How did you start gaming?

Bob and I were talking last nite about how wonderful it was finding people over 40 that love Adventure Games. When I started, I actually thought I was the only one and was embarrassed to admit to anyone that I played "computer Games". haha

I went to baby-sit for my daughter for a week. They had just bought a PC. My daughter dragged me kicking and screaming to the puter, (I didn't have one) to show me Riven. I sat there and pretended to be interested in a "dumb computer game". The next day, I was bored silly, so I loaded Riven to fool around with. I became throughly intrigued, engrossed and obsessed. That was all she wrote! I was hooked.

My husband came to pick me up at the end of the week and on the way home, I bought a computer and Riven.

That was February 1998!

How did you get started and how long have you been gaming?

------------------
~Dee

HI, Dee.........Now this is a big fun question! Thanks for bringing it up, me darlin'!

In September of 1997, my husband won a Sony PentiumII 166MHz at a sales meeting..an annual "auction" where they get to bid on things using their accumulated sales points. I was thrilled. Had been wanting a PC for a long time, but really couldn't justify it.

We (the whole family) fooled around with different programs, email and browsed around on the Internet; finding out how really helpful and useful having a PC could be! Then, in October...a month later....we went to Costco. I was wandering around in the electronics dept and my eyes lit on (yes!) RIVEN! That was it!!! From that day on, I have been completely in love with adventure gaming.

It is a wonderful, relaxing, rewarding, and stimulating hobby. The only reason people knock it is because they don't understand it. And, because there is no "product", no tangible result produced, that they can see,
it must be useless. This is not logical thinking. Humans would be better off spending more time at fun, fulfilling, wholesome activites like adventure gaming.

Get off the soap box, WITCHEN!

=O)

Dee;
Your going to laugh.I had seen something on TV about Doom.I couldn't stand it I had to play it,the only thing we had at the time was Nintendo so I dragged my husband to Best Buy and made him buy me a 'puter so I could play Doom. it was 5 years ago.Two years after that I discovered Adventure games,My wonderful hubby got me Phantasmagoria for my B-Day because he knows I love horror,so he gave it to me and I said oh gee thanks,and put it aside.then about a month later I was bored and looking for something to do so I loaded up Phant,and I was hooked I couldn't tear myself away.Now he always tells me he wishes he was a computer,LOL.Guess I need to pay him some attention.

ozma

We got our first computer in 1993...and mostly used it for word processing and bridge. Bob was playing an on-line game called "Maze" and he started networking with other players. Think he got hooked then..but I didn't see anything too great about it.

Then we got our second computer in 1996 and my daughter told us about Myst. That was it! We played together and had so much fun. We'd search the reviews, etc. At that time, the games just kept on coming. What a fabulous couple of years!

Well, we're still having fun...just no time to play games anymore. We just talk and read about them. Sigh.

I agree...this was excellent topic ~Dee. Am sure this is gonna' be a long thread.
:

------------------
Today is a gift. That is why it is called the present.

Hahaha Funny stories....Somehow I knew they would be....

Oz.....You are the Queen of Gaming! 5 years.....and you are sooo lucky that you like different types of games. My hubby ALWAYS knows where to find me too. lol Luckily, my puter is just off the living room not far from the chair where he sits and watches SPORTS constantly! So he still feels we are together.....now if he could just get me to clean house.....

Witchen......Riven was a difficult game to start with, wasn't it? and beautiful with haunting music. The deep rumbling of the Gate Room gave me Goosebumps! I agree that the games are challanging, but relaxing? Sometimes I get so worked up, I'm a nervous wreck. I also agree that people just don't understand that Adventure games, are "mind games".

Sparky.......That's awful! You guys need to put time aside so you can play these wonderful games that are coming. I hope it's not the board that's keeping you from it. Myst would have hooked me too. I wish I could get Ron to play with me......



------------------
~Dee

Yes, ~Dee,

You are right. We WILL have to put time aside for gaming. Like in our dreams.LOL.
That would be about the right time frame:
12:00 am until 5:00 am.

