Post a random classic gaming memory. Tell us a story!

[Manga4life]

I figured I would start a thread where people can post daily about memories stored away in their minds about classic moments you've had with games and/or about gaming in general. Spill the beans and tell us all a story about your favorite moments in gaming history whether it was beating a certain game, hunting for a certain game, playing with friends, Christmas day hauls, or anything that you can tell us that has to do with your most treasured and classic moments playing and enjoying video games.

Who would like to go first?

[Genesaturn]

I went to a Catholic school when I was younger and since it was down the road...got to walk home from lunch. I would always bust out some games before going back. One specific memory , was playing Three Dirty Dwarves on Sega Saturn and in one cut scene there was a swear word and my mom was watching me play. At the time I was probably in 7th grade maybe? and I never heard a swear word in video game...the look on my moms face was priceless followed by.."WHAT THE HECK KIND OF GAME IS THIS!?" Every time I play TDD I always think of that moment.

[hellraiser]

I remember in junior high when street fighter 2 first hit consoles. Lookin back it's funny how big street fighter 2 really was. I mean it was the game everyone talked about, played and wanted. Being good or bad at that game effected your street cred!!! Lol!

A buddy of mine was lucky enough to get a copy on snes before me. I came over and he already had a bunch of game genie codes. Air fire balls, fast and slow sonic booms, even color changes! I was blown away! That was one of the greatest Saturday's of my youth. To this day I'm a really big fan of fighting games and capcom although I later jumped to the M.K. side!

[Manga4life]

This story kind of goes hand in hand with the Mortal Kombat thread I posted the other day.....

I remember sometime in mid 1994 I was spending the night at my friends house despite it being a school night and I brought Mortal Kombat over so we could play it, it was supposed to blizzard the night before so we were like 80% sure we'd have no school the next day. We stayed up until like 2:30am playing the game and beating it with multiple characters as well as playing against eachother one on one, we finally decided to go to bed because much to our dismay we looked outside around 2:15am to see not a flake of snow on the ground so we figured we'd now be going to school in the morning. When we woke up and looked outside we saw that the blizzard had in fact came and we turned on the TV to see that school was indeed cancelled and we could hang out all day. We decided to earn some money and shovel driveways for cash and we made about $15 each and went down the street to a bowling alley and spent every red cent playing the arcade games they had. They had MK, MK2, NBA Run n' Gun, a 2 player shooting game, one of the Splatterhouse games, and one or two more, it was an awesome time and one I'll never forget for as long as I live.

[Neb6]

Maybe not so much stories, but perhaps some highlights:

- 1979 - My older brother took me on a tour of the arcades in the downtown core of the city I grew up in. At the time, it was a pretty glossy place, filled with book stores, music stores, movie theaters, indoor gardens, etc.... Anyway, the second I saw Tail Gunner on the second floor of the last arcade on our tour that day, I was HOOKED! That was the beginning of an obsession.

- 1981 - Walked past Space Fury and heard it speak. It wasn't the first time I had heard a game talk but it was easily the best quality synthesized speech I had ever heard (and to this day, along with Star Trek : The Strategic Operations Simulator).

- 1982 - saw Gravitar, Space Duel, Mr. Do, and TRON for the first time. Was blown away. Was so intimidated by the TRON arcade machine that I watched other players play it for over 6 months before giving it a try. Eventually racked up 450,000 points.

- 1983 - Laid eyes on Major Havoc. Was happy to see another vector game in a world of raster titles. Was pleasantly surprised by what would turn out to be the most ambitious vector game ever made.

I think the main thing was the awe-inspiring look and sound of the early arcades (music, lights, and dark labyrinths lit by the coin-op screens -- packed with neon and chrome). People everywhere and over thirty completely different types of gameplay. Along with that was a huge array of interfaces. It seemed like everyone was making totally insane custom cabs.

It wasn't until 1985 that I was to see an arcade cabinet that stole the show. And that was the deluxe hydraulic Space Harrier cabinet. I dropped a TON of coins into that one.

After that, the arcades started to suck exponentially. But they certainly did have their day, and it was great.

[TheRetroVideoGameAddict]

A fond memory for me would be going on a vacation with some friends and my dad back in 1993 and pouring loads of coins into Mortal Kombat and Street Fighter II at a local arcade/resteraunt. We must have blown at least $100 each on those two games and my dad got mad because we ignored going out on the boats and hiking and all that jazz in favor of playing at the arcade, but man o' man was it a blast and when I finally owned both games for my SNES I barely ever left the house. But still, I'll always remember my times spent inside of that arcade while we played them in arcade format for all those hours during that week, memories like that you can't buy.

[Lictalon]

For some reason, this memory comes to me:

I think it was 1989. A group of friends and I went on vacation with one of the friend's families. One of them had just bought WWF WrestleMania for the NES, and to us at that time, that was a big thing. The night we got there, we started playing against each other.

During one of the fights, I was playing the Honky-Tonk Man against (I think) Andre the Giant. Because of Andre's moves I kept backing away from him.

My opponent yelled, "Stop running and fight like a man!"

One of my friends yelled back, "He doesn't fight like a man, he fights like a Honky!"

[wayultratech]

I have never been more angry at a video game boss as i was with the spider boss from Sigma's stage in Mega Man X. Back in the day that one boss not only stood in my way of completing the game, but left a sour taste in my mouth for sticking points like that so close to the endings of certain games. i realize it's not THAT difficult, but for some reason as a kid i could not figure out the pattern/strategy for beating that damn spider. i recruited friends to try and beat it for me, and i left my SNES on for must've been a week straight and would invite any and all to try, along my my periodic and failed attempts to beat it. still haven't beaten MMX because of it, mostly due to the memories of controller-throwing, blood vessel popping frustration.

Also, i vividly remember constantly trying to skirt any and all responsibility when Ocarina of Time came out, literally skipping school and canceling plans with friends in favor of some more OoT goodness. It felt like a race to beat the game, and staying up all night to progress farther than your friends was common, followed the next day by "Yeah i already got that heart piece" or "Water Temple, yeah i already beat it last Tuesday"

Growing up, after playing the Metal Gear Solid demo on one of the Playstation demo discs, i knew i HAD to play this game, and once i finally got it and started playing, again i ignored absolutely every responsibility and made up ridiculous excuses for why i had to be quarantined in my room with my PSX and MGS. i beat it in two days without turning off the system or taking a break, no school, no talking to anybody else except when absolutely necessary. i guess i just remember that sense of tunnel vision, like nothing else matters except this one game and that's it. i have yet to feel that feeling again, being so excited for a game that literally nothing else matters.

[BricatSegaFan]

One of my fondest memories was my time I spent at the arcades playing the Neogeo MVS. I was soo good at all the king of Fighters and fatal fury games.

I remember spending a lot my money my dad gave me for the mall on KOF.

Still have to say KOF 96 and 98 are my faves.

[The 1 2 P]

My story involves the now non-existant arcades over here. Back in the late 90's I was in an arcade playing Mortal Kombat 4. It was one of the first times I played it and I had gotten all the way to the final bose. For some reason all of these people had appeared out of nowhere and were watching me play. I was using Mileena and on the final boss fight I used every single special move she had and still lost. That was amusing to me as all of these random strangers saw me get my butt kicked by the CPU.

But even more amusing was when I went back to that arcade two days later and again got to the final boss. This time, instead of using any of my special moves all I did was use the low kick sweep over and over for one round and the high kick round house over and over for the second round. And that beat the boss, just button mashing the same move over and over again. Meaning that the programmers made the boss immune to the majority of your special moves but vulnerable to the more common moves, which is cheap but still amusing. If only I had figured that out two days earlier.

[Niku-Sama]

a memory I have is at KB toy store there was always these HUGE bins neatly organized with NES games they were trying to clear out because SNES had been out a while and I think playstation had just came out, any way around that time relate other systems to the same era in your own head.

any way I remember finding some of my rarest games in there for super cheap. i'm talking about sub $5 cheap, the one that sticks out most in my mind was Mega Man 6. if you can imagine for a minute now. Finding Mega Man in a close out bin brand new for $5. I had already started collecting by then, It started with the megaman series and went from there.

Sadly though I had megaman 1-4 by this time and so I had a gap for a long time. it wasn't until about 4 years ago I was able to find a decent copy of megaman 5

Needless to say I still have the box and everything for Megaman 6 how ever its been through a few moves and I broke the box down to keep it from getting any more damaged than it already was, infact all my game boxes I broke down flat so I would still have them atleast

[treismac]

My first Summer break from college I worked as a pizza chef at a pizza joint, The Loop, which was walking distance from a Wal-Mart that had Street Fighter Alpha. Occasionally my manager would give me some cash to grab cigarettes when the restaurant was dead. Well, as you might imagine, it was damn near impossible not to pop two quarters into the arcade machine when I walked past it. The situation always delighted me on account of I always enjoyed getting to leave my places of work for a small mission, plus I was able to play one of my favorite arcade games while I was out and about. All these years later it still makes me smile to think back on it. All three parties are now gone: The Loop is a Moe's Southwest Grill, The Wal-Mart is a World Market, and only the Lord knows the fate of the arcade cabinet that I use to love feeding quarters both in and out of work.

