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How were you introduced to gaming?

Laptop1991

Member
Friends had Sega, Nintendo and Atari consoles and the ST plus Commodore 64 in the eighties that i would have a go of from time to time, then in 90 or 91 i decided to join in, and the one to get at the time from people in the know was the Amiga, so thats what i did, and bought Dungeon Master first, which i had seen on my mate's Atari ST.
 
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SmokedMeat

Gamer™
When I was a kid arcades we’re everywhere.

You went to the pizza shop? Arcade machines.
You went to the grocery store? Arcade machines by the exit.
You went to the mall? Arcade room in every one.
Chuck E Cheese arrived soon after
Friends/Family had Atari/Intellivision/Odyssey/Vectrex

So I really don’t know my first taste or first game that I ever played, really. But I was hooked, and man was it a great time. It’s a shame the younger generations will never experience that.
 

Dr.Morris79

Member
My old man brought home an Atari 2600 after he was working a late shift one night in 1984, it had a couple of game and one of them was Enduro racer, I was 4, and instantly hooked.

lOvpEpF.png


From then on i've collected most piece of gaming equipment and games for it

Run out of space about ten years ago.
 

MacReady13

Member
Was born in 1980. My parents owned a ColecoVision. From my very earliest memories I remember playing it with the Atari 2600 add on. Playing Carnival from Sega was a highlight, as was LadyBug which was a brilliant Pac Man clone.

I owned a few of the Nintendo game and watches but can't remember which ones exactly. Then got an NES for my holy communion and have not looked back.
 

Aion002

Member
I think I was 2 or 3 years old and my mom bought me an atari.

Then games became part of my life. I don't remember not owning a gaming device through my childhood.

I specially remember when my mom bought a ps1 for me, my father was complaining about the price at the store and I was throwing a fit because I wanted a gundam game.

In the end I got the gundam game.

Good Times Drink GIF by Men in Kilts: A Roadtrip with Sam and Graham
 

poppabk

Cheeks Spread for Digital Only Future
Spectrum 48k. Not sure how we knew about it, but me and my two brothers got it as a joint Christmas present would have been 84 or 85 I think. Actually before that maybe arcades - can't really remember what arcades were like back in the very early 80s.
Edit: also remember someone having one of those early pong games with the dials that must have predated the speccy.
 
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HeisenbergFX4

Gold Member
My dad was a mainframe computer repair man when they took up the entire basement of hospitals and I would tag along with him in the early 70s when I was young and play Hunt The Wumpus and it was so high tech at the time

Have been gaming with my dad ever since even though he is over 80 years old now

lebpl2Y.png
 

Dr.Morris79

Member
Spectrum 48k. Not sure how we knew about it, but me and my two brothers got it as a joint Christmas present would have been 84 or 85 I think. Actually before that maybe arcades - can't really remember what arcades were like back in the very early 80s.
Edit: also remember someone having one of those early pong games with the dials that must have predated the speccy.
I loved how basic the Spectrum was and what developers got out of the thing. I was into C64 more at the time but I remember playing Sam Fox strip poker round a friends..

It was pure filth. I mean look at it!

GLxHPMp.jpg


The raunch was unreal on a young mind.
 
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Star Wars the Arcade game at a local mall, the operator kept it there for years until they closed it down in the early half of the 90's. He set it up first in 1982 iirc. I got there some years after that and Saw the Star Wars the arcade game and I'Robot and was amazed by both. He also had Dragons Lair but you had to call in a request for that, otherwise it was for parties or events since he didn't want to have it operating all the time because he would have to often fi it up because those Dragons Lair machines were wonky. I think it was 88 he finally threw that out because it was on it's last legs.

The first time I myself BROGUHT a game myself was when I saw at I think it was radioshack or Sears, a Atari ST display running the near perfect port of Star Wars the Arcade game, which I wanted (not the biggest SW fan either) in all it's Vector color goodness.

I ended up also picking up Test Drive and Mercenary, saved up a bunch of money to get those 3 games and an upgrade ST, Mercenary basically set me on games for the Long-term, being able to play 3D games while consoles looked like the beep boops was the envy of friends and later co-workers.

 
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Kamina

Golden Boy
Early 90s, Neighbor Girl had a Gameboy and Super Mario Land, borrowed it and wanted one too, got it for XMas. Fast forward some two years and i had a few nice games, like Wario Land, Metroid 2, Bomberman,…
After school we played SNES at a friend, mostly Zelda ALttP, Super Metroid and Mortal Kombat, never got any of that though :/
First home console we were allowed to have when i was a teen was an N64, with Donkey Kong, Zelda OoT and MM and Starwars EP1 Racer.
Some years later Gamecube and PS2 i bought from my own money.
The rest is history.
 
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Patrick S.

Banned
When I was a little kid, everyone in our family went to our grandparent's house during the summer holidays, were some of my cousins and I were dropped off for a week or two every year.

