Most Exciting 5-Years of Gaming

[GhostDog]

What are the most exciting five consecutive years of gaming for you? From what year to what year? For me it's 1993-1997: 1993, 1994, 1995, 1996 and 1997.

[SpaceFlea]

I would have to say '92-'97. That period covered the height of the Genny/SNES war as well as the great paradigm shift from 2D to 3D gaming.

[Atarileaf]

1980 - 1985 for me. I was thinking about this the other day, but as a 10 year period, which for me was easily the entire 80's decade. In that time frame I owned my favorite consoles and computers - Atari 2600, Tandy Color Computer, NES, Genesis and TG-16 (although those final two were barely in the 80's)

[GhostDog]

I would have to say '92-'97. That period covered the height of the Genny/SNES war as well as the great paradigm shift from 2D to 3D gaming.

Very good years indeed. Those years may have been my second choice but had to stretch out the years to get to the Dreamcast years. Gaming up to 1997 was so great as it was but then the Dreamcast and all the Naomi games came into development soon after that.

[Nebagram]

I'd have to go 1996-2001 myself. '96 saw the launch of the N64 which gave us Mario 64 and the start of the whole 3D revolution. 2001 brought that to a sort-of natural conclusion with GTA3- the game that spawned a billion imitators. And in-between you have a collection of games the likes of which people had never before seen- FF7-9, Zelda OoT and MM, Shenmue, Gran Turismo, Resident Evil 1 & 2, MGS, Quake 1-3, Starcraft- the list could go on forever. Sure, other eras had their own greats, but for me, no gaming era will ever come close to 1996-2001.

[fairyland]

1988 to 1992. Before that I was into PC gaming which was rather annoying with shovelware crap games and their incredibly slow loading times. NES was instant gaming and so much better all around. So I ended with with dozens and dozens of great games to play on the system for most of these years. Then towards the end I was looking forward to getting the SNES and Super Mario World. The SNES was good, but I was really into the NES much more. Gaming systems after that was always hit or miss for me, never quite like the golden NES era which is what I enjoyed the most.

[bigbacon]

i have to say like 93/94 - 2000 ( i know this is more than 5 years)

but PC gaming exploded with games like doom, duke 3d, quake (1, 2 and 3).

Online gaming took off with Kali, TEN, etc.

3d acceleration took off and we got awesome games like GL Quake and what not.

System Shock 2 came out...

I fell out with consoles during this time. The games just couldn't top what the PC was offering, not by a long shot. Mods, level editors and everything else. I remember people my freshman year of college all on consoles and my PC was still blowing them away.

[Tanooki]

It's too hard to really nail down. As a kid you get those rosy memories of your first system and all it did for you, then as a teen you get that next one and while not a child you can more appreciate that one and afford to get a few more things. I'm stuck in a valley on that one I suppose. Perhaps 1990-1994? 1990 brought some of the NES's best offerings and yet through 1994 much of what is consider the most AAA of greatness hit the SNES as well with some Squaresoft level outliers and Nintendo too. I was in high school for the greater life of the SNES and really could dig into that stuff solidly around classes and stuff yet going back towards 1990s which was junior high SMB3 dropped and that was insane with the promos, movies, happy meal toys and the rest and I played that thing to death for a very long time.

[The Adventurer]

Honestly? Right now. The last five years have been just nuts in terms of the game industry. Both in development, distribution, and releases. We are living in interesting time.

[Greg2600]

1987-1992. I personally went from playing the 2600 to the NES to the Genesis to SNES, etc. On the hand held front, went from garbage Tiger LCD's to the Game Boy.

[GhostDog]

I'd have to go 1996-2001 myself. '96 saw the launch of the N64 which gave us Mario 64 and the start of the whole 3D revolution. 2001 brought that to a sort-of natural conclusion with GTA3- the game that spawned a billion imitators. And in-between you have a collection of games the likes of which people had never before seen- FF7-9, Zelda OoT and MM, Shenmue, Gran Turismo, Resident Evil 1 & 2, MGS, Quake 1-3, Starcraft- the list could go on forever. Sure, other eras had their own greats, but for me, no gaming era will ever come close to 1996-2001.

