What was your first video game? (Or the first ones per major generation)

[Dr Skeleton]

The first game I played on Amstrad was Cauldron (I had the German version - Hexenküche).

Cool game. Impossibly hard, but fun to fly around and go into different dungeon levels. On the same day I played Boulder Dash, Jet Set Willy and a few other games.

First console game was probably Contra on Pegasus

The fluidity of controls compared to most Amstrad games was amazing.

On DOS it was either Prehistorik

Which is a good game

or Barbarian

Which I thought was a very cool looking game, but the controls were horrendous. See those weird symbols at the bottom that take a fourth of the screen? You control by pressing on the symbols for actions (walk right, walk left, run, duck, attack, defend etc), instead of using something normal like the arrow keys and space on the keyboard. What the hell. Try that when you die in one hit from everything.

I played some games on an old windows 3.11 PC with a black and white monitor, the one game I remember was a 2d one where you fly a plane and bomb an island with enemy bases in a forest (jungle?) and sometimes fight other planes. No idea what it was.

On Windows 95 I got this demo disc

Intro and menu

Can't remember which was the first but there's a nice game selection: Diablo 1, Road Rash, Neverhood, War Wind, Fire Fight. There's also a weird 3d game (Hold Onto Your) Nuts! about squirrels collecting gold for a giant nut from space.

Spoiler

I remember Age of Empires 1 and Captain Claw demos from roughly the same time, but those are slightly later games and not on this sampler, so I'm probably conflating it with some other CD with demos.

Probably Commando on Commodore 64. Played it at a cousin's house and was blown away.

I played this on Amstrad, but it was never one of my favorites, the graphics bugged out around level 2 or 3 and the sound was awful. I don't know if that was a bad port or a bad pirated version. I preferred Who Dares Wins.

 

[ropetight]

The first game I played on Amstrad was Cauldron (I had the German version - Hexenküche).

Cauldron was pretty game, but crazy hard.
I prefered Sorcery, it wouldn't crush your soul, but it was fast and challenging.

Spoiler

I played this on Amstrad, but it was never one of my favorites, the graphics bugged out around level 2 or 3 and the sound was awful. I don't know if that was a bad port or a bad pirated version. I preferred Who Dares Wins.

Who Dares Wins 2 (never seen first one )was great, we played bunch of hot seat sessions.

 

[Nutmeg]

Sunset Riders was my first video-game

P. awesome first game ngl. Would have made a lot of other games seem shit in comparison on PCs and consoles.

 

[Dr Skeleton]

Sorcery was very good, and one of the few games I finished on Amstrad.

I know it's Who Dares Wins II, but apparently there was no Who Dares Wins I, I just called it Who Dares Wins

https://cpcrulez.fr/GamesTest/who_dares_wins_2.htm?t=Uw==

 

[Cyberarmy]

On my own PC it was Lemmings and Civilization. Civ was actually "hidden" till I tried some commands at DOS. My go to tactic was chariot spam with Rome.
But played Pac Man on my fathers work place PC and River Raid on arcades long before that.

 

[Falksi]

I can't let this opportunity go to also mention two Wizard-based bangers which drew me into the RPG/Adventure genre more as a young kid. I never see them get mentioned anywhere, but I lost hours to both...

 

[Sibelius]

By era and platform:

Pong/Tennis on the Intellivision in the late 70s (would have been 4 or 5 years old)

Manic Miner on the ZX Spectrum early 80s

Black Crypt/Eye of the Beholder/Monkey Island (can't remember which I played first) on the Amiga 90/91

Ultima Underworld or Crusaders of the Dark Savant (can't remember which I played first) on the PC 1992/93

 

[JarlFrank]

Test Drive, MS DOS, I was perhaps 2 or 3 years old, my dad showed it to me on his PC because I loved cars.
Still got an old VHS somewhere dad filmed of me looking at the screen excitedly saying "Comes car!!" during the game's intro

 

[Renfri]

I have hard time remembering which one exactly, cos I was so little.

 

[goregasm]

I don't exactly recall my first game.

Was definitely NES though. Could have been Mario Bros. Donkey Kong, bubble bobble, duck hunt, excite bike, ice climber, baseball.

I recall playing all of those at an early age, around 5 or so. Just not sure what came first.

Probably excite bike. My brother was a gear head back then, and indeed became a mechanic. I'm sure he had to set everything up with the system anyway.

 

[Bester]

color tv. lucky. my parents had odd belief that consoles kill tv so only old black and white was allowed.

Oh yeah, "it'll wear down the tube". Are you ex-USSR or not? This myth was absolutely pervasive in ex-USSR. I wonder if it was international.

 

[Reinhardt]

color tv. lucky. my parents had odd belief that consoles kill tv so only old black and white was allowed.

Oh yeah, "it'll wear down the tube". Are you ex-USSR or not? This myth was absolutely pervasive in ex-USSR. I wonder if it was international.

ukraine

 

[Lord_Potato]

It was around 1992, when I got my first computer, glorious Amiga 500, with 2 original (a rarity in that era) games: flight simulator Birds of Prey

and a turn-based grand strategy game (with arcade battles!) Cyber Empires

Both were of course too complicated for a kid like me, but despite having great troubles with the simulator (especially landing after missions) after numerous tries I managed to beat and later master Cyber Empires and thus started my everlasting love for strategy games.

