Singelli : Thanks for summoning me here, I have a tendency to miss good threads until they're almost spent. Also, you forgot 

Totts :

I'm 36 but I usually don't feel that old. Maybe I'm in denial. I agree with tgags123 though, if I weren't separated from my family, I doubt I would do much posting. One of my kids would likely be fighting for my attention or I might even just stick to the RGR for the stress relieving effect.

I know I've said this in other threads before but the first system that my parents bought me was a brand new Colecovision.

geeogree : I like that forum idea.

thephantombrain :

Welcome to the thread friend.

My first memory of a video game I think was Colecovision.The year was maybe 1984 or even less and I visited my friend and his dad was playing it, some very primitive rally game. We got to watch but he never would let us play. At least not me. I doubt he let even his own son to touch it.

I think it was fun for him to let us watch him play but to also to show us it was just for him, not for us.

Singelli : Thanks for the summon (remembering now that I had things to tell you in the teacher thread too)! 

I see that us geezers are discussing what video game system we first owned.  Mine was NES, but the first one I played was Atari.  The game was PacMan and I fell in love with video games!! 

I was trying to explain to my third grade students this year my trick for remembering how to spell "Wednesday."  It has "nes" in the middle and I could never play video games until the weekend when I was in elementary school, so Wednesday was halfway until I could play my NES   I have never seen such blank stares on students' faces!  They didn't know what the NES was!!  Even 8 years ago when I told my first class about that spelling trick, they knew what NES was and some of them even had one at their house!  Even last year a couple students said they had heard of the original Nintendo.  But not this year!  I had to explain the whole Nintendo family chain to them starting with Wii and going back.  My, how times have changed!

tgags123 : :-) Yep, I'm old LOL :-)

I never grew up with pokemon.  It was after my time.  And these kids that go on post sprees and rack up the thread counts; they do it for the points and for the jerseys and the mini-games and so on.

When I played video games as a kid, I went from some Atari to NES to SNES.  We didn't have "ACHIEVEMENT UNLOCKED" and side missions and extra bonuses.

You played a game to beat the game. 

THere were no online FAQs and answers.  You had either Nintendo Power (or your friend did) or you called a hotline for cheats and codes and paid money for it.  The directions were usually pretty vague and you sweated out playing a game.  Frustration was the name of the game and you simply hammered away until you could get to the end.  There were no saves, there were no redos, there was only a reset button and a thrown controller.

Everyone now can't truly appreciate the art and beauty of games like Techno Bowl, Kung Fu, and the magic of Super Mario 3.  You have button mashers and games that are movies more than games.  You play a movie.  Back then the imagination ran wild with your mission and what you were doing.  Games were usually insanely difficult.  Contra is unbeatable.  Battletoads is unbeatable.  Ghosts & Goblins is unbeatable.  The games were jokes on us kids.

I'm not saying kids nowadays are soft touches but you have it easy.  You can control difficulty settings, you can make things simple and you can run the table.  We didn't get any such thing.  If you didn't beat the game, you lost.  There was no middle ground.  

kramer4077 : I also think to myself "Wed Nes (pronounced NESS) Day" when I spell it.  no lie.

Brigand : I honestly don't think I've ever heard a story from another person about the Colecovision. Your post was awesome. I had a similar experience to yours with the original PlayStation in the early 90's. I went to this guys house with a friend (why doesn't really matter). This guy had a big screen with surround sound and was playing the PlayStation which had only been out for a few weeks. We just sat there watching him play for hours. I wanted to play so bad but never got to. He simply never put the controller down.

I had Pole Position for the Colecovision, maybe that was the game you saw back then?

kramer4077 : LOL @ geezers. Maybe that forum idea that geeogree had could be called Geezer Corner?

warmaker : I completely agree with EVERYTHING you said. Also, don't forget that if your parents bought you a game for $50 bucks, you'd better pray that it was a good one. There were no trailers and the Nintendo Power reviews were no help. 

I love it. Geezer corner! We totally need to make this forum a reality. I'm sure we can find a dead rented forum that we can take over. I'm willing to bet David would swing something where we could just get it without having an auction or anything.

This could be a lot of fun.

thephantombrain :

I had to Google the game and yes, even after thirty years I am very sure that was the game. I remember it being a formula one racer game but back then I didn't know the name and even if I did, it would not have said anything to me since I could not speak a word in English. But thank you for the info/tip! Perhaps I can find it now online and finally get to play it!

About the first PlayStation I remember how I never had one, but my dad got one for himself but not to me. ( we never lived together) Though he let me play it but our taste in games were kind of different. Like my friends dad in the eighties, he liked racing games and he even got this steering wheel to "get t he full experience". I sort of laughed at him when I watched him game with this serious face he had on when he played but his wife at that time told me "Don't laugh at your father. He had a tough childhood and he is now taking back all the things he missed when he was a kid. Let him have his game and his steering wheel."

Poor daddy.  Well, around that time I also kind of figured nobody is too old to be a gamer. Or to enjoy the fine things a good gaming experience can give you. It was just odd since I always figured him as this tough as nails outdoors man but hey, I was being kind of a prick my self for making fun of him behind his back.

I also love the idea about the geezer corner! Lets just make it happen. My vote goes to geeogree if he would be willing to look after such a thing.