One of my uncles is quite wealthy, so my cousin always had the latest stuff, which he brought along to our grandparent's house.

The first console I ever played on was his Vectrex:

2319895188_578a869b60_o.jpg


After that, it was basically Commodore C64 one year, C128 the next year, and finally he brought his Amiga 500. I was jealous of the Amiga with the intensity of a thousand suns, and finally managed to be able to afford one with all the money I was given for my communion. Getting the Amiga in 1989 or 1990 turned me into a gaming addict forever.
 

JOEVIAL

Has a voluptuous plastic labia
It was either Pac-Man at a local arcade, or Oregon Trail.

I distinctly remember Oregon Trail though, my Dad introduced it to me. I would watch him play while I sat on his knee.

Great memory, one of my earliest memories in fact :messenger_grinning:

We also played a parachute game on his Apple work computer. I forget what that game was called. I remember you guided or moved a haybale or something like that for characters to fall into safely. I totally forget what that game was called (maybe it was just Parachute? haha!). I thought that game was a pac-in for Apple computers of the time, but maybe my dad purchased the software? I'll have to ask him about that. I haven't thought about this in years. My dad was never really into games, although he did really like some of the arcade games in the 70's and 80's. It's pretty cool to remember my dad was pretty tech savvy in his time!

1*2U-T05tNR0u5eqzqZ0qQhw.png
 
My father was greatly interested in computers and technology. I don't think he played many games, but he would run them on his PCs sometimes, probably to test their capabilities. My first game was probably Prince of Persia on DOS but it was way too difficult for me as a young kid. My brother had a Game Gear and SNES and after he grew bored of them, I would play them. That's when I got hooked.
 

Fuz

Banned
5-6 years old. I used to skip church and go straight into a bar to play videogames.

Not sure if my first was Breakout or Space Invaders.
 

Isa

Gold Member
Ah man, ages ago. My Dad was deployed at sea so it was just my Mom and I. My Uncle would bring over a few early systems like the Atari, Intellivision and Colecovision with a few early games. Eventually it really took off when visiting my parent's friends, a large family with an NES. I remember seeing Duck Hunt, Mario, Top Gun and some Wrastlin' game, and we ended up turning it off to watch some Wrestlemania event or something. I'll never forget being around 1 or 2 learning how to control Mario, I just couldn't figure it out, the timing required. I'd have to look down at the controller. I even had a nightmare over it, seeing Mario facing Bowser with the lava, fire and creepy music. My Dad later got us an NES which was great as he had to leave again.

Man its funny remembering how things happen as an innocent kid. That family's daughters got their Mom's Playgirl mag and were showing it around haha! They gave me shit for looking at it but eh, I preferred the Dad's collection of Playboy. What a time man, those electric tracks people would buy and build things around. For my 5th birthday my dad and his best friend made a full table mountain valley with a race track, train track with tunnels and full forest, lakes and fishermen lol, then a neat little town with hand made homes and stuff except the micromachine cars. I so wish my family took photos of that thing it was a work of freakin' art. We were so 80's haha, inspired by Top Gun those two entered into the Navy, all the music and fab hair, I was so Rad.

My family wasn't well off but we did get gifts from church members and stuff. I loved the C64 we got from the Pastor with that loud old printer that worked and probably still does. So many Floppies and stuff. Still boggles my mind how humans were able to get games to work on tape cassettes. Parties were so fun playing arcade ports like Centipede or learning the crazy depth of sims like Gunship and other military sims. Favorite childhood system though goes to my Sega's hands down. More fair, fun and less frustrating. Plus it felt like it was growing with me in terms of appeal as opposed to the more kid friendly Nintendo style. Not hating on Nintendo, love them too.
 

Jeeves

Member
My parents already had an NES and a few games when I was a baby. The earliest memory of my life is of the first time I got to pick up the controller and play Super Mario Bros./Duck Hunt when I was three. I can't think of a better way to start.

I also really enjoyed Zelda even though I could only find the first two or three dungeons, I just kept replaying the beginning although I did watch my dad get as far as dungeon 8 one night.

We only owned Mario 3 for a short time before we sold the NES, but it really tickled my imagination and I used to draw out original level designs for it. I was basically playing Mario Maker with a pencil and paper.

Donkey Kong Country was my SNES pack-in and that's where gaming really started to become my primary interest.
 
Atari at 3 years old at relatives in the way early 80s. Pitfall was my fav. Then parents had intellivison which passed to me. Also had an apple ii home pc with some games on that.
Seen NES on vacation in 86 in s. cali. Played SMB1 for the first time and was mesmerized, I had to have it.
Next year got nes action set for Xmas. It all went from there.
 

HoofHearted

Member


this and learning to code and play PC games out of Byte magazines.

Apple, Atari, Intellivision, Colecovision were mains at that time… right before NES came in and changed the entire industry - hell - PCs at that time were considered as “business“ machines - gaming on a PC wasn‘t really a thing… Apple marketed to gamers at that time…

Sitting here typing this on my iPad makes me realize how far we’ve come….
 
