Feeling Nostalgic

My search was a little different this time than what I usually do for these blogs.  Instead of trying to find out new information, something I hadn't heard of before, I used Google to verify the facts and make sure that I had things in the correct chronological order.  And I did have to research the correct name of some of my favorite games.  It doesn't help to say "You know, that game where the guy swung through the trees on a vine and jumped crocodiles."

The very first video game I ever played was Pong.  I was in high school and I loved it!  The only place I knew that had it was a pizza parlor that had several pinball machines and the one Pong machine.  I couldn't get to the pizza parlor because I didn’t have a driver’s license and there were no such things as home gaming consoles.  Pretty soon, other video arcade games showed up but they were pretty bad in my opinion.  It wasn't until I was in college that the good ones came out such as Space Invaders and Asteroids.  The golden age of Pacman and Donkey Kong came out after I graduated.

The first real home video game console to be released was the Atari 2600.  But we never got one before I went to college since money was tight back in those days.  So it took several years before I could afford to buy an Atari 2600 of my own.

I had to get Pong, of course, and Breakout which was a more advanced version of Pong but tipped on its side.  My other favorite games were Space Invaders and Asteroids, Adventure and Haunted House.  I had Pitfall, Berzerk, Missile Command and Raiders of the Lost Ark.  Other games included Dig Dug, Pacman, and Frogger.  There was even an educational one - Brain Games.  I even bought ET the Extra-Terrestrial.  Yes, that one - the video game that was so bad they buried unsold cartridges in the desert someplace in New Mexico; the game that was so bad it almost destroyed video games before they even got started.  In addition to the games I had all the possible controllers – the joystick, the paddle and a keyboard controller.  I continued to play for quite a few years, but after one move I never bothered unpacking my Atari 2600. 

But I still have all of that stuff around someplace.  I never get rid of things.