What was your first Game? (1st RPG? Adventure? Shooter?)

[RCmodeler]

FIRST GAME EVER - ATARI 2600: Either Combat or Breakout or Space Invaders (can't remember).

 

 

FIRST ADVENTURE GAME: Raiders of the Lost Ark

 

 

FIRST TEXT/INTERACTIVE FICTION GAME: Mindshadow

 

 

FIRST 1ST-PERSON SHOOTER: Star Raiders

 

 

FIRST PLATFORMER: Pitfall

 

 

FIRST ALMOST-RPG: MicroProse Pirates! (it was actually an action game, but used stat-based battles)

 

 

FIRST ACTUAL RPG: Final Fantasy 10

[Chris++]

First console game besides Pong: Space Invaders

First arcade game: Asteroids Deluxe

First adventure game: Adventure

First text adventure: Zork II

First non-2600 console game: The Incredible Wizard (Bally)

First 8-bit game: Zaxxon (Synapse; C-64)

First major console disappointment: Pac-Man (2600)

First major 8-bit disappointment: Airborne Ranger (C-64; MicroProse)

 

I remember the first time I encountered pretty much everything in the video game world. When I was in Kindergarten, living in Cleveland, I remember a yellow game console that sat in our living room and got plugged in on special occasions. It played Pong, but my folks referred to it as Hockey, so maybe that's what the clone was actually called. Anyway, I thought it was really cool that you could control something on TV, let alone play a game against someone. It was an EVENT when it got hooked up to our television set, because it was way neater than any of the toys I had. It was definitely more interesting than a Pinball machine. We kept the unit when we moved to Milwaukee, but I don't remember seeing it after that. I've often thought about this: We older players still feel something of the very novelty of controlling something on a TV screen. This is something taken for granted by anyone born into a world in which there were already games with decent graphics.

 

In 1981, when I was 9 and we'd recently moved to Albuquerque, my dad dragged my brother and I along to his gym to wait in the lobby while he worked out. Looking forward to a boring afternoon with nothing to do, Mike and I brought along a matchbox car and a book (respectively). Arriving, we saw a strange coffee table between the reception couches, and ambled over to investigate as dad went off to torture himself by deliberately lifting heavy things over and over.

 

It was a table-top model of the Asteroids Deluxe coin-op -- my first encounter with a non-Pong video game. The lines and square ball had evolved into the shapes of boulders and an actual spaceship, and I thought it was the coolest thing in the world. You could shoot at stuff, and you had three chances to keep from being smashed or shot. It was a scenario, not an ultra-simple tennis court affair. I remember how it became a whole new game once I discovered the "thrust" button. New elements like that never arose in Pong. A further step beyond the role-playing sophistication of Asteroids Deluxe didn't occur to me, because I had nothing to compare it to except Pong. It was the height of consumer-ready technology.

 

I ran after dad and asked him for some quarters. He gave me the ones he had, but my brother and I quickly used them up. We could then only look at the game's teaser mode. I became so desperate to be in the little spaceship again that I worked up the nerve to approach one of the gym's members, a complete stranger who was standing in the lobby, and ask him if I could borrow a quarter. It was crucial that I further challenge this cool new machine. The prospect of leaving the gym without playing any more was tantamount to the end of the world. The stranger came over following my solicitation and looked at the game.

 

"Yeah, you better show me how to play," he said, and got us a couple dollars' worth of quarters. (Remember when strangers did cool things like that sometimes?) My dad came out to check on us and saw us still playing the game. The stranger told him, "They're showing me how to play." My dad thanked the guy, a little embarrassed, and returned to his workout.

