How old were you when you played your first Atari 2600 game?

[lastkill3r]

First when i was 4 i played Warlord, next time this year, when i bought Atari. Now i have got 12 years.

[Zoyx]

I'll join in on this old thread revival!

 

14 for me. I had to buy my own system and games... also walked 10 miles to school up-hill both ways in full gear.

[CorTat-G]

I Was 13-14 When I played My first Atari 2600 game:

"PAC-MAN"

[almightytodd]

17, 1977 - Target Fun at the store display at Sears. A few weeks later, our Atari Heavy Sixer catalog order arrived for us to wrap and put under the Christmas tree. Of course, the pack-in game was Combat back then...

[Koopa64]

16 or 17 perhaps. It wasn't very long ago I got a 7800 with at least one real 2600 game. Not much to look at, but I'll be damned if these games aren't fun.

[toptenmaterial]

Cannot recall if I have previously posted on this thread!

 

My first Atari 2600 was a present from my sister on my 27th birthday, in 2007. Before that, I had owned a Flashback 2.

[toptenmaterial]

17, 1977 - Target Fun at the store display at Sears. A few weeks later, our Atari Heavy Sixer catalog order arrived for us to wrap and put under the Christmas tree. Of course, the pack-in game was Combat back then...

Todd, I must ask, what was your perception of it then? Was it mind blowing?

[Ryanw]

I had an Atari games on my first computer (Windows 95) and I was about five years old. Remember it had Asteroids, Battlezone, Centipede, Missile Command, and Tempest. I didn't actually play the Atari 2600 until I was 8 or 9, so by then I was used to the arcade version of those games. Still, had a really fun time with games like Pitfall, River Raid, Adventure, and Yar's Revenge so that didn't really matter in the end.

[KingGhidorah]

I put four. I was born in 1985, I played my cousin's 2600. It think it must have been 1989 or 1990 because this was before he got an NES and he got an NES before I remember Super Nintendo coming out. He had 20 or 30 carts. I remember Space Invaders, Asteroids, and Barnstorming being faves. Kind of a random selection. We played it once in a while after he got an NES, because the NES was hooked up to the family TV and his atari was hooked up to an ancient 13" in his room. I bought my first atari 2600 in 96 or 97 with allowance money. I doubt it cost me more than $20. A guy in town had a junk shop and he sold 2600 games for $3(!) or 4 for $10 which seemed reasonable to me as I enjoyed the games. I acquired 20 or 30 this way before my dad started taking me around to thrifts. I got about 240 of the 260ish carts I have between age 11 and 16. I have bought the other 20 or so in the last 10 years.

[Ransom]

I was probably around 10 when I played my first 2600 game at a neighbor's house. It wouldn't be until shortly after I turned 12 that my parents gave me my own VCS.

[bmcnett]

i remember my family had the 2600 w/launch titles, so that was 1977? i was five years old.

most of the games required two people. my brother and i played a lot of indy 500 and combat...

 

it didn't occur to me until years later that games could look any better than that.

[almightytodd]

17, 1977 - Target Fun at the store display at Sears. A few weeks later, our Atari Heavy Sixer catalog order arrived for us to wrap and put under the Christmas tree. Of course, the pack-in game was Combat back then...

Todd, I must ask, what was your perception of it then? Was it mind blowing?

It was like a transition from the pre-computer age to the world of the future. The fact that a family could own a device that coupled a microprocessor with a video interface that could display graphical representations of tanks and airplanes on our television set; and that we could interact with those images - it was extraordinary. The period between 1975 and 1980 was really a magical one in terms of the advance of technology. I don't think I was able to fully appreciate the amount of money my parents were laying out for us to explore this new technology. $200 in 1977 was the equivalent of $742 in 2010 dollars. If that was the going price for a current XBox 360 or Playstation 3, everyone would complain and no one would buy it. But at the time, it was a chance to purchase a piece of the future - to jump ahead in time...

[toptenmaterial]

^^ That sounds like a magical time indeed! Combined with being a kid, you must have really felt as though mankind had arrived.

[zylon]

I was in 2nd grade and the game was 2600 Berzerk. Good times.

[Mirage]

Probably about 6 or 7. I don't think I was even really aware of the VCS when it first came out, at least not that I recall, but by '79 or so I had played one. It was already magical for me, but it wasn't until I later played Asteroids at a kiosk in LaBelle's department store that it really came alive for me. Then I got my own for Christmas, with Asteroids, which was still pretty new.

[mikey167]

I bought my first atari when i was 14.When I had a bmx bike to get me to the local goodwill everyday(10 years ago, the good times when collecting was insanely cheap, .50 to a dollar at most for any cart on any system).

[atari181]

My Dad for no reason at all(very unlike him) bought my 2600 off someone at work who's son didn't play with it anymore for 75.00 in 1981. It was very unlike him to buy anything for my sisters or I other than Christmas or our birthdays, but for some reason when I came home form Little league practice in June of 1981 he had it there waiting for me when I got home. I couldn't believe it, I only knew a couple people who had one and we didn't have a lot of money so I wasn't expecting one at all. I may have been the best(material) gift I ever recieved.

 

Oh, by the way I was 9.

Edited March 3, 2011 by atari181

[classicgamer_27330]

I think I was like 4 or 5. Combat was my first game

[bennybingo]

I played the first time with seven years in 1982, it was pacman and the console of a friend of my parents.

 

I was 5 yrs old when I got my first Atari 2600, bur prior to that I had a Telstar Ranger system prior to that I got in 77'. I thought that Telstar was the shiznit..then I found my true love....2600 Nirvana.

[isatonmyhat]

I think I was 4, but maybe a little younger. The console was ours but it was kept at our grandparents house. I'm not exactly sure what was the first game I played but the one I really remember was crackpots. I think that was the first time my older brother let me pick the game and I have a feeling that I chose that one because it had a purple lable. Purple was my favourate colour when I was little.

[marlinlee]

Probably around 81 or 82 which would have made me 24 or 25. I went with 25 because it was more likely in 82.

[atarigal]

We didn't get our Atari until around 1980 or '81, but our friend across the street had one for a while before that. So I'd say maybe around age 7, then got my own at age 8 or 9.

[Atari_afternoon]

I was 11.

[svenski]

I probably played on a friend's 2600 when I was younger but can't remember. I was around 32 when I got my first 2600 - started out with an Atari 8-bit in 1984 - never had anything before that apart from a pong clone. Sad, I know

[bretthorror]

I believe I was about 7 the first time I played Atari that I can recall anyways, and I never actually REALLY played until I was in my twenties when I bought an Activision plug and play controller that I thought was full of NES games. It worked out either way, because I'm here, right?