Lately I’ve been indulging in the wonders of emulators – programs that allow you to play old video games from various consoles on your computer. Back in the 90s when I was a kid and before I knew about anime, I spent the majority of my free time engrossed in video games. And even to this day, thanks to emulators, I’ve discovered that I still love old school games, sometimes even more so than new games…
The very first video game system I ever played was the Sega Game Gear. I was in 2nd grade and one of my classmates let me play hers. I was immediately hooked and it wasn’t long before I got one of my own.
The very first video game I ever played was the Mighty Morphin’ Power Rangers game on Game Gear. Considering the fact that the system only had two action buttons and a d-pad to work with, all of the many characters in the game had a variety of unique moves.
My most favorite series for Game Gear was Sonic the Hedgehog. Thus, Sonic is technically the first anime I became familiar with. I always liked to play as Tails more than Sonic because he could fly =)
Besides Sonic, I was mostly into games based on cartoons, TV shows, or movies that were popular at the time. A few of my other favorite Game Gear games…
In the Jurassic Park GG game, you play through five levels. In the first part of each level, you’re in a car and you move the crosshairs around the screen to shoot enemy dinosaurs. In the second part, you find your way through various levels, avoiding danger and defeating attacking dinosaurs before you battle the boss dinosaur at the end. It’s quite a fun game – not too hard, not too easy.
I was a big Lion King fan back in the day. I adored The Lion King game on GG and played through it many times despite it being a relatively short game.
Games featuring Looney Tunes characters were very common. In Desert Speedtrap, you play as Roadrunner. Like many old school games, this one was pretty difficult and had a lot of levels.
Of course, games featuring Disney characters were common as well. In Deep Duck Trouble, you play as Donald Duck searching for treasure in various dangerous locations. This was one of the most difficult GG games I played. Out of the many times I played it, I think I only managed to beat it a few times.
I was quite into Game Gear, but the Sega Genesis was the main video game system of my childhood.
I wish I had a dollar for all the hours I spent attached to this thing. I spent many years playing my Genesis, and by the time it finally stopped working, I think I had accumulated over 30 game cartridges and played at least 50 different games, since I rented games a lot. It would be too much to discuss all the Genesis games I played, so here are my most memorable ones…
Like with Game Gear, the Sonic games on Genesis were my favorites. I think I’ve played just about every one, particularly Sonic 1 through 3, Sonic & Knuckles, and Sonic 3D Blast.
The two Earthworm Jim games on Genesis were a ton of fun, if not uniquely bizzare XD Jim is a worm who gains superpowers after he crawls into a spacesuit and then fights off enemies including crows, cats, goldfish, and a giant slug, and rescues puppies and cows…yeah, it had a lot of 90s corniness in it, but it sure was fun.
Bubsy was another game-only character that I liked. His games were challenging and also quite funny because of the many cute, cartoonish gags, for example, when he hit a sharp object, he would fly around the screen like a deflated balloon, or after he came out of water, he would shake himself off and his fur would puff out.
Three Looney Tunes games I loved were another Roadrunner game called Desert Demolition (with the option of playing as Wile E. Coyote this time), Taz in Escape from Mars, and my favorite, Sylvester and Tweety in Cagey Capers.
The Disney Genesis games for The Lion King and Aladdin were excellent renditions of the movies. They even kept all of the same music. Another unique Disney game I played was Mickey Mania, where you play as Mickey through levels based on cartoons he starred in. A very hard game that I don’t think I ever beat.
The two Power Rangers games on Genesis were the only Genesis fighting games I played. The one based on the movie offered a unique 2-player tag team option.
As discussed on a previous post, Animaniacs is still my most favorite American cartoon, and the Genesis game was great. It was very challenging (though not impossible) and forced the player to use the Warner siblings’ individual powers to maneuver through various puzzles in the levels.
In Jurassic Park: Rampage Edition, you could play as a human or a raptor. This game was actually pretty violent – the weapons you could have included one that would electrocute your enemies or a flamethrower that would burn them to ashes. Lost World was probably the most advanced Genesis game I played – 3D graphics, enormous and detail maps, and an awesome 2-player tag team option.
Looking back on these old games now, they were really so clever and innovative despite the limited technology of the time. I also think that old games were more difficult than the ones nowadays because you couldn’t save your progress like you can in new games (though you can with the emulator). Another thing is that, because the games were much simpler and limited, it was a lot easier to make grave mistakes that could cause you to lose the game quickly. They’re more difficult simply because the old games offered much fewer options when it came to how you could progress through the game.
Since anime eats up most of my free time and money, I’m not nearly as big a gamer as I used to be when I was a kid. After the Genesis, I bought a Game Boy Advance, N64, and GameCube, but mostly for Pokemon games (though I did play a few others). The only game series I’m still extremely dedicated to is Pokemon. Others I like are Smash Bros., Okami, and occasionally Harvest Moon, Spyro, Sonic, and a few others. I’ve never had a PS2 and the main reason I bought a Wii and Nintendo DS is because of Pokemon games. I don’t play many of the really popular games like Mario, Zelda, or Final Fantasy. I guess nowadays you’d call me a casual gamer who prefers the old, simpler classics.
So yeah, I wouldn’t call myself a gamer but I couldn’t imagine life without video games. I’m so glad technology has allowed me to play these old school games again after all these years =D
Sega Genesis was my console of childhood too, I played Lion King (and never beat it) and a few other games, possibly my first was Streets of Rage, though I know it better as Bare Knuckles. Good god old times. Shit this means I am old. :(
Sonic 1 was among the first games I played on it too…I also never beat that game lol. Emulators kept my game going and I played a few more through those, but nothing can beat the nostalgia that comes from playing these games, and how good they were for their time, and perhaps still better in principle and programming than most games nowadays.
@ Panther
The reason I was able to beat most of the Genesis games I played was because I used cheats/codes that allowed invincibility, endless lives, etc,. I didn’t have Internet back then so I got the cheats from these code books they used to sell at stores where you could buy or rent games. The games were still fun even though I was cheating because I would play like I wasn’t and not have the frustration XD Good times.
Yeah, it is amazing how unique most of these games were despite the limited technology at the time.
This really brings back a lot of great memories for me. My mom rented a Sega Genesis and games a lot over the weekends when I was 5 until I got a super nintendo at 8. I remember Aladdin, Sonic, Mighty Morphin Power Rangers, TMNT’s, The Lion King-they were such amazing games.
I agree with you that it is amazing how unique and innovative they were. I could play them for hours and even now I could (and do) the same when I have freetime.
Wow that’s so nostalgic. My gamer career started at three, playing super mario on my fathers game boy. Of course I always lost in the first level.
But in primary school I got my first game boy (a pocket in pink) and later an N64. Since then I’m a huge fan of nintendo games, but the classics are still missing in my collection, since I’m just twenty years old and they were already old in my childhood. But just playing with emulators won’t satisfy me, I’ll get me some vintage consoles sooner or later! Classics rules. (^.^)
WOWWWWWWw I can remember playing Aladdin and Power Rangers and they were completely awesome. Of course Sonic is one of my favorite games, and I may in fact play it now (on my game boy advance, which is now completely outdated. It doesn’t even have a back-lit screen).
As far as I’m concerned, N64 is the best gaming system ever. In fact! I’m going to write a post about it.
@ Glo
Yeah, I remember one of the issues I had with the GBA was that the screen was so dark. I spent many hours playing Pokemon on it so I suspect it was one of the contributors to the near-sightedness I have now =P Then I got the GBA SP with the screen lighting button and it was so much better.
Glad I inspired you. I never played many N64 games but it was a great system too.