# Your first video games **URL:** \ **Category:** The Game Room\ **Created:** [February 8, 2010, 4:24pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/your-first-video-games/528151 "2010-02-08T16:24:05Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 20\ **Page:** 2
**Author:** ![GargoyleWB](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/gargoylewb/32/199_2.png) [@GargoyleWB](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/GargoyleWB)\ **Post date:** [February 8, 2010, 8:52pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/your-first-video-games/528151/21 "2010-02-08T20:52:03Z")
My first game was “Hunt the Wumpus” in the early 70’s on a mainframe dumb terminal when I visited my dad’s office on “Take your kid to work day”. My next earliest game memories are on Apple II, “Caves of Karkhan”, a text Zork-like adventure with some 4-color splash graphics. Next came our Vic 20, and I was hooked as a gamer for life. “Sword of Fargoal”!!! ---
**Author:** ![Rigamarole](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/r/77aa72/32.png) [@Rigamarole](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Rigamarole)\ **Post date:** [February 8, 2010, 9:03pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/your-first-video-games/528151/22 "2010-02-08T21:03:33Z")
I played my early console games on the NES before I ever got to computer gaming, but my first computer game was technically The Hitchhiker’s Guide to the Galaxy, a completely text-based game that I played on my grandparent’s original Apple Macintosh. Shortly afterwards though, my dad loaded Doom onto his PC and I started playing it at home, and even played my first “online” deathmatches by dialing up to our top of the line 28.8k baud modem and connecting directly through IP with my school friends. Ah, fond memories. ---
**Author:** ![muldoonthief](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/muldoonthief/32/3188_2.png) [@muldoonthief](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/muldoonthief)\ **Post date:** [February 8, 2010, 9:03pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/your-first-video-games/528151/23 "2010-02-08T21:03:56Z")
> [@Really\_Not\_All\_That\_Bright](#): > > _Was_ the Intellivision better than the Atari? Intellivision came out 2 years later, and definitely had better graphics and a more powerful processor. The controller had more options as well - a pointing disk plus 12 digit keypad and 2(?) buttons, instead of an 8-way joystick and 1 button like the Atari 2600 had. ---
**Author:** ![Hampshire](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/hampshire/32/4887_2.png) [@Hampshire](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Hampshire)\ **Post date:** [February 8, 2010, 9:27pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/your-first-video-games/528151/24 "2010-02-08T21:27:20Z")
> [@Really\_Not\_All\_That\_Bright](#): > > _Was_ the Intellivision better than the Atari? I guess it’s a matter of opinion but yes, I think it definitely out did the Atari. Intellivision certainly thought so too as it had television ads to point out it’s superiority in games like baseball. I can’t access youtube right now but if you search for Intellivision ads I’m sure you’ll find the one I’m talking about. ---
**Author:** ![Der\_Trihs](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/der_trihs/32/233_2.png) [@Der\_Trihs](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Der_Trihs)\ **Post date:** [February 8, 2010, 9:46pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/your-first-video-games/528151/25 "2010-02-08T21:46:36Z")
> [@kenobi\_65](#): > > I got a Pong game for Christmas in '75 or '76. It could play two-person Pong, four-person Pong, and handball (solitaire Pong!). Same here. After that, there was the Atari 2600, and some triangular console that I don’t recall the name of; it had a wheel for driving games on one side. I recall Breakout, Adventure, Space Invaders, Berserk, Defender… ---
**Author:** ![Carl\_Corey](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/c/8e8cbc/32.png) [@Carl\_Corey](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Carl_Corey)\ **Post date:** [February 8, 2010, 10:03pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/your-first-video-games/528151/26 "2010-02-08T22:03:55Z")
We had the Sears Pong game too. But that doesn’t count because I didn’t play that much. The Intellivision I played a lot. Baseball, Football, Basketball, Space Battle, Sea Battle. . . Disclosure: My dad worked for Mattel Electronics at the time. So I got the Intellivision stuff for free. And Space Battle was originally supposed to be a Battlestar Galactica game. I tested the actual battle part. The only thing different about the finished product was that they removed the the little bits of the theme song from it. ---
**Author:** ![Hampshire](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/hampshire/32/4887_2.png) [@Hampshire](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Hampshire)\ **Post date:** [February 8, 2010, 10:10pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/your-first-video-games/528151/27 "2010-02-08T22:10:41Z")
> [@Carl\_Corey](#): > > And Space Battle was originally supposed to be a Battlestar Galactica game. I tested the actual battle part. The only thing different about the finished product was that they removed the the little bits of the theme song from it. Interesting. I always thought the enemy ships looked like cylons. That explains a lot. ---
**Author:** ![Tom\_Scud](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/t/f08c70/32.png) [@Tom\_Scud](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Tom_Scud)\ **Post date:** [February 8, 2010, 10:10pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/your-first-video-games/528151/28 "2010-02-08T22:10:59Z")
I played games a lot on friends’ computers; one friend had an Atari 2600; I distinctly remember playing Maziaks on another friend’s Sinclair Spectrum. I think the first video game I owned for myself was one of those Nintendo Game and Watches; probably Donkey Kong Jr. - I can still call to mind the little repeated sequence of blip sounds it made as you ran across the ground floor, up and over, and made that leap to catch the key and unlock the first part of DK’s cage. ---
