So how old are you people then?

[Gorth]

playing old school RPGs -- at least of the Baldur's Gate/Icewind Dale era

 

Sorry, no insult intended, but those are modern games. For old school, look up Nethack, Rogue, Temple of apshai and the SSI rpgs

[Gorbag]

I remember I got an Atari 2600 for finishing first (or maybe second?) grade. I don't know where my father got it, because such technology wasn't exactly easy to come by in my country at the time. Anyways this was my first game console. I only had some hand-held game before that, but I don't remember that much of it (I only remember that it was Russian). A few years later my father got himself a colour ZX Spectrum, just like the one in Osvir's post - with the little rainbow on the side (where did he get all this stuff?! Eh, engineers...) and we sometimes used to play games on it together. I remember I used to love them, because they were so much more involved and looked soooo much better than those on the Atari. But they used to take ages to load (when they did load anyway) and it used to make this awful alarm-like sound when reading from cassettes. Even later, I played the original Prince of Persia and some other games on a neighbour's computer, but I didn't get my own PC until high scool. 
So this is how I got started all those years ago. I guess you could say I'm a PC gamer pretty much from the start.

Edited November 3, 2014 by Gorbag

[Gorth]

Also, the Hobbit (which was extremely difficult for a child, I never got past the very first room, yep, that screenshot there.

>OPEN GREEN DOOR

 

 

I remember that one. Also, tell Gandalf to give you the map when he pinches it, he's a notorious thief. To get a head start, you can tell him to enter the Hobbit hole, close the door and run for it to get a head start, away from his larcenous compulsions.

 

In the end, I was forced to read the paperback book (The Hobbit) that came with the game as I was stuck in the goblins caves, alway getting killed in the dark. I knew I needed a lightsource, but had no idea where to look for one.

 

 

The lightsource is the sword "Sting" which you can find in cave near the first 3 trolls you meet and dispose of

 

 

That's how I got introduced to Tolkiens books btw.

[Larkaloke]

 

playing old school RPGs -- at least of the Baldur's Gate/Icewind Dale era

 

Sorry, no insult intended, but those are modern games. For old school, look up Nethack, Rogue, Temple of apshai and the SSI rpgs

 

None taken! I agree, in fact. I meant old school more as a different thought behind RPG design, mostly as opposed to recent action RPGs. I don't usually think of games as being old unless they're at least DOS games.

 

I spent a lot of time playing Rogue, Nethack, and Beyond Zork -- I wouldn't count the other Zork games as RPGs, although I spent a lot of time with them as well -- when I was growing up (and still do sometimes), but unfortunately I never did play any of the others you mention. I played a fair amount of other text-based Adventure-style games when I was young, including Adventure, but somehow I never ended up playing anything in the way of RPGs inbetween those and Baldur's Gate.

 

I do assume that most backers of Pillars of Eternity played at least Baldur's Gate or some other isometric RPG at some point, regardless of their age, but I don't necessarily assume that the younger ones played anything older than that.

 

Also, the Hobbit (which was extremely difficult for a child, I never got past the very first room, yep, that screenshot there.

I remember that game! I don't remember when I played it, but it was certainly after I'd already read The Hobbit, which was why my parents showed it to me. I didn't get very far with it either, although somewhat farther than the first room. I think I was probably around six. Definitely long after it came out, no matter what.

Edited November 5, 2014 by Remmirath

[ambrusynev]

First game experience Prince of Persia on a 286 with a monochrome screen. That machine had gigantic 40 megabyte HDD

I was so impressed when I saw a game on a friend's CGA screen which had more colours than two I got used to enjoy at home....

Edited November 5, 2014 by ambrusynev

[BruceVC]

You guys have had it easy when it comes to your access to early technology. Growing up in South Africa and due to Apartheid and sanctions we didn't have any of these early technologies....we had to rely on carrier pigeons and smoke signals to play RPG. Now THAT is hardcore !!!! 

[Rostere]

I'm 24. My very first game would probably be Full Throttle (narrated to me in Swedish by my dad), or perhaps SkiFree.

[TrashMan]

About 7000...give or take.

[Lephys]

First game experience Prince of Persia on a 286 with a monochrome screen. That machine had gigantic 40 megabyte HDD

I was so impressed when I saw a game on a friend's CGA screen which had more colours than two I got used to enjoy at home....

