What was your game room like in 1995?

[KWKBOX]

I just recently got a blast to the past when I came across some old video footage I was digitizing for backup off one of my old camcorders in the 90s. I was able to freeze frame the footage and get a good look at my game room in 1995 and decipher where I was at. It was incredible to think I was pushing a 133MHz 16 MB RAM Packard Bell as my gaming computer. I have had computers before this but they were mainly for office use and not purchased with the intent of gaming. This computer was fully intended to be the gaming machine of the day and I am surprised how much has changed since then. From what I have researched the computer was the Ultimate Machine of it's time partnering with Microsoft. Can anyone remember what they were gaming with in 1995? I was just curious how these specs would compare to see if it was really that big of a deal.

I posted the footage for anyone interested in seeing my setup back then in the link below.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=gRokeIzEpEw

[jb143]

I had the same computer around the same time. Got it Christmas of 94 I believe. The specs sound about right as well. I still have it actually. I remember it came with the Jurassic Park game which we loved and played all the time. I think it was the only actual "real" game we had for a couple years until updating it with a multimedia CD-ROM and SoundBlaster upgrade kit, which came with a bunch of games. No game room to speak of, at the time we had everything set up off to the side of the dining room.

[YoshiM]

Hmm...1995. I was rocking a Packard Bell 486 SX at 25 MHz and 4 MB of RAM. I was playing Tie Fighter heavily at the time. Otherwise I would be playing on a Super Nintendo as I think I sold my Turo Grafix 16 with CD by then.

I was then just out on my own in a mobile home by myself. I did not have a dedicated "gaming room" but more of a computer room and video games would be connected in the living room. My NES collection was small and in a rolling wire rack with wire shelves. A year later and I'd be married to my first wife.

[Cornelius]

I was a HS senior then. Not playing a ton of games, and it all would have been on a PC. Not sure the details, but my dad worked for IBM, so all our computers were IBM, and we would have had some sort of Aptiva. They were trying the whole multimedia PC thing then, with mediocre results. No game room, the computer was just on a desk near the kitchen/dining room.

Not sure what games I would have been playing, probably a later Quest for Glory. I was using the modem a lot at that time, playing games like S.R.E. and B.R.E. on a couple local BBSs. Our local library had free dial-up internet access called Orion, so I used that for stuff. Pretty sure I downloaded Mortal Kombat using Usenet (? is that right? something where you downloaded many files and then assembled them back together) and played that a bit. Oh yeah, I definitely hauled the computer and monitor to a friend's house fairly regularly to play Command and Conquer linked with a serial or parallel cable(?).

[Aussie2B]

I didn't have a computer yet at that point in time. All I had was a small TV in my bedroom that only had RF input. The only home console I had was my SNES, and I'm guessing I had fewer than ten games for it. I got Donkey Kong Country on its launch day near the end of '94, and it was, if I remember correctly, my fourth or fifth SNES game. I know I was still playing it in '95 because I was having a hell of a time with the bee boss and ending up taking a break from the game for a few months before I resumed and finally cleared that part. I was also playing Donkey Kong Country 2 at the very end of '95, since I got that for Christmas. Between those, I can't recall what, if any, other SNES games I got. I'm sure most of '95 was just replaying my small collection ad nauseam. I probably already had or received my Game Boy in '95, so I was probably playing Tetris and Wario Blast and such as well.

[Emperor Megas]

My gameroom was my bedroom, and it was pretty basic. I had a large wooden entertainment center cabinet like most did in the 90s, with a 27" Emerson television which was the first set I'd ever purchased for myself before learning what a shit brand Emerson was. I did have a video selector box to swap between all of my game consoles on the fly, and I had a Commodore monitor for secondary screen, which I later would take with me to game on when I worked off shore.

I didn't have a PC then. In '95 I had a SEGA Master System, the original model Genesis with the SEGA CD (model 2, I think), an SNES that a friend convinced me to snip the region protection tab out of, a Vectrex with about half dozen games, a Panasonic REAL 3DO, an Atari Jaguar (I believe), and an Atari 2600 kicking around somewhere that I didn't play anymore.