**Author:** ![Page\_Fault](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/p/ad7895/32.png) [@Page\_Fault](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Page_Fault)\ **Post date:** [February 8, 2010, 10:13pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/your-first-video-games/528151/29 "2010-02-08T22:13:46Z")
> [@melodyharmonius](#): > > Our first gaming console was an ATARI - so I was definitely of the Space Invaders & Pong generation . . . > > But more realistically, I was in to PC gaming first with games like Kings Quest 5 (because that had a girl as the main character, not a guy.) Nitpick: King’s Quest IV and VII were the ones with Rosella as the heroine. King’s Quest V starred King Graham, the hero of I and II. III and VI were Alexander’s games. As to the OP, I started gaming on the Atari, but the first system I owned for myself was the NES with Kung Fu, Excitebike, etc. I’d often play my friend’s Apple IIe, though… especially GI Joe and Autoduel. ---
**Author:** ![TBG](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/t/c89c15/32.png) [@TBG](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/TBG)\ **Post date:** [February 8, 2010, 10:18pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/your-first-video-games/528151/30 "2010-02-08T22:18:48Z")
Parents had a Coleco Telstar (pong clone) as early as I can remember. Next, my dad bought and Intellivision (yeah it was a lot better than Atari, but I was still slightly jealous at the sheer number of games my Atari owning friend had). Then my mom picked up an Arcadia 2001 (same exact controllers as the Intellivision! Weird!) at a garage sale type dealie while I was busy trying to save up my money for the system all the cool kids were buying, an NES. Finally, I did get that NES, the first system I personally owned, instead of it being for the whole family. And the rest, as they say, is history. ---
**Author:** ![Max\_Torque](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/e9bcb4/32.png) [@Max\_Torque](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Max_Torque)\ **Post date:** [February 9, 2010, 3:29pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/your-first-video-games/528151/31 "2010-02-09T15:29:00Z")
Back in the late 70s, one of our friends actually won a cereal contest (he did a great drawing of Snap, Crackle, and Pop, as I recall; he grew up to be one heck of an artist) and got a Sears Tele-Games system, which was their knock-off of the Atari 2600. It came with Pong and Space Invaders, as I recall, and we all went over to his house to marvel at it and play it over and over. Pac-Man didn’t even exist yet. ---
**Author:** ![Sitnam](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/6a8cbe/32.png) [@Sitnam](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Sitnam)\ **Post date:** [February 9, 2010, 4:51pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/your-first-video-games/528151/32 "2010-02-09T16:51:22Z")
My dad bought me _Tetris_ in the early 80’s for our IBM clone, the booklet was in Russian, so it was a good thing you didn’t need it. _Curse of the Azure Bonds_, my crew and I were D&D nerds, we’d get spastic on cases of Shasta and geek out in front of that game all weekend, we’d never get more than a third of the way through before we’d get bored with our guys and we start all over. ---
**Author:** ![cckerberos](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/c/f0a364/32.png) [@cckerberos](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/cckerberos)\ **Post date:** [February 9, 2010, 5:10pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/your-first-video-games/528151/33 "2010-02-09T17:10:54Z")
Although I remember my folks renting some kind of computer earlier, my family’s first computer was a [Tandy 1000](http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tandy_1000) in 1987. The first game we had, which my father bought at the same time as the computer, was Rogue (of roguelike fame). My father was a computer programmer and was familiar with the game from his time in college. We also had a monthly subscription to Big Blue Disk. The first game that I personally bought for the computer was Civilization in 1991. As for console gaming, my two brothers and I chipped in and bought an NES in 1989 or so. I think we picked up Megaman 2 and Castlevania 2: Simon’s Quest at the same time. ---
**Author:** ![Regallag\_The\_Axe](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/regallag_the_axe/32/445_2.png) [@Regallag\_The\_Axe](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Regallag_The_Axe)\ **Post date:** [February 9, 2010, 5:31pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/your-first-video-games/528151/34 "2010-02-09T17:31:23Z")
My first system was the SNES, which my parents got my brother and I (but mostly me, because my brother was only 4 at the time) in '92. It came with 2 controllers and [Super Mario World](http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Super_Mario_World), and I played the hell out of that game. We had the system for a while, with various Mario, Mega Man X, and Donkey Kong games, as well as a couple others. Eventually it stopped working, but by then we had a Nintendo 64, so we didn’t replace it. My first online gaming experience was connecting to my friend’s computer with a 56k modem to play [Command & Conquer: Red Alert](http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Command_%26_Conquer:_Red_Alert), when I was in middle school. It took quite a few frustrated attempts before we figured out how to do it. > [@melodyharmonius](#): > > I used to think Frogger was so hard. In World of Warcraft, there is a part in a dungeon instance where you have to run between these highly poisonous blobs that are in a frogger pattern. Just out of curiosity, what instance is that? I don’t seem to recall anything like that. ---