[StealthLurker]

Playing Samurai Showdown 1 in the arcade with one hand (my right arm was broken in a cast). The game had recently come out and I loved it. Didn't let a broken arm stop me from playing. Learned to hold the stick and hit buttons with one hand. One exceptional memory was being able to beat a stream of decent people. One of them was I guy I recognized from school that I didn't really like too much. After I beat him in front of his friends for about 2 credits... I heard him mumble to his friends, "man I feel stupid losing to the guy with one arm!"

Another one was getting Super Mario Bros 3 a year before it came out for the NES... then showing it/playing it with neighborhood friends. It completely blew their minds. We thought we were the luckiest kids in the world at the time.

.

[Horsehead]

It's not much of a story, but I remember getting the Sega Genesis for my birthday one year. I played the thing all day and was forced by my parents to go to bed. My plan was to sneak out later that night and continue playing. The plan didn't work very well though. I came out to the living room only to find both my parents sitting in front of the television playing the Genesis. I guess they had been playing it since I went to bed. I don't know, I found it funny. :)

[WelcomeToTheNextLevel]

I was born in 1992, so didn't get any experience with video games until the late 1990s. So my classic memories are primarily from the 5th (PSX and competitors) and 6th (PS2 and competitors) generations.

When I was young, around 6 or so, I did not like 2D graphics. My first video game I ever played was in October 1998, 2 months before my 6th birthday. I had an asthma attack and had to be taken to Vanderbilt Hospital, where I stayed overnight and didn't go home until 4:30 am. They had a Nintendo 64 hooked up in the room where I was, and I played Super Mario 64 all night long. It was on the way home and I was in the back seat of our 1984 Lincoln Town Car and I told my parents I wanted a video game system. Within a month or so, I got a Sega Genesis that my mom got on sale for $80. Majesco resold 150,000 Sega Genesis Model 2's (not the smaller Genesis 3) and mine was one of those. Being a 5 year old with no concept of finances or video game history, I didn't like the Genny at the time because it didn't have 3D graphics. I could tell the difference between 2D and 3D graphics, even back then :D I wanted one of the "new" systems, a PSX or a N64. Well for Christmas 1998 I got a N64. It lasted a few months until a PSX came along in 1999.

PSX was my main "5th gen" system. It was my only system from 1999 to 2002. The Genesis was put away (not to be re-discovered until late 2005 and brought home on January 7, 2006) and the N64 was sold off (I went without an N64 from mid 1999 until February 19, 2006).

[retroguy]

One of my fondest gaming memories is when Resident Evil 2 first came out, my best friend rented it and the two of us stayed up all night to beat it, finally finishing it around sunrise, which seemed oddly appropriate. I haven't played Resident Evil 2 since and by now I'm kind of afraid to because I don't want to spoil the memory of how amazing it was.

[celerystalker]

I remember when I was 14 hanging out with my friend in his parents' basement to spend the night, which was awesome, as it was renovated as its own apartment from when his older brothers lived there. We rented NBA Jam that night on SNES, and we'd stocked up on snacks with a 24pk of Mountain Dew and 5 boxes of Little Debbie Oatmeal Cream Pies. Within the first 4 hours, we'd eaten probably 3 boxes of cream pies as finished the whole case of Mountain Dew while playing as the Orlando Magic and winning a bunch of games. Anyway, for the rest of the night, I had to pee literally ever 10 minutes, and started feeling bad. I had to keep drinking water to combat it, which only made going to the bathroom worse. Still, I was having so much fun with all of the insane dunks to stop, and we stayed up all night.

The next day when I got home, I was sick as a dog, like I somehow had a hangover from Mountain Dew. That night completely ruined Mountain Dew for me, as 20 years later it still nauseates me, yet still I love me some Oatmeal Cream Pies. It also caused me to love NBA Jam to death, and about once a year we still get together and play NBA Jam on SNES for hours, and wecoften reminisce about that great night.

[Emperor Megas]

I purchased Miracle Warriors: Seal of the Dark Lord for the SEGA Master System from Electronics Boutique in the New Orleans Centre Mall one weekend back in 1989 (I think it was '89) for about $60 and ended up forgetting it in a store on Canal Street after setting the bag down while trying on a hat or something. I realized that I left it in that store about an hour later while hanging out in Mardi Gras arcade a block down the road and hurried back to the store, but of course it was gone. I lamented that mistake for years.

:bad-words:

[celerystalker]

Years ago, my old roommate and I were playing through Lego Star Wars II together, as we always (and still) played co-op games together. We were playing in the level where Luke is doing his Jedi training, and every plant we'd hit was dropping studs. My roommate says, "There's no WAY you should be able to make that kind of money on Dagobah!"

I had to pause the game, I was laughing so hard, and he's just looking at me, kinda laughing, but kinda, "what the fuck?" It was just killing me, as it just hit me how absurd of a sentence that was. I mean, all of the things that had to happen through history for a sentence that ridiculous to seem normal. I might just be dumb, but we still chuckle about it sometimes.

[Tanooki]

Early 80s was my first gaming experience, Lake Arrowhead, A&W restaurant for lunch, got a chair, 2 quarters, and Pac-Man when I was 5 or around that. Little did I know a few years later at Christmas this huge box that was hiding as the last thing ended up being the NES Deluxe Set which I ended up screaming about and then ignoring anything else but it for at least a couple of weeks or more with its 2 games and also SMB and Hogans Alley.

Back in the day I also loved pinball, never really had anything regular, but between the pizza joints, showbiz pizza time theater and chuck e cheese I had a few favorites of the 80s which were Black Knight, Space Shuttle, and PinBot. I never was anything great with them as I never did (and really don't in action grasp) the smashing to move the ball thing to save it from the sides(somewhat) and the center. Funny thing you look 30 years later roughly and being inspired by this years Louisville Arcade Expo I finally am a pinball owner, and my second and last unless I ditch the other happened to be a home use only PinBot which I'm the third owner so that came full circle.

Back on more video gaming though, my christmas surprise of 1989 happened to get blown when I snapped up when my parents weren't looking so well a flat square box, ended up being Super Mario Land, so clearly there was a Gameboy somewhere. That ended up going with me everywhere through the 80s and 90s and Tetris was always the in game thing up until Mario Golf when I was in college. Talk about staying power. And on the PC side, got one of those amazingly for Christmas 90, it came with the first CD drive on a PC and had all these cool discs like Manhole, an encyclopedia and this huge disc of later 80s/1990 PC DOS games and many are still considered timeless. Shortly there after though my first game was Wolfenstein 3D's shareware disc followed by the first boxed game Simpons Arcade Game. I wish I still had that box, but for whatever reason (indy fan) I still have my total talkie CD box of Indy Fate of Atlantis on the shelf.

[jesse977]

I remember going to flea markets in the early 90's and there would be TONS of NES and Atari games all over the place. Back then games were dirt cheap. Luckily I started my collection when the SNES came out and the NES was no longer popular. I remember funcoland selling NES games for 10 cents!!! I swear people would throw away their old NES stuff. For a while people thought i was stupid for collecting NES. Glad I started back in the day. One cool memory I have was going to 7-11 to play games. When a new game came out everyone went bonkers.

[celerystalker]

A lot of what really captured my imagination as a kid was arcade cabinets at stores. In this case at a store that used to be in my hometown, Grandpa Pidgeon's, had 2 cabinets that really stuck out to me as a kid. The first was Rastan Saga. It was awesome, right past the checkout lanes, so I'd wander over to look at it while my parents were checking out. I never once had a quarter to put in it, but if no one was close by, I'd put my hands on the controls and pretend I was playing along with the demo. It was so awesome, with its badass hero cutting down monsters. It wouldn't be until nearly 17 years later that I bought a Japanese PS2 just to buy Taito Memories so I could play it the way I remembered it with an X-Arcade stick. Sure, I'd picked up the good Master System version in between, but if you're a Rastan fan, you get it.

The other was Time Soldiers. It was for me one of those games I could remember things about, but not the name of the game. 25 years later, I was looking to buy my first Arcade cabinet with part of one of my bonus checks. I went looking around with my wife to see if there was anything she would play as well. I went to a local arcade that also sold cabinets and was scouting out games, and was leaning toward Sunset Riders and Victory Road as the top candidates, as I could only afford one, and then I saw it. The giant centurion emblem on the floor in the Rome stage sent my mind back to 1987, and it hit me like a ton of bricks. I decided to talk it over with my wife. Truthfully, she wanted Sunset Riders, as I could put a TMNT board in it, but I couldn't deny my 7-year-old self. $500 later it was mine, and it was a realization of two childhood fantasies: having my own arcade cabinet, and finally remembering the name of that game and playing it. Now, I regularly beat it on one life, and it always makes me happy.

