What did/do you call your games?

[Kittenmommy]

When I was a kid, I and every other kid I knew called them "Atari tapes" even though they're not tapes. I'm not sure whey we called them that; possibly because they resembled 8-track tapes. Who knows!

 

Did anyone else call them "Atari tapes" or just "tapes", or was that just me and the kids I knew?

 

Now that I'm an adult, I call them cartridges... because that's what they are.

[+Psionic]

Did anyone else call them "Atari tapes" or just "tapes", or was that just me and the kids I knew?

My mom did.

 

Sample dialogue:

"Pick up these tapes on the floor or I'm throwing them away!"

[Kittenmommy]

Did anyone else call them "Atari tapes" or just "tapes", or was that just me and the kids I knew?

My mom did.

 

Sample dialogue:

"Pick up these tapes on the floor or I'm throwing them away!"

 

OMG, did we have the same mom??

[iswitt]

I always just referred to everything as a "game." Like, "Hey, why are all my games on the floor?"

 

However, I suppose due to the shape of the carts, my younger brother referred to 2600 games as "blocks."

[Kittenmommy]

However, I suppose due to the shape of the carts, my younger brother referred to 2600 games as "blocks."

 

Aww, that's cute!

[Tom Blair]

In Germany and in my Family we called them Kassetten, Videospielkassetten or Module.

[midnight8]

In Germany and in my Family we called them Kassetten, Videospielkassetten or Module.

 

I called them tapes also. I think it was cause the looked kinda like 8 tracks.

[Nukey Shay]

Cartridges or games...it says what they are right on the box I was really into audio recording when I was a little kid (adjusting recording speed, playing in reverse, etc...I still have some of the family when I was 12 c.1977 or so)...so I was well aware what the words cassette and tape implied.

[+Random Terrain]

Never once called them tapes. Later on, when I worked at Toys R Us, I was shocked by the number of people who wanted to buy "intendo tapes". Holy F-ing illiterate nose pickers Batman! How do they put on their clothing in the morning without strangling themselves?

 

http://uk.youtube.com/watch?v=fJuNgBkloFE

[Rom Hunter]

Quite disturbing video you got there, RT.

 

But believe me: people like these live everywhere, not only in the US of A.

 

 

I called my cartridges games back then, although I also knew the official term ROM-pack.

 

Edited June 10, 2008 by Rom Hunter

[pangasinan]

HAHAHA that video is priceless :rolling: :rolling:

[ovalbugmann]

was shocked by the number of people who wanted to buy "intendo tapes". Holy F-ing illiterate nose pickers Batman!

 

 

Same here as Random Terrain, I never once called them tapes and neither did any of my friends, and I got my first 2600 - a light sixer in 1980. Even as kids, we were quite intrigued by this new entertainment medium of videogames and the fact that it was fully electronic with IC chips in it. Everyone knew Atari was only the beginning of this new computer entertainment. We had the Radio Shack 150 in 1 Electronic Project Kits so we were becoming familiar with electronics and ICs - the future of elctronics. Cartridges was the most prevalent term that we used, sometimes game or rom cartridges. I never thought they look anything like an 8track tape?? - much smaller - oh and the fact that there is no tape that can be seen at the end!

 

Thing is; we knew instinctively this Atari 2600 (or Intellivision) was not a tape player, I and my friends seemed very interested in how this Atari thing works to play games for us and took apart at least two 2600s and many cartridges to try and figure it out - learning things like the difference between RAM & ROM IC chips at an early age. Playing Atari was the MAIN part of my youth, as well as my friends. Everything revolved around it. We played it as often as we could, after school, all weekend, before and after going to the movies, as soon as we wake up on Saturday, all night, before and after going outside, etc. So we were informed about what it was that we were playing.

 

I think calling carts - tapes, comes from being totally unfamiliar with this then new electronic medium and trying to rationalize

it as something that was familiar. However, after becoming even vaguely familiar with Atari, I just can't see how any kid 12 years or older would call a game cartridge, a tape. I think that's just lazyness or not really caring much about videogames and the Atari, or maybe just not having the awareness that it's electronics that are putting that picture on the screen and that it is not anything like a non-interactive medium such as cassette tapes, 8tracks, or VHS tapes or even one inch wide Betamax tapes.

