Childhood Gaming Christmas Stories

[marvelvscapcom2]

Hello VG Collect Dwellers... .   With Christmas fast approaching I figured i'd make a thread for all of us to discuss our fondest and most sentimental memories from Christmas when we were a young gamer and all the pine needles and dinners we enjoyed.  .

With some of us, our very first consoles or our favorite consoles came from the big jolly Santa or in the form of a X mas gift as a young teen. 

What is your favorite memory, favorite gift, favorite christmas?  Feel free to discuss them and relive christmas's passed.


My fondest memories and favorite gift I ever had was the PS2 my parents got me when I was about 10-12.  I love it so much.  It's my favorite console of all time .   It came with Jak and Daxter, And Grand Theft Auto Vice City (My parents let me play M games)  and I spent all christmas playing it with my brother.

One other funny memory I remember and wonder if anyone else had the same thing was growing up getting DVDs as gifts and think they were PS2 or Xbox games? lol.  I know it's random but that was a funny memory growing up being a gamer.  I would just go off the shape and the feel and think it was a game and always let myself down when it was an Adam Sandler movie lol.   

What are some of your memorites with gaming growing up?

[undertakerprime]

Well, I’m really old so this is going old-school...

My parents and I often took a trip to Norway for the holidays to visit family. One year when we were there, my great aunt and uncle got me a Nintendo Game & Watch Panorama Screen Snoopy game. I played it for hours. I often got other Game & Watches over Xmas in the ensuing years.

Of course, any NES games I received had to be NTSC so they would work on my NES at home, so I always had to wait after opening them until we came home, and it could be excruciating. I specifically remember being so thrilled to get P.O.W., I’d sit and stare at the box and instruction manual, patiently waiting for the time I could play it.

I also received my first Game Boy for Christmas in Norway. My parents got it for me, and of course it came with Tetris. I also got Super Mario Land at the same time. I still remember the first time I turned on SML, and quickly walked right into the first turtle I couldn’t see it because the screen got so blurry when I was moving.

[undertakerprime]

Sorry for double post, but this is unrelated to the previous Norway stories...

My mother brought me to the mall to buy a SNES for Christmas 1991. Of course, I wasn’t allowed to open it until Christmas.
Soooo, after mom and dad went to bed, I opened it up, hooked it up, and played Super Mario World 
Every day until Christmas, I’d get it out, then neatly pack it back up after I was done. They never knew.

[Warmsignal]

Considering that virtually every Xmas since 92 or 93 has been filmed, I'd like to dig up some of those memories and have them converted to digital format. It's all become somewhat of a blur by now. But I know there were many game openings over the years. I remember the year we got Donkey Kong Country and it was the first thing we played with (traditionally we never got to play with anything straight away, because we had to spend the rest of the day at my grandparents). I remember the year we got a N64, with Super Mario 64. I remember getting a PS1 with Spiro once.  I remember getting my kiwi colored Game Boy Color with SMB Deluxe one year. Once, we got both a GameCube and an OG Xbox in the same year.

Our parents always went over the top on Xmas, every year there was something game related. The way we did Xmas, the majority if not all of the presents were hidden away from view until the day of. We were not allowed to see even the wrapped gifts until the morning came. I guess because Santa brought most of it. He saved my folks a heck of a lot of money back in the day.

[ignition365]

I'll try to remember some.

I asked for a Genesis back in 92 I think, I was a big Sega nerd back then and literally knew next to nothing of Nintendo outside of the Gameboy and I already knew the Game Gear was "superior".  Parents bought us a SNES, I was kind of devastated, but playing Super Mario World as my first entry into a Mario game, it changed my feckin world.  Never took a second look at a Sega system ever again.  This was honestly a life changing event for me.  Without this event happening, I probably would've been a Sega fanboy talking down on Mario until the Dreamcast failed.

X-mas 96.  The only gift I got that year was Donkey Kong Country 3.  We drove to Louisiana to do x-mas with family that year.  My brother had to fly back home early to go back to work, so he asked if he could take DKC3 with to play it since I couldn't play it anyways (We didn't bring the SNES with on the trip).  By the time we got back home, my brother had pawned the game at a pawn shop to buy alcohol.  To this day I have never played DKC3.  I only got a replacement copy a few years ago off craigslist.

X-mas 98.  The only gift I received that year was to be Pokemon Red Version.  When we opened gifts, whomever wrapped the gifts for every one messed up the gifts and wrapped Rugrats: Time Travelers for me and wrapped Pokemon Red for my 4 year old brother.  It was not a pleasant x-mas fighting over gifts because they mis-wrapped the gifts.  Try explaining to a 4 year old that the gift you received was not for you, but someone else.  Now the child wants what they were told they can't have.  Made me let him play the game, well those games only have 1 save file, so he erased my data, very quick lesson to learn.  Luckily I had only played for a little bit and I picked bulbasaur or something.  Second time I picked Charmander.

x-mas 2001.  The only gift I was to receive was supposed to be a PS2.  No games, no memory cards.  Nothing, just the system.  I got a lot of gag gifts.  Soap, deodorant, toothbrush, ginger soda (Not ginger ale), etc.  After everyone unwrapped gifts.  Someone unwrapped a PS2, and feigned ignorance and stuff.  Eventually they gave me the system.  Because I was such a "good sport" about the whole ordeal, they gave me some extra gifts.  WWF Smackdown Just Bring It and Grand Theft Auto 3.  100% completed Smackdown but I didn't have a memory card, so I went out and bought a memory card, but the power went out while we were gone, so I had to start over anyway.  100% beat it again and then I started playing GTA3.

X-mas 2006?  I really don't remember what year it was, but I accidentally bought myself 2 copies of Super Mario Bros. Super Show Vol 2.