A year later I did go back and buy that Sunset Riders, though. :)

[Steven]

I remember when I was 14 hanging out with my friend in his parents' basement to spend the night, which was awesome, as it was renovated as its own apartment from when his older brothers lived there. We rented NBA Jam that night on SNES, and we'd stocked up on snacks with a 24pk of Mountain Dew and 5 boxes of Little Debbie Oatmeal Cream Pies. Within the first 4 hours, we'd eaten probably 3 boxes of cream pies as finished the whole case of Mountain Dew while playing as the Orlando Magic and winning a bunch of games. Anyway, for the rest of the night, I had to pee literally ever 10 minutes, and started feeling bad. I had to keep drinking water to combat it, which only made going to the bathroom worse. Still, I was having so much fun with all of the insane dunks to stop, and we stayed up all night.

The next day when I got home, I was sick as a dog, like I somehow had a hangover from Mountain Dew. That night completely ruined Mountain Dew for me, as 20 years later it still nauseates me, yet still I love me some Oatmeal Cream Pies. It also caused me to love NBA Jam to death, and about once a year we still get together and play NBA Jam on SNES for hours, and wecoften reminisce about that great night.


Heh, those are the memories that stay with us. Isn't it cool how we remember the little details to these events? Like the games we rented, played and exactly where we were, who we were with and even the year and season. Some of these memories are vivid it's almost haunting in a way.

I can see why you hate Mountain Dew now, lol, but what about the other Dew flavors? MD: Code Red is my guilty pleasure. I love it. Whenever I visit Taco Bell (I know I know) I also like MD: Baja Blast. The original Dew I'm meh on.

Staying on the NBA Jam path, did anyone else ever notice how Hershey Hawkins in TE I think it was, whenever you selected him, his eyes would flash red? It was so weird, but I was convinced it gave him magical basketball powers :P

There's my random memory share :)

[celerystalker]

One really crazy couple of days happened in 2011. I was working overnights at the time, so there was a tired glaze on everything. It started on October 27, which was the day before my wedding. Some time before, I'd given each of my three groomsmen PSPs with Monster Hunter Freedom Unite, which we were all getting into. The day of the rehearsal/dinner, the Cardinals (I live in St Louis) were in game 6 of the World Series, so we went to a bar next to the dinner afterward with friends to watch the game. It looked like they were sure to lose, so the groomsmen all headed over to my buddy's house to hang out.

We all fired up our PSPs and started hunting monsters, and we turned on the TV to see the final... the game was still going on in extra innings! It turned out to be a wild finish, and we had a blast watching and hunting monsters. We kept playing until about 4am, watching TV in the background, laughing, and joking.

We got back together around 8AM. We hit the ground running with breakfast and playing more Monster Hunter. At lunch time, we went WAY out of the way (about 45 minutes one way) for my favorite pizza (Pantera's). While we were walking in, my mom called. My granda had just died, some 4 hours before the wedding. It was one of those super weird moments where I was exhausted, happy, sad, hungry, and nervous (about the wedding) all at once. I have no idea how I was supposed to feel. Everyone looked at me and my friend asked, "What do we need to do?"

"Um, let's eat."

We went in, ordered a ton of pizza, talked for a minute, but as there was nothing I could do in the situation, we fired up those PSPs and resumed the hunt, and soon enough we were laughing again. Maybe not as hard, but we were getting back on track.

Afterward, they took me to my favorite store ever (that's now closed), The Game Trader in St Charles. I wanted to pick up a copy of Ryu Ga Gotoku Kenzan for PS3 the owner had ordered in for me. My awesome groomsmen decided to get me presents. I ended up with Monster Hunter Portable 3 remastered on PS3, Monster Hunter Tri w/the controller on Wii, and R-Type Complete on PC Engine CD.

After a few last-minute errands, we got to the church to get ready. I wore the Franklin Badge from the Mother 3 limited box on my tux. The wedding went well.

During the reception at the Chase hotel, the Cardinals won the World Series at home. It was only a few block away, so we all went outside on the massive balcony to the ballroom and watched the fireworks over the stadium.

I was exhausted, but I didn't sleep that night, even with the massive drive the next day for the honeymoon. It was just all too much, and I was completely overloaded. I just sat there all night after my new bride fell asleep trying to figure out what I was supposed to feel like.

I never figured it out, but it was all in all a damn good day.

[Emperor Megas]

That's a really great story.

[T2KFreeker]

The Christmas I got my Turbografx 16, it was awesome. I was a Freshman in High School. I wanted one so bad and we thought I wasn't going to get it because of the smaller size the box was versus other Videogame Consoles. My Cousin got the Sega genesis with Sonic the Hedgehog, Joe Montana Football and That Buster Douglas Boxing Game. I got the Turbografx 16 with Keith Courage in the Alpha Zone, Alien Crush and my Grandparents got me the mother of all games for me at the time, Splatterhouse...

See, I had played Splatterhouse in the arcades and was really wanting a home version of it. I was so happy when I saw that box come out from the wrapper. My Cousins were even quite jealous, which never seemed to happen on Christmas Morning for me. I had the game and it was the only system that had it. I remember plugging the system in on Christmas morning and us going at it with the game. My Grandmother, who was one of the biggest horror fans I have ever known, looked at my Grandfather and said "For God's Sake Chuck, what did we buy him?" I'll never forget it as long as I live. Was an awesome day and Been a Turbo fan ever since. The system still rocks at my house to this day! The only downside of the day was I was barred from Playing Splatterhouse anymore that day due the the content and it being Christmas...LOL

[Emperor Megas]

The Christmas I got my Turbografx 16, it was awesome. I was a Freshman in High School. I wanted one so bad and we thought I wasn't going to get it because of the smaller size the box was versus other Videogame Consoles. My Cousin got the Sega genesis with Sonic the Hedgehog, Joe Montana Football and That Buster Douglas Boxing Game. I got the Turbografx 16 with Keith Courage in the Alpha Zone, Alien Crush and my Grandparents got me the mother of all games for me at the time, Splatterhouse...

See, I had played Splatterhouse in the arcades and was really wanting a home version of it. I was so happy when I saw that box come out from the wrapper. My Cousins were even quite jealous, which never seemed to happen on Christmas Morning for me. I had the game and it was the only system that had it. I remember plugging the system in on Christmas morning and us going at it with the game. My Grandmother, who was one of the biggest horror fans I have ever known, looked at my Grandfather and said "For God's Sake Chuck, what did we buy him?" I'll never forget it as long as I live. Was an awesome day and Been a Turbo fan ever since. The system still rocks at my house to this day! The only downside of the day was I was barred from Playing Splatterhouse anymore that day due the the content and it being Christmas...LOLJust awesome!

[T2KFreeker]

Just awesome!

Yeah, those were the days. The Good Old days actually. The games may have been simpler in their own right, but they just seemed so much more worthwhile though. More fun time.

[Nesmaster]

Years ago I found Megaman 2 at a flea market with DIENO sharpied on the front. The very copy that got me back into retro.

Some years later at a Salvation Army, there's a box of NES carts for $2.99. Among them, The Three Stooges with DIENO in sharpie on the front.

http://img.photobucket.com/albums/v297/Nesmaster/3stooges_zpshoocux4s.jpg

No picture of MM2, I had found a boxed copy by then and the DIENO cart was traded before I started taking webcam pictures. I check periodically on ebay to see if that very cart is up for sale. No luck yet, and it may very well have been rubbed off but I do recall it was pretty stubborn ink.

[celerystalker]

At the end of summer 1995, my friend and I had a big sleepover on labor day weekend at his house. It was the last weekend before our freshman year of school, and I had just turned 15. He had just bought a copy of Final Fantasy III, and he had just finished it. He was playing through Earthbound at the time, so he played it the first half of the night, and I played Final Fantasy III the second half. I got through the first two scenario splits with Locke's and Edgar's complete, with Sabin's to finish. We stayed awake all night long, and met up with his church youth group in the morning to play tackle football at a park.

We played all day, having some awesome plays on one end, and getting flat run over by a couple of seniors at the other. We played until dusk before his mom dropped me off at home. He lent me his Final Fantasy III.

I was exhausted, sore, and beaten up, with that prickly eyes that were aching to close. I wanted to play more Final Fantasy III. I showered up and talked to my parents and brother for a few minutes before slinking into my bottom bunk bed. I picked up the controller and started Sabin's scenario.

I could barely keep my eyes open, and at times I drifted off to sleep, controller in hand. Before long I was at the Phantom Train. It was that hazy kind of surreal, and it really enhanced the atmosphere. I was drifting in and out, and the ghosts and dark colors were comfortable, yet creepy. I remember at one point waking up from drifting out at the part with all of the ghosts surrounding me... I was hurting and sleepy, but happy and fulfilled. It was a perfect night, and a feeling difficult to express or replicate, but when it happens and I realize it, I just smile to myself.

