Category Archives: Gaming

I play video games. Whew that was easy. Okay, so I have been playing them for many years. I have a penchant for playing games on a computer. I do not own a Xbox, a PS4 or a Switch. I do play games on my Android phone and tablet for mobility reasons. I make this point because I am going to start writing about some of the games I am playing. Maybe some reviews, but mostly just experiences.

For me it started out with an odyssey 200 as Christmas gift. Yup, a couple of variations of Pong, me and my brother played this for hours. I was hooked.

Next came an Atari 2600, well a Sears branded version of the 2600 anyway. Games, games, games. Although I do not remember every game I had for the system, I do remember my favorites. Adventure was my all time favorite game for the system. An adventure game, duh, where the main goal is to slay the dragons scaring the country side. Arcade game cross-overs that where fun to play, Asteroids, Space invaders, Defender and Dig Dug where all good. Star Raiders, a space adventure game, was a lot of fun to play as well.

Next up was an Atari 400. 8-bit gaming at its best. A membrane keyboard, joystick and paddle controllers and a cassette recorder for backup and storage. I had the 400 Star Raiders which I enjoyed even more than the 2600 version, Miner 2049er, some text adventure games on cassette as well as many other games that escape my memory at the moment.

I also had the Basic programming cartridge for the system and was teaching myself to program. I even saved up for a long time to get a floppy disc drive. Unfortunately it went bad on me and I was never able to repair or replace it. Maybe a game programmer lost to the ages, oh well.

The Colecovision game system followed the 400. Games available where ports of arcade games, some popular games, Donkey Kong and Donkey Kong Jr, Defender and Zaxxon, as well as a bunch of games that were not as popular in arcades. Some of my faves from this list are Lady Bug, Mouse Trap and Burger Time. Gaming was becoming ingrained in my life.

16-bit gaming entered my life with the Sega Genesis. Amazing graphics for the time, and a library of games that rivaled any system before. I played platform games, fighting games and a bunch of action adventure games on my Genesis. The I added a Sega CD drive to the system and added a whole new universe of games.

Everyone owned a Nintendo Entertainment System, NES for short, and so did I. It was a toss up for which franchise I liked best, Super Mario or Mega Man. I played the daylights out of both entries.

I entered 32-bit gaming with a Playstation, the first one. I didn’t have very many games for this one as I had acquired it after its life span but before gaming stores started selling used games for the system. I got a bit of play out of it before I packed it away and purchased my first PC

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