Excellent choice. I have a bunch of EGMs from 1996 and just looked through the November 1996 issue and there was definitely a lot to get excited about in that year. 1996 was an amazing year for arcades and consoles and it only got better until 1999 hit with the hype of the Dreamcast and began sizzling out until 2000 which is where I feel the glory of gaming ended for me.

[Zap!]

There are quite a few, but I'd say 1987-1992 were by far the top years for me. NES, SMS, Atari XE GS, Turbo Grafx 16 (and CD-ROM), Game Boy, Lynx Genesis, Super Nintendo, and even the Neo-Geo were all owned by me, as soon as they were released. Yes, I was a spoiled brat, but I loved every minute of it.

[PizzaKat]

!989 - 1994. Many great NES and SNES games. I remember buying a SNES with my own cash. What a great day.

[SpaceHarrier]

Playstation AND Dreamcast... there's no way I could pick anything other than 1995-2000. They truly showed me how much more gaming could offer, after 8 or so years of mostly 2D experiences (started with the NES in '87).

[GhostDog]

There are quite a few, but I'd say 1987-1992 were by far the top years for me. NES, SMS, Atari XE GS, Turbo Grafx 16 (and CD-ROM), Game Boy, Lynx Genesis, Super Nintendo, and even the Neo-Geo were all owned by me, as soon as they were released. Yes, I was a spoiled brat, but I loved every minute of it.

Wow, how in the heck did your parents afford you all of those things for you? How old were you during those years?

[Arkanoid_Katamari]

I'd have to go 1996-2001 myself. '96 saw the launch of the N64 which gave us Mario 64 and the start of the whole 3D revolution. 2001 brought that to a sort-of natural conclusion with GTA3- the game that spawned a billion imitators. And in-between you have a collection of games the likes of which people had never before seen- FF7-9, Zelda OoT and MM, Shenmue, Gran Turismo, Resident Evil 1 & 2, MGS, Quake 1-3, Starcraft- the list could go on forever. Sure, other eras had their own greats, but for me, no gaming era will ever come close to 1996-2001.

This was also the most exciting time for me, not cuz it was the best video game period, which it wasn't, imo, and it isn't my favorite, but it was the first time I'd owned my very first console, which was the Playstation. That made it the most exciting. And we also owned an N64 as well. I had played a lot of NES and Genesis before this, prolly since '91, but I'd never owned my own console till this era.

Suddenly I'd be going over my friends houses renting games all the time, I had a subscription to the Playstation Magazine, I wish I still had them all, and the demo discs which came with each one. I remember playing Metal Gear Solid, and being blown away when I finally beat it. Tony Hawk Pro Skater, Goldeneye, Mariokart, tonsa fun multiplayer games, tonsa FPS's, before the market was dominated by 2 franchises, COD and Halo. It was my golden age of gaming, although my favorite today is still when the NES ruled the world.

[GhostDog]

Playstation AND Dreamcast... there's no way I could pick anything other than 1995-2000. They truly showed me how much more gaming could offer, after 8 or so years of mostly 2D experiences (started with the NES in '87).

Looks like we're on the same page. That's exactly how I feel. 2D games were awesome, don't get me wrong. The Street Fighter II series in the arcade provided me with many highs that is probably unmatched by any other game series, but many other games of that time in the arcade left a lot to be desired and once 1995 hit we got a ton of great 3D games that really showed where gaming had arrived and where it was going and it was a great experience to be in on the ride. 1995-2000 were amazing years for sure. My second choice would have to be 1992-1997 once Street Fighter II hit the scene in the arcades and console gaming really took off.

[Zap!]

Wow, how in the heck did your parents afford you all of those things for you? How old were you during those years?

And I forgot to mention the Atari 1040 STe. :) I was 14-19 in those years. The funny part is, my parents were not even close to rich. They just had a son that was absolutely obsessed with video gaming. My mom was the one who got me the gaming stuff. She was very good to me, and I am forever grateful.

By 1990, I became increasing nostalgicly, and started getting back into the classics that I enjoyed as a little kid. In 1990, I thought about making a newsletter. The next year, Zap! became a reality. But unlike some others into classic, I never lost touch with the newer systems.

