Gaming is a staple for many people and this is before we even had PC or console gaming. Childhood Gaming started as early as we were born with our parents playing games like peek a boo with us, fort building, princesses and tea parties or even cops and robbers. The imagination and possibilities were endless. Be it games like tag, ring around the rosie, duck duck goose, 7UP, monkey in the middle and the list could go on and on. These are just some of the games that were played when we were younger.

Childhood gaming was the first step into the PC and console world of gaming and even today many video games on PC, console or tablets are used with education and building the mind of children as they age. In this series, I’m going to talk a bit about childhood gaming and the first games that led to what I’d like to say my long life of gaming and gaining friendships. 

Childhood gaming stemmed as far as your imagination would take you. From creating a fantasy world of magic and dragons, to chasing down bad guys and getting justice for your people to just simply creating a world where you rode around on your “horse” through a field on a warm summer day. The childhood imagination is the work of wonder and in those summer days or cold winter evenings you could create a story that is just your own or with your friends. 

Before we ever had the kind of gaming we do today, we used our imagination to bring our stories to life but that’s not to say that PC or console gaming didn’t play a part in our childhood gaming experience. 

The first dive I took into the console gaming world was with my brother, we would have competitions that often had the reward of the winner not having to do the after dinner dishes. We would play duck hunt on the Nintendo and whoever could get the most ducks would win. He always beat me because I wasn’t very good at aiming and would find myself laughing at the dog in the game. 

This early life of duck hunt then led into Super Mario Bros and it turns out I was pretty good at platformers and my brother spent a lot of time doing the dishes after dinner. This became a nightly ritual for us, we would get home after school to do our homework and as soon as that was done we would race over to our Nintendo and load up duck hunt or Super Mario Bros. Sometimes we’d even have to blow into the cartridge to get the game to boot up. Many could say that having an “A button”, “B button” and direction pad isn’t very complex for gaming but when I was a kid, it was pretty complicated to get that timing right. I know that I spent a lot of time gloating about beating my brother at Super Mario Bros, it’s why my brother would suggest duck hunt just so he wouldn’t get stuck doing the dishes again. This is just one of the memories I have from my early childhood days of gaming on the console. 

Before I even touched a console, I would often play games at school and one of my teacher’s favourite games and even though I was a kid then and didn’t really know any better, I believe now she used this as a way to keep her class quiet and to bring us some joy of not having to do classwork but we would play 7UP. On the playground at recess, we would play tag, hide and seek, hop scotch and double dutch, just to name a few.

Childhood gaming for many is what launched us into our expansive world of gaming today and even though we don’t play tag or hide and seek outside as much as we used to, we still do it virtually with our friends in various games. I’m sure many of you can relate to the fun little games we played as a child. 

To conclude this Let’s Talk, I’d love to hear from you in the comments. I’ll leave you with this question: What childhood game do you remember playing that’s stuck with you even to this day? 

Until the next Let’s Talk. 

Stormy signing off.