I got my Jaguar at a retail expo called the 'Super Sale' that they used to have every year in the New Orleans Super Dome. I think it was '95, when I got my 3DO, but it could have been '96.

I had about a dozen Master System games, several dozen Genesis games, about a dozen SNES games, I think, a pretty decent number of SEGA CD titles, and an impressive number of 3DO games interestingly enough. They were being liquidated by the end of the year at EB and they used to have 4 packs of 3DO games for like $9.99 - $14.99 in the preowned bin. It was crazy how a year after the console launched I could find dirt cheap titles for it. I've never owned more than 4 Jaguar games, ever.

I had about three of these cool, black wall-mountable Genesis game case holders. I would keep all of the game carts in a canvas audio cassette storage case. My SNES carts fit into a cool wooden cassette store crate from 'Peaches Records and Tapes' (that I wish I still had), and I had this super snazzy disc Rolodex style thingie that I stored disc media in for easy access. I stored all the cases and boxes for SEGA CD and 3DO games in the side cabinet of my entertainment center.

[KWKBOX]

Haha I had an Emerson TV for my consoles with only an RF on it and it was 13 inch so to say the least I am very impressed you had a 27 inch in your room for the day. You must of saved a serious amount of cash for that back then.

As for consoles I had my model 1 Genesis on life support with a Sega CD and 32X along with a neglected NES. All I have to say is playing DOOM on my Packard Bell was an incredible experience after beating it on my 32X prior.

[AdamAnt316]

In 1995, we would've had the NES, SNES, and Sega Genesis (and maybe the V-Tech Socrates as well) hooked up to our 19" Zenith TV in the den. Our only home computer at the time (also in the den) was a hand-me-down Apple IIe, complete with green-screen monitor, two Disk II 5.25" disk drives, and an Apple Dot-Matrix Printer. It was old, but it worked, and I typed up my homework using good ol' BankStreet Writer, played games from the "Beagle Bag" and "Snøggle" (Pac-Man clone) disks, and typed in BASIC programs from the AppleSoft manual. We didn't get our first PC until two years later (another hand-me-down, a 486 miditower), and didn't make the jump past 16-bit video game systems until the N64 came out.
-Adam

[gbpxl]

shitty tube TV hooked up to RF for NES and SNES and that was about it

[KWKBOX]

shitty tube TV hooked up to RF for NES and SNES and that was about it

I wonder how many people actually had the knowledge and the option of composite back then.

[gbpxl]

I wonder how many people actually had the knowledge and the option of composite back then.

mine just had RF and at the time (6 years old) I didn't even realize that composite RCA cables gave better signal quality than coax

[Emperor Megas]

Haha I had an Emerson TV for my consoles with only an RF on it and it was 13 inch so to say the least I am very impressed you had a 27 inch in your room for the day. You must of saved a serious amount of cash for that back then.Heh, I honestly don't remember what I paid for it. What's funny is it was a consolation purchase. I actually wanted this neat little gold 13" television that had a matching gold VCR that was in Macy's a year or so earlier., back when they still had an electronics section. I had a much smaller room then, so it would have been nice. I couldn't afford it at the time and it wasn't available anymore by the time I was in the position to afford a new set.

[Aussie2B]

I wonder how many people actually had the knowledge and the option of composite back then.

It had to be fairly commonplace by 1995 considering the PS1 and N64 didn't even come packaged with an RF cable. (I don't know about the Saturn since I never got one new.) I had to drop an extra $20 apiece to buy the official RF cables for each (real nice to pay more for a lower quality picture). It was especially frustrating with my N64. I got it the day before the official launch date in September of '96, and I was just about bursting at the seams to play this brand new system, only to discover when I brought it home that I couldn't even hook it up to my TV. When I got my PS1, at least I knew I had to check what kind of cable was included and not assume it'd have what I'd need.

[WulfeLuer]

It was actually fairly commonplace, but a lot of people just didn't know that those newfangled things were unless they also had stereo equipment. My family had a TV that was a decade old at that point and had at least two input and at least one output hookup sets for composite, plus some fairly esoteric ones I can't remember; it was a commercial RCA with JC Penny labels. The first console that I used composite was the PS1, since one of the input sets was in the front of the TV.