 

[Ladonna]

My family would go to the local recreation centre to play ten pin bowling, and they had an arcade area that my brother would run off to. The first game I tried cost 20 cents, and it was some space invader game in the arcade. I can't remember exactly which one. You had to sit down to play it, and it was a flat screen like a table top. I did play Pacland as well from time to time, and that was pretty fun.



There were plenty of other games there, including Wonder Boy, that I thought looked like something brain dead, but the second one I quite enjoyed.



First home electronic games were Nintendo Game and Watch. Donkey Kong flip screen, Snoopy Tennis, Donkey Kong Junior, Parachute, etc etc. We had a couple of bigger games that were hilariously titled "home arcades", which included a Pacman, Donkey Kong Junior, Monkey Jump, Scramble, etc.

My brother got a Atari 2600, and the first game I played on that was DigDug. Others I remember from it were Joust, Berzerk and my favourite, HERO.



My brother then got a Commodore 64 (that I still have). The first game I remember playing on that was Last Ninja. Talk about a shift from Atari graphics.



My brother would get masses of copied games from friends, and occasionally bought one, or had one bought for him.

But it wasn't until I tried my second RPG on the C64 that I really took much notice besides the odd play of a game. The first CRPG I tried was Bard's Tale 1. I didn't think much of it, and didn't think much of all the maps my brother was making either, but the concept interested me, so I tried another, Ultima IV.



It was all over from this point. I was hooked. He had to sometimes physically kick me out, and eventually gave the computer to me in disgust when he got an Amiga 500...that covers my first computer gaming up to the RPG era

 

[Melcar]

This was my first handheld game:

I remember those things. Those dirty Vietnamese at the local swap meet market used to sell them. I remember I had a Ghostbusters themed one and a Tetris clone. In fact, I would often get them as Christmas gifts. It was basically a:

Me: Mom, can I get a Game Boy?
Mom: We have a Game Boy at home.

 

[Humanophage]

I think the first one was Prince of Persia when visiting the workplace of my parents. But it may have also been Battle City or Kung Fu.

That said, although I did play a fair amount of NES games, I wouldn't say I feel especially nostalgic about them. Maybe only about the multiplayer ones because I played them with my dad, so it's a nice memory. Otherwise those are the games everyone plays, really. I think the first somewhat unusual game that I liked a lot was Super Contra 6 (the top-down one). I also liked Mortal Kombat, but in large part due to the aesthetics. I always had this aesthetic attachment to the late 80s and early 90s with gritty US and Mortal Kombat played into it a lot. Of course there's the edgy gore as well. But still, I can't say I feel especially attached to any of those games.

The first intelligent game I liked as my brain developed and I matured away from consoles was probably Warlords II.

 

[Ladonna]

This was my first handheld game:

I remember those things. Those dirty Vietnamese at the local swap meet market used to sell them. I remember I had a Ghostbusters themed one and a Tetris clone. In fact, I would often get them as Christmas gifts. It was basically a:

Me: Mom, can I get a Game Boy?
Mom: We have a Game Boy at home.

 

[Lord_Potato]

The first intelligent game I liked as my brain developed and I matured away from consoles was probably Warlords II.

I initially played Warlords I (with its single campaign) at my cousins' place, but when I got my own PC Warlords 2 Deluxe were already available with tons of scenarios and unit sets (fantasy, sf, history etc) and most importantly - scenario editor.

I've probably spent hundreds of hours creating scenarios and new unit sets, sometimes even with totally different graphics of the same unit for every faction, to work around the limit of 30 unit types per set and then playing them, alone or with my brother.

All those moments will be lost in time, like tears in rain, because back then I did not understand the importance of backups. So all my hard work got erased when one day my hard drive shat itself and perished.

 

[mastroego]

Damn, I can't really say.

Probably something on Apple IIc (or was it IIe?), the first PC we've ever had at home.
So long ago.

Do arcade games outside of home count?
Not that I could name the first arcade played, either.

 

[DesolationStone]

I was born in 2003

 

[Axie]

 

[mastroego]

yeah, old, I know

This really looks like our setup, even though it's IIe (I'll be damned, it really does).
Didn't have this zig zag game though.

We did have this:

We had a few like this one.
No colors obviously, I later learned there were Amiga versions of several of these games, and such.

 

[Azdul]

Not really the first - but the first I've spent more than 1 hour on:


Original author is making Director's Cut on Atari 800 - which should come out in 2024:


And there is modern spiritual successor coming out in 2024 on Atari 8-bit, C64 and Amiga:


But the original still holds up.

 

[DemonKing]

I was born in 2003

You got to play Company of Heroes when you were 3?

I like your parents.

 

[DesolationStone]

I was born in 2003

You got to play Company of Heroes when you were 3?

I like your parents.

I couldn't read, but I knew what an M4 Sherman was, which my high school teacher didn't know either.
BTW, it was a gift from my uncle for my brother, my parents never encouraged me to play video games and never tried to prevent me from playing.