Games 🎮
Amstrad CPC 6128 👾
I played my first games on an Amstrad CPC 6128 when I was around 9 years old. The Amstrad had a CTM 644 color monitor, a disk drive, and it also came with a Joystick 🕹️, but no mouse. Everything, including playing games was done solely using the keyboard and eventually the Joystick. The Amstrad CPC 6128 even came with a TV tuner that you could place below the screen, allowing me to watch TV 🤯.
Some of the games I remember playing on my Amstrad were:
Barbarian was actually quite a brutal game, as the goal was to chop off the head of the enemy, and after you did, a green goblin came into the screen, kicked the head out of the screen and then dragged the body out of the screen too 😲
Zombi was the first game ever to be released by UbiSoft
Super Nintendo (SNES)
A few years later, I got my first console, the The Super Nintendo Entertainment System (SNES). I was fortunate to have siblings, which meant that someone was usually around to play games like Mario Kart with me.
Here are a few games I can remember playing on my SNES:
Super Mario World was my first SNES game
Super Mario Kart was probably the game I played the most on my SNES due to its split screen feature. One mode was obviously racing, but there was also a second mode called "Battle Mode," which took place in arenas where you had to pop the 3 balloons on the other players' kart before they could pop yours. This was so much fun 🤣
My first PC (i486)
My first PC ever had an Intel 486DX2-66 processor, and this was the golden age of MS-DOS games. It was also a great period for adventure games. I probably played every 80s and early 90s adventure game LucasArts and Sierra would produce, but I also loved playing strategy, city builder and simulation games
King's Quest I was a leap forward compared to earlier adventure games, not only because it was using bitmap graphics (instead of vector graphics). Even though it had modern graphics that were partially animated, it was still a text adventure game which means that you had to type in the commands, like climb rope or give cheese to rat to control the main character of the game
Maniac Mansion was another leap forward and the first game using the LucasArts SCUMM game engine. It was the first point-and-click adventure game I ever played
The Secret of Monkey Island Monkey Island 1 & 2 are still today my two favorite adventure games of all times
The Settlers (german: Die Siedler)
Doom Years after first playing this game, I remember still coming back to build custom levels. It was a lot of fun, and I think I spent more time modding Doom than I actually spent playing it
UFO: Enemy Unknown (X-COM: UFO Defense in the US) This game had such an amazing intro (video below)
Pizza Connection (Pizza Tycoon in the US)
The Clou! (German: Der Clou!) The mix of genres in this game was what I liked most. The first part was like a classical adventure game in which you were wandering through the city of London trying to recruit members for your crew, but there was also a second part that was a top-down view of the interior of the buildings, in which you had to execute the actual burglaries
The Settlers II: Veni, Vidi, Vici (german: Die Siedler II)
Video (with sound) of the intro of X-COM: UFO Defense:
Nintendo 64
After the SNES, the next console I got was the Nintendo 64. Of course Mario Kart 64 was the first game I played and I was surprised to see how much it had evolved in comparison with the SNES version from 5 years before
SEGA Saturn
Another few years later, I bought the SEGA Saturn. I had spent some time in amusement arcades, where I played games like SEGA Rally and Daytona a lot, but putting coins into the machine to be able to play was very costly over time. When SEGA released a console where I could play those games at home, it was a dream come true for me. I didn't have a lot of SEGA Saturn games but here are the ones I remember most vividly:
Virtua Cop The game came with a light gun called the SEGA Virtua Gun. It was like playing an arcade game at home
My 2nd PC (Pentium Pro + Modem)
My second PC had an Intel Pentium Pro processor and also had a 3dfx Voodoo graphics card 🤯. I upgraded was because after having used Windows 3.1 for 4 years it was time to get new hardware and start using Windows 95. However the biggest reason for me was that I finally was able to persuade my parents to let me buy a 28.8 kbit/s dial-up modem to be able to access the internet and play multiplayer games. For my parents it was the start of a period when they would hear sounds like "beeep bluurp bop" modem sounds when they picked up the phones handset to call someone and me losing my connection to the battle.net servers. At some point I got a faster 56 kbit/s modem which was a spectacular upgrade in terms of connection speed
Tomb Raider or the day I fell in love with Lara Croft 😊
Diablo was my first online game. It was mindblowing for me to be able to connect to battle.net using my modem and be able to play with other gamers from all over the world
Unreal Tournament 2004 Capture the flag (CTF) was by far my favorite multiplayer mode. The rush you got when taking the flag and knowing you had to travel all the way back to your base, without getting killed and before the enemy team took your flag was epic. I also liked a lot was that unlike other FPS games, UT2004 had vehicles. Racing with the Manta through maps, making a jump and coming crashing down on an enemy player, made me smile every time 😅
My 3rd PC (Pentium 4 / Windows XP)
My 3rd PC had a Pentium 4 processor with Windows XP. The Windows 95/98 days were finally over, and I finally got a faster Internet connection (ADSL / ISDN). I bought this PC because I knew World of Warcraft was about to get released. I kept this PC for a very long period of time because the only game I was playing was WoW, and I didn't need another PC. I however, kept upgrading it, adding more Ram, adding a second Hard disk drive and after a few years I also replaced the graphics card. In the end I think I kept using this PC for more than 8 years.