[homerhomer]

Back when the snes was at blockbuster. A good friend and I would rent RPGs over the weekend and try to beat them. We would get misc junk food on a Friday night and do our best. I can't actually remember beathing any games, but one time we got stuck and we must have spent 3 plus hours looking for "the cider". I'm guessing it was like 4am and we decided to call a 900 hint line. I don't think I've ever called one before. We decided to call, 5 minutes later and we were informed that you don't need to get the cider. Ha, I don't even remember the name of the game. I think this is what got me out of rpgs. LOL.

[celerystalker]

Maybe the Cider from Final Fantasy III in South Figaro for the old man in Locke's scenario?

[Tron 2.0]

Sega Channel,mostly found memories for me for since it was very convenient to have.I would have friends over for all night gaming sessions to.Beside at the time being able to play games that didn't have a u.s releases.
http://youtu.be/sMRLZcBiN-k

[stealthrush]

I can tell you first hand. I was about 12 years old when I decided to buy Sega Saturn over Sony PlayStation, and the coming Nintendo 64 at the time.
What made me choose the Saturn were two things; I used to visit my local arcade once a week (since it was a long drive my parents would take me) and played many great SNK, Sega, Capcom arcade games (Virtual On, Daytona USA, Last Brox, Dead or Alive, Dungeons & Dragons etc.) the one that really enthralled me was Die Hard Arcade (Dynamite Dekka). When I found out it was going to be a Saturn exclusive I wanted the console badly.

It was at 1996 I went to Toys R Us and chose the Saturn bundle which came with three games (Virtua Fighter 2, Daytona USA, and Virtua Cop) shortly after getting Die Hard Arcade for $54.99 at the time. I very much enjoyed my Sega Saturn. From years reading about futuristic CD based systems like CD-i, and 3DO, it felt really awesome to own one. At the time it was very cool to play your audio-CDs as well as games! I would play my favorite soundtracks (at the time) Mighty Morphan Power Rangers: The Movie, The Simpsons Sing the Blues, Weird-Al Yankovic albums, and Now! That's What I Call Music Volume 1.

Mind you besides playing my Saturn I still very much played/rented Super Nintendo games at the time.
For about two years I went to Blockbuster and kept noticing how PlayStation library of games would cover two shelves where the Saturn section stayed roughly the same- small (less than half of one shelf) After renting majority of 'fun' titles that were available I would still have hope for the system. I would read in my magazine subscriptions on games that were being/been released overseas Cyberbots for example, really kept me anticipating a North American release that sadly never came. It became obvious towards the end of 1998 Saturn was going out of the market.

I would visit my friends house and he had a PlayStation which I didn't care for at the time. Since many of the games I loved and rented/owned were also for Saturn (Mega Man X4, Puzzle Fighter, Darkstalkers) BUT it was his older brother which was into more of the obscure titles being released for PS1 that got my attention.
He worked at Toys R' Us and used to buy games, play them for awhile, then return them for a full refund, a trick back in the day. He was into Japanese games, they were; Poy Poy, Silhouette Mirage, and Trap Gunner that got my attention. Also to my surprise he owned a Japanese Sega Saturn (at the time super rare, and expensive to own - you had to order in the back of a video game magazine) and he was running Vampire Savior on it!

The coming Christmas I got Sony PlayStation with Trap Gunner, still own them til this day. My Saturn took a hiatus for a good three-four years until around 2002 I discovered Saturn Torrents and the whole emulation via mod-chips and back-ups. I contributed and played many of the JP exclusive titles for the next years. Same to be said with PlayStation, then Dreamcast.

As for Nintendo 64, I never really cared for the system. It could have been the fact many of my favorite arcade titles were nonexistent on the console. That and I felt, many great games could already pull off the hyped up '360 degree 3-D gameplay' Super Mario 64 bragged about. Jumping Flash, Tomb Raider came to mind. I would play occasionally play Mario Party games over my friends house as well.

I originally posted this over at /r/retrogaming but it makes sense to post it here :-D

[celerystalker]

Trap Gunner was an early favorite of mine on Playstation as well. I picked it up on clearance at a Toys R Us for $10 in 1999, as I liked the anime cover art (I'd just started getting really into anime). The game just felt really unique, and it quickly replaced 2D fighters as the multi-player game of choice in my house for a few months. Setting up massive chain reaction traps and catching someone right in the middle of them was just so satisfying in a way different enough from Bomberman to be a real treat. Unfortunately, as I was the only person among my friends that owned it, I quickly got too toigh to beat at it, so the competitive play trickled off to nothing. Still, it makes me happy when one of the guys brings it up nostalgically.

If you were into Trap Gunner, try Grid Runner on Saturn or PS1. Some similar concepts and feel with a Capture the Flag bent to it, and it's cost all of about nothing for years.

[Eternal Champion]

initial random memory:
I'm old enough to remember Atari 2600 back in the day. Didn't have it; got a Coleco with the 2600 adapter. Have an older sibling plus older friend...we played tons of River Raid and Centipede.
So, my older sister is blasting away in River Raid, getting farther than we ever have (single player games with a group, who does that now?!) my attention wanders to the big button on the 2600 (or perhaps the main Coleco unit). Hmmm, what does this do? RESET.
I was probably 7, 8, maybe younger.

2 friends of mine got the NES before I did (I viewed them as spoiled). First game I played was probably Ikari Warriors, an arcade game we liked.

'kin' A I'm old.

[celerystalker]

So, when I was somewhere around 23 years old, I was hanging out at a friend's house (his parents' house, I should say) while I was supposed to be in a college class. We were playing Toejam & Earl on Genesis at the time around midday, joking around and being unproductive. Out of nowhere, quietly in the background, I heard the music from an old-school ice cream truck. Simultaneously, we looked right at each other, jumped up, and ran down the stairs. We chased that truck down on foot like a couple of idiots and bought some ice cream. I had an ice cream sandwich... I hadn't bought anything from an ice cream truck since I was very young. It was just a really funny moment where we were completely in sync with our stupidity, and that ice cream did hit the spot. Oh, and we did finish our game, naturally.

[celerystalker]

This is one I'll look back on later, but it just happened tonight. My buddy was over hanging out after my wife and son had been in bed (they conked out early around 8) to play some games. My 9 month old son wakes up crying on the monitor while we're playing Crossed Swords on Neo Geo, so I run upstairs to get him, figuring he was just a little hungry or in pain from teething. Gave him a bottle and some Children's Tylenol, but he still kept crying unless I held him and walked around. My buddy decides he's going to take a run at the first Castlevania on NES, which he's never managed to beat before. Anyway, he keeps playing for nearly 2 hours while my son is just inconsolable, so I just held him the whole time and either sat and watched or walked around. I tried to put him to bed one more time, but he started to shriek when I put him down, so back downstairs and pacing while my friend is fighting Dracula at least 20 times. My son is pretty good through all of this as long as I hold him, and watches the whole time. Finally, around 12:30am he beat Dracula... and almost immediately my son fell asleep, like he was just waiting to see the end the whole time. Right to sleep, no fuss. It was bizarre.

[Niku-Sama]

well that's super odd.

don't tell your son that you have to go gther his bits and you have to re assemble him on the next game other wise it might be longer before he gets to bed

[Daniel Thomas]

1994. Summer CES in Chicago. A car load of fanzine editors, including yours truly, being driven by the immortal Russ Perry, Jr. At some point, Russ drives the car on sidewalks. I can't remember why, but the whole trip was just a series of zany episodes and stunts like that.

[celerystalker]

When I was in fourth grade, I got invited to my best friend at the time's tenth birthday party sleepover. About six kids were there that night, and we all hung out and played Nintendo games in his parents' den, where we eventually set up sleeping bags and their couch hide-a-bed. I remember it being odd that they had us go to bed, lights out, at, like, 10pm. Most of the kids went right to sleep, but I've never in my life been a very good sleeper. Anyway, maybe half an hour later, I hear his parents fighting in the next room. Arguing, I should say. Apparently this was happening a lot, and my friend whose party it was heard them as well. We whispered about not knowing what to do, and he asked if I'd watch him play Castlevania II, and I agreed. As quietly as we could, he turned the game on with no volume, and put in the old "HELP ME" password. He played up through the first mansion while we tried to pretend we didn't hear his parents arguing, and as it died down, he started to get tired. He asked me to play something for him to watch, so I put in the old Baseball (the black box game). I vividly remember being afraid that his parents would come in and see me playing, but I needed the distraction as well. I remember playing as St Louis vs LA, and I remember hitting a few home runs, which impressed me friend. I won the game, and started another when we heard his dad leave the house, and we quickly turned the game off, fearing that his mom would come in, and I just closed my eyes for what felt like forever until I fell asleep. We didn't hang out in the morning, and I know I got picked uo early, maybe 8am. His parents divorced a few months later, and we only hung out a few more times, always at my house, before drifting apart. It wasn't a long friendship, but that nighthas stuck with me for more than 25 years.