[Satoshi_Matrix]

I'm probably going to be alone here, but for me the best five years were 2002 - 2007. In those years we got:

-The tail end of the Dreamcast
-The tail end of the GameBoy Color (Shantae!)
-The raise and fall of the GameBoy Advance, the spiritual successor to the Super NES
-The raise and fall of the original Xbox
-The raise and fall of the GameCube
-The best years of the PS2
-The raise of the DS
-The raise of the PSP
-The raise of the Xbox 360
-The very beginnings of the PS3 and Wii

and also other things like
-The fall of memory cards, slowly replaced by harddrives
-The raise of HD gaming, 480i at first, then 480p, then up from there
-The raise of online gaming in the console space
-Region free console based gaming becoming a thing, even if it was only Sony who was doing it with the PS3.

Plus, its just staggering to think about how many completely fantastic games we saw in those years. Metroid Prime, Wind Waker, Resident Evil 4, Halo, Phoenix Wright, the list goes on and on.

As much as I love classic gaming of the 80s and 90s, Those years were just magic.

[YoshiM]

Most exciting for me? Oh man. I want to say maybe 1988-1993. While I was playing video games for a while, it wasn't until I got my NES and discovered read the different magazines on the racks that I took more of an interest in the hobby. This was also the time where discovered PC gaming when I moved away from my CoCo and embraced my IBM PC compatible 8088 that I upgraded with a VGA card and an 8-bit Sound Blaster card. Police Quest, Lemmings, Civilization, Pirates!, Covert Action, Light Speed, Wing Commander (which worked decent on 10 MHz Turbo)...the list goes on. By the end of this time frame I got a 486 SX 25 which made my jaw drop at what I could play.

There were good moments later on but that transition was quite the time for me.

[Zap!]

I'm probably going to be alone here, but for me the best five years were 2002 - 2007. In those years we got:

-The tail end of the Dreamcast
-The tail end of the GameBoy Color (Shantae!)
-The raise and fall of the GameBoy Advance, the spiritual successor to the Super NES
-The raise and fall of the original Xbox
-The raise and fall of the GameCube
-The best years of the PS2
-The raise of the DS
-The raise of the PSP
-The raise of the Xbox 360
-The very beginnings of the PS3 and Wii

and also other things like
-The fall of memory cards, slowly replaced by harddrives
-The raise of HD gaming, 480i at first, then 480p, then up from there
-The raise of online gaming in the console space
-Region free console based gaming becoming a thing, even if it was only Sony who was doing it with the PS3.

Plus, its just staggering to think about how many completely fantastic games we saw in those years. Metroid Prime, Wind Waker, Resident Evil 4, Halo, Phoenix Wright, the list goes on and on.

As much as I love classic gaming of the 80s and 90s, Those years were just magic.

Rise? :)

[ggallegos1]

definitely 96-2001. I got my n64, played FFVII and Zelda, and saw the Dreamcast come in and was blown away. Great times indeed.

[PreZZ]

96 - 2001 for me too. We went from the final days of the Snes, the birth of the playstation, the n64 and saturn, gameboy color and advance, the greatest launch ever to this day: the dreamcast (and the birth of console online gaming) and witnessed the launch of the ps2. Dreamcast is my all time favorite console, if you had one during its 2 and half years of existence, you witnessed a truly unique console focused on hardcore gamers with so many quality games.

[Pikkon]

I would say 88 to 98 for me.

[Leo_A]

The first half of the 1980's is by far the most interesting in the history of videogaming as far as I'm concerned.

[GhostDog]

I would say 88 to 98 for me.

That's ten years. What are your favorite five consecutive years?

[GhostDog]

The first half of the 1980's is by far the most interesting in the history of videogaming as far as I'm concerned.

I can see many having some great memories from the early to mid 80s as there is video footage that I've seen when arcades were a real fun place to be full of kids. However, I can't help but feel myself that late 80s is when the arcades really took off as far as offering the quality of graphics and gameplay. Then again I was born in 1986 and it was before my time. Early to late 90s is when I was into the arcade scene so I missed out on how that was in the 80s.

[WCP]

For me, I think it's more of a 7 year stretch of time, but I'll try to pick the 5 best consecutive years of this period....

I'd say 1991 thru 1996.



