When I was a wee Santos and didn’t have much money. I remember saving up money to buy a game. I used to take long trips; long trip meant going 10 blocks away from your house. I remember hoping on a bus and heading to Main Street, Flushing Queens. I walked into a random electronic shop.

You see back in the day you didn’t have Gamestop like we have now; you got your games from Ma and Pop shops. Anyway I would go in with the little money I had and picked up Strider for the NES. I liked the arcade version a lot and figured the NES one was going be the same thing. This was way before the internet’s, you didn’t really know if a game was good or bad until you bought it or a friend got it. EGM was around but their reviews were always late. So I jumped back on the bus and while taking the trip back, I took the box out and stared at the back just imagining how good the game was going to be. I couldn’t wait to get home, I was so excited that I ripped open the box and started reading through the manual. At this point I am so psyched I get home and plug it into my NES. I start to play and I am confused. The game is nothing like the arcade. They turned it into an adventure side scroller, but I play on.

I get stuck at this one point. In my head I think I found a bug. For the life of me, I couldn’t figure out what to do. If the internet was around at that time, I could have easily gone to Gamefaqs and found a faq, but this wasn’t the case. So I take it back to the place I got it from. Of course they wouldn’t take it back. I was all sad and mad on the bus ride back. I got back home and figured out what I was doing wrong. It turns out there was nothing wrong with the game. It was quite good in fact.

That is my story… What is my point? I think about buying games now and the magic isn’t there for me anymore. Don’t get me wrong, I still love video games; but when I buy a game there is no surprise anymore. The excitement is less now. There is no need to look at the back of the box anymore, as you can get a preview of a game months before it comes out on the intertubes. No need to read through manuals as most game have tutorials. No more having that special one game that you play the hell out of because it’s your only game. At any given time I play through at least 3. I so do miss those golden times, Ah those were the days…

Comments (5)

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written by Jim Squires, August 29, 2007

Welcome to the team sir!

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written by Guruthos, August 29, 2007

Nice story - I can totally relate to it. There was something about those early days that can never be revisited. Sad

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written by Dan Zuccarelli, August 29, 2007

There's definitly something different, and it's true the magic isn't there like it used to be.

But I'll never forget the feeling of being punched in the guy when I got my parents to buy me Pac-Man on the 2600. The game was an abomination to all things good in the world, but there was just no way to know that until your plunked down the cash for it.

I couldn't agree more with that feeling of getting a new game as a young'n though.

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written by Dexie Oblivion, August 29, 2007

I still, to this day, refuse to play any game before I've read the entire manual cover to cover.

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written by Stevan, August 30, 2007

I also kick my console much less than I did when I was 13. I had the Atari 5200 and because of my lack of anger management at the time, I killed it playing Defender and kicking it when it didn't go my way.
My Wii and PS2 have yet to experience any wrath from me.

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