[celerystalker]

I had a really bad breakup in early 2004 with a girl I was crazy about, but she ended up cheating while away at college. I was really down and out, and most of my interests at the time I'd been sharing with her, from console games to anime to travel, and so it all reminded me of her, and I was getting depressed. I'd spend my days like a zombie, working, going home, having trouble sleeping, and looking for something to do that had nothing to do with her. So, for awhile I was doing time wasting crap that even I didn't enjoy, like watching Becker and doing puzzles... you know how you can get when you're young, stupid, and mopey. One night while I was busy not sleeping, I got out my Futurama DVDs and started watching them with the commentaries on. While doing so, I fired up my Neo Geo Pocket Color with SNK vs Capcom: Card Fighters Clash (Capcom version).

Next thing I knew, hours had gone by and I was starting to enjoy myself. This became a nightly ritual, and I'd fall asleep with the NGPC in my hands. It cost me some batteries, but I was sleeping at least.

I slowly worked my way into a reasonable mindset, and then started showing the game to my friends. Soon enough, five of my friends had NGPCs and the game, and we were all having fun showing off our new cards. One day, one of my buddies went to a Toys R Us and saw a stray copy of Pac-Man for NGPC, and asked if they had anymore games. The guy went in back and found an unopened case of the SNK version of Card Fighters Clash, knocked down to $5 each! We all ran and got a copy, and we played the hell out of it that year. It kept me distracted enough to get right, and we all had a ton of fun with that game.

Too bad the DS game sucked.

[sfchakan]

When life is rough like that for, I break out my Saturn and play some shooters. Time goes by so fast and before I know it, I feel a little refreshed.

[ave1]

I remember when I was around 11 or 12 my dad agreed that we could get an Atari VCS. We went to a locally-owned electronics store and got a brand new Atari with Combat (pack - in game) as well as River Raid. Within a few more weeks we also got Night Driver, Dodge 'em, Missile Command, and Yars Revenge. I played for hours and got really good at each game. I remember choosing not to get Pac-Man or Defender because I felt these ports were shoddy. I also played Atari at a couple of friends' houses: mainly Donkey Kong, Starmaster, Adventure, and Megamania.

I had other friends who owned Colecovision and Intellivision which were plenty of fun, but I liked the Atari joystick and paddles more than what the other systems offered.

A couple years into owning the game system, I entered a contest to recruit new customers on my paper route and won the 1st prize. Three Atari games of my choice were awarded to me- Jackpot!

Ended up getting Enduro and two others which i don't remember.. mightve been Omega Race and G.I. Joe Cobra Strike... Played Enduro till I got sick of it around 2 months later :) Never did get sick of Omega Race!

[celerystalker]

When I was a pretty young kid... I think about 9 years old... there was a bithday party for one of my friends from church. I was really more friends with his younger brother, but most of the kids from church between the ages of 8-12 or so were there. There were enough of us to play a pretty good game of kickball in their back yard while it was still light outside. Anyway, it was a sleepover, and after the kickball game, we all went inside for food, cake, and ice cream, then we all went down to the basement to play. There were some toys (they had a lot of He-Man and Thundercats stuff along with those goofy WWF thumb wrestler action figures where you put your thumb up their asses and tried to knock them off of each other's hands), but I was more into GI Joe, so I mostly hung around the Nintendo. This was the first time I saw and played Kid Icarus.

I was already into Greek mythology, as we had to check out a book at the school library every week, so it was either that or Choose Your Own Adventure books for me. The music immediately caught my attention. I've played and owned thousands of games since, but Kid Icarus for me contains some of if not the very best chip tunes of all time. I can still just sit and listen to the title theme several times before I press start each time I fire it up. The graphics were also so dark and brooding, and the march remix of the title theme as the music for the first few levels really set the mood for a young hero forging his way hopefully through a dark adventure.

I didn't get past 1-3 that night, but the game was in my head, and I knew I would own it eventually. As I laid there in the dark as the night wound down, though, it felt increasingly creepy. I decided to try to go to bed as the older kids turned on a movie as most of the younger kids were falling asleep. I wanted to be cool, so I sat up to watch as Empire Strikes Back came on. I'd never seen it; my dad had a copy of A New Hope he'd taped off of TV that I'd seen a million times, but my mom was afraid I might have nightmares from Empire. Well, I don't remember many dreams from my life, but I know the scene in the cave on Dagobah did not help, and I slept uneasily, filled with creepy imagery and haunting music.

The next morning, while waiting to be picked up by my parents, I played Super Mario Bros., which I was rather familiar with, even though I partly wanted to play Kid Icarus... but that bright blue sky, green little hills, and cheery music in level 1-1 were like a warm blanket after a long, creepy night. Still, Kid Icarus was destined to become a favorite of mine, and Empire certainly is the best Star Wars movie...

[BlastProcessing402]

I had a bit of a nightmare buying the Saturn. I heard about the early launch and somehow had enough money for it at the time, so I ran over to Electronics Boutique (my favorite place to buy games at the time) and plunked down my cash (note that, I paid in cash) and walked out with my shiny new system.

I went to a local rental place (one that only rented games not movies) and rented a few games that seemed interesting. So far so good.

Played for a few hours that night in the family room, then took the Saturn up to my bedroom to hook it up. Played for a few more minutes and then... nothing. It just stopped working. Unplugged it plugged it back in, nothing. Took it back down to the family room, nothing. Thing was dead.

Next night, boxed it up and headed back to EB to exchange it. Oh so sorry, we're all sold out. Well then, give me back my money, so I can head two doors down and buy one at Babbage (I didn't say that 2nd part out loud). Oh we don't have that much money on hand, we can mail you a check. A CHECK?!?!? I pay you in cash and you asshats want to mail me a check and leave me without what I paid for for weeks if I'm lucky?!?!? WHAT IS WRONG WITH YOU PEOPLE!!??* Finally they called another EB and they still had them. But that EB was way across town and no way could I get there before closing. But it was somewhat near my mom's work, so she said she could take care of it after work the next day.

She comes home the next day. I open the box... and something's not right. Things look a little off. The little protector for the battery is already pulled, and things just in general look a little disturbed. Hook it up... and there're already saves on the system. Welp, I'm not putting up with a used system when I just paid $400 for a new system. Take it back tomorrow, please, Mom.

And she did, and the next one actually was new, and it actually didn't fail the first night, and it's actually the same Saturn I have to this day.

Then a couple months later they drop the price buy $100. Yeah, VFremix free in the mail really made up for that...




*before anyone says things like that are common practice, they weren't back at that time, and it certainly wasn't the policy written on any signage or the receipt when I was buying the system.

[celerystalker]

I'dve been pissed, too. That was a ton of money at the time to get that kind of runaround. Glad it worked out for you in the end, as Saturn is a fantastic system.

[celerystalker]

I remember in 1999 I'd been working at a FuncoLand, and every Friday we'd get in a box of new and used games from UPS to supplement trade-ins, and of course the employees would raid them pretty hard. At that time, I'd pick up pretty much any NES game I didn't have that was $2 or less, so I'd occasionally bring home a big bag of games to try out. My brother was my play tester, and he'd come to my room and play everything for a few minutes and give me his always funny, yet very accurate capsule reviews. Every now and then, though, a game would stick.

The biggest of these was when we got in a pile of new, sealed copies of Suikoden, and a few magazines had raved about it posthumously. I picked one up for ten bucks along with about 10 other games, and we settled in to play. I'd been having insomnia issues and hadn't slept for about 3 days, so I was kinda drifting in and out. I remember him trying Amagon and Zanac before firing up Suikoden. He was lukewarm for the first few minutes, so I gave in when I started to fall asleep. I woke up almost 3 hours later to find him still playing. I chuckled, and asked him if he'd been playing that same game the whole time.

"Uh huh. Dude. This game is awesome."

I watched for awhile as he told me a little about McDohl and Gremio's rebellion, then I fell asleep. I woke up around ten in the morning, not expecting so much time to have passed. The game was still running, and there was my brother, asleep in the floor, controller still in hand. I laughed to myself and went back to sleep. It was just a calm, quiet, comical moment.

He finished the game within days, then again immediately after to collect all of the stars of destiny. Still one of his all-time favorites.

[celerystalker]

I remember the first used game I ever bought was Mike Tyson's Punch Out! in 1989. My brother's best friend had brought a copy over recently, and though I sucked at it, I loved the huge characters, catchy music, and the feel of the punches. A few weeks afterward, a kid named Jason in my third grade class offered to sell me his copy for $7! I had my allowance saved in a big pickle jar in my parents' room, as I was trying to save up for new Nintendo games. I asked my mom if I could have some of my money to buy the game, but she made me promise to put half of my money in the bank first, so I did.

