 4 and proceeded to explore the world without ever talking to an NPC except Lord British to heal me (didn't know to ask people 'job').
 
when i got my hands on the famicon. it was 5 months after the japanese release, my dad was in japan on buissnes and bought the "gamemachine" as he called it. :D

since that moment on videogames have taken over my life
 
I was given a Colecovision for Christmas '82. I was three years old then. I vaguely remember playing arcade games before then... I have a shitty memory in general.
 
My cousins had an NES at their house, and they got me to play Super Mario Bros. when I was 3 (they were teenagers). That was 1988.
 
Striek said:
Wizards & Warriors 3. Oh yeah, never got that far in the game because you couldn't save (to my knowledge), but it rocked. So hard.
Click to expand...

I loved the wizards & warriors series. Too bad it's dead :(
 
Arcade first, a Pong console gift later, an Atari 2600 system at one of my friends' house, and then I convinced my mother to get me a C64 cos "look, I can program games myself so there'll be no need to spend money at the arcades anymore" (yeah, I beleived the advert). She got me a Vic 20 instead as birthday gift. "But you said Commodore. Isn't this a Commodore?" she asked. I sold the Vic 20 a couple of months later but got to play some classics on it like Omega Race. So, no tripped switch for me. It just felt "natural" to play videogames to me.
 
Haha, I had a friend of mine play the first Wizards and Warriors game a couple days ago (he only played Ironsword before).

Wasn't 3 harder than shit, though?
 
'77-'80

My mom said I couldn't play Pinball until I was tall enough to reach the flippers. The anticipation was palpable. By the time I got tall enough, video games were coming out.

I remember admiring the pong game when we visited somebody's house.

Soon after we got a Sears Telegames (the generic VCS).

I loved games ever since.
 
Pong, playing on some crappy Philips tv-game system... IIRC somewhere around 1979 or so. First memory of "proper" game I played was Pole Position (arcade version). When your car exploded, it looked like real explosion!!!!
 
The original Super Mario Brothers was my first. I remember my dad talking to my mom about how amazing the Nintendo system was and all the cool stuff you could do in Mario. I remember the funny thing about playing Mario was we had this weird tv in my room. It had some of the biggest little dots I've ever seen on a tv. Whenever I turned on the game it looked like Mario was made up of a thousand little crystals, it was quite beautiful. Someday I'm gonna have to find me another old tv like that model.
 
I don't really know what started me on it.. my brother played games, so I knew I started playing games with him.. but what and when I'm not exactly sure. I was told that when I was like 2 or 3 I would "attempt" to play them. A little bit later on (maybe 4 or 5, dunno) I'd be asking everyone to read what was on screen for me. Heh.


So I definitely started on either the NES or the Colecovision. Can't recall. :lol
 
Unfortunately, I am old enough to remember Pong when it came out to the market (well, filtered out to Korea a year later at least).
 
Star Post and Mole Attack on the Vic-20. Unfortunately I can't get screenshots up for you guys.. but they were great games :)

Also Combat and Pac-Man (which I would later find out was butchered) on the Atari 2600 VCS.
 
aah, home pong/gun games. I remember our binatone ones, with switches to make your bat smaller etc. And play 'soccer'

The lightgun game was the best. The aiming was difficult so we just walked up to the screen and clicked on the white blob.
 
Pong, and all it's variations, it's incredible how long we played it... single paddle, double paddle, fast ball, slow, etc.... but we did...
 
lots of old games i can't remember the names of

The Last Half of Darkness comes to mind.
 
Pac Man and River Raid on the Atari 2600. I also played a ton of Smurfs, Wizardy, and GI Joe. Jump Man Jr. and Lady Bug on the Colleco Vision. Montezuma's Revenge on the Commedore 64 and lot's of the Epyx Winter and Summer Games. I got a NES a few years later than most people because we were pretty poor at the time but I used to run to my neighbors house and play theirs. My first favorite games for the NES were Mario Bros, Zelda, and Megaman. Those would be joined soon after by Metroid, Punch Out, RC Pro Am, and amusingly The Karate Kid.
 
oh.. yeah, pong also.. I was thinking of changeable games..

but yeah, pong (or a clone or whatever it was) that my grandma picked up at a rummage sale for us for like $15.. and that predates the other ones because I was still in my first home at the time which we left when I was five.
 
I missed out on all the Atari/Colecovision love, but not knowing much about video games, I spent the night with a friend and was utterly mesmerized by Super Mario Bros. He had R.O.B. also, so we played Gyromite with it. But Super Mario Bros. grabbed me by the balls and absolutely did not let go. From there it was all downhill (or uphill?).
 
I don't know what the first game I played was. I have vague arcade memories that may be mixed with later years of feeding quarters into a Galaga machine. Or tabletop PacMan. I remember a kid on my street had an Odyssey that (amazingly) seemed excellent at the time. And my uncle had an Atari with the magical Combat cartridge.

Later, I received a NES at Xmas, and SMB, Kung-Fu, Zelda, Baseball, 10 yard fight, Duck Hunt, Gunfighter....tons of games, good and bad, took over my free time when I wasn't playing sports.

