Let me take you back to the summer of 1977 for a curly-haired 10-year-old boy…
Star Wars was absolutely blowing people away in the theater. But at my house, there was nothing to do except watch TV and play with Hot Wheels.
Into this gap came Pong. That summer the Pong market crashed as imitators flooded the market, and my Dad felt they were finally cheap enough to pick one up. My envious friends spent many hours at my house playing Pong.
Later that Christmas, my friend’s dad trumped us by picking up an Atari 2600 system. Now it was I who was green with envy, sitting in my friend’s house playing Combat and Night Driver. And after that, another friend scored an Odyssey with the game Quest for the Rings. I had fallen to the back of the pack with my sad, little-used Pong system.
A curious thing happened during this time. Our dads had been sucked into the spirit of one-upmanship. And in 1980, thanks to my Dad perpetuating the cycle, I became the proud owner of an Intellivision game system. This was one of the best systems I ever owned, with excellent games like Hockey, Baseball, Astrosmash, Space Battle, Space Armada, Dungeons and Dragons, and Night Stalker. My friends’ systems gathered dust as the Intellivision became the hit of the neighborhood.
In 1984 my Intellivision made way for a Commodore 64 as I convinced my Dad I needed a computer for “educational” purposes. In this new age of 5.25″ floppies, joysicks, POKE commands, and a full keyboard was forged my desire to play RPGs and racing games such as Telengard, Sword of Fargoal, Racing Destruction Set, Pitstop, Phantasie II, Gateway to Apshai, Hillsfar, The Hobbit, and one of the greatest RPGs ever, Ultima III. The Intellivision was passed on to Grandpa, who became addicted to Night Stalker like it was crack.
After I left home and joined the military in 1986, I bought an Amiga 1000, and eventually sold this to buy an Amiga 1200. Great graphics and sound made playing games like F-18, Faery Tale Adventure, Bard’s Tale, Defender of the Crown, Test Drive, Ultima 5, Questron, Shadow of the Beast, and Mindwalker, an absolute blast. Grandpa got the C64 and switched his addiction to Boulderdash.
As the Amiga community began to dry up I stopped playing games for awhile. I started buying PC games, even rebuilding my entire computer to meet the requirements for playing Ultima 9. However, PC software almost killed the joy of video games for me, with buggy software and patches, constantly having to upgrade my system, and irritating copy protection schemes to deal with. After another gaming break, I got back into it when the PS2, Gamecube, and Xbox started slugging it out in what I think will be remembered as the greatest gaming generation of all time. I do still have my Amiga 1200, though, and to this day I only play 1 PC game: Microprose’s Magic the Gathering.
My first next gen system is the Xbox 360, purchased 1 year after launch. It is still running strong without any signs of the dreaded Red Rings of Death. I’m hoping to obtain a PS3 soon.
In future entries I’ll discuss current and previous generation systems in more detail.
It seems like video games have always been a part of my life – it’s hard to imagine life without them. They’ve brought me years of entertainment and sparked my creativity, even driving me towards a degree in Computer Science.
I still expect to be playing games when I’m 60. You see, that is the gift my Grandpa has left me. Though he has since passed on, he showed me not only could he play and enjoy games at an older age, but that he could switch from one generation to the next and maintain the fun factor. And if my reflexes desert me when I’m 60? Well, there’s always the Wii…