Sparks

Hello everyone,

What a great topic: going back to our gaming roots. I guess I qualify so far, for the Adventure Gamer dinosaur award.

From the moment I lugged home that 40 pound "portable" with 64K ram and 1 floppy (no hard) drive, booted it up with DOS 2.1, then inserted the text adventure The Colossal Cave, I was hooked.

Imagination played a key role then. We used to gather around that tiny monitor and stare at the yellow text deciding which command to type in next, visualizing each room we came to, wondering what traps or treasures lay in store for us.

I still remember those days fondly but I have looked forward to each computer and graphics innovation and upgraded my machine accordingly. From Kings Quest 1 through the Myst clones, the short-lived live action video to 3D. Even though I broadened my gaming habit to include RPG's and action/adventure hybrids, true adventures are still my gaming passion.

By the way, that text adventure was originally called Microsoft adventure.

Anet

We have had a computer for about 11 years now.Keith learned with the boys and then he surpassed them.I didn't have time for games other than a few card ones,until about 5 years ago.Then I saw Sherlock Holmes "Serrated Scalpel" in the store and had to try it.
We took turns playing it in between working and it took us about a month.After that we found this store that had great buys, and that is where a lot of money was spent.
I don't regret for 1 minute playing computer games ,and I have had my own for a few years now.He gets upgraded ,and then I do, and so on down the line to the others our family have.
The only thing that would have been any better is to have high speed service which we just got and no more tussles about who goes on first.
Keith has built 6 computers plus,and amongst the family ,there is always one where we visit.

------------------
JOAN
Nostalgia is like a grammar lesson.You find the present tense and the past perfect.

Yikes, Anet......Sounds like you are the "prize winner," at least thus far, for having played computer games the longest! I wonder if even Ashley or Tami has played longer. What year did you start?

In any case...the bottom line is FUN, FUN, FUN! Right?

Love, Witchen =O)

MacDee, me dear! YES, RIVEN was very difficult. It took us (my son and I played it together) six weeks to complete it. Neither of us having had any gaming experience and no walkthrough available. It remains my all time favorite game.

The scariest part for me is when the little girl appears in the middle of the forest path. I about swallowed my heart! LOL

[This message has been edited by Witchen (edited 10-09-1999).]

OMG......Anet......hahaha......I can just see you guys all around a little computer screen. I have never played a text game, but I have seen them and sites that are trying to save them. How many years ago was that anyway?

Witchen.......It took me 6 weeks too, but I loved it! That little girl startled me too, just didn't expect it....

------------------
~Dee

That was back in the olden days of 1985 (or somewhere around there). We also participated in the beta test of IBM's "mistake" computer the PC Jr.

I'm with you MacDee, I think my husband is secretly jealous of my computer. I see him giving it dirty looks all the time.

Anet

Hi, Anet..you may well have the longevity record then! That is impressive.

I do spend a lot of time on the computers, myself. But, my husband has his lap top for work and he spends plenty of time computering too. Everyone in the immediate family is into gaming...except my husband...so I have a big support group.

Love, Witchen =O)

------------------
We have enough youth. How about a fountain of SMART? =O)

My computer background is a little less complicated and engrossing as some of Y'ALL'S.
Actually, I've had about 6 computers over the past 14 years. I started out with an old PC (home made jobber!) that had hardly any hard drive and used a bootdisk to get the thing to run any of the programs. I ditched that one asap, a year or so later and got a TANDY1000SX. How many of you remember those? LOL Anyway, fooled around with Windows3.1, didn't know what I was doing til much, much later. They say we learn from our mistakes.....well I must have learned a TON of stuff, coz I made more mistakes than you could imagine! But, I DID learn. Sold that piece of junk and bought an IBM. Had that one for a few years, and then sold that one at a garage sale for peanuts (that was about all it was worth). Bought myself an HP8180, 266MHz, 4.6Gig Hard drive, and 24x CD ROM and I thought I was in HOG HEAVEN for about 5 years. Not so. Wound up loaning that one to my brother (who still uses it) and bought myself a brand spanking new HP8496, 500MHz, 12.9Gig Hard drive and CD Read/Writer Plus. Love this thing!
Anyway, way back when I had the IBM, I started playing MYST. That was all she wrote! I couldn't get enough. When I finished the game, I started looking for people who were playing it so I could stay "connected" to the game in one way or another and started helping them through areas of the game that had them stumped. Thrilled me (and still does) to help people out. That's how I got started, but that was EONS ago....or at least it seems like it.