But.... I hate the fact that I'm leaving 1989 and 1990 out of the party. I could also give a bit of love to 1997. For me 1989 thru 1997 was the glory years, but if I had to trim it to 5 years in a row, 91 to 96. The key years of 16-bit began in earnest in 1991, and you pretty much see 16 bit retired by 1996, so you pretty much get the entire generation of 16-bit. But you also get a lot of other interesting things going on during this time. The Sega CD Launched in 1992. The 3DO and Jaguar launched late 1993. You had the 32X in late 1994. You had the arrival of Saturn and Playstation in 1995, and you had the N64 in 1996. Yeah, you don't get a long time with the 32/64 bit era, but you get a good early taste of it. I put a greater priority on the 16-bit era, and I love years like 1993 and 1994 which had a million different systems trying to compete. Stuff like CD-I and Neo-Geo and TurboDuo, etc, etc. So many different systems trying to battle it out during the early 90's.

[Tanooki]

Satoshi, on your list, just putting this out there, but I wouldn't put 'harddrives replacing memory cards' as a positive of that period. Hard drives have been almost entirely a curse to the gamer while a boon to the developer. Before hard drives or flash storage(nintendo wii U) were common place when you made a game you had to get it right out of the box or you had to issue a recall if it was bad enough. Now we end up paying $60 for games that almost always are NEVER complete, true BETA by any pre-HDD era standard and they use paying sucker day one customers as free test lab guinea pigs for the shit they shovel. Patches and endless bugs are something that drove a lot of people off of PC games and off gaming or off to console and handhelds since that garbage didn't happen. I had they've added personal storage because it's hard to buy a game these days and not expect to have to wait awhile to play it. First you get stuck with an install that take a few minutes to whatever long, and then patches after that and down the line later too which just sucks.

[GhostDog]

I would have to say '92-'97. That period covered the height of the Genny/SNES war as well as the great paradigm shift from 2D to 3D gaming.

I just changed my choice to the same years as you. Looking through old EGM issues from 1992-1997 made me realize just how great games really were on both consoles and arcades. I lost a lot of interest in console gaming from 1998-2000 because I yearned for other things in life and mostly only arcades got me excited at that time. 1992-1997 were the wonder years where video games on both consoles and arcades provided euphoric experiences like nothing else. Great years indeed.

[Aussie2B]

Considering there was a chunk of time in which there were sadly no video games in my house, it'd have to be a post-SNES period for me, if going by what I played in my chosen years as opposed to purely release dates, since I didn't have 5 consecutive years of gaming prior to that period of no games. So I'm gonna go with '94-'99. I got my SNES in '93, but I think the selection of games for SNES in '92 and '93 was kind of so-so (no big surprise that Genesis took the lead). '94 is where I perceive a grand resurgence for the SNES, when the developers really stepped it up and started using the hardware to its fullest. The vast majority of my SNES favorites come from this tail end of the system's life. Then came the magic and excitement of the 3D transition, specifically the N64 for me. Super Mario 64 blew my mind. By the time we got to '99, I was really expanding my gaming horizons. I got a PlayStation, my first non-Nintendo system, I played Star Ocean 2, which would become my favorite game and favorite series, and I started my retro gaming and collecting, by tracking down my childhood NES favorites and making them my own. These are just a few of the highlights of these 5 years for me.

[HardcoreOtaku]

1988-1993 ftw

[GhostDog]

1988-1993 ftw

Not bad, not bad. Late 80s is when arcade and console games really started getting good in my opinion.

[gunswordfist]

Hmmm, probably '91-'96.

[Gandhara]

1980 to 1985

my favorite 80's Computer the Apple IIe had all my favorite games on it (apart from the Arcades), and the golden age for games on it was '81 to '84. Some of the great classics of all time first appeared on the old Apple II like Lode Runner and Choplifter.

These years were also the golden age of Arcade games, i have more fun playing early 80's games than i ever do next-gen stuff, and i play games from all eras :)

[WCP]

Hmmm, probably '91-'96.


yep, I feel bad for 1989 and 1990, but if you put a gun to my head it's 91 to 96.


Gotta give props to Super Mario 64 at the end of 1996

[kikenovic]

From 89-94. Solid NES and Genesis releases.

[GREEN00]

I'll serve as an example how influential first hand experience is on our perceptions.