I had this plastic little BB box that was meant to clip to your belt that I used to put little things I thought were cool inside, like my Lego knights or Silly Putty. I put the money inside and took it to school the next day. I had trouble going to sleep, I was so excited, so I did some reading in my copy of How to Win at Nintendo Games... I think volume 2. The tips didn't mean much to me yet, but I memorized the password to fight Mike Tyson, which I'l never forget: 007-373-5963.

The next day, I bought the game before school, effectively making it impossible to pay attention the rest of the day. As soon as I got it home, my brother and I started taking turns like maniacs until my mom made us turn it off for the night.

I played the hell out of that game, and beat it within the year. However, not having the manual, I had no idea about star punches, which I'd somehow glossed over in Jeff Rovin's book. It wasn't until I was a teenager and my buddy Tim started throwing uppercuts that I had my mind blown!

Nothing overly special, but it made me happy.

[dgdgagdae]

Celerystalker, you have some great stories. Thanks for sharing.

[celerystalker]

That was very kind of you to say. Thank you very much.

[sfchakan]

However, not having the manual, I had no idea about star punches, which I'd somehow glossed over in Jeff Rovin's book. It wasn't until I was a teenager and my buddy Tim started throwing uppercuts that I had my mind blown!

I think it's impressive you beat the game without them as a kid.

[celerystalker]

I think it's impressive you beat the game without them as a kid.

Heh, thanks, but it's not as impressive as it sounds... the later fighters get pretty tough to even get a star, and often recover so fast that it's tough to land one. I'll take the compliment, though! :)

Anyway, another silly story. Shortly before Christmas in 1994, I was trying to find a good present for my brother. I used to roll newspapers on weekends for a few years for my neighbor across the street who owned a route for $5 a day, and I'd saved up a bit of money. It was somewhat of a golden age for clearance sales in my area, and the local Wal-Mart had quite a few remaining NES games and some poorly performing SNES games marked down under $20.

I started pawing through the electronics department and picking out the soundtrack to Top Gun for my dad on CD. As I started to get into the games like Phalanx with that goofy banjo box art, Godzilla 2, Battle Blaze, etc., I ran across some winners.

That fall my friend Tim had exposed me to RPGs. He had a neighbor with divorced parents that constantly bought him new games, and we had gone over to play a game they'd been playing through together: Final Fantasy Mystic Quest. I'd played a little Dragon Warrior before, but this was different. I watched them go through Pazuzu's Tower, and everything had so much more color... the music was cool, the battles were fast, and there was animation for attacks and damage... I loved it.

So, when I saw both Final Fantasy and Final Fantasy: Mystic Quest for $15 each, I really wanted to buy both, but I didn't have money to do so and buy presents. I made the decision to buy one for my brother, and I went for the original Final Fantasy after long deliberation. I went home feeling that excitement of buying a new game, even if it wasn't for me, and was dying to talk about it.

I naturally immediately started hyping up to my brother this amazing present I had for him, and he was getting excited. He started probing, asking questions to try and figure out what it was. When I played coy, he started to brag about what he'd picked out for me. So, after excitedly poking at one another, we made a deal to tell each other what we bought. This was taboo in our house, and my mom always got upset when we'd spoil or figure out surprises. We didn't want her to overhear, so we for some reason we came up with the retarded plan to get out our copy of Baseball Simulator 1.000 on NES and write them out in the names of the players on a created team so there would be no evidence.

I went first, and he started giggling happily, both from excitement and because we felt like we were these sneaky geniuses, but I was about to find out there was another reason... he'd gotten me Mystic Quest!

That Christmas break, I got a TV of my very own for my room from my parents, and you'd better believe I camped out in my room pretty much the whole time playing Mystic Quest. I had a bunch of cherry Life Savers from a Secret Santa at church, and I sat on my bottom bunk playing the crap out of that game all the way through before New Year's Eve. It was so cool having this new game to play on my new TV, and my brother sat on the top bunk most of the time, sharing in my candy and playing Final Fantasy when I'd take a break. It was an awesome week, and every year since, it's been a tradition for my brother and I to tell each other what we're giving one another. The spoilers have yet to diminish the fun in the slightest.

[MadaoBob]

Alright, here's mine.

So about a decade or so back, maybe a bit more, my dad got us a GCN, that my siblings and I adored to death. We had a cousin who stayed on the 5th floor of our block, so he'd occasionally come up to our home up on the 13th, and us to his home on the 5th, since he had a GCN as well.

Basically some years after, my brother, cousin and I were playing Digimon World 4 that we had gotten on the GCN. We did loads of stupid shit then, with our childish thoughts what not. Back then we had this thing where each person took one of the four digimon, my cousin Agumon, my brother Dorumon, and me Veemon, this will be a little relevant later.

The very first of the funny things that happened being a weapon in the inventory of our cousin's Agumon, and we had the bright idea that the "Break" command was to break it literally into pieces that we could then share, and not that it would destroy the item. You can pretty much guess what happened.

The next one was us constantly going to the digivolve booth and spam digivolving to the other digimon, when we started to just run around and get slightly annoyed that we cant switch back to our own characters yet to continue the game.

Then came along what I'd call the apex of the shenanigans: I accidentally overwritten my cousin's Agumon save, which mind you by that time we were at level 40. He got mad at me for a long while until my brother offered to let him have his Dorumon save.

Other shenanigans included bastardizing the boss digimon names such as Apocalymon to Apple Curry Mon, and calling Malovamdemon "That guy with boobs on his shoulders that can open and shoot black balls".

Good memories....

[celerystalker]

At the end of January 2000, I was still working at FuncoLand when this kid named David came in asking about trade-in prices on his Sega Master System. Funco didn't buy Master System, so I told him that unfortunately we couldn't offer him anything. He asked me if anyone local would buy it, so I referred him to a Game Xchange down the street. He thanked me and left, and I didn't think much of it. About an hour later, he shows back up, saying they only offered him $20 in credit for his stuff. He asked if I knew anybody else, because he really wanted to buy a Dreamcast. I asked him how much he wanted, and he said $30 for the system and some games, cash. I told him I'd buy it if he wanted at that price, and he said he'd bring it by sometime. This sort of thing happened once in awhile, and usually they'd forget, give up, or sell whatever it was elsewhere, so I didn't expect much.

On the day the Rams were playing in the Super Bowl I was working, planning to head over to my sister's after work to watch the second half of the game when I got off, when the guy calls me at the store, asking if I was still interested. I told him to meet me at the store after I got off, and I'd pay the $30, sight unseen, not knowing what games I'd be getting.

He shows up with this box, I pay the money after glancing at it, and hurry off to my sister's house.

When I got there, I ate some food, talked and watched the end of the game, which the Rams won, which was cool. Then, my brother and I broke off to her basement to check this stuff out.

The first surprise was that it was a Master System II with Alex Kidd built in. Awesome, as that was one of two games I'd had great memories with, the other being Safari Hunt. I'd never seen a Master System II in person at that point, so I thought it was super cool. He also had a Light Phaser, so that was neat, but it was time to check out the games.

Turned out there were nearly 30 in the box, most in the cases! On top of that, I couldn't believe what all was there... Phantasy Star, Y's, Wonderboy III... I didn't even know there was a game based on Alf! We started just trying games out shotgun style, starting with Alf, which we watched all the time as kids, even the cartoon... well, it wasn't great, but next thing you know we're playing Penguin Land for a couple of hours, as it just had that great easy to play, tough to master feel, and it reminded me a little of Lode Runner, which we used to play on NES.

I only saw that David kid a couple more times at the store, usually buying Dreamcast sports games, but he gave me a memorable night and almost half of my Master System, all for the low price of $30. Pretty sweet.

[Az]

Can't remember the exact year but I'm thinking '91 or '92. Went on a short trip to Pigeon Forge, TN and stopped by this outlet mall. I was browsing around in the toy store and noticed they had an endcap of SMS consoles and systems, right out in the open, which was rather odd. I didn't pay a whole lot of attention to it since I had most of the games but what floored me was there was a game I'd never even heard of called Double Hawk.

I walk up to check the Genesis stuff out behind the counter and my mind is blown: half the titles actually say "Mega Drive" on them. Hardly any of them are shrinkwrapped and most just have a small Sega sticker on the side holding the clamshell together. I sheepishly asked the clerk if she could open one for me because in my mind Mega Drive meant Japanese games which I obviously couldn't play. I explained that to her and she looked at me a bit funny, but grabbed Toejam & Earl and popped it open, only for me to see a US style cart! My brain locked up and I had no idea what was going on. I knew something had to be up because right there was Sonic 1 with a Mega Drive label on a white background, nothing like the US version, but the shells weren't Japanese?

