I'll be first and foremost in admitting that the precise dates for some of my earlier exposures and experiences may be slightly off, that said, the roundabout period will be correct. Also, some of these memories may even transpire to not be correct, nevertheless, this is how what I believe to be accurate. The purpose of this post is to explore how interwoven gaming is in my history, and how similar to music, specific games/consoles can evoke certain nostalgic memories.
Going all the way back to my earliest memories of gaming, I remember that me and my siblings would sometimes go over our neighbour's house (I think her name was Lynne) across the road whilst our Mum was out, and we'd play on Aladdin (1993) and The Lion King (1994) on her old PC with a big-ass CRT monitor.
Me and my siblings also used to go and stay at family friend Jeff & Yvonne Bullock's house whilst my Mum was at work in the evenings; I recall their son Richard playing Alex Kidd in Miracle World (1986) and Flashback (1992) on the Sega Megadrive, and also later, Super Mario 64 (1997) on Nintendo 64. I am also fairly certain he used to let us have a play on it too.
I remember playing Super Mario Land on Troy Taylor's original grey mono Gameboy at The Close during break time and lunches, which must have been around 1993.
For one Christmas in the mid-90's (1995 perhaps?) we got yellow Nintendo Gameboy's as our main gifts along with Super Mario Land 2: 6 Golden Coins (1992). I have a vague memory of sitting around the kitchen table at my Mum's, with Spice Girls playing in the background. It served me well over the years, notably for Pokemon Blue/Red (1996) which dominated my life in the early 2000's (complete with the Rare Candy/Missingno Glitch, and the Link-cable for trading). Ultimately my Gameboy met it's unfortunate demise when I lost my temper with the boss fight against DeDeDe in my sister Stace's copy of Kirby's Dream Land (1992), headbutted the screen and broke it.
I have fragmented memories of playing Sega Megadrive at my friend Rob Lowe's house back when I was in Year 6 of Primary School; I would go his house after school and at weekends, and we'd play Streets of Rage 2, and Earthworm Jim.
For Christmas 1998 iirc, me and my brother Terry got a joint gift of a Nintendo 64 off our Dad, along with titles such as Mario Kart 64, Mortal Kombat Trilogy, Super Mario 64, and Goldeneye. This birthed the inside-joke/immortalised quotable of myself shouting: "Help, it's pulling me to the side!" as we played Mario Kart on Christmas Day, because we'd switched on the console whilst one of the joysticks on my controller was held to the side, therefore setting it's neutral position as fully to the left. Then there was the frustration when I downloaded a list of fatality combinations at school for Mortal Kombat Trilogy, then my sister Stace successfully did one before me (Johnny Cage uppercut) without even having the code, purely through button bashing!
Also, I found our copy of Mission Impossible that difficult, I swapped it at school for Banjo Kazooie. Terry had a cart of WWF No Mercy which would never save our progress, and we had to re-unlock content every time we played, and we would play ISS 98 together where Nigeria were the best team, and you could hold the Z-trigger and effortlessly curve a worldie into the top bin from the half-way line!
I believe I picked up Ocarina of Time second hand from Another World (now branded as Forbidden Planet); I have a limited edition gold cart of it. I used to swap games a bit back in the day cycling through a slew of titles including Carmageddon, Blast Corps, F-Zero-X, Wave Race 64, and Twisted Edge Snowboarding among others. This game sparked my love for the Zelda franchise, and also remains a mainstay in my nostalgia of childhood gaming. I also enjoyed it's sequel Majora's Mask, however I'm unsure of where I borrowed it from (probably Webby) since I never owned it myself at the time.
I remember playing Spyro the Dragon with Steph Hand (my girlfriend at the time) on the Playstation at her house and also in her caravan in North Wales. She also had an obsession with The Sims on PC.
My Dad randomly brought home a Commodore 64 one day with a load of random games which he'd picked up at a house clearance iirc. I remember being thoroughly underwhelmed at the insane load times from cassette tapes for such simplistic, low quality games. The only real game I recall enjoying was Pipe Mania (1989).
My stepbrother Matt had an original Playstation back in the day, and then for Christmas 2000, I believe, me and Terry got a PS1 (the new smaller model) as a joint gift. The main titles I recall hammering on the PS1 included Gran Turismo 2, Mat Hoffman's Pro BMX, Tony Hawk's Pro Skater 3 and later on, Tony Hawk's Pro Skater 4. I remember me and Terry taking it in shifts to complete the GT2 endurance races like the infamous 200-mile Laguna Seca!
Having a PS1 also made it possible for me to borrow Final Fantasy VII (and thereafter, FF:VIII & FF:IX) off my friend David Webb in 2002; FFVII remains quite possibly my favourite game of all time, even to this day.
It was 2002 when I got my first mobile phone capable of playing games, a Nokia 3410 with Snake II pre-installed.
Me and Terry received a PlayStation 2 as a joint gift off my sister Claire in 2002, I think. Major gaming highlights from my memory back then include Tony Hawks Underground, Final Fantasy X, Final Fantasy XII, Grand Theft Auto: Vice City & Grand Theft Auto: San Andreas.
Again, unsure where it came from, but at some point we ended up with a Nintendo GameCube for which my only real interest were the Zelda titles: Wind Waker and Twilight Princess. I remember fondly my younger siblings watching me play Wind Waker back in the day. I also remember the pride of completing the entire set of figurines!
During my relationship with Kirsty (which lasted from 2005-09), I bought a second-hand slim PlayStation 2 off my mate Josef Peach. This re-acquaintance with the PS2 saw my gaming expand to the Need For Speed, Guitar Hero, and Smackdown! Vs. Raw franchises.
