My First Experience with Games.

GAM-150

9/15/02

My First Experience with Games

Wow, my very first experience? To be honest, I don’t remember enough about my very very first experience to have a sufficient amount of material for an entire paragraph, let alone a paper. Therefore, I’ll write about several of my first experiences.

My Dad is in the Air Force, and when I was a kid around the ages of 3-6, we were stationed on an air base in Germany. Now when we first got there, mom was taking these German language classes. We’d just moved so we only had one car, so we usually all went. Dad and I weren’t involved in the class, so we’d go to the bowling alley on base and have cheeseburgers and sit and talk. Besides that time period being one of my very favorite memories, it was also the first time I experienced the glorious splendor of the arcade. I was probably 4 or 5 years old, and I could just barely see up over the control surface on an arcade cabinet, but it didn’t matter. I didn’t even have the slightest idea of what I was doing in the game, I just knew it was the coolest thing I’d ever experienced in all 5 years of my life. I was thinking about it earlier, and I can’t figure out what the draw was. I mean come on, basically all I was doing was standing there mashing buttons, but it didn’t matter! Every night when we went there, I had to play the games. I probably only lasted 10 or 15 seconds on the game, but every night, I came back for more. Then they got this other machine, one of the sit-down cabinets. The enclosed cockpit style arcade cabinets, which are still hands-down my favorite. I can’t remember what the game was, but because I could see the screen I could actually play this one. I wasn’t on any high score lists or anything, but I could understand and control the game. After I graduated from pre-school, my parents had this little celebration, and we went to the bowling alley so I could play the arcade games. It was years and years after that period of time before I ever got a home console, but every chance I got, whenever I saw an arcade, it was like “ooh ooh, I wanna go I wanna go!!.”

I’m just a little more subdued now, but I still get just as excited.

This is a preview of the whole essay

I’m just a little more subdued now, but I still get just as excited.

Now, for the second of my major introductions to video games, this one I actually remember. This also took place during my first time living in Germany. Mom and I were at the commander’s house one day, I think mom was having coffee with his wife. When you were growing up, did you ever know that one kid that had every toy, no matter what it was he had at least one? Well the commander’s kid was definitely one of those. He had an NES. I of course at the age of 4 or 5 had no idea what it was, but I found it completely fascinating. He tried to show me how to play Super Mario Bros. I’m sure I completely sucked with vigor, but I loved it. At this point, I’m forever in love with gaming. Now I still freaked out about the arcades, but since the NES was only a 5-minute experience, I forgot about it for a few years. Time passed, and we moved back stateside.

We’re in Florida now. After school every day, I used to go to the youth center on base, and play foosball, or pool, stuff like that. Then one day they got 4 or 5 NES systems, and for 50 cents for a half hour, you could play on them. They had a counter where you’d go up, get your controller and ask for a game. You could play any number of games you wanted, but you only got one at a time. It was basically like the bank of LAN machines here at school. Everyone would crowd around the guy having a good game, or if he got to a boss. It was such an amazing experience. So every day, I’d run home, tear through my homework, hop on my bike and tear ass over to the youth center, with my precious 50 cents or on a good day a buck or two, and wait for my turn on the Nintendos. I spent untold numbers of hours playing Metroid, and RC Pro Am, Silkworm, Xexyz (a classic platformer nobody’s ever heard of.) There were so many, a side-scrolling shooter called Seicross, of course SMB, The Wrath of the Black Ninja, Bad Dudes, Double Dragon 2. All those awesome fighter games from NES days. There was also this zapper game called “To the Earth” I adored. I was horrible at it, but that didn’t matter. Then there was the magic Christmas, I got my NES. I didn’t even expect it to happen. I’d already opened all my presents, and I had gone in to my room to look for something, I came back, and there was this huge box on the floor. I tore open the paper, and WHOA!!!!! MOM, YOU GOT ME A NINTENDO!!!!!

Ok, I just did a word count, and I’m up to almost 900 words. As that exceeds 500, I need to stop the rambling. Those three sets of events were the pivotal time periods in my life that led to my current love affair with all things gaming. I wouldn’t be here now if it wasn’t for that time in Germany.