Topic: Ages of players

I go through a lot of comments, I read forums, and I also read a lot of the reviews as well. I prefer reading the article as to watching a video. Why? I'm 45. I grew up reading articles and I feel smarter after reading anything, like I've learned something.

I have often wondered after reading a game review or a comment after it, how old the player base was that wrote it. I just finished reading a review and in the comments a few players mentioned how the game is the best they have ever played and is now their favorite game ever.

My question is: How old are you? I'm up there as a gamer, and I have played a lot of games over my lifetime. What is their comparison model?

I ask this because it seems like an impossible thing for myself to say, as I can't compare the first Resident Evil to kings quest 1 to dragons lair, games I absolutely loved when they first came out but for completely different reasons.

Ah, food for thought....

37.

It started here for me.

19, turning 20 in not too long. I’m not sure it affects my judgment too much since I play both retro games and modern ones although a lot of N64 and PS1 games are slightly dated for me but might have been brilliant when they came out.

i'm 36 and started gaming when i was 4

and i'm still doing it

33. Started gaming when I was about 5.

32. I can’t tell you when I first started gaming because my memories aren’t properly sequential from when I was very young. I do remember properly floppy floppy disks.

I remember my dad telling me when we first got a computer that had CDs that if you touched the shiny side or put it shiny side down on a surface it would stopped working.

42. Been gaming since I was about 5. Which is probably closer to my mental age lol. I fully embrace what most modern technology has to offer. Like these days I prefer to watch reviews and stuff rather than reading coverage on games. Although I still subscribe to OPM.

Just gone 38.

Started off gaming when at my uncles house and he used to rent(!) an Atari 2600 and a 48k Speccy.
We (my brother and I) had our own 128k+ Speccy eventually and just carried on from there.

@darklaw I'm not sure I could put a pin in what I'd call my favourite ever game these days.
As you describe, there are many favourites, from many systems and periods and for many reasons.

But, people enjoy things differently. I know many people who like me play relatively few games over the course of a console generation, but also people who seem to play every other release and even those who mostly just play the annual CODs and FIFAs.

Gaming is a past time that unlike many others, genuinely caters for all tastes and temperaments.

I don't want to give my exact age, but 21-24. (paranoid I guess)
I've been playing games almost as long as I can remember. I started on a PS2/SNES, I think the SNES was technically first since I don't remember getting it but I can remember renting games to start with the PS2. An ATV game I explored the crap out of with my siblings was one of the first one I played. The Super Mario Collection and Papterboy are two of the ones I first remember.
I had a similar transformation with my tastes as @KratosMD did. At first it was just fun, story isn't that important. I now have a lot more in terms of expectations for stories in my games and love when games are artistic. I like a game that makes me think. While of course some games that just fun are always going to be there, I also think games don't have to be fun (they do have to be quality though), which is it drives me nuts when people ignorantly say, for example, Death Stranding objectively isn't a good game but they love it. I treat everything that way now though, I like to dig books, movies, anime, games, all of it for deeper themes and feel people can often miss them.
My favorite game used to be Uncharted 3, which has great characters, but I never thought the series had great stories. Now a game has to have a good story to by my favorite. My all-time favorite is Persona 5, which is completely there for story reasons.

Early 30s.

It started out with the Mega Drive for me before converting over to PlayStation from there on in (with brief stops for the GameBoy and Wii).

The biggest change for me is that with games getting longer, me getting slightly less time to game, and having more money to buy games, I very rarely replay games so don’t always feel such an affinity for specific game as I used to.

For instance, MGS1 was amazing for the time. But seeing as it could be complete in 6-8 hours with a quick run and the fact I had few other games, I must have played it through at least four or five times (certainly enough times to unlock the tuxedo) so I remember it so well. Whereas MGS5 was so long I can only remember a few specific things about it but remember it more generally.

And this seems an apt place to post this twitter thread.

I particularly liked ones about GameBoy accessories and either writing to a magazine or calling a hotline to the developers when you needed help with a game.

@Thrillho That's great!

A few (more than a few) years ago, some mates and I had pretty much rinsed Rogue Leader on the Game Cube to the point where we were doing speed runs for the mission where you have to fly right in and take out a Star Destroyer. We found that one of the magazines one of us was in to, Nintendo Power I think, was running a competition for it. So we started recording runs on VHS tapes.
One of us got the best time (not me) and we sent it in. Got a mention in the following edition!
I guess to players accustomed to just pressing a button on a controller and firing something over to YouTube without much fuss would baulk at the laborious process 😂

Age 68. Into my 2nd year after being introduced to gaming by injured serviceman in hospital.
Purchased PS4 Pro 1tb with a VR system and have'nt looked back since, let's face it after 6 years of retirement I've plenty of time on my hands - I've downloaded 58 games, of which around 12 are in VR, still have 250gb left and spend quite a bit of my spare time on the console.
We have 6 grandchildren, 2 of whom are 13 & 16 and play with and against me when here, I have to say that they visit more often than they used to (another bonus!)...

