So, we all come to this place through a varied background. I thought it would be fun to see where we all came from in a gaming sense!
My first game system was Super Pong II out of the Sears catalog. It played tennis, doubles tennis, handball and doubles handball. It was high tech!
I did the AD&D thing with books and graph paper and figures made with real lead back in high school (I'm 48 irl.)
My first computer was a Commodore 64. I was all about Below the Root, Elite, Bard's Tale and similar AD&D branded games. I briefly owned an Amiga.
My first pc came later, with an interest in Activeworlds, which was sort of a Second Life predecessor, and eventually I got into my first online MMO, Everquest. That held me for 4-5 years and a couple of computer upgrades and new cards. This taught me a lot about the true cost of gaming, beyond the subscription fee! After being burned out and a bit of a break, I moved through a number of others. No guarantee of chronological order:
EQ2
Anarchy Online
EVE Online
Vanguard: Saga of Heroes
Ryzom
WoW
City of Heroes/Villains
Dungeons and Dragons Online
Star Trek Online
Star Wars: Galaxies
Aion
also, some "f2p"/deposit games/sandbox games:
Trickster
Ragnarok Online
Dream of Mirror Online
Mabinogi
Perfect World
Activeworlds
Second Life
Entropia Universe
Minecraft
Terraria
I lost a computer to a crit fail over Labor Day weekend, all data lost. I did my first "build your own computer" (quite nervewracking!) and now am happily on quite a nice windows 7 computer with new everything. But I lost a lot of my old gaming records and saved screenshots and stuff.
Current accounts, Entropia Universe, Aion, Minecraft and pre-ordered for SWTOR. (Oh, and I recoved my EQ1 account just to go on a nostalgia tour and replace my lost screenies.)
Woo, this should be interesting. Is this like talking about previous lovers where 5 is the magic number? Let me tally up my list and see...
Neverwinter Nights - this was part of AOL played via dial up modem. What a bunch of cybering crazies!
Star Wars Galaxies - the one that sucked me in.
Dark Ages of Camelot - the first one I truely loved, I still miss my Valewalker mage/fighter hybrid.
World of Warcraft - showed me that MMOs don't have to be serious and that "raid" is a four letter word.
Vanguard - my favorite implementation of a rogue ever and nice alternate healing classes.
Everquest 2 - loved the party maneuver thing, but things like all to frequent zoning killed the game for me.
Lord of the Rings Online - great setting, but the game just can't keep my interest. My second favorite implementation of a rogue with the burglar.
Tabula Rasa - great concept that didn't execute all so well.
Pirates of the Burning Sea - a fun twist on MMOs, but what a time sink!
Age of Conan - bleh, I didn't last two weeks.
RIFT - I forgot to add this one. Beautiful game, nice system, but we just didn't click.
Warhammer - I forgot to mention this one too. Loved the game, but it needed more players to be good.
Honorable mentions go out to a few non-MMOs:
Knights of the Old Republic - it made me wish that BioWare had run SWG, and years later I get my wish! :---
Battlefield 2142 - a fun slightly futuristic first person shooter for my pvp fix.
World of Tanks - my latest pvp fix and keeping me sane until SWTOR launchs.
I feel nostalgic so bear with me.
My first game system was atari. Unfortunately my big brother had picked the games and what we had was superman and ET.
As such my interest in gaming didnt take hold till I played commander keen. Then I was hooked.
I followed with Beneath a Steel Sky, Monkey Island, Simon the Sorceror and Day of the tentacle.
Till this day I love the zany and light hearted.
My first online game was diablo 2 where I was introduced to playing with others. Luckily this was mainly a lan thing over over college network so I was spared the online horror.
Then came Anarchy Online. Good gravy that blew my mind. AN online persistant world where others were doing their own thing.
My first serious MMO was Lineage 2. This was for about 3 months before the grind just blew my mi
I ended up plaing city of heroes until the game that would keep me interested for the next 6 years, world of warcraft. This was where I learned all the small details of mmos and how I came to bring my love of roleplaying from the pen and paper world onto the internet.
