Atari collector demographics

[Schizophretard]

What you are describing is not nostalgia Schizo.

Yes, it is.

 

If you were born in 1981 and you say you are "nostalgic for Wizard of Oz", it implies that you were there on or around the time or era when Wizard of Oz was a current movie event. What you are trying to describe is a nostalgia for a younger, happier time in your life when you saw and loved/appreciated/adored/enjoyed Wizard of Oz.

How is nostalgia for a younger, happier time in my life when I saw and loved/appreciated/adored/enjoyed Wizard of Oz not nostalgia? What about the definition of the word does it violate?

[Andromeda Stardust]

This thread went to a weird place.

 

 

 

3: The Beatles are a decent boy band, but gimme the Rolling Stones any day of the week.

This x1000!

 

There is a reason why the Rolling Stones just celebrated their 50th anniversary and even have a magazine named after them, whereas the Beatles disbanded after 9 years...

 

 

 

 

3. There'd be no Stones without the Beatles ~~~

Oh, poppycock...

 

= = = = = = = = = =

 

As for the Nostalgia argument, yes it helps if people want to remember things of the past, but the experience of playing a vintage game in 2017 is the same as it was in 1982, regardless of a person's current age, if he/she was alive when the game released, or whether he/she experienced it for the first time 35 years ago or last week.

 

Otherwise, nobody would ever branch out and collect games they may have seen in ads bitd but never got to play, pick up retro games they never heard of bitd, and hell, if the only reason anyone collected retro games was to play the exact same games they did during their childhood, then the homebrew culture would be practically non-existent. Face it, people play old games and collect antiques for the same reason: they just don't make 'em like they used to.

 

And discovering new old games that we weren't aware ever existed can keep the hobby fresh because even after 30+ years, there is still stuff we haven't played or discovered yet!

[Schizophretard]

This x1000!

 

There is a reason why the Rolling Stones just celebrated their 50th anniversary and even have a magazine named after them, whereas the Beatles disbanded after 9 years...

 

 

Oh, poppycock...

 

= = = = = = = = = =

 

As for the Nostalgia argument, yes it helps if people want to remember things of the past, but the experience of playing a vintage game in 2017 is the same as it was in 1982, regardless of a person's current age, if he/she was alive when the game released, or whether he/she experienced it for the first time 35 years ago or last week.

 

Otherwise, nobody would ever branch out and collect games they may have seen in ads bitd but never got to play, pick up retro games they never heard of bitd, and hell, if the only reason anyone collected retro games was to play the exact same games they did during their childhood, then the homebrew culture would be practically non-existent. Face it, people play old games and collect antiques for the same reason: they just don't make 'em like they used to.

 

And discovering new old games that we weren't aware ever existed can keep the hobby fresh because even after 30+ years, there is still stuff we haven't played or discovered yet!

 

What year did you say you started playing Atari?

[Andromeda Stardust]

 

What year did you say you started playing Atari?

I discovered NES in fall 2002.

 

I discovered Atari in spring of 2012.

 

I discovered Classic Rock in 2010 when I got an XM Radio in my car and got hooked on Classic Rewind. Yes, freaking 2010. What rock was I living under? Finally got a turntable in fall 2012 and still discovering stuff I never knew existed...

 

Let's see what else. I couldn't ride a bike or roller skate until around age 10 or so. Tie my shoes until age 11. Figured out how to whistle at age 12. Finally figured out how to pop bubble gum at age 31!!! Late bloomer I guess?

[Schizophretard]

I discovered NES in fall 2002.

 

I discovered Atari in spring of 2012.

 

Would you say that you have already and/or it is possible that later in life you could play the NES or Atari and you long for BITD of 2002 or 2012? Like maybe you are 60 years old, play a game on Atari, and you think,"Man this takes me back! I miss those good times on AtariAge! I remember what it was like playing this game for the first time and I kind of miss that feeling of when it was brand new and exciting!" or some similar emotion like that?

[Andromeda Stardust]

 

Would you say that you have already and/or it is possible that later in life you could play the NES or Atari and you long for BITD of 2002 or 2012? Like maybe you are 60 years old, play a game on Atari, and you think,"Man this takes me back! I miss those good times on AtariAge! I remember what it was like playing this game for the first time and I kind of miss that feeling of when it was brand new and exciting!" or some similar emotion like that?