Best game to date: RDR2.

42 year old here. It all started with this baby and a tape deck.

I have gamed on and off to varying degrees over the years. Switched to consoles with the Sega Master System. I remember my Dad taking me to Toys R Us to get it and only having the built in game Alex Kidd for a while. Then it was a Snes which was a peak gaming period with some of my fondest gaming times. I got a Snes mini almost entirely for Zelda and F-zero.
After that a certain company called Sony entered the race and I have had all their systems since. I have grown with the medium and definitely feel like games have become better experiences as they have evolved. I would say most of my favourite games are from this generation but I'm excited to see if the next can top it.

46 year old here.First got into gaming when my dad bought the VIC 20.Thought it was the coolest thing ever despite having to wait a lifetime for the tapes to load..(and people moan about a minute loading screens now)
Then a few years later my parents bought us (my older brother and sister) the Atari 2600 which was on another level!
Soon after my sister lost interest and it was really just my brother and I but I ended up buying the Sega Megadrive as well as started to collect the Game And Watch Handhelds which I deeply regret selling for a ridiculously low price.
I was allowed to set up the megadrive in hospital when I became seriously Ill back in 92 which helped me and my young roommate get through the worst of it.
Shining Force,Shining Force 2,LandStalker,Soleil and Rocket Knight Adventures were some of my faves.The add on Mega CD introduced me to my fave RPG ever Lunar The Silver Star and for a while I would play nothing BUT rpgs..
After The Sega systems came to a halt I jumped onto the PlayStation consoles and apart from a jump to the 360 it wasn't long before I jumped back again and am completely loyal to Sony (ok so I won't mention my fantastic Nintendo Switch )

My father brought home the original pong console. In which you could play Pong against the computer or another person. It was the home version released by Sears in 1975, so I was 2 at the time. I barely remember it except for one memory of spinning the knob as fast as possible to try to "Cheat" to win. Never worked though. lol

I'm mid 30s, and the first console that was my own, my precious, was the Sega Genesis/Mega Drive, and then Playstation consoles from then on out. I think I'm of the generation that was lucky to get to experience emerging 3D while being in my formative years - and that really cemented my love for gaming. It captures the imagination more than if you were already a cynical adult by the time. I used to buy the OPM and still have a couple from 1997, one was the Tomb Raider 2 preview issue with Lara spread over the front and back cover, and the other with Cloud on the cover with the first review of FFVII. I remember being so intrigued by this Japanese RPG and the reviewer being bowled over by the dynamic moving backgrounds. Simpler times lol

@Vahla_Hanesh There's a lot of similarity in our backstories and, as such, I completely agree with your sentiment about hitting formative 3D gaming in our formative years (with no disrespect to any "cynical adults" who may be passing through).

I used to spend hours staring at foregrounds and backgrounds in PSone games, imagining what was beyond the walls, wishing I could go check it out. It was something I'd never done with any of my MegaDrive games, which were still awesome; it's just that I treated them more like moving comic books, rather than believing they were actual, real worlds.

That being said, it's still a bit of a struggle to play Tomb Raider II right after Shadow of the Tomb Raider, given how far we've come in this last generation!

@RogerRoger As a current cynical adult I know it to be true that I would not be as impressed or captivated by it haha. I genuinely feel lucky to grow up in the time I did with the hobby that I had, though I did take it for granted that this was just how things were. Looking back there was massive leaps happening that we were getting to enjoy and take advantage of.

Agree about Tomb Raider. I love both versions but when you go back to classic Tomb Raider and can see how it was made I feel it is now more of a puzzle game rather than what it was packaged on release. With the blocky limitations of the time there's such a strictness to how you need to play and progress.

Gotta say, I still love old school Lara's character model, her animation is really fluid.

@Vahla_Hanesh Oh, agreed. The animations they achieved are still really satisfying to pull off.

Even as somebody who grew up with a PSone, I sometimes find it difficult going back and playing PSone games for the first time today (whereas I don't mind replaying the ones I had back in the day; something to do with muscle memory, I suppose). It's a sign of how far we've come, that so many leaps have been made and we've travelled so far from those first, franchise-creating adventures.

But I'm halfway through a slow-burn playthrough of Tomb Raider II at the moment because, you're right, they're puzzle games dressed up as action games (even TR2, which is way more action-heavy) and it's something the new adventures rarely capture.

Anyway, we're drifting a little off-topic! For the record, I'll be 33 next week.