Still later....I didn't care about games. Girls were more interesting and being in a band, etc. etc. A few Playstation games here and there a few rounds of Goldeneye with roommates.

The Dreamcast sucked me in again. It's as important (if not more so) as the NES in really sucking me in to the hobby. It really got out of hand from there.
 
I'm not that sure but I think it was Combat! for the 2600 when I was 3. I have two older brothers who were 8 and 11 at the time. My first memory of getting to pick out my own 2600 game in a store was Pele's Soccer (HEAVILY influenced by my father). :lol
 
The first game I played, Snoopy for C64. I was probably around 3/4 years old.

snoopy6qj.jpg


Made by a fellow Dutchie as well.
 
Sander said:
The first game I played, Snoopy for C64. I was probably around 3/4 years old.

snoopy6qj.jpg


Made by a fellow Dutchie as well.
Click to expand...
Snoopy was awesome. Maybe little too short but I didnt mind back then... heh. Great music btw. =)
 
Fuzzy said:
I'm not that sure but I think it was Combat! for the 2600 when I was 3. I have two older brothers who were 8 and 11 at the time. My first memory of getting to pick out my own 2600 game in a store was Lee Trevino's Fighting Golf (HEAVILY influenced by my father). :lol
Click to expand...

FIXED.


And I'm probably off on the Simpson's reference.. it was something along that lines, I think.. :D Combat Golf, Fighting Golf, something.. I think.. :)
 
Mr_Furious said:
Pong
Click to expand...
Yup, we had the (illegal) version with 4 games on it. Squash (SP Pong), Tennis (Pong), Football (Pong with 2 pebbles & Obstacles) and Hockey (Pong with 2 pebbles)



It kicked ass, still does. I reckon it's gathering dust at my parents place now. Should hook it up just for old times sake when I go and visit them :)
 
This fish game on Intellivision. You just had to keep eating more little fish to get bigger and bigger.
 
While I had an atari and played it all the time, I still had no love for video games then. It was just something I did while bored.

Enter first Christmas since NES was released (not sure of year off hand)... My brother and I had a choice, a bunch of toys or Nintendo. Me, being the stubborn ass that I was / am, said I wanted toys and not some stupid game machine. My toy of choice? You guessed it, Fortress Maximus (the $100 transformer). My mom refused to by that for me... she ended up buying us a Nintendo (the full pack with ROB the robot). The game I fell in love with? Zelda! :D

Ironically though, by buying me the Nintendo (which stated me down the full-fledged video game nerd path) that ended up costing her 100 times more money than if she had just got me the Transformer. :P
 
I can really narrow it to one game. For me it was Donkey Kong and Smurfs on Colecovision and Pac-Man and Q*Bert in the arcades.

I could play DK, PM, and QB for hours on end and I was great at them. Its funny...when I play them now I am still good at them but I think I was actually better at those games when I was 2 or 3.
 
River Raid and Boxing on the Atari are what made me what I am today. Countless of Atari and C64 games later.....

Legend of Zelda: Link to the Past hit the homerun into the next neighbourhood and then some.
 
Probably would be Pong.

I have vivid memories of playing the living crap out of Astrosmash on the Intellivision. I was so good that I would quit out of boredom after about 3 hours or so. The game couldn't get fast enough for me to lose enough lives to die.
 
Mario Bros., Excitebike and Contra on the NES at four years of age, had me playing through the night and day. The rest was history ... :D
 
I remember my absolute first video game experience was an old home system that my dad's friend had brought over. It was a rectangle box with 2 rotating paddles on it. We could play 6 games mostly revolving around a Pong style of gameplay. No buttons... no controllers... you had to set this thing in between the two players. Oh, and no single player games that I can recall. My best guess toward the year would be between 79 and 80. I wouldn't know the year.

My dad was intrigued by the thing and bought an Atari 2600 when they came out. He returned it to the store because he didn't like the idea of buying more games... he wanted them all installed already. But shortly after, by perhaps God's grace, my father bought the Radio Shack version of the Intellevision (Tandyvision if my memory serves) and this was my big introduction into playing games. We had Bump 'n' Jump, Night Stalker, Astrosmash (who didn't?), Advanced Dungeons & Dragons, Donkey Kong, Q*Bert, Lock 'n' Chase, Frog Bog, SNAFU, Triple Action, and some others.

Advanced Dungeons and Dragons was my favorite and probably paved the way for me to enjoy things like Final Fantasy and Dragon's Quest. When I turned 16 in 1988, I got my first job and was able to buy an NES. That's when my gaming got insane and probably borderline obsessive. When, in 1991, I met my friend Craig, gaming became my #1 priority. Earning money to buy games, play games, and the stuff to play them on was priority over everything.

Now, I have a wife, an 11 year old boy, and a daughter just 2 weeks from being born, gaming has taken a 3rd seat behind everything else that is so important to me. But because games have been so engrained in my being, I will always play them, enjoy them, and read about them. But I have to keep them where they belong: Hobby status like building a model or gardening.

I was even so into gaming that I was a manager at about 4 different GameStop stores. But now... I have a blue collar job that I'm pretty good at that makes me more money than at GameStop... but I do miss being surrounded by games. It sticks with you.
 
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