I’m as old as dirt, or at least my kids seem to think so, they don’t get the love I have for one of the original video game systems, the ATARI! I remember my mom’s younger brother had one and how my eyes grew the first time I saw the graphics, and how it was my mission to have my parents buy me one. I don’t remember how young I was, or if my brother who is 8.75 years younger than me was even born, but my parents did indeed buy me one. I do remember my brother as a tiny tot playing it with me, then he was around 5 when he became the NES Nintendo generation. I went on to buy an original game boy with my first job as a teen to play Tetris but that was the extent of my video game love, I will always be an Atari and original Tetris girl. My brother went on to be a Sega Genesis and then Sony PlayStation kid/teen/adult My own children of course got all his hand me downs, the original NES, the super NES and I don’t know how many N64 this house and my parent’s house has seen. We have also always gifted our children the handheld systems through the years from Nintendo to Sony, and the consoles. My oldest with his 9th Birthday money purchased a Nintendo GameCube and the story went on.
Between Hubz and the kids this house has held; all Sony Playstations, Sony Vitas Sony PSP, Nintendo handhelds, all the Nintendo consoles, All the Xbox systems, and Gaming Computers. As each new system came around, this mama would donate the old ones, who knew that one day in the near future Hubz and the kids would round up all those old systems and re bring them home! Of course I too rounded up an Atari and have it to play! HUBZ also collects the new classic minis, the Sega Genesis has been on Amazon pre-order for months, it will be shipped in a week I believe. My top faves from each system are as follows
ATARI
When I found my Atari a few years ago, I had to hunt down a copy of this game, it was like I had played it yesterday! Not to be mistaken with Pitfall
NES
Oh the nights spent awake trying to clear a board!
SUPER NINTENDO
It’s Mario! & Yoshi!
SEGA GENESIS
I was a late teen/young adult when my brother had this console. I will never forget the belly laugh I’d get seeing Sonic tap his foot when play was stopped.My dad bought this game for our oldest two to play when they went to visit, this and a McDonald’s Game!
N64
Like Tetris, But not really, still fun
GAME CUBE
While mama was playing the original Sims on the PC, my daughter played this on the game cube by the hours. I could never get into Sims on the consoles, for me it is a PC game only but loved how she enjoyed this so much.
WII
We loved all the just dances, our youngest once even had a just dance birthday party.
WII U
These Mario parties are great family games!
NINTENDO SWITCH
Such a cute mini games game. I don’t play much of the switch but this one so far of the ones I have played is my fave.
PLAYSTATION 1
This one technically is not my fave, I did not much play the Ps1 and we only have a few games in our collection now. This shout out goes to my brother and oldest child, those 2 boys, 10 years apart from each other, played this game series on their own, together and on their own again through all the Sony systems over the years. It was life for them both as far as video games go.
PLAYSTATION 2
Another shout out here, our second youngest loved, and still loves this series. I recall an early Black Friday line up at Target a few years ago for Hubz to get one of these games for him. This family ( not mama) has spent many over night/early morning line ups for games and consoles!
PLAYSTATION 3
This game is so cute, and I got to watch as our youngest from preschool age- to a preteen played this series until his heart burst.
PLAYSTATION 4
We have this game series mostly on the PC, where we stream it to the tv’s and play as a family. This game is always good for good old fashion family fun, laughs and memories. I remember playing you don’t know jack in the 90’s on the PC with my brother.
XBOX
While all my boys, daughter, and brother are Sony players, Hubz is an Xbox guy, I remember our early years together and him playing this series for hours, my brother gifted him this one for Christmas one year.
XBOX 360
These family game night games were so much fun for our family, we played these disks out!
XBOX 1
I love this series too, I just wish more people were online to play Monopoly, my kids laugh at me and say this doesn’t count as a video game lol. My nieces love playing battleshipMy youngest introduced me to this game, and now I love it, he and I play all the time and it is also a fan fave with my nieces.
GAMEBOY
There is a huge Tetris following, I heard not too long ago that this is one of the most sold games, with over 100 million copies sold. I think it’s for all consoles over the years, but non the less, people agree with me, this game is awesome!I also spent many hours and bus rides as a teen trying to clear these games
PC GAMING
Next to my Atari games and Tetris, and probably even more so, THIS IS MY FAVE GAME! I was given a gift card from my kids school when one year myself, my daughter and a few of her friends began and designed their school year book. I purchased this with it, that was almost ten years ago. even though number 4 has came out I have so many of the expansions for this one gifted to me and purchased, I just stick to playing this one, to this day. I have owned the series up to this one.
Happy Video Game Day! Do you have a favourite system or game?
Make sure you have plenty of snacks and your favorite games. Get your friends together for a marathon session! Friends, new games, retro games, munchies and beverages, and you’re ready to go. Use #NationalVideoGamesDay to post on social media.
Our oldest graduated from University 3 years ago with a computer sciences degree ( he is a computer programmer) , he is 25 now and just moved on in his career to work at GOOGLE!
Hubz and I laugh now how as a young mom and a young step dad we use to shoo him off the computer and video games because it was going to rot his brain!
All jokes aside we did what we thought was best while allowing our kids to enjoy and pursue what captured their interests.
Our other son is currently getting a computer sciences degree as well, and our daughter started in a security course. All gamers, yet functioning adults now, ….THANK THE UNIVERSE lol, just one more to go.
As you can see video games are not always shooter games, there are many games that can be shared for family game nights. In fact I had very strict rules about age appropriate games, the younger kids can thank their older siblings who eased me into some “ok” games not marked E for everyone lol.
I loved playing games on the Atari! My brother had a Game Boy and we were supposed to share, but I only wanted to play Tetris. I could play that game for hours!
Our kids had to share a pc (that didnt last long as they became teens lol) and the consoles (again only till were teens) but the handhelds we made sure each had one in a different colour lol. I had my gameboy up until a few years ago when the screen went. It seen many trillion hours of Tetris and now i have other game boys that play it…even the orignal!
I loved playing games on the Atari! My brother had a Game Boy and we were supposed to share, but I only wanted to play Tetris. I could play that game for hours!
LikeLike
Our kids had to share a pc (that didnt last long as they became teens lol) and the consoles (again only till were teens) but the handhelds we made sure each had one in a different colour lol. I had my gameboy up until a few years ago when the screen went. It seen many trillion hours of Tetris and now i have other game boys that play it…even the orignal!
LikeLiked by 1 person