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Midn1ght

Member
My father came back one random evening of 1990 with a NES + Mario/Duck Hunt. The rest is history.

I’ll add picking FFVII on PS1 without knowing anything about the game or the franchise in 97. I went from being a casual sports/platform gamer to falling in love with the medium because of this game.
 

Ben87fr

Member
First on Pc, on Ms Dos with games like Corridor 7 and Batman Returns i think and then the first episode of Doom on Cd-rom ! Doom was a revelation...
 
My dad was a mainframe computer repair man when they took up the entire basement of hospitals and I would tag along with him in the early 70s when I was young and play Hunt The Wumpus and it was so high tech at the time

Have been gaming with my dad ever since even though he is over 80 years old now

lebpl2Y.png

Pretty sure we've crossed paths in these threads over the years, same here mate. Coding Hunt the Wumpus with my brother to play a text based game from a BASIC book our dad had brought home with his work PC is one of the greatest memories I have from my childhood. It led to loving text based games, upgrading PCs with Hercules cards and on to the first PC games and home consoles from there. Gaming it was for me ever since then.

Also DK on Game & Watch for long car trips and flights when I was around 8 or 9.
 
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TLZ

Banned
pong GIF


My mom ran a day care out of our house. In the playroom, we had both an Atari and an Intellivision. I'm not sure where they came from, as neither of my parents were into gaming.

When the NES launched, I got it that Christmas and became obsessed, mostly with The Legend of Zelda.

I actually still have all three of those consoles, along with almost every home console released after in my current home.
That's awesome man.
 

Garnox

Member
My earliest memory is going to Second Hand Sports with my two older brothers to pick out a game. They got Mega Man 2. Every time I hear Bubble Man's stage music, brings me back to that time.
 

nemiroff

Gold Member
My uncle had Home Pong,. It was fascinating. My first local arcade memory besides pinball was Breakout and Asteroids. Breakout had transparent colors strips taped onto the screen to make it look like the screen had color.. And that feeling of 60 fps Asteroids..
 
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I have some very faint memories from the mid-80's of Atari and Colecovision... maybe even some Intellivision and TI-99. These were consoles that my friends had and I would play on them when at their houses. Also played a lot of NES and started hanging out at the arcades in late 80's. But I was just a "casual" at that point and had yet to even own a console myself.

Street Fighter II changed all that. I dropped some serious coinage on that at the arcades, and when it came out on the SNES in '92, I spent my summer washing cars, mowing lawns, cleaning up litter and dog shit, running errands for elderly neighbors, and just anything else I could do to earn the money to finally buy the SNES and SFII. I remember that Toys R Us even had an offer to get certain games for free with the purchase of a SNES, and I had chosen Castlevania IV. Played the hell out of those two games for the rest of the year.
 

StreetsofBeige

Gold Member
My fam had a Coleco Telstar (which is like Pong). By the time I started gaming that thing was already in the box and shoved in a closet. I dont remember ever playing it and I dont think we ever hooked it up again.

I started gaming in the early 80s on an Apple II Clone and Intellivision. I would sit in a chair playing Apple and sit on the floor playing Intellivision. The earliest Apple games I played were probably Hard Hat Mac, Dung Beetle or Evolution. The Intellivision cords were so short and spirally you had to be close to the TV. I didn't get good at games till maybe 1985/86 when I could hold my own (but still usually lost). Then got a NES in I think 1988.

I remember going to arcades at the mall too with $2 in quarters I'd grab from my moms purse. Gyruss, Time Pilot and Mat Mania were my favs as I could at least last a while on a quarter. Young or old I have always been bad at pinball, so I avoid those games. Those were times when kids could do anything on their own. So while mom and dad went shopping, I'd hit the arcade by myself (or with my brothers). And then they'd come get us an hour or two later at the arcade. On the way home, my dad might buy a KFC family combo. I'd do this probably once a month at Sherway Gardens (Toronto suburb mall which is still alive and kicking). I still remember the arcade was located right at one of the many spoke-wheel entrances (Sherway has a figure 8 layout with lots of entrances at every corner)
 
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ranmafan

Member
My introduction to gaming is still one of my earliest memories. Just a few years old in the early 80s. I remember my father turning on the Atari 2600 and the game Home Run. He let me try to play with him. I was mesmerized by the ability to play on a tv all the way back then. And even though the game was so incredibly primitive, I loved it. A great memory and it led me down the road from the Atari up to now.
 

RoboFu

One of the green rats
PAC man in the arcade is the earliest I can remember.

The first game I ever owned was I got donkey Kong for Christmas on the 2600.
 

dDoc

Member
I think it was a Space Invaders arcade machine in a pub not too far from home.

Also have strong memories of playing Pong at my uncle's during some Christmas visit.
 
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