Brigand :
thephantombrain :
geogree:
warmaker :
orionfoxgibson :
Singelli :
Jordanv78 :
Anyone else in this geezer thread

I have been wondering about a game that I used to play in elementary school and am hoping someone else knows this game or can help me  This game is from the early 90s.  This was most likely an Apple computer game and in it you were a truck driver.  On the computer screen you had a view of the truck dashboard and the road ahead of you.  You would deliver cargo to different places.  I remember everyone loved this game because it was funny when you had to use the "rest stop."  One of my friends found the game Cross Country USA and it seems like this should be the game, but it's not quite what I remember.  From what I've tried playing of it, there's no way to see the truck dashboard view like I remember from elementary school.  I can't figure out the code words enough to play this game through to see if it really is the trucking game I remember.  If anyone can help I would greatly appreciate it, since this game has been "driving" me crazy for a couple of years now and I'd really like to find the right game and play it again  

kramer4077 :

Doesn't ring a bell at all... And at that time everybody I knew had either Amiga or some sort of PC if they gamed on a computer.

It sort of reminds me of some biker game that I played a few times where you would drive and stop for to get tattoos and gear or some such but I guess that is another story.

But I am intrigued nonetheless. Anyone?

kramer4077 : That's a good one.  I don't remember that game.  Unfortunately the only games I remember from that far back are Peanut Butter Panic, some submarine game, and the best driving game of all time: Test Drive.

thephantombrain : Yes, thank you so much for investigating this for me!  It seemed like we always had Apple computers at our school since I remember looking at the logo while I waited a LONG time for any games to boot up   It may indeed have been on a PC and it must have been a bit earlier than 1995, since I would have been 13 by then and in middle school.  So I did a little search too and found what looks like a screenshot of the dashboard that I remember from an earlier version here and possibly a place to try playing it since I know David doesn't have PC games in the RGR.
The version you found looks awesome too and maybe I did play that 1995 version in middle school (although I've tried to suppress most middle school memories so maybe that is why I'm not remembering LOL)!

This geezer thread is turning out great   Our own old folks forum would be awesome!  I do know Singelli asked about renting a teacher forum and David said it would be too time consuming to rent them and to look for one being auctioned off, so I bet our answer would be the same.  I'm not sure if David allows users to actually ask someone who has a "dead" forum if we could buy it directly from them to take it off their hands, but that might be something to consider   I'd love a place to be able to ask questions of all the older members like I just did!  Thanks, phantombrain!  You rock!

Brigand :  

Well, I just turned 30 last week, but I won’t lie when I say that I feel and I have felt much older than that for a long time. I’ll be the first to admit that I do not post as much as I used to. It is not because I no longer have interest in the site or anything like that, it has just been a very busy year for me. I have been doing a lot of writing this year, in some ways more so now than usual because I have been trying to go independent and have not been doing too much work for outlets this year.

 

It has been very busy, at times frustrating, but it has been a challenge and I am a firm believer that anything worthwhile in life is not always easy. In some ways I’m doing more now being independent than I did when I only did work for outlets.  I still do work for outlets as well so it’s been busy.  I do agree with you that the site provides a lot of nostalgia. It didn’t take too long when I first one the site a couple of years ago to have memories of the 80's and playing many of the games. I may be in the minority here, but I believe even with all the advances in technology in regard to games today, in some instances back then was better. If nothing else, the durability and the longevity of consoles were better. As someone who is gone through three PS3 consoles, my experiences with those consoles have made me to believe that better technology does not always necessarily mean better durability.

 

I have been an avid PlayStation gamer for close to 20 years. Based on the issues with the PS3 however, it has me a bit hesitant on buying a PS4. The PS4 in terms of design looks similar to the designs of the first two generations of PlayStation and seems cheaper. My issue however, when Sony announced the new console, there was plenty of  mention of the new technology and the graphics and such, but not one mention of anything that was done to address the issues with the previous console.

 

It would not surprise me if one were to take a poll to see if many gamers, particularly collectors still have the original consoles to Atari, Nintendo, and right on through the list up to the latest generation of consoles. The technology of the current generation consoles is great, but it seems like they’ve lost touch in what made previous generations of consoles durable. Just one man’s opinion.

 

Maybe I’m just really starting to show my age. There are certain things that for one reason or another have me fighting the urge to use the phrase “You know in my day…”. I guess that is normal, if I had it my way if given a choice I would gladly go back to the 80's and early 90's. Things seemed so much simpler back then.




Singelli : Thanks for the summon. I appreciate it.  

thephantombrain :

Same actor I guess. My step dad got the first Leisure suit Larry and imagine, I used to play it with my mom! And I learned a lot of English through it. Before we learned about the alt-x trick the opening questions were really frustrating since neither my mom or step dad had so much knowledge of the American pop culture. I played the 1992 remake not so long ago and it was funny how I still remembered all the puzzles and finished it around two hours. But the first three games of the series are still one of my all time favourites.

I didn't know that you could alt-x past those questions! I still remember the look on my moms face when she said "Why do you want to know who Richard Nixon's vice-president was?" 

thephantombrain :

The oldest trick in the book. In Leisure suit Larry three it is ctr+alt+ex and you get to set the "smut level". My mom actually had to help me out with those but since she had never watched I love Lucy for example it was a challenge even for her. And without her help I would have never guessed how to buy the condom or that you actually have to get in bed with the hooker.

so, I have a forum lined up if we want to use it. I just need to know what the age limit should be before hand. Do we want it 30+, 25+, 20+??? Obviously I don't want to go higher than 30+ since that would rule me out but I am up for suggestions on ages.

geeogree :

Way to go guy! But does it even actually have to have an age limit? Well, yes,now that I think of it maybe it should. How about 25? You are almost a geezer when you are 25. Kind of like a geezer prospect.

Brigand : it wouldn't have an official age limit but I would want to enforce one unofficially so that we don't get the 10-15 year olds posting in this forum a lot. I would really like to have a forum where we can post about more adult topics and not get 13 year olds jumping on the thread and ruining a serious conversation.