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[Column] General: What Made You a Gamer?
SBFord
Former Associate EditorMember LegendaryPosts: 33,129
The Newbie Blogger Initiative has been continuing through the month of May. One of the weekly NBI events is called the “Talkback Challenge” and the question for this week is an interesting one: “What made you a gamer?”
Read more of Jessica Cook's Tales From the Neighborhood: What Made You a Gamer?
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Then moving on to 8088->8086 the age of commander keen and prince of Persia came with the 286 and 386 .. Doom, duke nukem, sim city on the 486 and the first mmo (mine) Ultima online on the early Pentium systems.
Then I started working in shop selling and fixing PC's so yea.. My live is all PC :P
IM a true PC gamer, played nearly all mayor and a huge lot of minor famed games ..
These days I find I play less, seen it all, done it all kind of thing.. Might try the witcher 3 ..maybe .. And currently no mmo's coz non really can keep me interested but again, its more me then the faults of the games.
Maybe I should try tabletop
edit: small not needed txt removal & spelling check (web automated)
My first gaming experience was at Prime Computer in the 80's on a locally networked space sim built with Object Pascal that was very similar to Asteroids but allowed you to actually "map" other zones (or galaxies) and visit other player screens. All the graphics were 2d and most of the data related to your environment was in-line text but at the time it was pretty unique and very cool.
My real love and addiction to MMO's came much later.
After the Army I moved to Vegas and became friends with a developer at Westwood Studios. While he hooked me up with their latest RTS game, he would drone on and on about a game he was testing called Ultima Online. I finally relented and joined the UO beta. 6 months later UO is released, I am a guild leader and my wife is demanding we see a shrink to save our marriage.
Del Cabon
A US Army ('Just Cause') Vet and MMORPG Native formerly of Trinsic, Norath and Dereth. Currently playing LOTRO.
Were you playing Empire?
There isn't a "right" or "wrong" way to play, if you want to use a screwdriver to put nails into wood, have at it, simply don't complain when the guy next to you with the hammer is doing it much better and easier. - Allein
"Graphics are often supplied by Engines that (some) MMORPG's are built in" - Spuffyre
I was a real outdoor type of kid. Then I found playing NES had me just as happy but without the hassle of expending energy and socializing..
That got me hooked.
Though I played arcade games when I was younger I never really bought video games. Wasn't interested.
One Saturday evening I was done composing and was waiting for Mystery Science Theater to come on. I had just purchased a used computer from a friend and was looking over the software she threw in.
There were two games. One was a "Battlezone" knock off which I installed and fooled around with for a bit.
The the other was in a cd. She told me that she thought the cd drive of the computer didn't work but I put the disk in and it actually installed.
The game was called "Myst".
Yadda, yadda yadda I missed Mystery science theater and the next thing I realized was the birds were singing as the sun came up.
Godfred's Tomb Trailer: https://youtu.be/-nsXGddj_4w
Original Skyrim: https://www.nexusmods.com/skyrim/mods/109547
Serph toze kindly has started a walk-through. https://youtu.be/UIelCK-lldo
I still remember it like yesterday,even though it was a long time ago.I was into computers before we had normal household computers,i liked tech in general.
I soon began coding in C language,yes a far cry from C++.I learned along the way i had a friend who was also into computers,he had friends that were really good and were making software and selling it to Microsoft and other businesses.
It started with you guessed it Wizardry lol.Gaming in DOS and talking about Castle Wolfenstein with my friends.So i had my rpg in Wizardry and my fps in Wolfenstein and my DOS gaming,having to format drives and configure hardware,lots of fun lol.It was somewhere around early 80's so it's been about 30+ years.
Never forget 3 mile Island and never trust a government official or company spokesman.
Now, which one of you will adorn me today?
I was young, there was a C64 on which I could play many games. That's it.
Humans are mammals. And for mammals it's a natural instinct to play games. Best way to learn things and to socialize is gaming.
It sounds like gaming were some "big thing". It's just natural. The kind of game doesn't really matter that much. Be it computer games, sport games, card games, tabletop games, your first baby rattle, whatever...
I am not really sure I get the point of this thread. Sorry.