I played other games during this time including Vanguard , SWG , Aion and Rift.
My off line games are varied and all over. From Ratchet and Clank, Jak and Dexter to Unreal Tournament to Oblivion, Morrowind, Skyrim to Mass Effect, Dragon Age to Final Fantasy to Mario, Zelda, Mario Kart to Baldur's Gate, Kotor, Gothic and so on.
What a long, sordid list mine would make, especially if I threw in the PnP RPG's I've played. Thankfully, I will try to list the prominent fantasy/sci-fi genre single player computer games I have played in a (roughly) chronological order:
Adventure (Atari VCS/2600)
The Bard's Tale (C-64)
Alternate Reality: The City (Atari 130XE)
Zork (Atari)
Leather Goddesses of Phobos (Atari)
Lurking Horror (Atari)
Wasteland (Commodore 128)
Pool of Radiance (SSI Gold Box AD&D game for the C-128)
Curse of the Azure Bonds (C-128)
Buck Rogers (C-128)
Ultima-Ultima VIII (C-64 to PC)
Fallout 1, 2 and 3 (PC)
Baldur's Gate, BG2 & assorted expansions (PC)
Neverwinter Nights, NW2 & assorted expansions (PC)
Knights of the Old Republic, KotOR 2 (Xbox)
The Elder Scrolls: Arena, Daggerfall, Morrowind, Oblivion, Skyrim (PC)
Mass Effect, ME2 (Xbox)
As for my MMO background:
DragonRealms (MUD)
Ultima Online (very briefly)
Everquest (I cannot for the life of me remember what server I played on, but I RP'ed a despicable DE-SK with the Church of the Firstborn)
Dark Age of Camelot
Anarchy Online
City of Heroes/Villans
Star Wars: Galaxies
Champions Online
Warhammer Online
Star Trek Online
World of Warcraft
I am also of the Pong generation. B&W TV/UHF connection in all its glory. Had an Atari not long after that. Then my father bought a TRS-80 with a whopping 4k of memory (I remember when he upgraded to 32k, insane!). The TRS-80 sported a tape cassette drive as the I/O device. You actually hit play to load games (and record to save files). Anyway Zork and other text games were what I played on that. When my dad bought an IBM PC with a floppy drive I raced out and bought Rogue on 5.25". Good times.
I bought my first PC when I was 19 or 20-years-old. An IBM PC (8088) with dual floppy drives and an RGB monitor. Now I was cooking!
Years later...
My first MMO was Ultima Online. So many fun times in that game. I even met the lead programmer of EVE and we swapped old UO storys. His claim to fame in UO was killing the bride at an in-game wedding...haha
MMOs since (in no particular order, just as my foggy mind recalls)...
Everquest, Asheron's Call 2, Dark Age of Camelot, Shadowbane, Everquest 2, WoW, EVE Online, Vanguard, Anarchy Online, Final Fantasy XI, Final Fantasy XIV, Darkfall, City of Heroes, City of Villains, Planetside, Aion, SW Galaxies, Dungeons and Dragons Online, Age of Conan, Lineage 2, Pirates of the Burning Sea, Lord of the Rings Online, Warhammer Online, and Rift.
Arcade games were just becoming all the rage when I was a youngling. I used to play pinball and standups like Battle Zone, Pacman, Frogger, Asteroids, Defender, et cetera.
So obviously the most important thing in the world to me was convincing my mom to buy me an Atari 2600, so I could play Asteroids and Frogger until my head exploded.
As home computers progressed I was able to transition to games like Telengard and Zork. Then games like Bard's Tale and Wasteland.
When computer gaming really came alive, there were games like Masters of Orion, Civilization, Might and Magic, Ultima, Wizardry, X-Com, Fallout and many more.
My first online gaming was MUDs in the early 90's and playing Starcraft through BattleNet.
I heard about Ultima Online when it came out and was interested, but the scuttlebutt said the PvP was crazy-annoying.
Then... EverQuest shipped, and I've been hooked on MMOs ever since. My first main was Incanta Solitaire a High Elven Enchantress and Jewelcrafter on Mithaniel Marr server in a guild called Jus Divinum.