Back to the main point, I didn't really have a game room as such yet. The NES was in the bedroom that my brother and I shared or the living room, whichever was more convenient at the time, plus a Commodore 128 that we jury-rigged to an ancient TV in my parent's room that I futzed around on once in a while. I think it 1995 is more-or-less when I got a SNES and that bounced around the same way the NES did.

[jb143]

Yeah, by that point it was typically just the budget TV's that only had RF inputs, and even then you could usually connect composite through a VCR. Higher end TV's, even in the late 80's/early 90's, often had S-Video in addition to composite and RF. But even low to mid range TV's usually had composite...though at the time I don't think I really knew or cared that there was a difference in quality, or that going through the VCR wasn't so great either. Just that it let me hook up the newer systems.

[Aussie2B]

I remember routing my Dreamcast through a VCR hooked up via RF to my mom's TV that had to be from the early or mid 80s, haha. I don't remember if the Dreamcast even had RF cables available or if I was just fed up with spending extra. My own personal TV was from '91 or '92. Since I had no game systems at that point in time, it was bought solely with the intention of me watching TV on it, so I guess any other inputs would be seen as unnecessary. Plus the average family probably wouldn't splurge on a set for a 10-year-old, so it probably was a budget TV.

[eskobar]

I wonder how many people actually had the knowledge and the option of composite back then.

Few gamers had, at least in Mexico ... many CRTs were sold with RF. Many sony's CRTs had composite and the deluxe one had s-video, which was really something impressive on the day.

Europe had RGB through scart connectors ... wish we had that luck :embarrassed:

[AdamAnt316]

The Zenith TV I mentioned in my post only had an RF input. We had a chain of RF switches connected to it for all three (four?) systems, and it worked. It may not have been perfect, but it was good enough for us, at least as long as all the F connectors were nice and tight. When I got an NES to use with the B&W TV in my own bedroom, I used its RF output there, too (not like I had any choice, of course). I didn't start experimenting with using the A/V outputs on the side of the NES until I got the crazy idea to try hooking my NES to the green-screen monitor which went with the Apple IIe. Man, did The Legend of Zelda look weird in monochrome..........
-Adam

[YoshiM]

Yeah, by that point it was typically just the budget TV's that only had RF inputs, and even then you could usually connect composite through a VCR. Higher end TV's, even in the late 80's/early 90's, often had S-Video in addition to composite and RF. But even low to mid range TV's usually had composite...though at the time I don't think I really knew or cared that there was a difference in quality, or that going through the VCR wasn't so great either. Just that it let me hook up the newer systems.

By about 1995 most TVs save for maybe some 13" or smaller sets had composite cables. Stereo was available for most sets. I worked at Sears in the Home Electronics/Home Office section so I worked with all sorts of makes and models of TV. When I wotked at Wal-Mart the year prior I don't recall a TV 20" or higher that just had RF.

This was also a time when "home theater" was starting to get pushed. Surround sound was appearing at more attractive prices (my then fiancee bought a Sony rack system with two two speakers, surround, powered subwoofer, dual tape deck, 5 disc carousel CD player and tuner for $999). Stereo VCRs were coming down in price as well.

Fun times.

[ncman071]

1995...didnt have much..I had the SNES and ...i dont believe i had ps1 yet...believe i got that in 1996 with my first job... didnt have a lot of games..i had madden 95/96, mortal kombat 2, nhl stanley cup, nba jam, ncaa basketball, batman returns, mario world..thats honestly about it...we used to rent a lot of games back then...only time i got games was christmas and birthdays..that was it

[Greg2600]

We had a spare room that my sister and I would hang out in, as our bedrooms had no TV's. Had something like a 24" TV if I recall, maybe smaller, color. NES, SNES, Genesis were there, and I'd swap them with an RF cord. Also had an ancient console TV in the basement, which once in a blue moon I'd hook up the 2600.