------------------
Never will a Winner QUIT, and never will a Quitter WIN!!
LINDA
Snatch up YOUR next Adventure
ADVENTURE GAMES GALORE!!



[This message has been edited by LSHAW3457 (edited 10-09-1999).]

Hi Linda,

I remember the Tandy, had one of those too. I don't think I could take the time to count how many computers or upgrades I've had over the years just to keep up and keep playing the new games.

I don't happen to agree with some people who say that Myst was the beginning of the end of adventure games. Not only did it start the developers on the concept of beautiful graphics but it also encouraged people to use their brains as well as imagination to complete the puzzles. It certainly wasn't empty of atmosphere.

Anet

Joan....You are so lucky.....I wish I could work on puters, or had a hubby that could. In less than a year, my 225 MHz Mac was not enough.......but I'm happy for the time being with my 450 MHz IBM Aptiva.

Linda......Isn't it amazing how fast a computer becomes obsolete? Myst was definately a ground breaker..... We need more!!!

------------------
~Dee

Myst was my first love! I remember seeing an ad for it years ago at Micro Center and I got chills up and down my spine! It didn't work on my old 'puter. So I went out and bought an new one just so I could play it! I borrowed money to pay for the puter - that is how important it was. I was completely, COMPLETELY entralled. I had no idea whatsoever what I was doing - but I knew it was opening new worlds for me. And, of course, it has.

Great topic, Dee.

I think I've had a computer the longest (and I'm probably one of the youngest posters on this board) . I had a Commodore 64+ (hooked up to the TV) somewhere around 1983-4 (along w/ my old Atari which still works). Then while I was visiting my aunt in 1985, she showed my how to play a great new game called Kings Quest 2 on her old IBM (which later became my "new" computer). The next year (86), she and my grandparents bought me a Tandy 1000EX. About 5 or 6 years ago, my aunt gave me her old IBM and a huge box full of floppies and original game boxes. I used that until I bought my Compaq in 1997 (my first experience w/ a CDROM). Both the Tandy and the IBM have been gifted to relatives, as nobody would want to buy them.

Wow....Ashley.....I forgot about my Atari. I never considered that a computer though. I played all those silly games on it....you know, arcade. Come to think of it....haha...I do remember doing some programming on it and it saved onto a casette.... I still have it too and I bet it works.......

Scoot......Another Myst lover..... Aren't we something? Slots and Adventure Games........haha

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~Dee

[This message has been edited by ~MacDee (edited 10-09-1999).]

Dee, I agree. Great topic!

As you know, I am a MAC nut. I love my Macintosh. I had used PC's at work for years and liked working on them but did not even think about games. Then I got my first Mac, a Performa 6200 and I fell in love! That was just a five years ago. I then got a G3 Macintosh 266 and just thought I was in love before ! But I did not get turned on to games until I watched my husband, Paul playing them constantly. He is a gamer! (but a PC gamer...so I can buy games for both). But he loves action games and adventure games. He just loves games. He introduced me to Myst and I fell in love again! He had to help me alot with Myst. I thought it was the most wonderful experience....until I discovered Riven and then I was really hooked.

Until I found this Board...thanks again to Mr. Bill and ~Dee, I had a hard time finding adventure games...in fact I thought they were called RPG games; never noticing the difference. Now thanks to ~Dee I do!