**Author:** ![Headrush042](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/h/a5b964/32.png) [@Headrush042](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Headrush042)\ **Post date:** [February 9, 2010, 5:38pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/your-first-video-games/528151/35 "2010-02-09T17:38:48Z")
> [@Regallag\_The\_Axe](#): > > Just out of curiosity, what instance is that? I don’t seem to recall anything like that. Naxx. ---
**Author:** ![Ferret\_Herder](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/f/e47774/32.png) [@Ferret\_Herder](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Ferret_Herder)\ **Post date:** [February 9, 2010, 5:42pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/your-first-video-games/528151/36 "2010-02-09T17:42:27Z")
> [@Headrush042](#): > > Naxx. Yup. Specifically, in the Construct Quarter, in the room where Patchwerk wanders. **melodyharmonius** - for those having trouble with Naxx-Frogger, they should really have been trying not so much to run right in front of the blobs as run **immediately** after them as they passed, nearly trodding on their “tails.” It also helps to not have a pet out at the time, as they seem to get you killed during the run. ---
**Author:** ![Really\_Not\_All\_That\_Bright](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/r/e8c25b/32.png) [@Really\_Not\_All\_That\_Bright](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Really_Not_All_That_Bright)\ **Post date:** [February 9, 2010, 5:44pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/your-first-video-games/528151/37 "2010-02-09T17:44:16Z")
> [@Regallag\_The\_Axe](#): > > My first system was the SNES, which my parents got my brother and I (but mostly me, because my brother was only 4 at the time) in '92. It came with 2 controllers and [Super Mario World](http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Super_Mario_World), and I played the hell out of that game. We had the system for a while, with various Mario, Mega Man X, and Donkey Kong games, as well as a couple others. Eventually it stopped working, but by then we had a Nintendo 64, so we didn’t replace it. My brother bought himself a SNES when it came out in the UK in '93 with SMW. I used all my birthday and Christmas money that year to get Super Tennis, Pilotwings and F-Zero. First and only time in my life I happily woke up before dawn. Had to get my fix. ---
**Author:** ![melodyharmonius](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/melodyharmonius/32/21310_2.png) [@melodyharmonius](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/melodyharmonius)\ **Post date:** [February 9, 2010, 6:20pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/your-first-video-games/528151/38 "2010-02-09T18:20:40Z")
> [@Ferret\_Herder](#): > > Yup. Specifically, in the Construct Quarter, in the room where Patchwerk wanders. > > **melodyharmonius** - for those having trouble with Naxx-Frogger, they should really have been trying not so much to run right in front of the blobs as run **immediately** after them as they passed, nearly trodding on their “tails.” It also helps to not have a pet out at the time, as they seem to get you killed during the run. Exactly. And \*\*Ferret \*\*- I try telling them that. But what do i know - I’m just the priest that rezzes them after they die . . .again. ---
**Author:** ![magnusblitz](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/b4bc9f/32.png) [@magnusblitz](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/magnusblitz)\ **Post date:** [February 9, 2010, 6:35pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/your-first-video-games/528151/39 "2010-02-09T18:35:45Z")
First games I remember playing were four-color ones that ran on old versions of DOS in the early 1990s. Some of them were remakes of games like Monopoly or Family Feud, but there were also platformers and Centipede and even an “Attack the Death Star trench” game. I also had my dad’s Atari 2600 which he had played a ton back in his younger days. Tons of games for it too… First “modern” game I played was Doom. Not bad for a seven year old. (Well, my mom didn’t approve). ---
**Author:** ![Oakminster](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/o/77aa72/32.png) [@Oakminster](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Oakminster)\ **Post date:** [February 9, 2010, 6:36pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/your-first-video-games/528151/40 "2010-02-09T18:36:25Z")
> [@JohnT](#): > > Back in the mid-1970’s (1975?), I had one of the original Sears Pong games. It was bright yellow with black knobs and could play pong, pong, and pong. I had something similar. It wasn’t the actual Pong machine, but I can’t remember what it was called. It was nifty because it had not only the Pong-style tennis game, but also had a hockey variant where you had a front “guy” and a rear “goalie”. Think there may have been some other variant…maybe a solo thing where you just batted the ball against a wall or something. Not too terribly long after that, maybe a year or two, we got the Atari 2600, and man, that was **COOL!** You could change cartridges and play a totally different game…Space Invaders, Centipede, Pac-Man, Pinball, some of the first sports games–football, baseball, boxing, even something sorta like an adventure game… [Previous page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/your-first-video-games/528151.md?page=1) [Next page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/your-first-video-games/528151.md?page=3)