[WelcomeToTheNextLevel]

Hmmm... I guess in '95, the only gaming I was doing was occasionally playing games on the computer, but even that seems a bit early as I was 2 that year. I know I was playing SimTown in '97 at age 4, and playing with Visio about the same time.

I can tell you about my game setups in the late 1990s, however:

My first "gaming" setup would have been in 1998, I briefly had a Sega Genesis hooked up to the TV in my living room, then got an N64 for Christmas that year. Don't remember where we stored the carts, never had that many of them.

A few months later we got rid of the 64 and got a PlayStation 1, it was usually hooked up in that same living room but it occasionally moved to my bedroom or my parents' bedroom. Some of the games we kept in their original cases, some we stored in a CD binder.

When we moved out of that house in 2001 into a new house, the PlayStation went into my bedroom.

[XYXZYZ]

Man... 1995... I was a teenager in my bedroom, I had an SNES, and eventually a Playstation (Maybe that was 1996 or 1997, I didn't get one at launch) The NES didn't get much use with the SNES around. I had my home pro-play arcade (an arcade cabinet for your TV and NES, sold at Toys R Us) and that had my TV in it, but the controls were for NES, so to play SNES I had a L&C controls championship joystick on top of a floor tom from a drum set in front of the TV, so I could still stand up and play arcade style.

Beyond that, I had a bunch of comic books and whatever Japanese animation I could get my hands on. Eventually my room was covered wall to wall in 1980s Japanese animation posters.

[Rickstilwell1]

I was only 7 and 8 in 1995. All I had back then was NES, Genesis and SNES hooked up to the woodgrain RCA tube TV in my grandparents' living room via RF. With more games on NES than the others because they were cheaper.

[KWKBOX]

Well since the SNES was still going strong in 1995 I am going to share this with you all on the topic while we are at it.


https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=NTA0Ecc_H9Q

[Tanooki]

1995 HS senior going into college, and mid-year discovered I could slowly start to afford second hand old NES games so I started to slowly buy them up a bit, GB and SNES too, so there wasn't huge bulk other than what I kept the last 10 years.

I had this big wood 7"~ cabinet which could hold like a 25-27" TV offset to the side, the other side had a narrow space with a shelf for like magazines. Top had two square/cube spaces, in there had a few gaming fun items and 2 speakers. Below the TV area was a larger rectangle/cube spaces with a moveable pegged shelf on each side as it was divided in the middle as a support. The left had my NES/SNES in there, and under in that half were all my NES/SNES games in NES game holders and exposed in their dust jackets for SNES, right side had my stereo/receiver in there, and below the accessories for gaming etc storage. The games were fairly tight in there as I had around 100~ games between the two consoles. I had some other wood cubes too off to the side, more games and accessories went in them as well as only so much fit below the main space. Another wall had my computer/computer desk-hutch and that had more PC gaming and accessories random fun stuff on top, etc. I didn't let it ever take over the whole room, but it did get the better half of 2 of 4 walls around the closet and the door.

[StealthLurker]

Maybe not 1995, but this was around 1991. Wish we had taken more pictures back then, but taking pictures was a lot more work compared to today haha. I only have these pictures because these were "proof of property" pictures my dad took before we had to evacuate our house. I kid you not, we had to evacuate to escape an erupting volcano. Best part though was that finals were cancelled and we got to move back to the United States early :)

Ah the old 13" hand me down TV, such a rite of passage. I only really had my Genesis and Amiga hooked up to it at the time, however at this point I had gotten back into PC gaming instead of the Amiga.

http://img.photobucket.com/albums/v337/jviloria/IMG_3701_zpsvmyjbpwd.jpg~original

http://img.photobucket.com/albums/v337/jviloria/desk2_zpsskewtxcb.png~original

http://img.photobucket.com/albums/v337/jviloria/desk_zpsaefhcv9d.png~original

[Gamevet]

The only computers I had were a C64 and an Amiga 500. I was still living in an apartment at the time, so those were on a small desk in the corner of the dining room.

