First, Chaeyoung of Twice released her debut solo project today. I would describe the project as late 70s R&B with notes of Trip-Hop, Trap, and a splash of Chicano Batman, a pinch of 80s College Rock, and a dash of Blind, Deaf, and Dumb by the Wigs. It’s a song I first heard on the soundtrack for the 1986 Romcom, My Chauffeur. If that’s your bag, you should check it out. You can listen to them on YouTube Music and Spotify. I don’t have Apple Music, but it’s on there as well.
I was watching the Nintendo Direct today, where they mentioned that Super Mario Bros. is turning 40 years old next year. I also watched a YouTube short about the oldest WoW players, and the comments section as well. It got me thinking. I’m a person in my early 50s, and I can still remember the first time I played a video game.
I was ten years old. I remember for two reasons. The biggest reason is that… haha… it was on my birthday. At the time, I’d been sick the week before, either with a bad cold or the flu, I can’t remember which. But I clearly remember being happy that I was finally able to get out of the house when I went to the grocery store with my mom. Back then, Kroger was called Jitney, and when I walked into the store, I saw this video game that I’d only read about previously in magazines, named Ms. Pac-Man. Sitting next to it were the original Pac-Man and Galaga. I was excited and wanted to try them, so I took a dollar to the cashier and asked for change, then ran back quickly to where the arcade games were located at the front of the store. After doing a bit of quick thinking, I chose to try Ms. Pac-Man first. I was immediately hooked, not just on Ms. Pac-Man, but on gaming in general. I’ve been a life-long gamer since that first day in 1981.
It’s interesting to see how far video games have come from the days of Pong and stand-up arcade machines to being able to play games on your smartphone. It shows that when a community is freely allowed to be creative and innovative, what we, as humans, can achieve for the good.
Hehe…there’s actually another reason why that memory left a mark on me. Heh…see, I was actually matured fast for my age. By the time I was ten, I had already started looking like I was in my teens, complete with…I already had boobs and noticeable curves. I’ll just say it. LoL! So, people who knew me and those who didn’t often commented that though I was ten, I looked like I was fifteen. So, while I was having my first experience playing video games, this teenage girl (first time meeting her, never saw her again) came up and started conversing with me. I didn’t think much about it at the time, because I was a pretty shy and sheltered kid growing up. Additionally, I was deeply engrossed in the game that was Ms. Pac-Man. It wasn’t until several years later that I realized that the girl was actually trying to hit on me.
Hmph…
Funny how that can happen.