I made brief appearances on a couple of Zek PvP servers, and took a break. Then I jumped on Firiona Vie when that RP server launched. I was in a small guild called Lux Aeternam, that was part of an alliance of guilds that included Saga. And here I am.
After the original Everquest experience, I've tried a large number of MMOs, but I tend to move on after several months:
Anarchy Online
Horizons
EvE
Dark Age of Camelot
Vanguard
City of Heroes/Villains
EverQuest 2
World of Warcraft
Age of Conan
Fallen Earth
Rift (played that hard for 6 months as my last game)
I was in the Star Wars Galaxies beta, but it was such a buggy mess in beta that I avoided it at launch. I wish I'd stuck with it.
I briefly tried Asheron's Call, Champions Online, Final Fantasy XIV and Aion, but didn't last long. I tried LOTRO and TCOS when they went free to play, but they didn't catch my interest.
Interspersed amongst all that MMO, I enjoy games like Baldur's Gate, Oblivion, KOTOR, Mass Effect, Dragon Age, Deus Ex and Fallout 3/New Vegas.
If SWTOR wasn't coming out, I'd be starting Deus Ex:Human Revolution and/or Elder Scrolls:Skyrim. But I reckon I'll save those for late next year, when I need a break from SWTOR. I'm eager for Mass Effect 3 too!
Awww :( So few mentions and NO one fell in love with Asheron's Call! It's a lonely title I wear, I tell ya!
I started with some single player dungeon game that got me hooked on games on the computer.
Then, believe it or not, Duke Nukum. I adored that game! The shock! The hilarity!
Asheron's Call took over my life after Duke Nukum and I played that for years. And years.
Followed to Asheron's Call II, which tanked. I found a new group of friends who went to Horizons.
Horizons was another love affair for me. I adored that game just as much as Asheron's Call. I also learned how to RP there.
After Horizons, I headed to EQ2 and joined this motley crew.
Since then, nothing has won my heart, not even EQ2, although I've spend several years yo-yoing into new, shiny games then back to EQII:
Vanguard, DDO, Age of Conan...and Rift.
Rift is where I am, if I game at all. Which isn't much.
I won't be joining the literally EVERYONE from this guild in SW:TOR. I wish I had an interest (or even the coin to do so!) but I do not.
Have fun!
@Lyrima heh, if it was a Sith guild, we could lure you in with cookies, which I am reliably informed the Dark Side has in abundance.
@Askari I used to play Battlezone for hours on one token, once you figured out how to kill the fast tank, you never died again. And How could I have failed to pay homage to the Zork franchise! Ah, that awesomly bad text parser. To go from text parsing to a full graphical game in the later incarnations, truly a historic franchise. That and the Myst games.
@Tal I completely forgot Pirates of the Burning Sea. It was different but only to the extent it was a space trading sim on a 2D ocean instead of 3D space. The towns were pretty funny though, all the drunk npcs!
@Chryse AR: the City, there's a bit of wayback! And Adventure...I didn't even own that system, but I remember cursing out that darned bat a lot playing at friends' houses. Gotta love those duck dragons!
@Rumze AO blew me away visually too, the landscapes were so lovely, the skies and the duststorms...plus the player radio and dance parties at Reet's Retreat, I still tune into Gridstream sometimes. Epicene! Alien Invasion kind of ruined AO to me, all those super enormous player "cities" cluttered the natural beauty, Trash King's junkyard used to be in this lovely desert and then after that expansion, he was like in a vacant lot surrounded by all this flash and nonsense. I pined for the vast quiet wilderness.
@Althion Vanguard was fun, but so much of the land was empty...there was a huuuuge castle town on the "good" continent and it housed about 10 actual NPCs who had a function. There were parts of the lands where it wasn't even finished or provided with foliage. Big plans clearly, but not finished. The parts that were finished were stunning though. The Vision (tm) of all the former Verant people seemed elusive.
My uncle had a 2600 when he was young. I remember playing all those games. I remember the annoying BUZZ from the helicopter backpack that Lex Luthor wore in Superman.