I also got a Nintendo DS Lite during my relationship with Kirsty Ellard meaning it was probably 2008. She was obsessed with Professor Layton and the Curious Village, meanwhile I played titles including New Super Mario Bros, Final Fantasy Crystal Chronicles: Ring of Fates, Final Fantasy XII: Revenant Wings, Final Fantasy III, and Legend of Zelda: The Phantom Hourglass. I still vividly recall the time I was at Rob & Lorna's, playing Phantom Hourglass with Hayden Joyce, and I was frustratingly unable to extinguish a torch as part of a puzzle, and I yelled at the DS, to which my breath in the mic blew it out! Ingenious design idea!
When I started University studying Computer Games Design in 2008, I inevitably needed to acquire a decent gaming rig; I invested in an Antec 900 with an Nvidia GeForce card that was cutting edge at the time. What ensued was a period of PC gaming including The Orange Box, and Unreal Tournament III. As part of my course I would be modding using the Hammer Source Engine, and the Unreal Engine.
Around 2009 I also got quite into casual gaming on Facebook including games like Farmville, Pet Society, Restaurant City, Yoville, Zynga Texas Hold'em Poker, and Farkle.
In 2010 when I was single and had finished my University degree, I treated myself to a PlayStation 3 as I finally had time to actually play some proper games; I bought FF:XIII as my first title. I also went through my sweaty phase on Call of Duty: Modern Warfare 2 around this time, with a penchant for knife kills. That's right, I was one of those scrubs running the Marathon Pro/Lightweight Pro/Commando Pro loadout with a UMP-45!
Beyond my online escapades, I also reaffirmed my love for single player experiences. Other notable titles from those PS3 years were the Uncharted and Assassins Creed franchises, Grand Theft Auto V and Red Dead Redemption, and of course, the sensation that is The Elder Scrolls V: Skyrim. There are so many more titles worth noting here, the Batman Arkham series, the Far Cry series, Bioshock Trilogy, Dead Space Trilogy, Borderlands, the God of War Trilogy, Prototype, and Kingdoms of Amalur: Reckoning to name a few!
It was around the end of 2011 that I got my PlayStation Portable (fitted with a Pandora Battery, and running the Clockwork mod) so that I could play Final Fantasy VII: Crisis Core. I think I got it from Cunnie iirc. It was also during 2011 when me and JB co-op completed Halo 3 in a single sitting on his Xbox 360.
It December 2014 when I got a modded Nintendo Wii (R4 with Wii Flow and GX Loader) with a HDD containing 128 titles off my sister Stace and her ex Mark. I'd played on one previously in the break room when I worked at Argos, and also when I worked at the Odeon back in 2008. I'll admit, almost all of the games on the HDD I've never even played. I don't particularly like the controller, and I only truly got the console for Wii Sports and Legend of Zelda: Skyward Sword for myself, the rest of the titles I thought may be of interest to my daughter. Note, when I say I don't like the controller, I actually abandoned Skyward Sword purely out of frustration with the slice mechanics which as a fan of Zelda, and also as a die-hard completionist is diabolical!
In 2015 I got seriously addicted to mobile gaming in the form of Game of War: Fire Age which I played for about a year, including the cardinal sin of spending money on micro-transactions resources, and becoming massively invested in online relationships which were fostered over LINE. Met some cool people I still speak to 7yrs later. RIP Jakodi, Kingdom 607.
Over the following years I dabbled in many mobile games including obvious titles such as Angry Birds, Temple Run 2, Flappy Bird, Cut The Rope, Candy Crush Saga, Fruit Ninja, Subway Surfers, Draw Something, and The Tribez.
I bought my PS4 second hand from the cleaner at work back in October 2016 which afforded me the opportunity to play some gems including The Witcher III: Wild Hunt, Dragon Age: Inquisition, and Fallout 4, all of which are excellent sprawling titles. It's worth also noting at this point I'm a grown ass adult with responsibilities which limit my playtime, but also money which permit the purchasing of more titles... the result is lots of games on my shelves that I don't have time to play!
My mobile game addiction reared it's head once again in 2018 with Marvel Strike Force, another game that I spent money on micro-transactions for, and became massively invested in online relationships with, this time through Discord. I finally quit this addictive little bastard in March 2021 at which point I was part of a super competitive guild, Puny Gods, ranked in the top 25 globally.
Bought Frog a second hand Xbox One S from Duane Cooper in June 2020 so she could play Minecraft and Fortnite easier, and also with her own friends. Both of those titles we'd played previously on my PlayStation 4, but now we could even play co-op without needing split screen!
I upgraded to a second hand PS4 Pro from Pete Carney in August 2021 and utilised it's additional power to experience Horizon Zero Dawn, Final Fantasy XV, The Outer Worlds, and Kingdoms of Amalur: Re-Reckoning in all their glory. I also abandoned Red Dead Redemption 2 midway through playing, which I occasionally regret and contemplate reinstalling it to complete. As I alluded to previously, there are a fuck ton more titles I could list here, but I won't.
Most recently I invested in a new gaming rig in May 2022 which has allowed me to play a couple of graphic masterpieces like The Long Dark and Eastshade.
When I think of my past forays into gaming, I think of a few omissions that I would have expected to feature in my history purely due to my long standing obsession with gaming and these title's sheer scope. Titles such as Counter Strike, Rust, Runescape, World of Warcraft, Elder Scrolls Online, and Genshin Impact. For clarity, these games absolutely fucking terrify me because I would undoubtedly end up on some TV show about people who neglect all their responsibilities, and become 500lb blobs of flesh, fused to their sofa with zero awareness of reality.
Maybe I'll play those games when I'm older, and the stakes aren't so high.
Time will tell.
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