[Niku-Sama]

I had a very old, even for the time. J.C. Penny TV (a lot like this one (https://www.ebay.com/itm/J-C-Penney-Model-685-2009A-Color-TV/302723808250?hash=item467bbebbfa:g:7jcAAOSwjL5ZMIG O)) that I had to hook up using an adapter to let me use coax over the VHF antenna screw terminals.

[KWKBOX]

Maybe not 1995, but this was around 1991. Wish we had taken more pictures back then, but taking pictures was a lot more work compared to today haha. I only have these pictures because these were "proof of property" pictures my dad took before we had to evacuate our house. I kid you not, we had to evacuate to escape an erupting volcano. Best part though was that finals were cancelled and we got to move back to the United States early :)

Ah the old 13" hand me down TV, such a rite of passage. I only really had my Genesis and Amiga hooked up to it at the time, however at this point I had gotten back into PC gaming instead of the Amiga.

http://img.photobucket.com/albums/v337/jviloria/IMG_3701_zpsvmyjbpwd.jpg~original

http://img.photobucket.com/albums/v337/jviloria/desk2_zpsskewtxcb.png~original

http://img.photobucket.com/albums/v337/jviloria/desk_zpsaefhcv9d.png~original

That is a pretty nice setup for early 90s. What is the smiley face covering your game genie?

[WelcomeToTheNextLevel]

Maybe not 1995, but this was around 1991. Wish we had taken more pictures back then, but taking pictures was a lot more work compared to today haha. I only have these pictures because these were "proof of property" pictures my dad took before we had to evacuate our house. I kid you not, we had to evacuate to escape an erupting volcano. Best part though was that finals were cancelled and we got to move back to the United States early :)

Ah the old 13" hand me down TV, such a rite of passage. I only really had my Genesis and Amiga hooked up to it at the time, however at this point I had gotten back into PC gaming instead of the Amiga.

http://img.photobucket.com/albums/v337/jviloria/IMG_3701_zpsvmyjbpwd.jpg~original

http://img.photobucket.com/albums/v337/jviloria/desk2_zpsskewtxcb.png~original

http://img.photobucket.com/albums/v337/jviloria/desk_zpsaefhcv9d.png~original

I'm going to guess Pinatubo, judging by the fact that it happened June 15, 1991 and affected two American military bases. Pinatubo's activity started on April 2, and the area within 10 km of the volcano was evacuated April 7, 10-20 km on June 7, and 20-40 km, including the military bases, on June 13. So these pictures were probably taken between June 7-13, 1991, they could have been taken as early as April 1991 though.

[StealthLurker]

That is a pretty nice setup for early 90s. What is the smiley face covering your game genie?

Thanks, it was a pretty decent setup. Prior to that I had the first TV my parents ever bought. I was able to trade up for a more modern TV because the text on my Amiga was absolutely unreadable on it. The smiley face on the desk is covering up a roll of toilet paper haha. I have no idea why it was there. By the time these pictures were taken, our family had been gone for a couple weeks already. My dad had to stay behind to help clean-up and close the military base.


I'm going to guess Pinatubo, judging by the fact that it happened June 15, 1991 and affected two American military bases. Pinatubo's activity started on April 2, and the area within 10 km of the volcano was evacuated April 7, 10-20 km on June 7, and 20-40 km, including the military bases, on June 13. So these pictures were probably taken between June 7-13, 1991, they could have been taken as early as April 1991 though.

That's right! It was Mt. Pinatubo. At the time I was sooo excited to be moving back to the good ol' USA, however looking back now it wasn't so bad. Almost twice a month we'd spend the weekend at the capital city where I had a good chance of squeezing some games outta my mom for one reason or another haha. It was great too because I was able to choose from Japanese Megadrive games that came out long before the US versions.

Closer to home there were many "Computer Copy Shops" where you would go through different binders with lists of PC and Amiga games. The ones you were interested in you could "try before you buy." Games cost $1.50 per disk to copy. I would often save my allowance money to buy a pack of 10 3.5" disks and some money to make copies. They would often get new games every week too. Got 90% of my Amiga games through these shops and friends. The Amiga was super popular at my school.