 

One night later in the year, he had an argument with my mom and decided to bring me to the bar with him. He seldom drank, but when we got there I beheld the actual object of his patronage: Pac-Man. He showed me how to play and I was fascinated. This was surely the most incredible progression from the single-color Asteroids screen that was possible. I didn't even know that these things were called "video games"; there were just Asteroids machines, and now, Pac-Man machines. I played a couple of games, and the wild colors and multi-character action -- something that wasn't taken for granted yet -- blew my mind so thoroughly that I could clear little more than one corridor's worth of dots. "It takes practice," my dad said in that typical state-the-obvious mode of fathering.

 

Our first VCS was brought home in 1981, along with Space Invaders and (of course) Combat. I couldn't play the thing enough. That's all I did; all I thought about was getting more games. I invented new ones that I fantasized about programming someday. I envied people who had games that I didn't. They were all exciting to me. What an improvement on the so-called Hockey machine we'd once had!

 

I first saw a Defender stand-up in a gas station. I didn't play it, because whatever grownup was driving didn't have time to wait around, but I thought it was neat how the game's characters were introduced Pac-Man-style during the teaser mode despite being aliens and spaceships instead of cutesy ghosts. I first played it in a Safeway grocery store; I dropped in the lone quarter my mom gave me, blew away a few enemies, and got the dreaded GAME OVER message the second I finally figured out the controls. This was a new peak of involvement.

 

Left without anything else to do, I watched the demo until I finally realized that you were supposed to shoot Landers and rescue the Humanoids that they kidnapped, returning them safely to the ground. What a cool idea! Manic to play the game now that I knew what was going on, I begged my mother for another quarter, but she didn't have any more and didn't feel like getting change.

 

My first Tempest was at the local Husky truck stop/diner. Donkey Kong and Centipede were both first spotted at a local Smith's grocery store, and I finally played the former at a Howard Johnson's restaurant. Red Baron and Missile Command were first indulged-in during a fourth-grade field trip to Chuck E. Cheese.

[ubersaurus]

FIRST GAME EVER - ATARI 2600: I can't remember...I think Cookie Monster Munch

 

 

FIRST ADVENTURE GAME: Zelda 2 count? If not, then the original legend of zelda.

 

 

FIRST TEXT/INTERACTIVE FICTION GAME: Zork

 

 

FIRST 1ST-PERSON SHOOTER: Wolfenstein 3-d

 

 

FIRST PLATFORMER: I'd wager 2600 Donkey Kong, or pitfall.

 

 

FIRST ACTUAL RPG: Dragon Warrior

 

FIRST SHOOTEMUP-I'd say Space Invaders on the 2600.

[NE146]

FIRST GAME EVER:

First "videogame" ever? I don't remember my first arcade game but it was probably some Electromechanical unit. My first home videogame was a Coleco Colortron Telstar Pong... a 4 variation pong unit that used 2 9volt batteries that my dad brought home one day

 

FIRST ADVENTURE GAME: I think it was Adventure.

 

FIRST TEXT/INTERACTIVE FICTION GAME: Zork.. I think

 

FIRST 1ST-PERSON SHOOTER: Star Fire (Arcade), then Star Voyager (home).

 

FIRST PLATFORMER: Man I don't know.. I guess Pitfall. But I also remember Montezuma's, Space Panic, Lode Runner, etc. I don't remember which was first... well on 2nd thought I guess Space Panic/Montezuma's came later

 

FIRST ACTUAL RPG: Wizardry. Then first console RPG was Phantasy Star on the SMS

[Raijin Z]

FIRST GAME EVER - ARCADE: TEMPEST, BITCHES

 

 

FIRST ADVENTURE GAME: Metroid?

 

 

FIRST TEXT/INTERACTIVE FICTION GAME: Leather Goddesses of Phobos

 

 

FIRST 1ST-PERSON SHOOTER: Star Wars

 

 

FIRST PLATFORMER: Jungle King

 

 

FIRST ALMOST-RPG: Dunno

 

 

FIRST ACTUAL RPG: Dragon Warrior

[RCmodeler]

FIRST PLATFORMER: Man I don't know.. I guess Pitfall. But I also remember Montezuma's, Space Panic, Lode Runner, etc. I don't remember which was first...