I pick 2000-2005. The swan song of the PS1 to the inevitable but triumphant end to the PS2, not to mention the Gamecube & GBA therin as well. These were my formative years, and I think they were good ones (barring the Xbox, yuck)

I wish I could have fit 1998 in there somehow, but 2005 was just too tempting. And there are a ton of great games on the fringes of 2000 & 2005, namely the Dreamcast launch on 9/9/99

[WelcomeToTheNextLevel]

For me personally? 2006 - 2010. I got my 360 on 1/26/06 (was supposed to get it 12/25/05, but there were supply shortages), my PS3 AND Wii 12/25/06, and many awesome games such as Dead Rising, TDU, Oblivion, and GTA 4. Plus the beginning of my classic gaming collection was on 1/7/06 when I found my old Genesis in a desk in my grandma's house. By the end of '06, I had a 2600, NES, Master System, Genesis, SNES, TG16, 3DO, Virtual Boy, PS1, N64, and Dreamcast on top of my PS2, GameCube, GBA SP, and PSP I had going into '06. I got at least 14 consoles in '06, and possibly as many as 20 (I don't remember the exact years I got some of my consoles). By the end of '07, I was in the 20 systems club, and by the end of '10, high 30s. Countless games - by 2009, I had over 500 different video games spanning all of my consoles. I got 63 games for $17 on 3/2/08. 12/31/10 saw the dream I had that led to me getting an SG-1000 the next Christmas.

Tragically, my favorite game store closed on 7/14/09 though.

[Mayhem]

Probably either 79-84 (birth and death of the first arcade era, launch of the Commodore 64) or 90-95 (launch of the SNES, Sonic, PS1 launch).

[WelcomeToTheNextLevel]

Exactly 5 years later...

I'd say the most historically exciting 5 years was 1993 to 1998. You have the heyday of the 16-bit era, to the launch and failure of the next-generation pretenders (3DO, Jaguar, etc), to the launch of the real next-generation consoles (PSX, N64, Saturn), to the heyday of the 32/64-bit era with CD/3D based gaming and games that were so much deeper and more complex.

There was also a change in leadership of the console market 3 times, Sega being in the lead at the beginning with the Genesis, Nintendo taking over with the SNES' resurgence in 1994 and the early lead of the N64, and Sony taking over about late 1997. Sega left the console market temporarily at the end of this period.

You begin to see video games expand from their core market of young males to a more diversified audience.

As for the most changeful period in video game history, it might be 1982 to 1987 with the video game crash and resurgence led by Nintendo. But the technology change of '93-98 was a bigger leap, and from 1982-1987 not a whole lot of all-time classic games came out; '82 and '87 each were great years for gaming but the middle years, '83-86, weren't as rich with games in general as '80-82 or '87-on due to the video game crash. 1982-1987 had a couple of very exciting years on the fringes, but '84-85 were dead, dead, dead. I give it to '93-98 for that very reason; it was exciting the whole way through.

Obviously 1986 was an extremely important year as this was the year that the video game market was revived with the launch of the NES and to a lesser extent the Sega Master System and Atari 7800, and Super Mario Bros. was extremely important, but the NES-era games from 1986-mid 1987 don't have as many classics as, say, late 1987-1991. '93-98 had numerous great games being released throughout the period.

(Specifically, I'd make it Sept. 2, 1993 - Sept. 2, 1998, that way I get the launch of Mortal Kombat on home consoles in there)

[Steve W]

For me, it'd have to start around 1989 to 1993. I had an Atari 2600 Jr. and an NES, along with my Texas Instruments 99/4A home computer. I dropped the NES (due to Nintendo's horrible behavior to the US market) and started picking up machines like the Atari 7800 and the Intellivision (bought from a co-worker) at the end of their shelf lives when the games were really pushing the limits. I was given a Commodore Amiga 1000 by my brother which was amazing compared to what I was used to, and I picked up an Atari XE to fool around with. I bought an Atari Lynx in 1990 and practically wore it out. I'd seen a TurboDuo at a friend's house and eventually bought a TurboGrafx-16 for myself, later getting the CD-ROM attachment a year or so later. I put a Sega Genesis on layaway at MacFrugal's (one of Tandy Corporation/Radio Shack's attempts at a general purpose electronics store that failed) but really only picked up around 16 games for it during the machine's lifetime. Dallas locations of Incredible Universe (again, another Tandy Corporation/Radio Shack electronics store, but this time they went really big rather than small) got Atari Jaguars in during the New York/Los Angeles test market period, so I bought my Jag in November of 1993 before it was out on the market for the rest of the country. It was such a rush of new games and old classics in those years, it's a shame I was only making $4 to $5 an hour. I could have really gone wild if I wasn't broke all the time.