In 2003 I got into some legal troubles and had my PC confiscated. No internet for six months. I remember spending long hours hacking games using nothing but a Game Genie with pen and paper. Sometimes when I play with the genie, I remember those long hours I spent typing in random six figure codes hoping something would pop up.

 

I discovered the address that controls the 400 player clock and 300 player clock levels by pure accident. I could set the clock to 900 on every level and it felt like I'd won the lottery by discovering such a useful code.

 

Later in 2004 when I got my PC back, I started delving into ROM hacking with a hex editor, and created some genius 3-byte ROM hacks.

 

My favorite is Super Mario Bros alternate ending. 8-4 is a dead end and the pipe in 8-2 warps directly to Bowser!

 

Originally posted by: Kosmic StarDust

 

Originally posted by: hybrid

 

nice try and find that code

Super Mario Bros.: Three byte level hack...

 

IKIZKV + ITAXPA + OYYXZA = Super Mario Brothers Dead End and Alternate Path

 

IKIZKV = 8-4 Dead End

ITAXPA + OYYXZA = 8-2 Pipe (After the long jump) leads directly to Bowser

 

If you hit the flagpole on 8-2, the game cannot be completed.

 

 

 

 

http://nintendoage.com/forum/messageview.cfm?catid=31&threadid=161155

More GG from my old code text files, circa 2004...

 

 

I dug up my old text file (Click attached so you don't lose formatting - bolded stuff I think is worth checking out). Please be aware that this list is over ten years old (2005) and I haven't tested everyting recently. Most of these I made by modifying objects in YY-SMB and saving the ROM, then comparing the offset in a hex editor and using GG_Converter to make codes out of them. My rule was it had to fit in three bytes or less for the Genie. Unfortunately a lot of stuff I recall making over the years appears to be lost and most of the handwritten stuff that survived was just me tweaking or combining someone elses codes. Some of the YY-SMB edits I remember making, I can recreate though.

 

LLAZAP - End-Pipe in 1-2 puts mario on the flagpole!

LLLZAP - Same for world 4-2...

LLYZYP - WORLD 2-2

 

Alternate Ending:

IKIZKV + ITAXPA + OYYXZA - SMB1 has an alternate ending.

I won't give you all of the details, but

bowser has set up a trap in world 8-4.

The secret to finding the princess is an

"Easter Egg" buried elsewhere, at the end

of a long jump in world 8-2!

 

Yes, I did all of this with just 3 simple

Game Genie codes, meaning it will work on

an old NES console, too!!!

 

Gotta Love my hacking skills

 

THIS NEXT ONE IS PURE EVIL:

VLIPNT - ENTER THE 8-4 PRINCESS CHAMBER

WITH GREAT FREEZE

 

YEGETN+IOIAPN - WELCOME TO THE FART ZONE!

 

4-2 WARP ZONE LEADS TO:

 

AEYAYY - WORLD 0 (FLOODED CASTLE - EMPTY)

PEYAYY - WORLD 1 (START OVER)

ZEYAYY - 2

LEYAYY - 3

GEYAYY - 4

IEYAYY - 5 (DEFAULT)

TEYAYY - 6

YEYAYY - 7

AEYAYN - 8

PEYAYN - WORLD 9 (BIZZARRE - FREEZES)

 

GXYAYY - THE INFAMOUS MINUS WORLD

IXYAYY - SPECIAL BONUS "PLUS" WORLD

 

VNYAYN - WARP TO THE 8-7-6 WARP ZONE WORLD

 

AEYAZN - WARP TO WORLD 8 FROM 1-2 (8-4-3)

 

YZAPXN - FORTH PIPE IN 1-1 LEADS TO WARP ZONE

 

WARP ZONES DISABLED:

 

SLAZLP - 1-2 Warp DISABLED - Toad stands guard as a reminder

EAAXOS - 4-2 VINE IS A 1UP

AGTXOS - 4-2 END PIPE BROKEN (MUST TAKE WARP)

VKYXSP - 8-7-6 WARP ZONE DOESN'T WORK - Commit suicide to return to world 4-2

 

First Goomba Enemy Sprites:

 

LPAPSY - 1st Goomba is a BIG pile of shit,

which turns into stinky red koopla

when stomped - YUK!

