twisty on 16/7/2016 at 06:25

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Another good topic. I haven't had much of a chance to post lately but can't resist this one ;)

My first memory of playing an electronic game was when I was 4, with a hardware version of Pong that one of my uncle's put together after doing an electronic course funded by the Australian Army. After that it was with arcade games such as Space Invader at my mother's pizza restaurant when we moved up to Brisbane. At some stage 1-2 years after that my father purchased an Atari 400 which I kept in my room attached to a portable B&W television. This would serve as my introduction to PC gaming (and to a lesser extent programming) through the ground-breaking (http://www.atarimania.com/game-atari-400-800-xl-xe-star-raiders_4992.html) Star Raiders and US "(http://www.atarimania.com/game-atari-400-800-xl-xe-states-and-capitals_5046.html) States & Capitals"; the former of which probably made me one of the few youngsters in Australia at that stage (and now as well) who was able to recite all of the US states and capitals.

<table border=0><tbody><tr><td><img src="https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/f/f7/Atari-400-Comp.jpg" style="width:250px;height:180px;"></img></td><td><img src="https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/en/d/d1/Star-raiders-game-under-attack.gif" style="width:250px;height:180px;"></img></td><td><img src="http://www.atarimania.com/8bit/screens/states_and_capitals_atari_3.gif" style="width:250px;height:180px;"></img></td></tr><tr><td>Atari 2600</td><td>Star Raiders</td><td>States & Capitals</td></tr></tbody></table>
From there it was a mixture of various handhelds, the explosion of games at the Arcade that got more amazing year after year, playing Karateka and some other games on an early Apple Mac at school, followed by my first true console machine, the Sega Megadrive, and eventually my first real PC, a 386. The Megadrive was really the key to what gave me an appetite for more serious story driven games.

<table border=0><tbody><tr><td><img src="http://www.visualnews.com/wp-content/uploads/2011/03/Donkey-Kong-Jr.png" style="width:250px;height:180px;"></img></td><td><img src="http://static.giantbomb.com/uploads/screen_kubrick/0/4705/370416-karateka.png" style="width:250px;height:180px;"></img></td><td><img src="http://www.gadgetdaily.xyz/wp-content/uploads/2015/10/RS39200_Megadrive.png" style="width:250px;height:180px;"></img></td></tr><tr><td>Donkey Kong Jr</td><td>Karateka</td><td>Sega Megadrive</td></tr></tbody></table>

twisty on 16/7/2016 at 10:05

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Ah no, there weren't any serious ones that I recall but it was around that time that as a result of the increased power of gaming machines that we were starting to see more advanced systems (albeit still fairly simple compared to today) and a greater of variety of genres than was previously possible. What I was getting at before was that the games started to hint at what might be possible, and as such whet my appetite for deeper experiences that would largely come later in my gaming experience.

icemann on 16/7/2016 at 12:08

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Phantasy Star 2,3 & 4 would certainly fit into that category. Lunar and Landstalker would be another 2.

prideassassin on 16/7/2016 at 16:41

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Getting this as a Christmas present back in 1989.

http://jscustom.theoldcomputer.com/images/manufacturers_systems/Nintendo/NES/199644800px-NES-console-with-controller-png.png

scumble on 16/7/2016 at 18:00

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One of these: (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Commodore_VIC-20)

Playing this:

[video=youtube;g4mJPm5Aszc]https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=g4mJPm5Aszc[/video]

After I'd waited for the tape to load it of course...

Then there was the BBC Micro that invaded UK schools in the early 1980s: (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/BBC_Micro)

My Dad had one of these with a disk drive for work mainly but a friend of his gave him disks full of games that I went through.

Further to that it went Atari ST->Amiga A500 Plus->Playstation->First PC.

I suspect I've been gaming in some from since 4 or 5.