Oh, yes, Paul constantly makes the statement...I thought I had a wife. It is his fault to introducing me to games!!!! I love my computers

Pam

I was serving my last eighteen months at San Quentin. Desperate to get away from "Tiny", a 375 mental defective who had fixated on me, I volunteered to work in the library (Tiny wasn't much of a reader). One day I noticed that, in all the excitement leading up to his lethal injection, Paddy McArsenic had left his copy of Myst in one of the computer stations. I was on my break, so I popped it in the cd player and fired it up . . . and not since my first hit of horse had felt such a high or gotten hooked so quickly.

Sorry . . . my real story's too boring. I bought my computer last November with NO THOUGHT of playing games. Really! Then AOL offered me Riven for $20. I loaded it up and the scales fell from my eyes.

[This message has been edited by ray (edited 10-10-1999).]

I actually got into Gaming thru an ad for Riven, touting it as the sequel to "The Best Adventure Game Ever, MYST", and it gave a brief synopsis of Myst. I have been a Fantasy and Sci-fi nut since the late 40s, and have about read out our Library, so I was thrilled to hear about a new way to enjoy it. Also, at work, each time our Field Engineers got a Laptop upgrade, they would show me all the games, and talk about what they and their wives and kids played at home. That decided me to plan ahead for a lot of gaming when I retired last year. I bought my 'putor in April, 98, with Myst, Riven, Starfleet Academy, X-files & Frogger, and started stashing money for future games. (You notice how little I knew about the make-up of games) Then when I retired in late Sept, after a 3 1/2 week trip to Vegas & Reno ( threw that in for you, Dee) I settled in for some serious playing and shopping. Then this summer I discovered GameBoomers thru a post from Witchen on Nexus, and my life is now full and happy.

------------------
granny goodwitch

A woman NEVER shot a man while he was doing the dishes!

My husband got me started, it's all his fault. We started with card games and pinball games. One day he and our grandson Tim were spending a lot of time in the office with this music..... can't explain the music... it just went on and on and on. I went in to check on them and they were involved in some dumb game they called Myst - what the heck is Myst I asked - they tried to show me, but I would have nothing to do with wasting my time on such dumb stuff. Later on Jerry got another game called Phantasmagoria and told me he got it for me, maybe I would like this better than pinball. I too put if off for a long time and the only reason I sat down to play it was because I didn't want to hurt Jerry's feelings. Well, that's all it took, he now watches tv alone LOL
M

These are such wonderful stories TY Dee.
Marcie,are you my long lost twin? LOL.

ozma

Lela and I became victims of MYST back in January 1997. I've had a computer (486/33) 16meg of RAM since late 80's. It was the latest then, and of course no one would ever need 16 megs of RAM (that's what guys at work told me). I used the machine to help me with teaching. You know: keeping records, writing lessons and tests, etc. Anyway, I kept hearing about this adventure game, and constantly saw it in stores, so I bought it for myself as a Christmas gift in December 96. My nephew and his family came for Christmas and begged me to load it. So after Christmas Lela and I went back to it and finally got off the main island. We didn't sleep, eat, drink, go to the bathroom, feed the animals, or anything for about 7 days. We used only one hint from Cyan and they were quite concerned about us. The lovely gal we talked with said that we had to eat and all that because they did not want to lose any customers from starvation, nervous breakdowns or anything like that. True Story! Honest! Lela had never played any kind of games, she wasn't interested - Look at us now!

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Mr. Bill

Adventure Game Website

These are such wonderful stories! Thank you all so much for sharing your story with everyone. So many of us started with Myst and Riven.....I'm amazed.

If this thread wasn't so long, I would copy it and send it to all the gaming companies and magazines so they could see how much we love and need our genre.

~Dee



[This message has been edited by ~MacDee (edited 10-10-1999).]

We started with Myst also. Had no help at all for most of the game since we had no internet. I remember vividly the sound from the next room for a couple days--MMM-KLUNK-- over and over with my husband trying to solve the elevator puzzle. Finally an "I got it" Thank heavens.

I got hooked on adventure games through our son, who had a borrowed playstation and Resident Evil. We played together, he doing all of the navigation and shooting, and both of us hunting for inventory and solving the (rare) puzzles. Then we got Tomb Raider and played that together. Next he bought Riven which had us ENTHRALLED for weeks. Soon I had bought a computer, our son got me Journeyman 3 and Lighthouse, a friend lent me Phantasmagoria, and I haven't stopped since.
verm

HI, Vermie and all!