You've got me beat. My first PC was a 386. Can't remember how big the hard drive was (I think 20MB?), but I DO remember that it was a 10Mhz system, with a TURBO button that took it to... brace yourselves... 20Mhz! WHOA, SLOW DOWN, PC!

 

I think modern PCs need that button. "Whoa, getting some framerate drop here... *doubles the CPU speed*... *computer bursts into flame*"

 

I remember Prince of Persia, though. That was the most amazing game to me when I first played it. That and Betrayal at Krondor.

Edited November 6, 2014 by Lephys

[Gorth]

we had to rely on carrier pigeons and smoke signals to play RPG. Now THAT is hardcore !!!! 

That is no excuse...

 

In 2001 Bergen Linux Group implemented RFC1149 (IPoAC) as put forth by the IETF (Internet Engineering Task Force).

 

Internet!

 

Ping result:

 

Script started on Sat Apr 28 11:24:09 2001
vegard@gyversalen:~$ /sbin/ifconfig tun0
tun0      Link encap:Point-to-Point Protocol
          inet addr:10.0.3.2  P-t-P:10.0.3.1  Mask:255.255.255.255
          UP POINTOPOINT RUNNING NOARP MULTICAST  MTU:150  Metric:1
          RX packets:1 errors:0 dropped:0 overruns:0 frame:0
          TX packets:2 errors:0 dropped:0 overruns:0 carrier:0
          collisions:0
          RX bytes:88 (88.0 b)  TX bytes:168 (168.0 b)

vegard@gyversalen:~$ ping -c 9 -i 900 10.0.3.1
PING 10.0.3.1 (10.0.3.1): 56 data bytes
64 bytes from 10.0.3.1: icmp_seq=0 ttl=255 time=6165731.1 ms
64 bytes from 10.0.3.1: icmp_seq=4 ttl=255 time=3211900.8 ms
64 bytes from 10.0.3.1: icmp_seq=2 ttl=255 time=5124922.8 ms
64 bytes from 10.0.3.1: icmp_seq=1 ttl=255 time=6388671.9 ms

--- 10.0.3.1 ping statistics ---
9 packets transmitted, 4 packets received, 55% packet loss
round-trip min/avg/max = 3211900.8/5222806.6/6388671.9 ms
vegard@gyversalen:~$ exit

Script done on Sat Apr 28 14:14:28 2001

Crazy Norwegians...

 

Nobody seems to have implemented RFC2549 yet (RFC1149 with QoS enhancements)

 

Edit: For good measure, BLUG's description of the event

 

Edit2: Just for Bruce, a quote from the wiki page:

 

Inspired by RFC 2549, on 9 September 2009, the marketing team of The Unlimited, a regional company in South Africa, decided to host a tongue-in-cheek "Pigeon Race" between their pet pigeon "Winston" and local telecom company Telkom SA. The race was to send 4 gigabytes of data from Howick to Hillcrest, approximately 60 km apart. The pigeon carrying a microSD card, versus a Telkom ADSL line. Winston beat the data transfer over Telkom's ADSL line, with a total time of two hours, six minutes and 57 seconds from uploading data on the microSD card to completion of download from card. At the time of Winston's victory, the ADSL transfer was just under 4% complete

[BruceVC]

 

we had to rely on carrier pigeons and smoke signals to play RPG. Now THAT is hardcore !!!! 

That is no excuse...

 

In 2001 Bergen Linux Group implemented RFC1149 (IPoAC) as put forth by the IETF (Internet Engineering Task Force).

 

Internet!

 

Ping result:

 

Script started on Sat Apr 28 11:24:09 2001
vegard@gyversalen:~$ /sbin/ifconfig tun0
tun0      Link encap:Point-to-Point Protocol
          inet addr:10.0.3.2  P-t-P:10.0.3.1  Mask:255.255.255.255
          UP POINTOPOINT RUNNING NOARP MULTICAST  MTU:150  Metric:1
          RX packets:1 errors:0 dropped:0 overruns:0 frame:0
          TX packets:2 errors:0 dropped:0 overruns:0 carrier:0
          collisions:0
          RX bytes:88 (88.0 b)  TX bytes:168 (168.0 b)

vegard@gyversalen:~$ ping -c 9 -i 900 10.0.3.1
PING 10.0.3.1 (10.0.3.1): 56 data bytes
64 bytes from 10.0.3.1: icmp_seq=0 ttl=255 time=6165731.1 ms
64 bytes from 10.0.3.1: icmp_seq=4 ttl=255 time=3211900.8 ms
64 bytes from 10.0.3.1: icmp_seq=2 ttl=255 time=5124922.8 ms
64 bytes from 10.0.3.1: icmp_seq=1 ttl=255 time=6388671.9 ms

