Hi, I'm 29 and my era was probably from around '78 to '88. The first games I remember playing were Gunfight, Boot Hill, M-79 Ambush, Sea Wolf, Depth Charge and Guided Missle.(posted 9898 days ago)I was totally hooked from about the age of 8. Then a year later I came across Space Invaders, Carnival, Galaxian and then Pac-man, my fave game of all time. Pac-man was just so playable and although it looked simple it was a very strategic game, only truly appreciated by those who had spent the time to fully understand it. Donkey Kong was the next big hit, again massive playability, this was followed by a series of hit games which relied on strategic gameplay with an impeccable level of progression in difficulty. Well I never looked back, I was totally addicted to games like Scramble, Ms.Pac-man, Donkey Kong Jr, Mr.Do! Bombjack, Paperboy and Star Force.
When I was 11, my school project was about Pac-man and my creative writing exam was a fictional piece based on Stargate and Defender. I used to go to the arcades after school during the week, there used to be a group of people who would meet there, we were so into it, it was like nothing else in life mattered. We would work together on games, playing doubles and sharing tips to help everyone, appreciate and enjoy the games more.
It wasn't until my teens that I started to master a few games and be able to play them infinitely. Starting with games like Track & Field, Commando and Terra Cresta, I soon began to master almost every game as it arrived in our local arcade. Some of them were Jap imports which I've never seen since, my fave from the mid 80s was "Hot Rockin' for You" from Konami, if anyone knows anything about this game then please let me know.
Then it happened, game manufacturers started adding endings to their games! Even worse, some games allowed you to continue by adding credits, where's the challenge in that? That's when I started to loose interest, I started writing my own games and I have worked in the games industry since. It's still pretty exciting and there is a lot of influence in my work from the classic era, but I wish I had been a coin-op games designer 20 years ago.
MAME is the best piece of software I have ever come across. Not only does it bring back all those memories of the games I loved, I now have the rest of my life to master all the classic games I used to see in the arcades but never had time to play. To make things even better there is a group of expert players online. MAME emulates the hardware but it's you guys here at MARP who emulate the community of players in my local arcade 15 years ago.
Dith, England.