Interesting to see both RIVEN and MYST pop up so frequently in these "how I got started..." stories. Truly two profoundly compelling invitations to adventure gaming!

Love, Witchen =O)

In 1992 I went to visit and old friend of
mine in the bay area.(old golfing buddy)He
was a programer for General Electric. He
had PC's at work but his personal puter
was a power MAC. After a round of golf he
would sit at that [blip] thing for hours playing "silly games" Well to make a long story short, when I left for home he gave
me an old Mac of his and two games. Myst
and Gabrial knight sins of the fathers. One
on CD (Myst) and Gabe on 12 floppies. I was
hooked. I think it took me 3 months to play
Sins of the Fathers and only about 45 days
for Myst. My downfall had begun.

Don

Thanks for stopping in Don and Verm and sharing your stories.

Two more Myst and Riven fans! Wish the brothers could see this.

~Dee

I didn't like Myst, and didn't bother getting Riven. It was boring, and there was no one to interact with. King's Quest 2 and Space Quest 3 were my first adventure games.

Boy, am i ever late on this one!! We got our first computer back in either 1982, or 1983...can't remember. It was the type, that only took the 5 1/2 inch floppy...talk about old!!! Couldn't even play the type of adventure games on it, that was sold in the stores. But we did have adventure games to play...been so long i can't even remember what they were. Nothing anyone would have ever heard about anyway. What i consider playing "real" adventure games, was two years ago. My son bought a new computer, and gave me his old one. I was getting really frustrated, because i didn't even know how to get around on AOL, and was ready to give the thing away. Then he brought over Phantasamagoria, which i loved by the way, and i couldn't keep my face out of the computer. I've been hooked ever since.

Debbie

Once upon a time, there was a gaming machine named Commodore 64. Many great adventures were developed for this and most of the time, the games were text only... Remember: GO W. You just found a river. LOOK. There is a bridge. CROSS BRIDGE. You can't, bridge is broken. Etc, you got the idea
That's how i started, some very long time ago... Eventually i crossed that bridge, 3-4 years ago and bought a PC

Fascinating thread! It is interesting how many of us got into "the game" because of MYST. I have been into computers for a number of years, but primarily mainframe and MAC (I love MACs!). A couple of years ago I had a good buy on a pc, so I decided to get one for my home. I had run across the MARS HILL tapes, which come out every other month and consist of (very interesting) interviews by a talented interviewer by the name of Ken Myers. I took advantage of an opportunity of getting several years back tapes AND just at the time I was bedridden because of an operation, these tapes arrived and provided a nice alternative to reading, reading, reading, which was all that I was doing. I was most favorably impressed.
Now what has this to do with Adventure Games? Well in the Jan/Feb 1995 tape was an interview with Rand and Robyn Miller on MYST. Rather interesting, I thought. They were also talking about a sequel (RIVEN). Not long after that I read in one of the news magazines an article about MYST & RIVEN and the developers. I figured that anything that Ken Myers thought worthy of an interview and a national news magazine thought worthy of an article was surely worth investigation. So, I found MYST in a store, played it (went pretty well after I finally found the tower and its significance) and began to think of computer gaming as rather fun. I was in a computer store and found SHIVERS and 7th GUEST and played them next. SHIVERS is still number 1 on my "hit parade". I then found Journeyman III (LEGACY OF TIME) and then, as the final clincher, RIVEN, and I became one of the TRAPPED. I didn't have a server for some time and I knew nothing of "BOARDS" and didn't deal with the WEB, so it wasn't until some time later that I checked in on a few. I found them rather noxious. I then came across Linda's Page and that was a revelation - a warm, friendly, no profanity, illuminating board peopled and run by Adventure/Puzzle game enthusiasts. Later I came across a reference to GameNuts and, after it started, to GameBoomers. Many familiar names among contributors to all three. I felt "at home", warm and cozy, in a non-threatening environment. Thank you all!

