old school video games

[TurboMinivan]

The other day, I saw this in the Lighten the Mood thread:

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Like many of you here, I was also a fan of Pitfall. Apparently unlike many of you here, I actually still play it at home on occasion. Back around Christmas 2017, I bought myself an Atari Flashback 8 Gold.

This is a small standalone unit, styled to look like a 4/5-size Atari 2600. Instead of a cartridge slot, it has 120 games built-in (including Pitfall, of course). It has an HDMI-out port for quick and easy hookup to a television. Maybe best of all, it has the ability to pause and even rewind your game so as to correct a goof and thus extend your gameplay as desired.

Just thought I'd mention it for the other closet 'old skool' video game fans here.

 

[nnnnnate]

I'm a big fan of the rewind feature for the OG games on the nintendo switch. And being able to save.

I wish I had an OG controller to play them with. I know 8bitdo sells some but I don't want to buy one to use very infrequently.

 

[Stephen]

I had something similar to this 10+ years ago. It was entertaining for a bit. I used to love playing computer games, but I find life to busy these days to even sit down and watch a 30 minute TV show, let alone games.

Last game I played all the way through was an old PC game called Descent: Freespace - The Great War and its sequel. Awesome space flight sim that I played a ton back in high school. When the world ended in March 2020 and I was stuck at home I discovered that the source code for both games had been released to the public in the early 2000's and people have been constantly refining the gameplay and graphics ever since. So I ordered a joystick, downloaded the game and the latest graphics and physics updates, and it was like playing a modern game. Blew through both games in about two weeks. Tons of fun.

 

[mbryson]

I'd mostly use this to spank my kids . They'd catch up time pretty fast, I'm sure?

 

[Jesser04]

I’d love to play contra again it was one of my favorites.

 

[Kevin B.]

Wife has every Nintendo since the first, and I think a PS1, in a box in the garage. They mostly come out for NYE video game parties.

 

[N-Smooth]

I’d love to play contra again it was one of my favorites.

You can get all the Contra games on Switch in a whole package for $19.99- even the weird Japanese versions I didn't know existed. Is it the same as playing with the original controllers? No, but it's easier than getting out my NES and trying to get the game cartridges pushed down perfectly

 

[ebryson]

I'd mostly use this to spank my kids . They'd catch up time pretty fast, I'm sure?

I'm willing to bet after 20 minutes of practice I could "spank" you.

 

[mbryson]

I'm willing to bet after 20 minutes of practice I could "spank" you.

This sounds like a potential event?

 

[Kevin B.]

This sounds like a potential event?

What game? Inquiring minds want to know who to bet on.

 

[TurboMinivan]

Last game I played all the way through was an old PC game called Descent: Freespace - The Great War

Oh, wow. That's a game I haven't even thought about in years. Descent was a fantastic game--the first truly 3D FPS. There were numerous occasions where you'd be down in a mine, flying along for quite some time... only to suddenly realize you had been upside down for who knows how long. It was trippy.

 

[Stephen]

Oh, wow. That's a game I haven't even thought about in years. Descent was a fantastic game--the first truly 3D FPS. There were numerous occasions where you'd be down in a mine, flying along for quite some time... only to suddenly realize you had been upside down for who knows how long. It was trippy.

Yeah, I played all three of the Descent games. Used to play multiplayer with a buddy over our dialup modems. This was long before in game audio chat, but both of our families had a line for the modem and a line for the regular phone, so we'd tie up both so we could talk while we were playing. I'm sure our parents loved us for that!
Man... thinking about that makes me feel all 40 of my years...

 

[Stephen]

I was also way into 4X and RTS games back in the day. My favorite RTS was, and still is, StarCraft. I used to enter tournaments for it before that was cool. Once our team made it to the final in an international tournament in the early days of Battle.net and only got beaten out by a South Korean team after six hours of play. It was epic. The only "prize" was an early release copy of the expansion Brood War. Far cry from the big money "e-Sports" of today!

And then I spent weeks playing Sid Meier's Alpha Centauri. I still think thats the best 4X game of all time.

 

[Kevin B.]

I was also way into 4X and RTS games back in the day. My favorite RTS was, and still is, StarCraft. I used to enter tournaments for it before that was cool. Once our team made it to the final in an international tournament in the early days of Battle.net and only got beaten out by a South Korean team after six hours of play. It was epic. The only "prize" was an early release copy of the expansion Brood War. Far cry from the big money "e-Sports" of today!

And then I spent weeks playing Sid Meier's Alpha Centauri. I still think thats the best 4X game of all time.

The entire Civ franchise is great. When Civ2 first came out I don't think I left the computer for anything but food and bathroom breaks for 48 hours.

 

[N-Smooth]

I was all about StarCraft LAN parties in junior high. We would all carry our PC’s to my friend’s house. Team Protoss for life!!!

 

[Stephen]

I was all about StarCraft LAN parties in junior high. We would all carry our PC’s to my friend’s house. Team Protoss for life!!!

Yup. I could get a dozen carriers in 10 minutes at one point. Just focus on building cannons across the entrance to your base and the research route to carriers and nothing else. It was risky, but awesome if you pulled it off. Nothing like hearing the other guys reaction when they Zerg rush your base only to be greeted with a swarm of fighters.

And I "fondly" remember hauling CRT monitors and Pentium towers to LAN parties.

 

[ebryson]

I was all about StarCraft LAN parties in junior high. We would all carry our PC’s to my friend’s house. Team Protoss for life!!!

Ah yes! Starcraft, one of my favorites too (specifically SC2). I stopped playing because I watched (and continue to watch) pros play it and everytime I play it I'm just reminded at how good I am not. But it's wayyy fun to watch.

 

[TurboMinivan]

I was all about StarCraft LAN parties in junior high. We would all carry our PC’s to my friend’s house.

And I "fondly" remember hauling CRT monitors and Pentium towers to LAN parties.

Relative to this topic, the highlight of my life was the mid-to-late '90s and the original Quake. In the off-campus apartment complex where I lived, virtually everybody played this game. Being the days before wi-fi, we had (obviously small) individual wired Ethernet networks in a few apartments... so we would buy lengthy CAT5 cables and string them out our windows from apartment to apartment, connecting one hub to the next. (If someone wanted to be part of the fun but they were the only one in their apartment, we'd run a cable from one apartment's hub out the window directly to their computer.) On any given evening, someone would suggest we start a game... and anywhere from 3 to 12 guys would jump in and have at it.

I wish I had a photo of all the cabling--it was hilarous to see. Those were the days.

 

[N-Smooth]

That’s awesome. I loved playing quake and unreal tournament.

 

[Coco]

I still have our N64 with probably at least 30 games if not more. I don't get it out as much as I would like, and would love to get a modern NES/SNES with all the games on it.

Did some halo parties when I was younger, but other than being on a team playing Counter Strike I didn't do many other LAN stuff.

Now I just occasionally play Warzone ha