I ended up buying Wings of Wor (US version) for either $15 or $20. I had no idea until years later that what I was looking at was a gigantic stock of European games that somehow wound up in an American store. I kick myself in the ass for passing on the import version of Captain Silver, Double Hawk, and other SMS games going for $10 or less. Now that I know what was going on, I always wonder what happened to the people that bought all those PAL consoles only to have them not work.

[Steven]

CS, had no idea you worked at a Funcoland. Overall, do you look back on that period of your life with a real deep fondness? Or no? And why or why not? I always found that place fascinating, and my mantra in the late '90s/early 2000s regarding Funcoland visits were "bring 20 bucks, stay 10 minutes and then get the hell outta there" lol.

Random memory time. I always get nostalgic around Thanksgiving time because back in November 2002 when I was in my DIEHARD Sega Saturn (importing) stage, I found out Capcom Generations 5 contained the classic Street Fighter II games. World Warrior, Champion Edition and Hyper/Turbo. I bought a copy in time for Thanksgiving 2002 and just remember playing the sh!t out of it, and LOVING the intense bursts of nostalgia. From Blanka's stage to E. Honda's, the game overwhelmed my senses with memories from a better time in gaming. And mind you, in 2002, SFII was only 11 years old, so it was still kind of fresh in my mind a little bit. I was a sophomore in college, and I just recall that time very dearly. I played Capcom Generations 5 that whole week straight, and I loved every damn second of it. Damn I should pick it up again. As much as I love the SNES ports, the Saturn compilation was arcade perfect (or so it seemed). Blew the SNES ports out of the water, naturally.

[celerystalker]

Steven-overall, Funco was a bitter-sweet part of my life. I started working there the summer after high school, and my buddy Tim worked there as well. Within a month I promoted, and was pretty happy. They hired another friend of mine from high school shortly thereafter, and then a guy who became another close friend and later roommate for a few years. We were all friends, running the place together, and it showed in some great sales numbers. We sold so much that we surpassed even the mall stores in our market, and our customers were super loyal. I'll post some of the better stories eventually.

Anyway, eventually, the company sold out to Barnes and Noble after we all thought it was going to be EB, and had gotten new employee paperwork from them until B&N swooped in at the 11th hour. It went downhill from there, as they began to carry DVDs, move away from classic games, and really push for reservations on new games. The new DM was a dick from Babbage's, and he was terrible to work for. He directly told us to lie and say that everything was great, whereas Funco encouraged honesty, and simply offering customers asking for shitty games to try them first. I finally got fed up and quit in 2001 in the fall, as the last original Funco employee in St Louis not replaced by a Babbage's associate or someone off the street. I did go out on my own terms, which is a popular story among my friends, and maybe I'll share it sometime.

I spent just about all of the money I made back in the store, and up until the last 10 months or so, it was a blast; me and my friends running a store together successfully, and we're all still friends today. We even used to prank call our other stores, as we were friendly rivals... it was great. When it was Funco, I was allowed to be myself, and I had a great relationship with my friends and customers, some of which end up recognizing me all these years later at Walmart stores I've been a salaried manager in for years now. I can't imagine having that kind of fun at work again, but I doubt it was as much fun for everyone out there. I do, though, obviously hate GameStop.... just for more reasons than most.

[Emperor Megas]

Around 2000 or 2001, back when I lived in New Orleans, my girlfriend (who was living in MN at the time) came down and moved in with me. She didn't really game much, but there were a few titles that she enjoyed. We used to play Trip'D on 3DO a lot, and also Crazy Taxi on the Dreamcast, which she REALLY enjoyed. Anyway, one day she was playing fast and furiously right out of the gate and when she drove her first fare to her destination at the base of the hill that you start on top of, she violently slammed into the wall of the destination zone while still holding down the accelerator, causing her to grind on the wall in slow motion, slowly creeping along the side of the building until she eventually broke. Well, the trick/tip counter was rapid firing, multiplying like mad, and the fare in back was going absolutely nuts, LOVING it. The woman in the back of the cab couldn't finish a single sound sample because another one would start a second after she spoke. She made a mint off of that first fare and that exploit changed the way we played the game. We dubbed the technique the 'Wall Ride', and from then on that's how we started every game of Crazy Taxi.

The trick was to get know when to stop the trick as to get the maximum tip while maintaining the best delivery time. I don't know if everyone learned this trick since I didn't really talk or read about the Dreamcast much online back then, but it was the shit.

Til' this day if Crazy Taxi ever comes up in a conversation and she's around, she declares "That 'Wall Ride'...yeah, I pioneered that shit".

[celerystalker]

That's awesome. I'll have to try that stunt out. :)

[celerystalker]

Right before Thanksgiving 1998, I was beyond excited for Ocarina of Time, or "Zelda 64" as everyone around me called it back then, and so were many of my friends and family members. It was my senior year of high school, and I was still working at a Taco Bell at the time. I had reserved the game at a local KayBee Toys, and it was due to come out, like, the day before Thanksgiving if I'm remembering correctly. They gave me a T-shirt as a preorder bonus, which I was wearing that Wednesday after school when I went to pick it up, taking my brother along for the ride.

I picked the game up excitedly, and my brother was reading the manual out loud in my car as I drove home via the gas station to get a huge soda. We were ready to go, and I called a few friends over to see and try it.

There were seriously 8 people crammed into my little 10 x 10 bedroom when I turned on my N64. That cinematic memory of the fairy Navi flying through the village made me think this was going to be the game I'd be calling my favorite forever. Then, I started to play.

By the the time I'd crawled around to get my equipment, gone through the Deku Tree, and started going through Hyrule field, I was bored out of my mind, and in severe denial about it. Maybe it was the fact that one of the people from school on my bed was a girl I was super into, I figured, so after awhile I decided to save and start passing the controller around.

When it came back around to me after having found an excuse to sit all but on top of that girl at the time (hey, I was a kid with a crush), I did one more dungeon, and found myself getting irritated again. This was going to be the best game ever made, and I'd been telling everyone that for months.

The weekend was an awesome blur of hanging out, bouncing back and forth between houses with that group of friends, playing board and video games, eating, and watching movies, all while pining away over a girl and trying to like Ocarina of Time. I barely slept all weekend, even working a couple of shifts in the middle of it all. It was one of those magical, blurry whirlwinds that you look back on so fondly...

Except for Zelda. I kept playing as much as I could stomach until Christmas, when I got a Playstation. I put in that demo with the opening area of Metal Gear Solid, which put into sharp relief just how much fun I wasn't having with Zelda.

I look back on that time and smile, and it was great, but Ocarina of Time, I hate. I've tried to do it again at least 10 times, most recently this summer. The game will always have the strange distinction of being a game I remember fondly, but have never liked.

[celerystalker]

This is about how Goldeneye on N64 made me buy a bunch of stuff that isn't Goldeneye.

New Year's Eve, 1997, my family went over to the same home we'd gone to for so many years to hang out while all of our parents played board games all night. It was the first place I played NES, Master System, Turbografx, and SNES, and now it was about to be my trial by fire on N64. They'd added a separate apartment to the house they'd rent out, but with no current tenant, they hooked up an N64 to keep us occupied.

I'd briefly played Mario 64 at a Wal-Mart, and wasn't really into it at the time (probably my favorite N64 game now), but I was totally unprepared for the four-player insanity headed my way. Mario Kart, Star Fox, WCW/nWo World Tour, and Goldeneye were all there, and those controllers were in everyone's hands all night. I was crazy about the whole pile, but Goldeneye really stuck out, with it's uniquely competitive vs mode eating up most of the night.

When I went to bed that night, I was thinking about Goldeneye... the matches, the complex stage, and the take on the music. I had a jonesing for 3D gaming for the first time. Problem was, I worked at Taco Bell for $4.75 an hour, and had promised my mom that I'd only keep $100 every check and put the rest in the bank, and I wanted to play now, not some $400 or so later for a system, game, and three more controllers. I wasn't that patient.

First came the music. I bought the soundtrack to Tomorrow Never Dies, which was the next big movie. I had a 3 disc stereo in my bedroom, and it had that, Aerosmith's Big Ones, and Sarah McLachlin's Mirrorball that a girl I was into gave me most of the winter and spring. This, however, did not soothe my need to play.

It'd take me at least two months with no expenses to save that kind of money, and my SNES wasn't going to give me the particular experience I wanted... I needed to go new. So, when I saw an Atari Jaguar on clearance at Kay Bee Toys for $25, I thought that maybe, just maybe, I'd found my ticket. I remember my parents had steamed the carpets that day, and I sat down on the damp floor in my room with my brother and a brand new system to try, with Cybermorph.

"Where did you learn to fly?"

"Dude, this looks awful."