Okay,
My story isn't all that interesting, but here it is. When my kids were in middle school and junior high, we bought and Apple IIE for them. I had no idea how to use a computer, but my kids and husband did. It didn't take me long to learn! So when the kids were out playing, I was on the computer The first Adventure game I played was a Scott Adams text adventure. I believe there were about 14 in all. They fascinated me, and I just kept playing them. Then came the stick figure text and people games. I believe the first graphic adventure game I played was on an IBM. The game was Indiana Jones and the Fate of Atlantis. It's still one of my all time favorites.

I got started with Adventure Gaming about 12 or 13 years ago. When my business (I am an Accountant), went to computer I found a shareware of word puzzles and cryptograms. That was enough to get me going. I have been a puzzle freak since the late 1930s. My office is in our home and I spend my spare time on gaming. It keeps my mind sharp and relieves the boredom of cutting back on my work load. I have several friends of the same vintage as myself and we pick games and play them at the same time to support and help each other. With lots of Grandchildren I have a good common ground to communicate with them also. Just been on the net about 18 months and find it an adventure in itself. I thank everyone for their wonderful input on games coming out. I have been able to obtain many games I would have otherwise missed.

It has been soooo loooong ago that I almost forgot how I started with computers and games. At first I played Colassal Cave on a Univac Mainframe (text only). Then I bought my first computer, Texas Instruments TR99/4A, I think. It had a HUGE 16K of memory, it had a Casette Tape for mass storage (what's a hard disk, never mind - what's a floppy disk). I played a series of text adventure games on that machine that I still consider "classic text adventure games". I sold that and bought an IBM Clone called Leading Edge with 64K memory, 5 1/4 floppy (360K) and the world's biggest hard drive (10 MEG). Wow - talk about a trip down memory lane!!! My first adventure game on IBM machine was Kings Quest I on 5 1/4" floppy.

Wow Cherie and Grandpa, you guys go WAY back......Makes me feel like a baby.......

~Dee

I was breezing through some of the other topics now that I have a free moment, and I thought I would responde to this topic, albeit rather late...Anyway, I too played what was probably Colossal Cave, or something like it. It was a text adventure that the NJ programmers "slipped into" the UNIX based mainframe so we Force & Facilities people could do something interesting while monitoring the call volume late at night at our dumb terminals in Pennsylvania.

That was my very, very first interaction with adventure games, although I did not know what it would become. That was 11 years ago. Before that I had had an Atari, and then a Magnavox Odyssey, but that was exclusively arcade action. In 1993 I finally bought a Packard Bell dinky little 66MHz, 486 MB of disk space, and 4MB of RAM. The modem was 2400 baud. I still have the miniscule monitor it came with. It has since upgraded, but not to the whopping monster memory machines you guys were talking about I WISH!!). A friend built me a 166MHz, 32 MB RAM, 3 gig hard drive machine of $200 bucks. It does the job, and except for DOS installations which is just my own ignorance, I have few troubles with it.

Back to the game that got me started - the game was Myst. The ol' standard, Myst. I have never looked back. Hundreds of dollars later, I am still, at 48, having a ball. And yes, my husband ALWAYS knows where to find me!! Ha! Ha!

Hi Mooey,

Good old Myst..... Sometimes I still can't believe how hooked I am on Adventure Games. I mean, I actually pout when I don't get a chance to play.
My hubby has bowling and sports on TV.....that's how what I tell myself so I don't feel guilty.....LOL

~Dee

Very interesting thread. I started adventure gaming back in the late 80's. I think King's Quest 3 or 4 was about the first one. My daughter and I have played many games together since then. We played the rest of the KQ games and especially enjoyed the Journeyman Project series and loved The Neverhood. Myst, Last Express and the Broken Sword series were also great. We have recently discovered some old classics like Zork Grand Inquisitor and Discworld 1&2 still very playable and enjoyable. Working on Discworld Noir just now and really enjoying it.

The Snake

[This message has been edited by Thesnake (edited 10-22-1999).]