90's Nostalgia in the Gaming World

My First Gaming Experience

Atari was my first real experience with a video game ever, thanks to my dad who had introduced me to gaming. I had no idea what they were up until that point. Although I didn’t understand everything about this new equipment, or the technology behind the Atari, I had tons of fun playing it. I remember playing mostly Donkey Kong and Frogger. While playing, I was often distracted by my little brother because he wanted to play too. If I didn’t let him play, he would start crying and throwing tantrums, so in attempt to quiet him, I would just let him play, even though he didn’t know how to. My little brother didn’t know how to jump in the game. He only knew how to move forward, which was funny because his character would die right away. I would just laugh and laugh about it (and probably tease him too). Several years later, my grandma ended up with a hand-held Donkey Kong game, and anytime we went to visit her, my little brother and I would always try to convince each other and ask if we could play it, but we were too shy. I remember constantly staring at the silver hand-held Donkey Kong Game, hoping that my grandma would notice and offer it to me.

My First NES

Anyway, going back to sometime around the late '80s or early '90s, I remember accompanying my mom and dad on a trip to our local electronics store. My parents had purchased something and had said to my brother and I that they had a special surprise for us. After stopping to pick up pizza, we headed home. I was really excited because I knew that they had bought us something really cool, since it was from an electronic store. As soon as we settled and had dinner, my parents gave us our surprise. I really couldn’t tell what it was at the time, but would soon figure out that it was a new and improved gaming console called an NES! It was way cool, and I was so excited to start playing the plethora of games that it came with. I remember the first thing we played was Duck Hunt. We had so much fun playing and advancing in games. Over the first few months of having the NES in our home, my little brother finally learned how to play games and was actually getting good. We would often race home from school to beat the other sibling to the Nintendo. Eventually, our gaming skill levels were about the same, and we became super competitive. We would often brag to each other about our scores and talk about new things we learned how to do. Our favorite game was Super Mario Bros., of course! There would be times that we would fight, but there would also be times where we put our heads together to beat King Koopa and all of the bad guys.

A New Twist on an Old Favorite

Several years later, the Super Nintendo (SNES) came out, and it was everything we had talked about. Suddenly it had seemed as if the regular Nintendo was suddenly not good enough. We would often get to play Super Nintendo at our friends’ and cousins’ houses. Super Mario World was the best game we had ever played. Following along the lines of the original Super Mario Bros., but vastly improved. The game even introduced Yoshi, which made it ten times more awesome than the original. I never wanted to leave their houses because that would mean going back home to our regular ol’ NES, which was still fun, just not AS fun. Sad to say but as time went by, I believe we both gave up hope of ever getting an SNES.

Video Games and Cookies

One Christmas morning, several years later, after my brother had opened up his gifts, and I had opened up mine, my parents announced that there was one last gift but we would both have to share it. In my heart, I had hoped for a Super Nintendo. After opening the gift, we realized that it was NOT a Super Nintendo. It was actually a Sega Genesis. I didn’t know anyone who had one yet, but I was excited. The Sega Genesis and my Easy Bake Oven, were easily my favorite gifts that year. My brother and I quickly ditched our regular NES, and started playing our Sega Genesis. We played many games, which of course included Sonic the Hedgehog. That game was awesome. I couldn’t get enough of it. I remember pressing the down arrow to make him go faster! I would play that that game for hours upon hours. My brother started getting really good at gaming by this point. There were games that he was better at, and there were games that I was better at. Whenever I would play games on our Sega Genesis, I only ever took a quick break to put a cookie in my Easy Bake oven, then of course, take a quick break to eat the cookie and put another cookie in the oven to bake. It only made one cookie at a time, and that clearly wasn’t enough. In my opinion, cookies tasted way better in the '90s. Many things were better in the '90s.

New and Improved Gaming Console

Eventually, the years rolled by, and many things were changing in the gaming world, including consoles themselves, the graphics, and the controllers. Even the cartridges that had been used with previous consoles were no longer a thing. Games came in the form of CD’s at this point. Our next gaming console was the Play Station. I don’t remember ever getting bored with the Sega Genesis, but I suppose my parent’s were trying to keep us updated with the times. The Playstation is the gaming console that I remember least about. I remember playing Tomb Raider and a few other games. It took us forever to figure out the object of the game, but when we finally figured that out, we had a blast! Also, my brother was so good at playing games started winning me at most games.

All Good Things Must Come to an End

Some time after that, we moved on to the X-Box gaming console. It was awesome, and of course by that time, I was already an adult, and my interest in games had diminished. There would be times where I would sit down and play a game or two with my brother. A few times I got hooked back into gaming, but that didn’t last very long. Now I’m in my mid-thirties and married. I don’t have very much time to play games anymore. I wish I could go back in time for a moment and remember how life truly was back then. It’s such a sad thing how when you are at a specific time in your life, you may not see anything special or worth remembering about it until you are far away in time and start feeling nostalgic and wish you could go back to that very moment. To all of my old gaming consoles and video games that had brought so much fun and excitement to my life, may you RIP, and may someone find you and cherish you!