I was introduced relatively early to the world of video games. On my dad’s computer, my brother and I played endless amounts of Pac-Man, and on our TV we could also play some lousy clones of slightly more famous games. But it wasn’t until a few years later that I got my first real game console. My older brother already had a Gameboy for some time, and I would often lean over his shoulder to watch him defeat the various gym leaders in Pokemon Yellow. After all, I loved Pokemon somewhat brutally. Every weekend morning I got up early to watch Lattjo Lajban where the highlight was above all when a new episode of Pokémon was broadcast. I was obsessed and it even resulted in something of a bloodbath.
When we were on holiday in Spain, I woke up just as early as I used to. Rather than go back to sleep and get up a little later with the rest of the family and go downstairs to have breakfast, I jumped out of bed. Ran out of the bedroom and rounded the corner into the living room to turn on the TV. The room was elongated and from the bedroom the TV was at the far end of the room on the left and straight ahead was the balcony. At full speed, I ran to turn on the TV and then jump down on the couch, but the second I turned it on, I tripped and fell helplessly into the glass door to the balcony, which was shattered into small pieces. A shard of glass cut me on the chin and on the knee, which I am reminded of even today by the fine scars that remain. The blood and shards of glass were everywhere on the floor and I can only imagine the sight of my parents when they came running into the living room and saw a five-year-old wearing nothing but underwear among all the blood and shards of glass. ”I was going to check out Pokemon,” I replied as they asked the crying boy what had happened.
As my birthday approached, there wasn’t much I wished for, but with my penchant for Pokemon, there was something sacred I wished for. Gameboy Color and Pokemon. So one early summer vacation morning, mom, dad, and my older brother stepped into my parents’ room where I slept during the night. The birthday breakfast arrived on a tray while they sneaked in and sang to me. Of course I had been awake for a long time and was just waiting for them to come in. Pretended to rub my eyes as if I had just woken up and soon after they handed me the packages. I tore open the first and there was the purple translucent Gameboy Color and in the next Charizard graced the cover of Pokemon Red. For years to come I played it daily. It followed me almost everywhere. When I had to accompany my mother to work, it was included. When I joined one of my childhood friends, he was also there and we sat at opposite ends of the couch and played. Even though I was insanely motion sick as a kid, I couldn’t resist the temptation to play it even then and 99 percent of the time I ended up throwing up. Sometimes completely without warning in the back seat. Sometimes I managed to warn mum and dad and I had to throw up outside the car. So there it was.
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When we visited my grandmother, there wasn’t much to do. Other than a couple VHS movies of Looney Tunes and some B version of Peter Pan that my brother and I had seen several times, it was dead sad. In other words, it was a matter of course for me to pack with my Gameboy. This led to me falling straight down grandma’s steep stairs on two separate occasions because of course I had to stare down at the screen while walking down it. One of the times I dropped my Gameboy and the batteries fell out. I hadn’t saved the last two hours of Pokémon Crystal and was crying because I had lost my progress, rather than because it hurt.
As you can probably tell by now, I have many painful memories with my first game console but given the amount of joy it brought me, the other incidents pale in comparison. I loved my Gameboy and was pretty much the only occupation I needed for years. We traded different Pokemon games with each other. Yellow, Blue, Red, Silver, Gold, Crystal. We played all the Pokemon games before the Gameboy Advance was released. When I try to think if we played anything other than Pokemon, I can’t actually think of a single one, oddly enough. I know I borrowed some game with the smurfs at some point, but other than that I can’t think of anything else. It was a wonderful time and to this day I almost regret selling my Gameboy when I got a little older and got a Nintendo 64 to play on instead. Because although it gave me a lot of joy, it was my Gameboy Color that really introduced me to video games and I loved it like a family member.
What was your first console?
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