My brother was always so tactful. :) Anyway, I played on as the wet carpet slowly seeped into my pants, clumsily smacking mountains until I figured out how to clear a few planets. Now, I actually am a little fond of Cybermorph, but this... this was nowhere even close to what I was searching for... not even a little bit. It was hard to find new games as well, so the next two I found, I bought, which were Checkered Flag Racing and Troy Aikman Football. If you are not aware, they are ass.

Frustrated, I was thrilled about two months later when I stumbled across a Sega Saturn on clearance at Wal-Mart for $25. I had seen them aggressively go after Nintendo, so maybe they had something comparable? If nothing else, I was a big fan of arcade Virtua Cop, so I knew it wouldn't be a bust. I stopped by a Microplay next door and bought Panzer Dragoon II and NHL '97 to go with my demo disc.

Well... after some hijinx figuring out how to save (who knew you had to pull the ribbon from the battery holder?), we got into the Saturn. NHL was bland, but Panzer Dragoon II was cool... problem was, my brother and I cleared it in that first sitting, passing the controller back and forth alternating levels. No matter what, though, I wanted to dig it, and the Mansion of the Hidden Souls video on the demo looked interesting... but no Goldeneye.

It wasn't until fall that I knuckled down and bought my N64. I went all in, and got my controllers, controller pak, and even WCW/nWo to go along. It took two systems to learn the virtue of patience... but I still have both of them. I still play both. Hell, I even love my Saturn a hell of a lot more than my N64 these days, and its arcade-y library has aged way better. In 1998, though, they couldn't fill that gap that only Goldeneye could.

[Tanooki]

So so many misfires there. Perhaps you should have realized you needed to take it easy and not buy everyone a controller up front. That would save a considerable bit not paying up for 3 extras controllers. If the friends came over they could bring their own. Personally I mostly dislike, somewhat downright hate multiplayer as I didn't grow up with it especially at the same time, usually just 1-2P swap. Goldeneye 99% of my time was beating the hell out of the stages over and over again and it was and still is a fairly good right.

[celerystalker]

So, among my friends it's a well-known and often joked about fact that Zelda II is not only my favorite Zelda, but also my favorite NES game. While I have gradually won all of them over to at least appreciating the game and its excellent design and control, one friend thinks it's hilarious that I've played through it so many times. Because of that, in the early 2000s, the challenges started.

First, it was speed runs. Then it was no heart/magic containers. Then it turned into low level challenges... my buddy Tim would come hang out, we'd talk, play games, watch movies... but he'd want to finish the night by watching me play through Zelda 2 with some goofy handicap. Then, one fall night, he gave me the most infuriating of them all: I could only kill bosses.

This is a dumb-ass challenge to take.

To gain enough levels, you have to scrounge up point bags all over the place early so that when you clear a palace, you get the maximum points toward your next level. However, that's not the hard part. That comes when you get the downthrust.

Five times I had to start over from accidentally tapping a diagonal or reflexively hopping off of a bit or bot. It became somewhat of an endurance and math challenge, mastering dodging, using the fairy spell in odd places, timing random encounters to avoid overworld traps, making sure the points from a boss would hit my next level so I'd get another from the statue after...

Most of Tim's challenges took me about two hours. This one turned into a six hour marathon that ended at 4:30am when I finally took down the shadow. It was the last challenge he gave me on that game, but he still brings it up from time to time. I still adore the game, and the GBA port always comes along in my Game Boy Micro when I travel, but I will not do that challenge again. I've never been so mad from killing a Moblin...

[celerystalker]

There's not much more annoying to a kid than wrecking a perfectly good Christmas with a boring family visit.

When I was in my mid teens or so, there was a Christmas in which I got two gifts from my parents that I really liked a lot: SimCity for Super Nintendo and the book Martin the Warrior. I really enjoyed Brian Jacques' Redwall series at the time, and Martin's story was sort of an underlying legend in some of the early books. SimCity, of course, is just awesome, and I'd been playing it on a neighborhood friend's DOS computer for a couple of years, so I was super excited to get a chance to dig into it.

There was a problem, though... right after opening presents, my brother, sister, and I were bundled up and rushed into the car to drive 2 hours to visit my mom's parents in Bland, MO.

If you are understandably unfamiliar with the town of Bland, it was named after former US congressman Richard "Silver Dick" Bland. He was called that due to his platform of wanting to make all US currency out of precious metals as opposed to being backed by them in order that it might retain value resistant to inflation. To my siblings and I, it was a delightful penis joke on a billboard. That is the town's sole redeeming feature. It has a population of around 400, and I'm pretty sure that's counting livestock. They have a Baptist church and a stop sign... but that's where they decided to move after retirement, 2 hours away from their closest relatives.

I brought two things with me: Martin the Warrior and the instruction manual for SimCity. I knew this trip was only going to be about a four hour visit bookended by two 2 hour drives, but I needed something to get me through, and separating a kid from a brand new video game on Christmas (back when you only got one or two a year) was like watching the clock on the last day of school.

Honestly... I kinda hid out in the bathroom most of the time, reading Martin the Warrior and scouring the sample maps in that manual, planning out where I'd put industrial areas to minimize the impact of pollution on residential zones... the one good part of that excruciating wait was the nice dusting of snow that made for a pleasant view out the back window. The book was good (though maybe not as grandiose as I'd imagined), and the fact that nobody but my brother really noticed me hiding away was cool, as that set of my grandparents were known to sit and argue about scripture during... well, anything. I wanted to go home.

That drive home seemed interminable, and no restaurants were open to get something good to eat like we often did when making that trip (mind you, "something good" to me at that time pretty much meant McDonald's). It was too dark to read, so all I could do was look out the window and think, looking out at the snow.

It's funny how in some ways my mind romanticizes the calm of that day, but my memory clearly defineshow bored and anxious to get back home I was. I did play SimCity much of the night when we got home, and I remember naming that first city Mikeston...

Both of those grandparents have sinced passed (I think I mentioned that granpa passing on my wedding day in another post in this thread), and I don't have any relatives at that kind of middling driving distance anymore. I'll probably never go to Bland again now. I look back on that Christmas, though, and I can only laugh at myself for my teenage combination of enthusiasm, boredom, and anxiety. I hope everyone here had great holidays!

[celerystalker]

Daria's recent video about Rhapsody got me thinking about the three or so years when I worked at FuncoLand and some of the stupid/fun shit we used to do there.

So, you may recall FuncoLands used to have around ten or so TVs set up in each store, which we referred to as "the arcade" at the time, and they were designed to give customers the opportunity to try games out before buying them, as we didn't take returns on non-defective merchandise, and wanted people to know exactly what they were getting. It also provided a great chance to expose people to new games, and I used to get a kick out of putting obscure stuff in and getting people excited about new games... but those aren't the people I'm talking about today. I'm talking about the rat kids.

"Rat kid" was a pejorative we used to describe kids whose parents would drop them off with no intent to shop, trying to use us as free day care while they shopped elsewhere in the plaza. Some were polite, but some would want you to change out games all the time to cater to their time wasting, and it created a dilemma between customer service and what was clearly a waste of time. So, my buddy Ben who worked there came up with an awesome plan.

We put Ghosts n' Goblins in the NES. When a kid would loiter in the store too long, we'd make a bet with them. If they could beat the first level of Ghosts 'n Goblins on three lives, they could stay and have a free issue of Game Informer. If not, they had to leave. I can't tell you how many cocky ten year olds smirked like they were hot shit before getting booted within minutes.

One particularly bratty kid started to pitch a fit after three consecutive days of getting kicked out. His mom was a real piece of work, and would try to dump him there for hours at least four days a week. He started bitching, saying it was impossible and that we were assholes for laughing at him fail time and again. I'd beaten Ghosts 'n Goblins many times by this point, but I almost never played games at work; they encouraged it, as it would familiarize us with games, but I played plenty at home. However, the kid was irritating me, so rather than argue, I just went over, picked up the controller, and rolled through the level.

This shut the kid up, but one of my coworkers apparently had never seen anyone play the game well, and he asked me to keep playing. We were pretty dead, so I gave in and started the second level. I mean, really, if you can beat the second level of Ghosts 'n Goblins, you can beat the game, but I guess people who haven't stuck with it would be a little impressed. Anyhow, I was having a good game, and as customers trickled in, a small crowd of 10 or so people started gathering, as I hadn't died yet. I tried to pause it and help the customers, but they wanted me to keep playing. Long story medium, I ended up finishing both loops on one life, and ended with about a dozen people standing around in the peanut gallery cheering at the end.

It was a weird moment, and probably the closest experience I'll ever have to those stories about good arcade players in the '80s getting crowded around cabinets. The most important thing, though, is that no rat kid ever left that place with a free magazine. They just left. :)

[Cookie]

When I was three years old I was introduced to the NES by my father. I thought that the board inside the cartridge was supposed to be removed from the bottom, so I tried to pull it out. My father flipped out and yelled at me and all that jazz. It was super traumatic and I never made that mistake again. ;)