[ovalbugmann]

Cartridges or games...it says what they are right on the box

 

True That! Nukey!

[Vic George 2K3]

Cartridges. They never really looked like tapes to me.

[classicgamingguy]

I think, even when I was little, I called them "carts", never the whole word, just "carts". That was because my brother referred to them that way, and being his younger sibling, I followed him like a little puppy dog, doing and saying just about everything HE did.

[Major_Havoc]

http://www.megaupload.com/?d=XOU0W6XO

 

Never once called them tapes. Later on, when I worked at Toys R Us, I was shocked by the number of people who wanted to buy "intendo tapes". Holy F-ing illiterate nose pickers Batman! How do they put on their clothing in the morning without strangling themselves?

 

http://uk.youtube.com/watch?v=fJuNgBkloFE

 

You can make that video anywhere in the world. Ask a bunch of people the same questions, then depending how funny you want it, only show the ones who get it wrong.

 

..or if you want it boring, keep the ones who answer correctly also..

 

It's the ol' standard

[Captain Beard]

when I worked at Toys R Us, I was shocked by the number of people who wanted to buy "intendo tapes".

When I worked at a used CD store, folks used to come in often asking for "the latest Mariah Carey" tape (or whatever.) When I'd say, "we only sell CDs," they always looked at me like I was a fool and said something like, "yeah, that's what I want," as if somehow it was my fault they didn't know what words mean. (Of course, my fave dumb customer question of all time came from a young lady who asked me how the CDs were arranged -- "Alphabetically by artist," I told her. "Oh," she said with a thoughtful look on her face, "so is Phil Collins under P or F?")

[joeybastard]

I always called them carts or cartridges because that's what it said on the box. Many of my friends called them tapes though.

[Lord Helmet]

I always called them "games" or "cartridges"

 

I never called them tapes because that implies that they actually have magnetic tape in them...which they don't

[Recycled]

Called them cartridges then, carts now.

Edited June 10, 2008 by Recycled

[+Random Terrain]

You can make that video anywhere in the world. Ask a bunch of people the same questions, then depending how funny you want it, only show the ones who get it wrong.

Yeah, but it's amazing that the ones who get so many things wrong can tie their shoes and feed themselves. For example, if you don't know how many sides a triangle has and you're older than 7, you deserve to have your brain condemned, then demolished by wrecking ball.

[Merrick Bill]

In the late 70s and early 80s I worked in a video store that sold Atari and Intellivision games. We had one customer that we always found very amusing because even though he had both systems, he didn't seem to know what either was called. He'd ask for Tari tapes, Intermattelevision tapes, Intervision tapes and Mattelevision tapes. And he'd come in every day looking for whatever the newest cartridge was. He'd ask for it and we tell him it wasn't in yet. Day after day. Then when it finally came in, he'd show up and we'd tell him we had it and his response was always, "Oh, I bought it at Toys 'r Us this morning.

 

I wonder if he's still alive.

 

Bill

[classicgamingguy]

In the late 70s and early 80s I worked in a video store that sold Atari and Intellivision games. We had one customer that we always found very amusing because even though he had both systems, he didn't seem to know what either was called. He'd ask for Tari tapes, Intermattelevision tapes, Intervision tapes and Mattelevision tapes. And he'd come in every day looking for whatever the newest cartridge was. He'd ask for it and we tell him it wasn't in yet. Day after day. Then when it finally came in, he'd show up and we'd tell him we had it and his response was always, "Oh, I bought it at Toys 'r Us this morning.

 

I wonder if he's still alive.

 

Bill

 

You mean you guys didn't kill him for buying his stuff at another store??

[Dauber]

My brother and I called 'em "cartridges."

 

I always cringed whenever I heard anybody call 'em "tapes." THERE'S NO EFFING TAPE INSIDE!!!!

 

Similarly, I knew someone who'd call a cartridge a "disk." I asked him why he called it a disk despite it not even being shaped like a disk. "Well, what about those square things they put in the Apples? They call THOSE disks but they're not disk-shaped!" ugggh...I just lost my patience at that point and didn't continue the questioning. And I was nine years old at the time. Even at that young age I knew why those things were called "disks".

[Crazy Climber]

I remember people calling them tapes. Usually older Family members that didn't really know much about video games.