World of Warcraft (WoW) was mindblowing. It was the first MMO I had ever played. I remember the first time I arrived in Stormwind City and saw all the other players running around, and those were no NPCs like in other games. Those were real people sitting behind their computers, just like me. It felt so good to be surrounded by other players and be able to interact with them. Yes some quests were repetitive, and the grind was real. I enjoyed doing quests that told us more about the fantastic Warcraft storyline, which I had already enjoyed while playing the previous Warcraft strategy game(s)
The Burning Crusade would finally allow us to march through the Dark Portal. The expansion came out at a perfect time, because many things you could do in WoW started to feel excessively repetitive, and the expansion did not disappoint. It brought two new playable races, the Draenei of the Alliance and the Blood Elves of the Horde, a new PvP Arena System, and a lot of new content to explore. It was great to have new content to enjoy with people I had been playing with for some time
Wrath of the Lich King meant we had to get ready for the new snowy region called Northrend. By now, I had made many friends in the game and had spent several years in the same alliance. Together, we had slain countless raid bosses to get the best possible gear in the game. After having watched the trailer countless times (blizzard cinematics are the best I have ever seen), we were more than ready to face the Lich King and his minions
Cataclysm was the last expansion I played and would mark the end of an epic journey that had lasted more than 6 years. I'm not exactly sure what made me quit, but I guess one day, I just woke up and decided for myself that it was enough 😉
My 4th PC (Intel Core i7 / Windows 10)
I got my 4th PC in 2014. I bought an Intel Core i7-5960X processor and an Asus RAMPAGE V EXTREME board, 32 GB of RAM, a 512GB SSD, 2 AsusSTRIX GTX980 graphics cards (connected via an SLI bridge), and an Asus ROG PG278Q 27 inch / 144Hz gaming monitor
My 4th PC was a dream come true. I had worked hard in the past few years, and I thought I had earned a reward because I had just gotten a new job. I didn't just buy costly parts but also built a custom liquid cooling system to cool the processor, the RAM, and, of course, the dual graphics cards. I also bought blue lights, as well as several white and blue spray cans to spray the black inside of the tower, the graphics cards' back plates, and the PSU.
Here are some pics I took back then:
As of today (01.01.2024), I still use it 👾. It is now 10 years old, but it is enough for the kind of games I play. I plan on buying a new PC at some point but have not made any plans yet.
Fallout 3 is my favorite Fallout game so far. The story and atmosphere were great
Left 4 Dead 2 is a game I had a lot of fun playing with my co-workers
Battlefield Bad Company 2, more specifically the Vietnam expansion, is the Battlefield game I liked more than the others. Doing kamikaze dives into the enemy camp using the helicopter and then going on a rampage was fun for me (and maybe a bit less for the others that had joined me in the helicopter not knowing what I was up to). It is also the only FPS I remember not being too bad as a Sniper
Civilization V is the one Civilization game I played the most. I'm not sure if it is the best one they ever released, but it is the one I played the most so far. I have enjoyed the Civilization and Colonization series since the first games were released, and I still like them today
Fallout 4 was not the best Fallout but the one I played the most, for the simple reason that I spent countless hours building my own Vault and Settlement. My vault was a great place to display all the comic books and Power Armors I had collected
I haven't played a lot of games lately. When I play, it is often on my iPad, while also binge-watching a TV series. Lately I spent a lot of time (and money) playing Rise of Kingdoms. Some PC games that I bought or planned on buying were disappointing (to say the least), like Fallout 76 and City Skylines 2, to just name a few.
However, several smaller games like DAVE THE DIVER, Katana ZERO, DREDGE, Graveyard Keeper, Fabledom... that I mostly watched others play on Twitch have reignited my desire to create my own game someday, which is why I also spend more and more time watching solo game devs build their dream game on Youtube. I however currently don't have enough money aside to be able to spend 3-4 years working on a project like that, so who knows what will happen next... to be continued