Some games I loved from computers I owned across the years:
Vic-20: Star Trek
C-64: Ultima V, Wasteland, Space Rogue, 7 Cities of Gold, Pirates!, Sim City
Early PC: Ultima VII, Civilization II, Master of Orion II, Alpha Centauri, Starflight, every game in the Tie Fighter series, Fallout and Fallout 2
Recent PC/Console: KOTOR1 and KOTOR2, Jade Empire, Mass Effect and Mass Effect 2 (I actually pre-ordered the Xbox 360 because of Mass Effect), Arkham Asylum, Fable 2 & 3, Civilization III-V, Fallout 3, Assasin's Creed 2.
Quote from: Askari on December 07, 2011, 12:48:45 PM
If SWTOR wasn't coming out, I'd be starting Deus Ex:Human Revolution and/or Elder Scrolls:Skyrim. But I reckon I'll save those for late next year, when I need a break from SWTOR. I'm eager for Mass Effect 3 too!
ditto
If you were to take a core sample of me, you would find:
Gelatinous age: (high school)
D&D (the three little books in the white box) with the D&D guys.
Third Reich and other various Avalon Hill games with the rabidly political/history buff guys.
Lots of poker with some other guys
Little wars (Napoleonic miniatures) with my father
En Garde! (a musketeer RP game that came out around 1977)
Frobozzian age: (college)
Adventure, Zork, and any Infocom game I could get my hands on. Still have the floppy disks the size of dinner plates. Not sure why...
Cyanian age:
Myst and all its ilk. Even have the books. Still listen to the music. Even played URU. Yes. I was one of the 10 people who did that. :(
Brellian age: (about 10 years after the Frobozzian age)
EQ for several years
Then a flurry of Horizons, DAoC, LOTRO, SWG.
Came to rest on EQ2, but only in a very half-baked way.
I've been looking for the last year or so for something to catch my interest. Flirted with Allods and other FTPs. Did a few games like KOTOR and the Portals. Sort of biding my time until....
SWTOR!
Wow, I guess I can start at the beginning.
Pong was the first for me and then I moved over to an Atari 2600. That didn't last long because I got sucked into the PC world when my father brought home and AT&T 8086.
I first had a Vic-20 and only played that stupid little mouse game. Then I got a Commodore 128 followed by an Amiga 500. I guess you can say I've been gaming since I was a little kid, like 33 years or so.
The MMOs I played:
EQ1
WWII On-line
DAoC(best PvP game out there)
SWG
EQ2
WoW
CoH
Vanguard
AoC
Warhammer On-line
I've played AD&D for years as well. Not into FPS games though. I love strategy games like the Total War series and Civ.
I think I have been playing PC games all my life (20 years old), my dad first introduced it to me on his old macintosh. I cannot actually remember all the games I have played... But hey. :D I think I will try to list some of the games at least:
Civilization
Civilization II
Civilization III
Civilization IV
Civilization V
Europa Universalis II
Europa Universalis III
Crusader Kings
Victoria II
Need for Speed: Underground
Mass Effect
Mass Effect II
Dragon Age: Origins
Dragon Age
Knights of the Old Republic
Starcraft
Starcraft II
Warcraft
Warcraft II
Warcraft III
World of Warcraft
Diablo II
Age of Empires
Age of Empires II
Age of Empires III
Total War: Medieval II
Total War: Empires
Rift
Age of Conan
DC Universe Online
Runescape
Worms
Worms II
Galactic Civilizations II
Sins of a Solar Empire
Heroes of Might and Magic
Heroes of Might and Magic II
Heroes of Might and Magic III
Heroes of Might and Magic IV
Heroes of Might and Magic V
Might and Magic: Dark Messiah
Dawn of War
Dawn of War II
Warhammer Online: Age of Reckoning
Uh, I think that is all those I can remember. :)
I forgot to mention, I worked at Electronics Boutique from 1997-2000. So pretty much saw everything from the Playstation/Saturn/N64 days. I also remember those new Everquest boxes coming out on the shelves, back when PC game boxes were all about obtaining shelf space / destroying forests.
