Saturday, May 16, 2009

Game & Watch

ThenGamer has a great article on the history of Game & Watch. You can read it here.

Game & Watch was, along with my encounter with the adventure game Colossal Cave, one of my earliest introductions to computer games.

I remember when my good friend Anand returned from an overseas school holiday with the Popeye Game & Watch. I was blown away by the incredible graphics, the small size and the addictive gameplay.

Popeye Game & Watch

Thankfully Game & Watch arrived not long after in Australia, and I got Parachute for Christmas. I played that game religiously every day until I clocked it (reached 1,000 points so the score reset to 0).


Parachute Game & Watch

Of course it wasn't just a game - it was also a watch - and it wasn't uncommon to see Game & Watch's propped up on desks throughout my school until we were told by teachers not to play with them in class.

I have extremely fond memories of these systems and still have the original Parachute game and box in my possession to this day!

www.passfieldgames.com

1 comment:

sCameron said...

Wow awesome. I cut my gaming teeth on these game watches as well... my first one was a "racing" game where you could position your car in one of 4 lcd positions on the screen and you had to avoid obstacles along the track.

By far my most prized possession though was my "Super Mario Bros" game watch... a little LCD platformer on an actual watch-face where you had to get to the top of the screen to win. Secretly playing my watch in class was my second greatest primary-school exploit after convincing the teacher I was diabetic so I could eat lollies in class!

I'm not really sure why, but the tinny sounds on these things are among the most satisfying game reward SFX I can remember... up there with the Wolf3D treasure pickup noises, and the "Where's Dildo" soundbyte from Leisure Suit Larry 7: Love for Sail.

Scott.