 

AAAPSY - 1ST goomba is a green turtle #00 (000)

zaapsy - buzzy beetle #02 (002)

laapsy - 1st goomba is a red turtle #03 (003)

iaapsy - hammer brother #05 (005)

taapsy - goomba (default) #06 (006)

yaapsy - blooper #07 (007)

AAAPSN - bullet bill #08 (008)

zaapsn - green fishy #0A (009)

laapsn - red fishy #0B (010)

gaapsn - fire ball #0C (011)

iaapsn - pirana flower #0D (012)

yaapsn - red paratrooper (vert) #0F (015)

apapsy - green paratrooper (horiz) #10 (016)

ppapsy - grounded Likatu #11 (017)

zpapsy - spiney (likatu ahead) #12 (018)

LPAPSY - BIG pile of shit - yuk! #13 (019)

GPAPSY - Lots of flying fish! #14 (020)

ypapsn - hot hot hot! #1F (031)

IZAPSN - BOWSER GETS A HEAD START! #2D (045)

ilapsy - toad says "hello" #35 (053)

ylapsy - 2 goombas instead of one #37 (055)

alapsn - 3 goombas instead of one #38 (056)

llapsn - two kooplas #3B (059)

glapsn - three kooplas #3C (060)

 

IPAPON - MISMATCHED ENEMIES IN 1-1 ONLY

 

SPECIAL ITEM SPRITES (Top "?" block above first grouping):

 

AEPZYT - TOP (?) BLOCK IS A MUSHROOM #00 (000)

PEPZYT - A COIN (DEFAULT) #01 (001)

ZEPZYT - AN HIDDEN COIN #02 (002)

LEPZYT - AN HIDDEN 1UP #03 (003)

GEPZYT - A [bRICK] MUSHROOM #04 (004)

IEPZYT - A VINE (BUGGY) #05 (005)

TEPZYT - A STARMAN #06 (006)

YEPZYT - MULTIPLE COINS #07 (007)

AEPZYV - A 1UP #08 (008)

ZEPZYV - A USED ITEM BOX (DUD) #0A (010)

YEPZYV - NOTHING (AIR) #0F (015)

AXPZYT - AN EMPTY BRICK #20 (032)

AUPZYT - A STONE #30 (048)

AKPZYT - LOOSE COIN #40 (064)

*ASPZYT - ALSO AN EMPTY BRICK #50 (032)

*AVPZYT - ALSO A STONE #60 (048)

ANPZYT - A DUMMY PIPE #70 (112)

ANPZYV - A SMART PIPE #78 (120)

 

LOIEAI+LEIEZI+AZIAIY - PLAY AS WARIO

 

When I play around with a Game Genie, I remember actually creating the codes for the first time and I get this deja vu feeling. So yeah, nostalgia from 2004 I guess. Some of it was just juvenile, like "WELCOME TO THE FART ZONE," despite my being 23 at the time of creation.

 

Funny story about that alternate ending code posted above. I came home from school and convinced my friend to play a 2-player game with me and I input that silly alternate ending bit as he was using the bathroom. He said "you had better not input any codes into that thing" and I replied "nope, I'm just using the Genie because the game won't load without it." My friend went straight to the warp zone to world 8 and I took the long way. Then he hit the dead end in 8-4 and was so pissed off! I stopped dallying around and dropped into the pipe in 8-2 and leapt across the chasm to Bowser. He was so pissed off...

warp.txt

[glazball]

Would you say that you have already and/or it is possible that later in life you could play the NES or Atari and you long for BITD of 2002 or 2012? Like maybe you are 60 years old, play a game on Atari, and you think,"Man this takes me back! I miss those good times on AtariAge! I remember what it was like playing this game for the first time and I kind of miss that feeling of when it was brand new and exciting!" or some similar emotion like that?

That 60 year old looking back at his 2012 discovery of Atari is experiencing nostalgia. But it requires that 2012 context. If that 60 year old says "Man I'm nostalgic for Atari 2600" to a stranger, he would assume the speaker is talking about the late 70’s/early 80’s when Atari was a thing and everyone had Atari fever.

 

PS. I promise not to derail the thread further, but you really would have never heard of the Rolling Stones if The Beatles had not been around. Also, the Fab Four gave, yes gave, the Stones one of their earliest hits: I Wanna Be Your Man.

[Schizophretard]

So yeah, nostalgia from 2004 I guess.

 

I'll take that as a yes which proves to me that experiencing something for the first time in the 21st century that was created in the 20th century could generate feelings of nostalgia.