The arcades, with games ranging from Pacman to Ninja Gaiden, Robocop and Ghouls and Goblins.
The NES took over after that (with lots of Double Dragon action), and eventually my Sega Megadrive (Genesis for you American types) where I grew to love RPGs through titles like Fatal Labyrinth, Rings of Power and D&D's Warriors of the Eternal Sun.
My SWTOR referral link for those wanting to give the game a try. (Newbies get a welcome package while returning players get a few account upgrades to help with their preferred status.)
https://www.ashesofcreation.com/ref/Callaron/
"Its better to look ugly and win than pretty and lose"
"Mr. Rothstein, your people never will understand... the way it works out here. You're all just our guests. But you act like you're at home. Let me tell you something, partner. You ain't home. But that's where we're gonna send you if it harelips the governor." - Pat Webb
We had an Atari 2600, so that in general first off.
But my Spectrum 48k was when it really started.
Seminal games... Manic Miner, Lords of Midnight, Elite, Atik Attak, Jetman, Ant Attack, many many text adventures...
"We all do the best we can based on life experience, point of view, and our ability to believe in ourselves." - Naropa "We don't see things as they are, we see them as we are." SR Covey
"This is not a game to be tossed aside lightly.
It should be thrown with great force"
I played lots of games before I became a gamer. But it was "Quest for Glory: So you want to be a hero" that triggered that feeling of "yeah, I'm super into this". Sure, zelda, mario bros, megaman, along with a litany of others had been thoroughly enjoyable, but it was Quest for Glory that took me from I'm playing a game, to I'm having an experience. I also think that's what a lot of people who can't find an MMO to call home are seeking. It's easy to find a passable game, there's tons - but how many are experiences that you love?
In all my years, there's still only a few games that ever gave me these feelings:
Quest for Glory
Odyssey: The Legend of Nemesis
Marathon (along with Durandal and Infinity)
Pathways into Darkness
Devil May Cry
Metal Gear Solid 1 & 2
Shadow of the Colossus
God of War
Otogi Myth of Demons
Ninja Gaiden (xbox)
Everquest
WoW (Vanilla - WotLK,)
Dark Souls
Uncharted 1 & 3
And I think that's about it. There's lot of games that I think are amazing, but these games left an impression on me for various reasons.
It started with Atari 2600 and Space Invaders and the original Adventure and E.T. games. There were arcades back in those days too which had what were considered highly advanced games, or just interesting games. I LOVED going to the arcade to play "Sinistar." I thought that was the creepiest voice I'd ever heard, and still do sometimes.
First PC game was "King's Quest 2" on a Tandy 1000 PC. No hard drives back then, you ran everything from floppy disks on RAM. Of course, you always had to copy the original floppy disks, in case something happened while you were gaming. DOS interface too, you ran everything from the command line, games and programs alike. If you didn't know your DOS commands you were screwed.
I loved stories, and King's Quest taught me you could tell them, and become part of them via gaming in a way I'd never imagined. Fast forward to end of the 90s, and I loved them all: adventure games, FPS, RPGs, RTS. I always looked for the story and that is what drove me into gaming. MMOs came later in 2004 with EQ2, and many others since then.
Currently enjoying ESO, GW2, The Secret World, and LoTRO. Just finished Alien Isolation (GREAT story and insanely fun game to play.) Playing through "Life Is Strange" another great game in the "choices have consequences for the story" genre. Also enjoying Dreamfall Chapters.
TLDR: I love stories and technology, gaming is the perfect fusion of both.
I never fit in socially, games took my mind away from all the shortcomings I perceived myself as having, they often offered a sense of accomplishment instead, they gave me the perception that I was actually good at something and that was a rewarding feeling. Games offered an alternate reality and that reality was better than the real world. That was 20 plus years ago, I'm still hanging around, but just barely, games are far less significant to me today than even 4 years ago. i finally figured out I was good at more than just video games.
It started before computer or console gaming for me: played both board games and strategy war games with very complex rules.
The motivation for me is learning new rules and doing my best to master them. In that sense, I do it to play more against myself than against others.
“Microtransactions? In a single player role-playing game? Are you nuts?”
― CD PROJEKT RED