--- 10.0.3.1 ping statistics ---
9 packets transmitted, 4 packets received, 55% packet loss
round-trip min/avg/max = 3211900.8/5222806.6/6388671.9 ms
vegard@gyversalen:~$ exit

Script done on Sat Apr 28 14:14:28 2001

Crazy Norwegians...

 

Nobody seems to have implemented RFC2549 yet (RFC1149 with QoS enhancements)

 

Edit: For good measure, BLUG's description of the event

 

Edit2: Just for Bruce, a quote from the wiki page:

 

Inspired by RFC 2549, on 9 September 2009, the marketing team of The Unlimited, a regional company in South Africa, decided to host a tongue-in-cheek "Pigeon Race" between their pet pigeon "Winston" and local telecom company Telkom SA. The race was to send 4 gigabytes of data from Howick to Hillcrest, approximately 60 km apart. The pigeon carrying a microSD card, versus a Telkom ADSL line. Winston beat the data transfer over Telkom's ADSL line, with a total time of two hours, six minutes and 57 seconds from uploading data on the microSD card to completion of download from card. At the time of Winston's victory, the ADSL transfer was just under 4% complete

 

 

Good post Gorthfucious

 

And that exercise was true at time, I remember it very well.

 

The good news is we have upgraded large parts of our fibre infrastructure since then so I doubt the pigeon would win now

[Sedrefilos]

 

First game experience Prince of Persia on a 286 with a monochrome screen. That machine had gigantic 40 megabyte HDD

I was so impressed when I saw a game on a friend's CGA screen which had more colours than two I got used to enjoy at home....

You've got me beat. My first PC was a 386. Can't remember how big the hard drive was (I think 20MB?), but I DO remember that it was a 10Mhz system, with a TURBO button that took it to... brace yourselves... 20Mhz! WHOA, SLOW DOWN, PC!

 

I think modern PCs need that button. "Whoa, getting some framerate drop here... *doubles the CPU speed*... *computer bursts into flame*"

 

I remember Prince of Persia, though. That was the most amazing game to me when I first played it. That and Betrayal at Krondor.

 

Haha! I almost forgot the "turbo" button all pcs had :D

My first was an 8088. 8Mhz to 16Mhz when turboed (I don't think anyone ever played without turbo button on) with 5+1/4 floppies; no hard drive.

I remember Prince of Persia too. Couldn't believe a game could have such a fluid animation :D

But I believe the slowest 386 was at 33Mhz.

[Lephys]

Haha! I almost forgot the "turbo" button all pcs had :D

My first was an 8088. 8Mhz to 16Mhz when turboed (I don't think anyone ever played without turbo button on) with 5+1/4 floppies; no hard drive.

I remember Prince of Persia too. Couldn't believe a game could have such a fluid animation :D

But I believe the slowest 386 was at 33Mhz.

Hmm... maybe we had a TWO-eighty-six? I can't remember now. We got a new computer when I was about 7. The first one's still sitting at my parents' house somewhere, though. Probly still works, too.

 

I actually had to turn Turbo off on a few games, because it just made them run too fast.

 

That was my reaction to Prince of Persia, also. "My goodness! SUCH REALISTIC SWORDFIGHTING!" Haha.

[Zakaste]

I think my very first exposure to computer games was on a Tandy, and it was either King's Quest or Leisure Suit Larry. To this day I still somewhat miss parser-based commands. I also remember when floppy disks were actually, well, floppy.

[Mr. Magniloquent]

 

Haha! I almost forgot the "turbo" button all pcs had :D

My first was an 8088. 8Mhz to 16Mhz when turboed (I don't think anyone ever played without turbo button on) with 5+1/4 floppies; no hard drive.

I remember Prince of Persia too. Couldn't believe a game could have such a fluid animation :D

But I believe the slowest 386 was at 33Mhz.

Hmm... maybe we had a TWO-eighty-six? I can't remember now. We got a new computer when I was about 7. The first one's still sitting at my parents' house somewhere, though. Probly still works, too.