[Schizophretard]

That 60 year old looking back at his 2012 discovery of Atari is experiencing nostalgia. But it requires that 2012 context. If that 60 year old says "Man I'm nostalgic for Atari 2600" to a stranger, he would assume the speaker is talking about the late 70’s/early 80’s when Atari was a thing and everyone had Atari fever.

 

PS. I promise not to derail the thread further, but you really would have never heard of the Rolling Stones if The Beatles had not been around. Also, the Fab Four gave, yes gave, the Stones one of their earliest hits: I Wanna Be Your Man.

 

A stranger's assumptions doesn't define what a person means. Besides, if the stranger kept on carrying on a conversation they would get more clarification on what is meant. For an example, just talking long enough to discover that it is a 60 year old that is speaking and then doing the math would already show that he is talking about a time after the video game crash. The same thing if I said that The Wizard of Oz makes me feel nostalgic because I'm sure that they wouldn't assume that I'm saying that I saw it when it first came out or read the book when first published.

[Rhomaios]

 

NintendoAge has a very active Atari high score board and discussion thread.

 

Yes, some people have an inferiority complex when it comes to Atari...

[Rhomaios]

 

NintendoAge has a very active Atari high score board and discussion thread.

 

Yes, some people have an inferiority complex when it comes to Atari...

[Andromeda Stardust]

 

The same thing if I said that The Wizard of Oz makes me feel nostalgic because I'm sure that they wouldn't assume that I'm saying that I saw it when it first came out or read the book when first published.

VHS. Even as a child, my eyes lit up when the black and white Kansas turned into a technicolor wonderland. I was aware that black and white = old and boring, so the color transition after the film started was surprising. And I really fell in love with the cast. Tinman was my favorite character. Or scarecrow. Heck, I liked them all...

 

In retrospect, it really amazes me that color was available to use in 1933 and studios were still making black and white movies well into the 60s. Slow adoption, or was color film just really, really expensive?

 

I also still get a big kick out of King Kong and those old black and white monster movies. Is that not nostalgia too?

[Schizophretard]

VHS. Even as a child, my eyes lit up when the black and white Kansas turned into a technicolor wonderland. I was aware that black and white = old and boring, so the color transition after the film started was surprising. And I really fell in love with the cast. Tinman was my favorite character. Or scarecrow. Heck, I liked them all...

 

In retrospect, it really amazes me that color was available to use in 1933 and studios were still making black and white movies well into the 60s. Slow adoption, or was color film just really, really expensive?

 

I also still get a big kick out of King Kong and those old black and white monster movies. Is that not nostalgia too?

 

I think price was probably a factor but also how the movies were paid for. Originally movies only made the money from ticket sales. My dad remembers going to movies as a kid. He would get a big thing of popcorn, a soda, candy, and the ticket for a quarter. He said that when a neighbor became the first to own a TV everyone in the neighborhood thought they were rich. Every weekend everyone would bring their yard chairs and watch this neighbor's black and white TV in the yard. It didn't seem as weird to them as it does us because to them it was just like going to a drive-in minus the cars and big screen because drive-ins used to be huge and not just with movies but with restaurants too. My mom's first job was at a drive-in restaurant. She worked at Frisch's Big Boy as a waitress on skates. They make it seem like we are getting lazier but when I think of everyone having waitresses coming to their cars, even the waitress wearing wheels, and then right after eating they drive right up to a movie then it makes it seem like one big culture of Hoverounds. At least they would get off wheels long enough to do the Twist but later solved that dancing problem with Disco roller rinks.

 

If it makes you feel nostalgic then it counts as nostalgia. I lived at my parents' first house until I was 25 and then the house they live in now something like 6 months before moving in with my wife. So, since the most I can experience of that house now is just driving by it I can have that nostalgic homesick feeling for pretty much anything that takes me back to being in that house.

 

Edit: I never thought of black and white as boring. Just old. I liked the original Psycho, the Andy Griffith show, Beverly Hillbillies, etc. When little I didn't even know they were filmed in black and white. I thought the color faded with age because even older color films had an inferior color than more modern films. So, I thought they faded from perfect color, to less than perfect, to eventually black and white. I got the correlation with these transitions having to do with age right but got the cause wrong. King Kong was my grandfather's favorite childhood movie and his wife(grandma obviously) cried when she was little from the witch in The Wizard of Oz.