Good to see a few people here were playing Pong like I was before graduating to the 2600! Adventure got a mention too; that ws a big one for me as well.
I ws from a small town and unfortunately I got into D & D in the 80's, right when the fanatical Christians started associating it with devil worship. So my mom and the crazy lady down the street convinced a very young teenage me to throw away a set of original 1st edition books: Players Handbook, DM Guide, Monster Manual, and Dieties and Demigods (the one with Elric and Stormbringer before copyright law forced them to reprint!) - along with a twelve inch stack of original modules (Into the Giants, Vault of the Drow, Expedition to Barrier peak, etc.).
Before that though, I devoured every inch of text in those books. I am firmly convinced that my succes in acadamia can be attributed to reading D & D material. No doubt about it. We're smart folks. I started buying books again in college, but ironically have only played the game a handful of times in my life!
So most of my computer gaming experience was a quest to find those D&D games I never played.
Too many computer games to list when you start with the TRS-80 and Commodore 64...
Zork
The "gold box" series from SSI (D&D done right!)
Master of Orion I (much time doing this instead of homework at Arizona State)- eventually MOO II
So naturally, when EQ came out- I was from the beginning; played up to and through Firiona Vie's heyday!
City of Heroes
WoW
SWTOR beta!
Great read here! Cheers!
QuoteSo my mom and the crazy lady down the street convinced a very young teenage me to throw away a set of original 1st edition books: Players Handbook, DM Guide, Monster Manual, and Dieties and Demigods (the one with Elric and Stormbringer before copyright law forced them to reprint!) - along with a twelve inch stack of original modules (Into the Giants, Vault of the Drow, Expedition to Barrier peak, etc.).
Yikes!
My first game was Pong. I don't remember what system it was just that it has rabbit ears and a turn dial. My father was (still is) a techie so if it's new he has it
I didn't play computer games for awhile after that not until the twins were born. Of course I was a part of the whole video game/arcade phenomenon that happened (or was that just here in the middle of nowhere)
I started again with Neverwinter Nights. I met two good friends there but I did not stay long
Then I went to a game called Illusia. I beta tested a few games after that none of which ever went anywhere and I can't remember them
My first serious game was Ultima Online. I moved from there I Everquest and then back
I played Dark Ages of Camelot, Asheron's Call Baldur's Gate (wow forgot that one) tried EQ again and then back to Ultima Online. I played City of Heroes then City of Villians and SWG.
I went offline then and started hanging out with a different crowd (console gamers) I played KOTOR there but I found I couldn't hangout with that crowd so I went back to PC games with KOTOR2 I also got hooked on the Sims. I can decorate like nobody's business oh and I played the Sims Online - good concept horrible game.
I read somewhere about KOTOR being developed as a MMO so I kept an eye on that while I concentrated on school. I was confidant that I had kicked my gaming addiction and then one day I found myself dancing in a tavern again in SWG. When they announced that they were closing I went to WOW. I never thought I would do it. They had Mr T as a night elf mohawk for heavens sake but I did. It was not so bad because I knew I was only there temporaritly until TOR was released. The day has finally come
(http://thecustomizewindows.com/wp-content/uploads/2011/01/computer.jpg)
[Me loading pong onto my first computer]
(http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/en/thumb/3/3f/Donkey_Kong_NES_Screenshot.png/200px-Donkey_Kong_NES_Screenshot.png)
[me rescuing the Princess from an ape]
(http://splashman.phoenix.wikispaces.net/file/view/071022_the_deer_hunter.jpg/192940546/071022_the_deer_hunter.jpg)
[Me as I listen to the music in the Rivervale starting area in EQ]
(http://asset.100.ggftw.net/gallery/images/1045/1_anarchwp3.jpg)
[An advertisement for the vehicle I was eventually able to afford in Anarchy Online]
(http://1.bp.blogspot.com/_RvC9h7ZJmZ4/S7MJxZZWVcI/AAAAAAAAAI0/W_LpkLVcso8/s1600/wow-nerd-south-park-cambiojoe-hoovdizzle.jpg)
[Me playing World of Warcraft - I really let myself go]