posted 03-26-99 07:31 PM ET            

I'm 46, my first computer was the Vic20. The only game I played on it was the game of life (cellular automation) which I programmed myself in Forth. My first commercial games were Infocom adventure games played on the Apple 2E.

posted 03-26-99 07:56 PM ET            

yes i do remember c-64.
in fact i think i owned most of these old computer.
zx-spectrum,c-64,atari-520,amiga-500,amiga-1200 and pc.
WHAT? MAC MISSING? gotta buy myself one.

i was seriously addicted to dungeon master and all those SSI and westwood frp games,till one day when i bought civ1 for amiga-500.
in short...after civ i bought civ2,after civ2 - civ2 multiplayer,then smac and thats it.
smac is a good game...mebbe very good,but it simply haven't atmosphere like civ or civ2.
can't wait to try call to power,but w/o sid and brian who knows how it will look like.

posted 03-26-99 08:02 PM ET            

I've owned two amigas ... an Atari 800 ... several Commodore 64's (C64s) ... but the daddy of them was the PET 2000 computer ... I bought it when it first came out, chicklet keyboard and all!

AND... about MULE!!!!!!

We used to play 4 player MULE on my C64 as a family holiday tradition every Christmas ... we had a stuffed MULE that was the trophy that passed on year after year ... it has got to be one of the greatest games EVER!!! Why don't they put it out for the PC? (the music and sounds were great too)

Best Regards,

posted 03-26-99 11:27 PM ET            

First micro was the TRaSh-80. Can't remember any games for that one though.

And yes, I remember M.U.L.E. as well. I used to love the hokey music.

posted 03-26-99 11:53 PM ET         

I can't claim to be the longest computer player in my family. My younger brother, now 39, bought the Timex Sinclair (with the extra 10K module) when it came out. He hand keyed in a flight program which was simple two dashed lines to reflect the runway. He saved the program on a tape recorder. The game was just a little better than Pong. I want to take the Timex to the Antiques Roadshow - at auction, with open bidding, it might be worth $1 to $5.

posted 03-27-99 10:17 AM ET            

And remember when you had to actually put your telephone receiver on your modem?

posted 03-27-99 04:07 PM ET         

Played a bunch of games on the TI, not worth noting other than Tunnels of Doom - great game, anyone ever play?

posted 03-27-99 05:28 PM ET            

43 here and still going. <g> Blue are you by any change the guy who worked at the Smithsonian's Silverhill fascility and was on GEnie? I may be a little fuzzy on the details, but if you're the same guy you really loved flight sims.

If so how the heck are you? <g> Long time no post.

Yeah my best friend and I had 2600s. We eventually had to take apart the joystick controllers and just used the little circuit boards. You could press the dimples to move and fire. Sort of like the arrow keys on a keypad. We LOVED playing that maze-racecar game where your little block chased his little block and shot each other. The bullets would travel around until they hit something which made for some interesting play. You could know you were dead LONG before it happened.

posted 03-28-99 10:22 AM ET            

And 4Horses, I played that game over a modem using an accoustic coupler, at the AMAZING speed of 300 baud.

You guys sure brought back some memories.

posted 03-29-99 08:32 AM ET            

As for the rigs I've owned myself so far: Commodore 8296 - Sinclair ZX81 (w/ a whopping 1KB RAM!!!!) - TI-99/4A - Commodore SX-64 (the C64 with built-in disk drive & 5" screen) - original IBM XT - NoName AT (286) - NoName 386/25 (Dos 5.0) - 486/66 running Dos 6.0 & Windows 3.0 - P75 (Win95) - PII/400 (NT 4.0).

Eternal top 5 games: Archon (C64), Ultima III (C64), Civ II, MOO II, Diablo.

posted 03-29-99 10:24 AM ET            

BTW, Someone said....

"Transcendence age:
...Pentium3...Linux...OpenGL...Voodoos...?"

I don't think you will get OpenGL or Voodoo to run under your Linux.

posted 03-29-99 03:45 PM ET            

My favorite games are Alpha Centauri, Civ II, Railroad Tycoon, Rollercoaster Tycoon, and I still play Sim City 3000.

My husband brings home his computer from the office on weekends and we play against each other.

posted 04-13-99 07:26 AM ET            

Hey, all you other old farts, remember Spirit? The rock group. Their album "The Twelve Dreams of Dr. Sardonicus" had that song that went "It's Nature's Way of telling you...something's wroooong." Does anyone else ever hear that song running thru their head when their ecodamage is pushing triple digits, Planet's on your ass with a vengeance and you just can't pump out those empath hovertanks fast enough?

posted 04-13-99 08:31 AM ET         

I remember when Univac was a babe.

I remember when 2K was a lot of memory on a "big" machine.

But then, I remember when programers knew how to conserve memory by linking programs and using peeks and pokes to get the graphics and sounds right (and the graphics were printed out and the sounds came from a little bell).

posted 04-15-99 07:05 PM ET            

Sure I remember Spirit. The band with this bald-headed drummer who was the stepfather of guitarist Randy California or something like that. This guy even played guitar on a Van Der Graaf record called Red Shift.

But the times they are a-cha-han-ging. I get a strange feeling sometimes sitting in front of my screen and wiping out a faction while there's a real war going on.

Anyway, maybe that Spirit song is Deirdre's favourite. But what are the others listening to?

A Hard Rain's A-Gonna Fall... I'm A Believer... Taxman... Underneath The Radar... Relax -

yes that might be Santiago's and then she starts playing Unreal with her generals.

posted 04-15-99 08:36 PM ET         

I had a TI99/4A for my first computer (and the 32K expansion cartridge, wooooh lol). I also had an Intellivision and I loved Burgertime... Downloaded original television commercial from net..

Kick ass

posted 04-17-99 07:27 AM ET            

Only 26, but computer gaming most all of my life .. thank you for bringing back to life my memories of MULE, Archon, early Ultimas, and Seven Cities of Gold.

Although things started with a Timex Sinclair and a VIC-20, I always treasured my C-64 and Apple //c - sure, the //e was "open", but I fondly recall the //c and the Cricket! sound box ...

Just thought I'd throw out a few more titles: Raid on Bungling Bay, Mail Order Monsters, Choplifter, Starflight, Armor Alley, the first Wizardry ... heck, most any of the early EA games - how many times did I watch the cube/sphere/cone flash colors as I waited for Racing Destruction Set or Adventure Construction Set to load?

There was something special about the flat packaging of those early games ... with the size of some game manuals these days, I wonder why companies haven't moved back in that direction

Anyone remember the name of the EA game that featured a character running through mazes and dropping crosses to block snakes and various undead creatures ... does Realms of Impossibility sound right?

Still have the //c [Karateka, Crush Crumble and Chomp!], my C64 melted from overuse [bye, bye Temple of Apshai and related Epyx titles].

I once saw a demo of some group put together for MULE-386 on the PC - still have the zip. It was terribly buggy, but it really got my hopes up at the time. Perhaps someday they will remake the game - hokey music and all. For now, the C-64 emulators will have to do.

And I remember when Activision started out as the new kid on the block with their 2600 games - how many joysticks did I bust playing River Raid, HERO, Pitfall, and all the rest.

Thanks for the memories,

posted 04-18-99 03:35 AM ET            

The argument could be raised that you have to be over 40 to truly appreciate the subtleties of SMAC. But I won't be the one who raises that argument.

I think SMAC provides the Star Trek TOS fans another universe they can really get into. As did MOO and MOO2 and Descent. Some of us will do whatever we can to get into space, and to another world.