[Andromeda Stardust]

You know it's funny in the early 80s, my parents only had a black and white TV but they finally got a color TV when we moved into the new house (where I currently still live with my mom) around 1985. I think I was 4 when we moved. So my earliest childhood memories of watching Dukes of Hazard and Mr Rogers was on that black and white TV, despite the fact that these shows were filmed entirely in color. And then when we moved into the new place, I saw all those reruns in full color. My dad had an old muscle car from 1972, lime green, I forget the make, but I used to climb out through the window because that's how the Duke Boys did it...

 

EDIT: This was my dad's old car, a Plymouth Fury Gran Sedan, I think:

[buttheadrulesagain]

I´m glad to read the evolution of this discussion. I am 34, from Mexico. Since here we were a bit behind in consoles back then, I still experienced it (the final stages though). My dad built me a player's desk with an enclosure for the controller since I was not able to hold the controller so well so young (I was around 4 when I started). Nice memories...

[Schizophretard]

You know it's funny in the early 80s, my parents only had a black and white TV but they finally got a color TV when we moved into the new house (where I currently still live with my mom) around 1985. I think I was 4 when we moved. So my earliest childhood memories of watching Dukes of Hazard and Mr Rogers was on that black and white TV, despite the fact that these shows were filmed entirely in color. And then when we moved into the new place, I saw all those reruns in full color. My dad had an old muscle car from 1972, lime green, I forget the make, but I used to climb out through the window because that's how the Duke Boys did it...

 

EDIT: This was my dad's old car, a Plymouth Fury Gran Sedan, I think:

 

My parents had a console TV. I don't remember a TV before it and I wasn't born much after they moved out of their trailer and into the house I was born in. So, I assume they bought that TV along with most of their other furniture when they got the house built. The TV lasted to maybe 1998 or so. Our first VCR loaded from the top. The remote for it had a wire. I remember my dad thinking it was cool that he could control it without having to get up. If I remember right I think the VCR had these little mechanical tuner things inside for manually tuning in channels like old TV's have then my dad would have the rabbit ears going into the VCR to work like an over the air cable box so that he could change the channels with that wired remote. I think he was more fascinated by that set-up than the ability to record shows. It is also probably why he was so fascinated by the Atari VCS because he has this box with switches and controllers that he could use on the TV without getting up that played games in a way that seemed magical to him. When he brought the Vader home he treated it like a major event like the father from a Christmas Story when he got that leg lamp. He didn't know it was Darth Vader instead of Dark Vader because his big reveal was something like,"I now present to all of you the brand new Dark Vader Atari!" He didn't seem to think there was anything wrong with PAC-MAN at all. It was his favorite game. He hated the stock controllers though. He went out and bought a Gemstick. He claimed that it was the best joystick but I suspect that he just saw the yellow button, it reminded him of PAC-MAN, and, therefore, it must be the best joystick. I remember him teaching my brother and I the double shot trick for Space Invaders. It was my first time seeing a cheat code so it seemed as amazing to me as a Game Genie. Later when I would play Super Breakout and change the difficulty switch to make the paddle bigger I got excited because I thought I found another cheat code. I couldn't read yet and didn't understand the concept of everything being programmed in so I thought that cheat codes came about by discovering them on accident by messing around with the difficulty switches and the select switch. In a way, it was kind of more fun that way than being able to read the manual and count as high as the numbers for the select switch because tinkering with the Atari felt like part of exploring the game to see what magic would happen,"Every time I hit the reset switch in Super Breakout the sounds change! It has all the sounds in the world!"

[atarilovesyou]

I have to admit, I learned something about nostalgia and its meaning. I've never felt a 'yearning' for going back to any days...that sounds almost like a pathological response, or something harbouring a mental disorder I think that's why my european friends almost never talk about nostalgia in a good way, they must be using the actual definition. But the fact is, like irony, most of us know what we mean, even though it may not be 'technically' it. And let's not forget, that which is fully understood, need not be discussed.

[Schizophretard]

I have to admit, I learned something about nostalgia and its meaning. I've never felt a 'yearning' for going back to any days...that sounds almost like a pathological response, or something harbouring a mental disorder I think that's why my european friends almost never talk about nostalgia in a good way, they must be using the actual definition. But the fact is, like irony, most of us know what we mean, even though it may not be 'technically' it. And let's not forget, that which is fully understood, need not be discussed.

