What's Your Earliest Gaming Memory?

[Howiee]

Surprisingly, for such a fundamental gaming experience, I couldn't find a thread for this! Correct me if I'm wrong.

My earliest gaming memory was playing Moon Patrol on one of the Atari systems at a friend's house in the mid-1980's. Details are sketchy but I think we somehow thought that the game was simultaneous 2-player, and we played through many of the levels with two joysticks - but, alas, I don't think it was.

Discuss!

[dvdx2]

I remember playing an original home pong console (with paddles) in 1977/78

I was lucky enough to see the whole arcade area of the 80's and 90's so pretty much played it all!

[Flabio]

I do vageuly remember we've done this one before, but the thread might've disappeared into the ether.

It's one of two for me, because I can't recall which came first.

Playing 3D Monster Maze on a ZX81 that someone had brought into school on toy day (do schools still do a 'toy day' on the last day of the year?)

Or standing on a bar stool to play Galaxians in the family room of a campsite pub in Mablethorpe.

Both when I was around 6-ish.

[sj33]

My earliest gaming memory was playing Hang-On on the Master System when I was about 3. I don't remember that much about it, but I became very aware of what Sega was and cemented an interest in anything Sega!

A bit later when I was about 5 or 6, my uncle owned a Japanese MegaDrive, initially with Rainbow Island but later with Toki, Truxton and Last Battle. Played them to death. Started import gaming at an early age!

[Tsingtao]

For me I think it is on an Acorn Atom when I was about 4 that my borther had for his O-Levels / A-Levels. It was some sort of text adventure as I recal and I couldn't get enough of it. I was also lucky enough to pretty much see the whole of the arcade revolution where if you wanted graphics and speed it meant the summer holiday at the coast, funnily enough not Mablethorpe but Ingoldmels and Chapel St Leonards - Galaxians, Moon Cresta, Pheonix, Gorf and more.

The first machine of my own was a zx specturm and that kept my busy for years, again text adventures stand out, the Hobbit and Jetset Willy I think were my first games. It's also the first machine I programmed and what led me to work in IT most likely.

[charlesr]

"Playing" an arcade game that I don't even remember the name of. I was under the impression that I was controlling it even though it was the attract mode. It was a little pacman-esque - it featured concentric squares around which you had to navigate the pathways and collect dots (I think). There were linking pathways up down left and right. Obviously the outer pathways were longer and more risky because there was less chance of escape if being closed in on. Anyone? 1979/80 ish?

[Stoppy2000]

I had this exact experience but with a different game - I believe it was called Kung Fu Master, it was a side scroller, does this exist?

[beecee]

playing Atantis on an Atari VCS2600, way back in 1983ish......

[Brad]

My 'uncle' was loaded and one day we went round there and I played pong on something. Must have been about 6 or 7. It had paddles and it only played pong. Same uncle had me watching Star Wars on a VCR when I was about 12. I told people at school and got beaten up for being a liar.

Yes there was a game called Kung Fu Master, it was the best game in the arcade at Maldon Prom until 720 came along.

[Decider-VT]

I went to my cousin's house in 1986(?) and her mum's new boyfriend had plugged an Atari 2600 into their TV. After turning it on and waiting for it to warm up (remember when big TVs had feet?) Galaxian popped up on-screen.

The next game I played was a "Find the Elephant" game on the BBC Micro at school. Amazingly good fun for a five year-old but it seems so primitive now- type in co-ordinates and try to narrow the position of said elephant down on a grid. Someone probably spent all lunchtime programming that.

[Colin]

Another one for pong here though can't quite recall where I played it, we did end up getting our own one that also had a light gun attachment and you shot the dot as it bounced around the screen. After that it was probably pitfall at my cousins house on the Atari VCS, which from that point turned me in to someone who loved videogames. First console I owned that really made me gaming obsessive though was probably the Master System, happy memories of getting one for Christmas.

[Fader209]

My earliest memory was playing The Smurfs on the Atari 2600 and I must have been under 3 years old yet I can remember it vividly. Bit of a crappy game really but it had you jumping over fences and snakes whilst avoiding this scary crow that would attack you sometimes.
Other games that I played during that time was Pac Man, Donkey Kong, Mouse Trap and Space Invaders. Things like Missile Command and Q-Bert were a bit taxing for that age though!
We also had a tank game that was labelled Gorf and I loved playing it when I was a bit older (6-7) and it was only a few years ago that I found out the game was in fact called Robot Tank...I was shocked!

[nakamura]

I remember having a 6 in 1 style pong machine way back in the early 80s. I would have been around 3-4.
First actual computer I remember playing after that was on the CPC464. Run the Gauntlett. That was 1988 I think and my strongest memory.

[capcom_suicide]

I thought it was the Grandstand Scrabble game, from 1982 (When I was 7) but I believe it was the arcade game at the youth club in 1981 that was first...

I have memories of drawing scramble ships and fuel tanks on cardboard, and making an arcade game with cardboard and dice. I was pretty happy getting the Grandstand that christmas!

Then for my Birthday in 1983 I finally got a ZX Spectrum rubber Keys 48K. My friend got it on release, but only 16K, so he got a 16K expansion thing that Christmas.

The rest is history, and knowing so many on these board had the same background makes this place fracking awsome.

[koopatroopa90]

I remember playing a game that someone here will hopefully be able to name from the following crude description when I must have been like, less than 3?
You played as a chicken going up blue ladders (I think) collecting eggs on a black background with red platforms. Some things chased after you as you did this. I don't remember the console but it was my uncles and I know he had something that took tape type carts...

After that I remember getting my Gameboy when I was 3 or 4 and the SNES shortly after. Reason I got them was again because I played my uncles ones when I was even younger (he's only 11 years older than me) - SF2, Stunt Racer and Mario Kart are probably the earliest ones I remember. My 2 aunts were also a little obsessed with Tetris on the original GB - there is a photo somewhere of one of them in hospital playing it (whilst waiting to give birth I think)!!