[Aussie2B]

I didn't catch it when I originally posted in this topic, but it's pretty funny how most of us actually selected spans of six years, haha.

My answer is still the same, so to make it a proper five years, I guess I'd trim it down to '95 to '99. I've been reading Nintendo Power issues from '94 lately, and really, the year didn't heat up for me until that fall. Before that, the main releases of note in '94 were Mega Man X and Super Metroid. Outside of that, the big games were Super Street Fighter II, Mortal Kombat II, NBA Jam, Ken Griffey Jr. MLB, etc. And as someone who isn't crazy about fighters or sports games, and never played games like Mega Man X and Super Metroid until many years later, '94 was pretty low-key for me until Donkey Kong Country came out. So I can rule out '94. Similarly, the main game of '95 for me was Donkey Kong Country 2, but that game made me even more obsessed with the series than before. It's the reason I first got a subscription to Nintendo Power (as I wanted the free DKC2 guide), which was the first step in totally changing the trajectory of my gaming. I became much more informed in terms of what was coming out and on the horizon, and Nintendo Power introduced me to Chrono Trigger and convinced me to give it a shot. That became my new favorite game and started a lifelong obsession with RPGs. Once I started paying attention to their RPG-focused Epic Center section, I was introduced to games that weren't leaving Japan too, and that's what would eventually turn me into an import gamer, on top of motivating me to buy Star Ocean 2, as the memory of their spread on the first Star Ocean stuck with me for years after I saw it.

[gbpxl]

95 through 99. Basically from the Saturn launch to the Jap PS2 launch and Dreamcast

[pichuscute]

For me, it's more to do with my age than with what was coming out at the time, at least in part. I'd say that was 1999-2003 or so. Pokemon was in full swing, Ocarina of Time had just happened, and Smash Bros. was also becoming a big phenomenon, and that all came together right around the time that I was 11 or 12. So, I was the perfect age to enjoy all the excitement of all these great games around the turn of the century.

Needless to say, I had pretty much exclusively played Nintendo consoles/handhelds as a kid, lol.

[Edmond Dantes]

Honestly? Right now. The last five years have been just nuts in terms of the game industry. Both in development, distribution, and releases. We are living in interesting time.

Speaking as someone who hasn't owned any modern gaming hardware past the PS2 and Gamecube (and PSP, I forget if its afterr those two or not)... I'm tempted to agree. Even for someone in my boat who only ever plays vintage or low-tech, things like repro carts have made that a promising new world too.

That said, for me personally I'd have to say from 1989 to 1994. It just seems like the times in my life that really inspired me were around there, and its a set of years I keep going back to. Past 1994 I drifted away from gaming and into other things, by 2001 I almost gave up gaming entirely but didn't because of discovering flea markets and pawn shops, and... yeah.

Honestly I feel like I cheated this question because like, I technically named three different five-year periods (1989-1994, 1999-2003, and today)

[WulfeLuer]

Hmm. I have to say '96-'00. While I can't claim that was when the games and consoles I loved were stating to be released, I can say that was when my obsession for something other than Mario, Sonic, or Link blossomed. Final Fantasy VI (which I've already rambled on about at length) came into my life, and then things were never the same. Secret of Mana. Robotrek. Super Mario RPG. Chrono Trigger came into my life right at the beginning of high school. Then I went a buddy's house for a nerdy slumber party and was introduced to Final Fantasy VII. RPGs were suddenly cool, and the bigger market meant more stuff was localized. I devoured pretty much anything published by Square, plus a fair bit of other offerings to be had. The last game I know I was excited about getting released was Breath of Fire IV. There would be other games later on that I would happily pre-order (a standout being Tactics Ogre: The Knight of Lodis) but I wouldn't get nearly so hyped about a game for a very long time. This was also when the Pokémon insanity started, which I partook a bit for a while.

Looking back, this was also when games and/or series I would come to enjoy later got their start. Castlevania: Symphony of the Night, Wild ARMs, Star Ocean, Tales (have yet to play a Tales game of the period, though), a few others.