Never? You never had a memory that takes you back and kind of gives you a feeling of missing it? Like maybe it is Christmas and you remember ones where a grandparent was still alive. Then you feel kind of happy and sad at the same time. You feel happy because they are good memories but sad too because you wish they were still here this Christmas? Or maybe you hear an old song that you like or maybe even one that you don't but it still triggers memories that you miss because they were good? Or you look at a pet cat or dog that are now old and lazy but miss when they were youthful, cute, and playful? Etc.? It just seems like there would have to be some memories that were good enough to make you feel happy when thinking about them but also have a kind of homesick like sad feeling because they are lost to the past.

[Keatah]

 

But what if you were a fan in your younger years? Could listening to Beatles music make you feel nostalgic by bringing up childhood memories of listening to the Beatles in your younger years?

Yes because you are wanting to go back to earlier years. That's nostalgia. You have to have experienced something. Whether it be a recording or the actual band - doesn't matter. The only thing that matters is a large block of time between the first experience and the now & present.

 

Regarding Atari. Atari is nostalgic to the people that experienced back then and are playing it today.

 

If you are playing it today for the first time, you are NOT experiencing nostalgia. That will come in time, 10 years later, 20 years later. For now it will be appreciation and admiration which morphs into nostalgia.

[Keatah]

 

 

I think THAT statement, particularly after a semi-colon, proves you can be nostalgic for something you never experienced, although I wouldn't have agreed before.

 

That is,

If watching The Andy Griffith Show gives one a sentimental yearning for the happiness of a former place or time

Then by definition, that IS nostalgia, regardless of what year you were born.

 

EDIT: Hehe... however a lookup of the definition of Sentimental keeps referencing nostalgia! Kind of a loop here...

Would a 20-something today have a sentimental yearning for the days of Andy and Opie, or just a plain yearning?

Do I have to look up yearning now?

 

"Happiness of a former place or time" clearly implies that you were there to experience it. No contest.

[Schizophretard]

Yes because you are wanting to go back to earlier years. That's nostalgia. You have to have experienced something. Whether it be a recording or the actual band - doesn't matter. The only thing that matters is a large block of time between the first experience and the now & present.

 

Regarding Atari. Atari is nostalgic to the people that experienced back then and are playing it today.

 

If you are playing it today for the first time, you are NOT experiencing nostalgia. That will come in time, 10 years later, 20 years later. For now it will be appreciation and admiration which morphs into nostalgia.

 

Your explanation of appreciation and admiration morphing into nostalgia makes more sense to me because it is focusing on more about when the experiencer first had the experience instead of when that which is being experienced was first possible for anyone to have experienced.

[Keatah]

Nostalgia - desire to return home or to a happy place and time. In order to return to something you have to have been there in the first place.

 

Playing Atari for the first time today isn't nostalgia, it's a curiosity, an enjoyment of something, a first experience and whatever you attach to it. You can think it's nostalgia, but it isn't because it's the first game you're first now playing. Nostalgia must be slow cooked, aged, simmered.

 

And there are many other things that define and shape 70's and 80's videogame nostalgia. The atmosphere, the culture, and all the side experiences surrounding the videogame. Not just THE game itself. It's inextricably intertwined.

 

---

 

It's also interesting and curious. The formative age of games (for those who have been there at their heyday) may have been a few short 5 years, arbitrarily say 1978 though 1983 for example (it can vary). Maybe shorter. But those concentrated years seem much longer and stretched out today. Especially as the memory fades through the ages and only the most prominent details remain. And the time expands and engulfs you. There will be a time when you can only remember the rumble of the tank engine in Combat. Or the bleep and bloop of Breakout. All the culture and ambiance, the faces, too, fade as the years go by..

 

The brain churns it over and over like a madman stuck in a fuge. Confused and wondering what's happening. Like being stuck in a secret room in Doom with no way out. You're pushing walls and running in circles. Scrutinizing every detail, whether it repeats itself or not. Getting +25 health is like picking up a MIB CIB NIB cartridge. It's all refreshed and the cycle begins again.

 

That's what happens to collectards. Going too far into nostalgia is a serious disease.

Edited June 20, 2017 by Keatah

[Schizophretard]

Nostalgia - desire to return home or to a happy place and time. In order to return to something you have to have been there in the first place.

 

Playing Atari for the first time today isn't nostalgia, it's a curiosity, an enjoyment of something, a first experience and whatever you attach to it. You can think it's nostalgia, but it isn't because it's the first game you're first now playing. Nostalgia must be slow cooked, aged, simmered.

