When I was in FunCoLand last week (and what an awful sounding name that is – and why do so many people hate that place?), I saw a clear sign that the mighty had fallen.

Sure it is not news that the N64 is outdated, but it was certainly a sad sight to see it up on the wall with a $29.99 price tag on it. In 1996 I remember how much I wanted to play Mario64 when it came out. I even considered saving up to buy a system and a game. But the N64 was then $199!!!! And games like Mario64 ran as high as $60 a pop! I think there were bundles later on, but at that time there was no way I could afford that.

Here is a little bit of history on my game systems….

It all started with a Radio Shack Pong game. I still have it, and will post pics if I remember. It was a Christmas present and it was impressive. There were many pong games for your home TV then, and pong was pong, no matter who made it. It was a blast, and you could play against the console or with someone else. I bet it would still work if I set it up.

In grade school, the biggest thing was the debut of a handheld football game. Even today, I can vividly remember the sounds the game made as it was played all around me on the bus ride to school. Sadly, even then I didn’t like football, so I didn’t have one. I did have some sort of handheld space fighter game, and that was very cool. Later (1976) the awesome WildFire handheld pinball game came out. That was a great game, and it still is. I have mine still, and every so often I put batteries in it and play a round. I think it was as close to real pinball as you would find. Really a great game. You can get a simulator of it here.

In 1977 came the Atari 2600. I remember that my Dad was as excited about it as I was. We even pooled our money and bought it together. (As I look back, he was probably just playing along, as he never really played it, but it was a bonding moment I cherish) The first game we bought was Breakout. I also had Asteroids, Pac-Man (ick) and Adventure. My favorite was Missle Command. I rocked on that one! I had a huge collection of Atari games, and held onto them until the late 90′s when I sold them all in a garage sale.

Check out these fancy wireless controllers! Be sure to wander through Carl and Kurt’s Atari History site for some interesting prototypes that never saw the light of day).

My Grandfather had a TRS-80 that ran some pretty neat programs off cassette tapes. He was a very good programmer and even wrote a math tutotial program for me. It had a sub-hunter game I remember playing, but I never did much else with it when I visited. At that time, I had little interest in computers (my how times change).

I never had an Atari 5200 (1982), though I played it a couple of times and the graphics were so much better than the 2600 I still had gathering dust. I remember visiting my girlfriend in Texas and her father had an Atari 400 or 800 computer. It had Pac-Man and Centipede which looked amazingly like the arcade version. But since I didn’t care for either game, I was totally bored waiting all day for her to come home from school (I was visiting for her Prom – yes, I was in college then). That was as close to the next generation systems as I ever got. I didn’t even know there was an Atari 7800 system!

In 1981 I somehow wound up with this Pac-Man tabletop game. I never got the Ms. Pac-Man version, which is what I really wanted. I think my wicked Step-B!tch got it in the divorce. An aside, I was so good at Ms. Pac-Man that I was able to enter a several local competitions.

Although my first game system ever was the Atari 2600, when the ColecoVision came out in 1982, that was the one I wanted. Why? Donkey Kong! I remember launching an all out campaign with my Mom to be sure she knew what I wanted. When the Coleco came out, they were hard to find as they were snapped up pretty quickly. I even found one at Otasco and made sure my Mom knew where it was in the store. Then one day it was gone! And I was sure Mom had not been over there. I kept tabs on her (or so I thought) and I was determined to be sure to learn if she had been the one to buy it. I think that was the only gift I ever actually searched the house for. Needless to say it was under the tree that Christmas and it was the only game system I owned. The in 1984, the game market crashed! My hopes of having an A.D.A.M. system were dashed. I kept the system for years to come, but finally sold it in a garage sale (mentioned above). Ah, if only I had forseen e-Bay then.

When the NES came along I was in college and never felt like I wanted another system, guess I was still mourning the loss of ColecoVision. But my (next) girlfriend had a younger brother with a NES. It had Mario Brothers and I would play it when I would wait (and wait) for her to get ready for our dates. Finally! A Mario fix after all these years!

When I worked at the FOX station I was lucky enough to score a free Playstation (one) AND a Sega Genesis. I had a few games for the PS1, mostly the Mario-ish Crash Bandicoot and a few of the Namco Museum games (I love the 80′s arcade games). For the Genesis I had all the Sonic games, again, because they reminded me of the Mario titles. And honestly, I didn’t play them all that much. When I saw Toys ‘R’ Us was closing out the Nomad system, I grabbed one. It came in handy on long plane trips and at hospital stays. Vectorman was a cool game. Especially with the GameGeinie added on. Still, I wish it was a SNES so I could play Mario games on the go (yeah I know the GBA does that, but I want it Nomad-sized, plus I own the carts already).

Then somehow I got a SNES. I actually don’t recall if I inhertited the SNES from someone or I actually bought it, but let me tell you, the only games I ever bought were Super Mario World and Yoshi’s Adventure (those games being the main reason I’d love a GameBoy Advance SP) and Mario All-Stars.

Thankfully, I can play all of my old ColecoVision & 2600 games on my Dreamcast thanks to emulators. But I would still love to have a portable SNES system like the Nomad I have. The Nomad was OK, but Sonic will never compare to Mario.

Further Reading:
Make Your Own Portable Atari 2600 (and SNES too)
A portable 2600 made from a Sega Nomad – heyyy, I have a Nomad somewhere….
ClassicGaming.com – Atari 2600 Emulators anyone?
AtariAge.com – ROMS anyone?
Atari7800.com – Emulators and all kinds of goodies
Atari 5200 Emulators & Roms
Archive of Video Game Console Art – Pac-Man series of games
How Atari 2600 Arcade Game Should Have Looked – Some are even playable on emulators – wooo!
Play the music from NES games in WinAmp
Play the music from SNES games in WinAmp
Mario Games have a Soundtrack CD – here is a review