 

I kept my Atari cartridges in the order that I purchased them (Combat first... Crystal Castles last)... that's how I can remember what came first. Weird way of arranging your carts eh?

[snorlaxnut]

FIRST GAME EVER-

ARCADE:Pong (Tabletop model, at a sandwich shop, in 1979)

ON A TV:The Coleco Pong system that had a light gun with it?

 

FIRST ADVENTURE GAME: Legend of Zelda

 

FIRST TEXT/INTERACTIVE FICTION GAME: The Hobbit

 

FIRST 1ST-PERSON SHOOTER: Star Wars

 

FIRST PLATFORMER: Super Mario Bros.

 

FIRST ACTUAL RPG: Final Fantasy

[sku_u]

FIRST GAME EVER: Pong

 

FIRST ADVENTURE GAME: Adventure

 

FIRST TEXT/INTERACTIVE FICTION GAME: Some Broderbund game i can't remember the name of

 

FIRST 1ST-PERSON SHOOTER: Does Asteroids count?

 

FIRST PLATFORMER: Donkey Kong

 

FIRST ALMOST-RPG: Probably Swordquest Earthworld

 

 

FIRST ACTUAL RPG: Ultima

[NE146]

FIRST PLATFORMER: Man I don't know.. I guess Pitfall. But I also remember Montezuma's, Space Panic, Lode Runner, etc. I don't remember which was first...

 

I kept my Atari cartridges in the order that I purchased them (Combat first... Crystal Castles last)... that's how I can remember what came first. Weird way of arranging your carts eh?

 

yeah.. and you've been doing that for the past 20 years? Holy crap You must've had your "system" down early on

[Jasoco]

First Game would have to be either Asteroids, Fast Food or Video Pinball on the Atari 2600.

 

First Platformer is Mario of course.

 

First RPG was Dragon Warrior.

 

My first FPS was DOOM Shareware. I didn't get to try Wolf for a few years. No wait. Actually, I guess it'd be Blake Stone on a friends computer.

[desiv]

First console game: (Other than Pong) - UFO for the O2.

First Text Game: Scott Adams, Adventure ??? or Pirate something...

First RPG: Ultima I (Apple II)

First Arcade: Asteroids

First FPS: Ultima Underworld (Released B4 Wolf3D)

First platform: Space Panic

 

Good times.... :-)

 

desiv

[Nintendo Penguin]

First console game besides Pong: Mario Brothers

First arcade game: Pole Position

First adventure game: Kings Quest

First text adventure: Zork

First non-2600 console game: Mario Bros

First 8-bit game: Mario Bros

First major console disappointment: Cybernoid

[JagMX]

First Game ever Asteroids

First major addiction - seaquest

 

[BassGuitari]

My first game ever was probably either Blue Max, Beach Head 2, or possibly Ms Pac Man for Commodore 64...I was probably four or five years old at the time.

 

Shortly after, one of my preschool pals (who is still my pal today) exposed me to Super Mario Bros for NES...I remember squealing with glee every time Mario smashed apart the bricks, that was absolutely hilarious for some reason.

 

Good times, good times.

[JB]

First game ever: No clue. Grew up with nifty electronic widgets all around me, so I first lifted a joystick when I was like 2.

 

First RPG: Tunnels of Doom.

 

First adventure game: One of the old Scott Adams games. Probably Funhouse.

Good luck convincing an 8-year old that typing's fun when he's got a joystick and a box of action games.

 

First addiction: RoadBlasters. That game hit the market, the gorcery store put one in, and every week my mom bought grocieries while I poured my allowance into that coin slot.

 

First disappointment: Arkanoid.

I thought the spinner knob was a joystick, leading me to the logical conclusion that since my paddle wouldn't move, the game was busted and I'd wasted my quarter.

 

First system that wasn't dead by the time I got it: SNES.