 

But if you play Atari today then years later it can be nostalgia. Nostalgia is kind of like the honeymoon period of a relationship. You can still be in love with the person you are with and even love them more but you still chase after that original high of when the relationship was new.

 

And there are many other things that define and shape 70's and 80's videogame nostalgia. The atmosphere, the culture, and all the side experiences surrounding the videogame. Not just THE game itself. It's inextricably intertwined.

 

Couldn't that make an exception to the above? For an example, someone experienced that atmosphere but missed out on experiencing Atari then and only knew about it. Then today they play it for the first time but it triggers the emotions of that atmosphere that they miss. Wouldn't that still kind of be nostalgia for Atari? Maybe not in the sense of reliving the experience but in a sense of living an experience for the first time that they longed to experience for decades that they missed out on back then?

 

---

 

It's also interesting and curious. The formative age of games (for those who have been there at their heyday) may have been a few short 5 years, arbitrarily say 1978 though 1983 for example (it can vary). Maybe shorter. But those concentrated years seem much longer and stretched out today. Especially as the memory fades through the ages and only the most prominent details remain. And the time expands and engulfs you. There will be a time when you can only remember the rumble of the tank engine in Combat. Or the bleep and bloop of Breakout. All the culture and ambiance, the faces, too, fade as the years go by..

 

I think what you are describing is how as we age the years start to seem shorter and shorter. That is because this year will be a smaller percentage of your life than last year was, the year after this will be a smaller percentage of your life than both of those years were, etc. and then once you are living your 100th year that would be only 1% of your life which compared to now may feel like a week.

 

Since I was born in 81 the pre-crash years I experienced feel very long. My grandparents on my dad's side lived in Ohio while we lived here in Indiana. So, they only came for special occasions like birthdays, holidays, and maybe just an occasional visit. I called them Granny and Papaw but on my mother's side it was Grandma and Grandpa. I thought back then there was a difference. It feels like I saw Papaw a lot. I remember saying,"Papaw!" a lot, I remember knowing exactly who he was the moment he would enter the house from being so familiar with him, I remember his presence and how it was much like my dad's with things like dad getting kicked out of the "man seat" and having to sit on the couch with the rest of us kids, him doing things like whispering in my ear to go smash a thing of Legos my older brother built and then my brother crying about it, me being his favorite because I look just like him and my dad, the way he liked to dress, etc. It felt like years and then he died. Long enough that I loved him and still miss him. It felt like a decade. I remember them putting him in the ground and when Granny was placed next to him in my 20's the graveyard looking as I remembered it even though those were the only two times I was there. I remember my parents being heartbroken because my mom was pregnant with my younger brother when he died and they wanted him to see him born. I remember him being born, what he looked like when they pushed him up, me being the first to point out and yell with excitement,"I have a Chinese brother!" then everyone laughing because on my mother's side they have those kind of eyes but are unsure of the origins but always joked about being Chinese and thought it was cute that I got the joke, I remember when mom came back home with him how my dad would clean out her wound from the c-section a few times a day, them explaining that is where he came from, me thinking c-section was the place instead of the operation something like,"The water in mom's belly where we come from is the Sea Section.", during those few weeks that mom was home she allowing me to hold him once, and I gave him this talk about how I'm his big brother, he is my little brother, and what I think that all means which I thought was "the talk" I was required to give because I remember my older brother once doing the same for me.

 

But the thing is Papaw died when I was 2 1/2 years old and my little brother was born two months after I turned 3. So, it was only 3 years of experiences but it felt like a decade. And the memory described earlier of dad bring home the Vader was somewhere around there and it feels like another decade of memories of just having that until my older brother got the NES for Christmas when it launched. We were all excited, he plugged it up, and then when dad and I saw the controller we both looked at each other with a confused look while knowing what we were both thinking without speaking a word which was,"WTF is that?! It is all buttons and a lot of them! Where is the joystick?! He got us all hyped by explaining that the present he wants is like the Atari, Mario is like Pitfall!, etc. but what is this?! It looks like our VCR with a remote instead of a controller!" Dad never got over it and hasn't been a gamer since but my brother figured out how to convince me. He just had to hand me a gun that at the time felt as big as Dirty Harry's and tell me to blast some ducks. That was some VR entering the world of Tron shit right there! I had a gun that could shoot magical bullets into the TV that would really kill video game ducks and then a laughing dog could actually look out of the TV to see that it was me that did that! Mind blown!