 

I actually had to turn Turbo off on a few games, because it just made them run too fast.

 

That was my reaction to Prince of Persia, also. "My goodness! SUCH REALISTIC SWORDFIGHTING!" Haha.

 

 

He is correct. The x386 was 33mhz. I had one, a Hewlett Packard--turbo button and all. Several years later I used a tutorial online I found to turn it into a drink mixing robot. Not the most statutorily appropriate skill building exercise, but educational none-the-less!

[TMZuk]

does anyone here remember the spectrum zx?  Played manic miner to no end, i loved the spectrum zx, just the keys were really of bad quality and i wore them out. Had a Schneider (Amstrad) CPC after that with a cassette deck and somehow managed to spill an entire can of a cola on it but the Amstrad still worked. Then played games like wing commander, lemmings, Indianapolis 500 on the 286 and 386 sx pc. Also played elite plus back then and am a proud backer of elite dangerous Last game I played was the shadow sun from alan miranda’s Ossian studios on the ipad, it’s a cool little rpg for the ipad.

I had a Lambda, which was Korean ZX81 clone. Then I got a ZX Spectrum and argued no end with all my Commodore 64 owning friends. And the I got a Armstrad CPC 6128. It had a screen! And a floppy disc drive And 128 kb of RAM. Yes, you read it right: 128 kilobytes of whooping RAM!

[Jarmo]

So then. Pretty much exactly 50-50 split between those under- or at thirty years or more.

 

Incidentally, if PoE comes out with Adult Only rating, that excludes about 2% of the audience.

(Assuming this forum is representative of potential customers, which is almost certainly not the case.)

[Sedrefilos]

So then. Pretty much exactly 50-50 split between those under- or at thirty years or more.

 

Incidentally, if PoE comes out with Adult Only rating, that excludes about 2% of the audience.

(Assuming this forum is representative of potential customers, which is almost certainly not the case.)

Like underage people don't play 18+ games

Edited November 12, 2014 by Sedrefilos

[Silent Winter]

^might exclude them from 'buying'/'claiming' it on gog/steam account though

New trailer was PEGI 16 - not sure if that's for the trailer or the game though.

[RadonGOG]

Interesting to see that there are plenty folks around who´ve been for a waaays longer time than others whole livetime! 

[Busmumrik]

I'm 24 years old.

 

My first game was Wolfenstein 3D which my dad and I played when I was 4.

[Sedrefilos]

Interesting to see that there are plenty folks around who´ve been for a waaays longer time than others whole livetime! 

I thought that was common in... earth... no?

[Trogdor]

I'm 25 years old, thought the government claims I'm 33.

 

First gaming experience I had must have been when I was around 4-5 years old and played on my fathers Commodore 64. As I got older it was the Nintendo Entertainment System all the way...  was in ~91-92 or so my father got a 486 DX2 66 Mhz and I forgot all about that Nintendo. The graphics, gameplay, music, the story... it was all leagues ahead of consoles at the time. Gaming companies such as Sierra, Microprose, Origin and Bullfrog became instant favourties. First 'modern' computer rpg I played must have been the adventure-rpg hybrid series Quest for Glory. Got into Dungeons & Dragons in the late 90's by playing the paper and pen version with buddies... getting Baldur's Gate after that was a no brainer, and the rest is history..

[Agiel]

25. I first started gaming at about '95 when my mother had to take me to her office after picking me up from school. As you might imagine, I was bored out of my mind at that place and had too much pent up energy. So she went to one of her younger co-workers, who happened to have Marathon and Wolfenstein 3D clandestinely installed on his work computers that helped keep me occupied.

 

Another big formative gaming influence was my uncle who was (and remains) as big a gaming enthusiast as me. After he had played through some games he'd give them to me as gifts for Christmas or my birthday. Quite a few of them were combat simulators like Jane's F-15, Longbow, and TIE Fighter, but there were also some cRPGs among them like Betrayal at Krondor and the original Fallout.

Edited November 12, 2014 by Agiel

[EvLokadottr]

I was scared of Grues.

I played ASCII Star Trek 

I played Tass Times in Tonetown a bit later, which like 3 other people in the world remember.

My sister and I managed to get past the "age-check questions" to play Leisure Suit Larry, though I had no idea what a condom was or why I would want it in plaid. 

I think our first machine was an Apple II.