 

The brain churns it over and over like a madman stuck in a fuge. Confused and wondering what's happening. Like being stuck in a secret room in Doom with no way out. You're pushing walls and running in circles. Scrutinizing every detail, whether it repeats itself or not. Getting +25 health is like picking up a MIB CIB NIB cartridge. It's all refreshed and the cycle begins again.

 

That's what happens to collectards. Going too far into nostalgia is a serious disease.

I think I would be a collectard with or without nostalgia. When I imagine getting rid of it all with a home with just the basics it seems very boring and I would feel lost. I would feel like there isn't really anything to do at home and would have to go out all the time. Then once I realize I can't find anything to do out of the house that really interests me other than party to numb me of the boredom I would probably take up pot. Then I would be a home body again on a forum about bong collecting talking about which kind of bongs to use, how to set up the atmosphere with things like lava lamps, the rituals, the right music, etc. about what is the authentic experience of getting high. Then after finally getting busted I would get rid of it all and then take up video games.

[Andromeda Stardust]

 

Regarding Atari. Atari is nostalgic to the people that experienced back then and are playing it today.

 

If you are playing it today for the first time, you are NOT experiencing nostalgia. That will come in time, 10 years later, 20 years later. For now it will be appreciation and admiration which morphs into nostalgia.

Bullcrap. I get the same benefit experiencing it as an adult as you did experiencing it in your youth AND as an adult.

 

Memory reference or lack thereof doesn't magically change what happens when you plug in a cart and toggle the power switch.

 

And noone would collect for anything they didn't own as a child, much less buy new and exciting homebrew for that matter, if this "nostalgia" if applied in the strictest dictionary sense, were the sole motivation for collecting.

 

 

Nostalgia - desire to return home or to a happy place and time. In order to return to something you have to have been there in the first place.

 

So in the whole definition of nostalgia is a return to childhood, period, which brings my next point:

 

 

That's what happens to collectards. Going too far into nostalgia is a serious disease.

That is the antithesis of your dictionary nostalgia definition. Name one individual, who as a kid, had a whole bookshelf or even an entire wall dedicated to Atari 2600, or NES carts? Who, as a kid, had 12 systems hooked up to the poor little TV all at once? Nobody. I'm sure even rich millionaire kids didn't do this. More than likely you had a few crappy game carts scattered across the floor with dirty socks and underwear, and a crusty slice of half-eaten pizza laying on top of the NES (or Atari), while your best friend was lying on the bed trying to look up tips on where to find the warp whistle in the latest issue of Nintendo Power.

 

Anyone who looks upon their game collection and thinks "herein between these walls lies my entire childhood" is delusional. And a wall of perfectly curated CIB games is not a realistic childhood dream either, it's a man-boy collectard fantasy. A childhood dream opening your bedroom closet and finding a Chuck-E-Cheese parlor or Aladdin's Castle tucked away in there, with all you can eat pizza and all the games on freeplay. After you've had your fill of games and pizza, you hop on top of that beast from Never Ending Story and fly around through the sky like Peter Pan, high on pixie stix dust.

 

Speaking of Pixie Stix... Anyone remember these? These were responsible for so many ADHD infused sugar high rampages.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pixy_Stix

[Keatah]

But if you play Atari today then years later it can be nostalgia. Nostalgia is kind of like the honeymoon period of a relationship. You can still be in love with the person you are with and even love them more but you still chase after that original high of when the relationship was new.

 

Yes.

 

 

Couldn't that make an exception to the above? For an example, someone experienced that atmosphere but missed out on experiencing Atari then and only knew about it. Then today they play it for the first time but it triggers the emotions of that atmosphere that they miss. Wouldn't that still kind of be nostalgia for Atari? Maybe not in the sense of reliving the experience but in a sense of living an experience for the first time that they longed to experience for decades that they missed out on back then?

 

That would be nostalgia for the other older time. Not nostalgia for Atari.

 

Also, if you knew of something decades ago, and really really wanted it, you will have imagined doing some of it in your head at the time. And then it would be nostalgia for those imaginations. Not the actual thing. Many folks see that as a gray area, yet nostalgia remains specific in that you have to have experienced it, waited a long time, then want to experience it again.