[thewelshman]

Sorry for double post, but this is unrelated to the previous Norway stories...

My mother brought me to the mall to buy a SNES for Christmas 1991. Of course, I wasn’t allowed to open it until Christmas.
Soooo, after mom and dad went to bed, I opened it up, hooked it up, and played Super Mario World 
Every day until Christmas, I’d get it out, then neatly pack it back up after I was done. They never knew.

That's hilarious, I did the same with Chrono Trigger. I begged my mom to buy the game for me as it was all I wanted for Christmas. After about a week, I found out where she hid the it. Since she got home about an hour after I did, I would sneak a few hours here and there and got all the way to where you recruited Robo (roughly six or so hours at that time.) I felt bad for doing it, so I deleted my save and started over at Christmas.

Christmas was always an extra special time for my family. We didn't have a ton of money, but my dad would get a bonus and would have some extra cash just for Christmas shopping. I never expected to get a console or games, but he and my mom would surprise me.

My parents bought me a NES when I was 8 and a Genesis when I was about 10. While I never had a ton of games, I put a ton of hours into those consoles. I'll never forget the feeling of unboxing those and frantically connecting them to the tv.

When I was 13, my friend introduced me to Final Fantasy III (VI). I was immediately hooked and HAD to play it. HAD to. Sadly I had a Sega Genesis, so operation, "Save money for a SNES," went into full swing. Luckily my birthday is December 18th, so I would get birthday money around that time. In 1994 I had a birthday party. I admit, this was completely a selfish act as I invited some people who weren't really that close of friends for the extra cash. Funny enough, they ended up being better friends after that. Long story short, I saved enough money to get a SNES (Link the the Past included.) However, I didn't have enough for FFIII as well. Cue mom with the extra cash. While my parents technically never bought me another console, they did help me get the funds to get an SNES and FFIII. Upon getting home I immediately hooked everything up and pumped 13 hours into that wonderful game. This was right before the Christmas break, so I had all the time in the world to play to my heart's content. I have a lot of gaming memories for the holidays, but none much like that. I'm 37 now with two boys and I will always appreciate my parents.

My goal now is to make sure my kids have a Christmas game to make memories with.

[bikingjahuty]

Despite my parents having a modest income growing up they always delivered on XMAS, but I was also fortunate enough to have an aunt and uncle that were very well off who got me some of the more awesome video game related gifts I received during the holidays.


On XMAS-eve 1996 I wanted an N64 so bad and was anxious to the point of pacing all evening at another relatives house that we were celebrating. I remember my appetite for all the tasty food their was diminished since all I wanted to do was open my presents. One thing I was notorious for growing up was examining every preset that had my name on it and doing my very best to guess what was inside. That year there was one box I was all but certain was my N64. I ended up being right, but even though I had guessed correctly it did not make me feel any less excited and happy to get it. I also ended up getting Super Mario 64 with it. It was among the best Xmas gifts I've every received, certainly one of the most memorable.


The other awesome Xmas gift I remember receiving was my PS2. The PS2 had just come out and at the time it was impossible to find in stores. Until then I had never even seen one in person and had only heard how people were flipping them for double their MSRP on ebay given how sought after and rare they were at the time. I wanted one so, so badly, but I was fairly sure I was not going to get one because of their scarcity. In fact, I was so certain about not getting one that I didn't even do my present inspection routine that I mentioned in my N64 story. So XMAS-eve in 2000 we were an another one of my aunt and uncle's homes, I was fairly moppy and depressed because I didn't think I'd be getting a PS2 that night, but then when it came time to open presents I grabbed a large box that was gifted to me, opened it and there was the iconic blue box of the original PS2. I nearly shit myself in excitment and was dumbfounded how my well off aunt was able to obtain one. Supposedly she knew someone in the shipping business who was able to acquire one for her somehow. It sounded very shady, but being an excited 13-year old kid I really didn't care. I was so happy and excited about it that I was able to hook it up that evening and play Tekken Tag Tournament and NHL 2001 which were the two games I got with it.

[stealthrush]

Notable Christmas video-game highlights of my youth 1995-2001;

- Mega Man 7, Kirby's Dream Land 3 for Super Nintendo
- Trap Gunner, Silhouette Mirage for Playstation
- Cannon Spike, Street Fighter III: Third Strike for Dreamcast
- Gotcha Force, Ultimate Muscle for GameCube

- Sega Saturn system, 3-Game Bundle
- Sony PlayStation system
- Sony PlayStation 2 system
- Nintendo GameCube system

Not including the 9/9/99 when my family and I stood in line for the official North American release of Sega Dreamcast home-system which came with a XXL logo t-shirt.

[oldgamerz]

BUMPED TOPIC FROM 2017


OLDGAMERZ'S REPLY:

I was always lucky at Christmas, in 1997 I got my 3rd gaming PC

 a Packard Bell with some games I discovered came with it later on. I used to love playing "G-Nome", it was an underrated mech game that let you get out of your mech or tank or vehicle and roam on foot to find and steal other means for transportation. It was the first video game I ever played that let you exit your mech and find something else in fact. The game even let you enter buildings and steal your enemies encryption code and go through the level undetected. This game also had multiplayer but for some reason you didn't need to be connected to the internet in order to play multiplayer, This game was full of many glitches and poor AI but I still love it

[kypherion]

I remember getting Super Mario Galaxy for christmas once, that was good.
Got a ps3 another time, so glad I got that.
Got an xbox one S with Halo MCC. Pretty rad I guess.
A long time ago I got a DS (original) and that was neat.

I have a pretty bad memory so this is all I remember.

[kashell]

My most vivid memory is when we got a PlayStation and I got Breath of Fire III from the folks. My brother got Final Fantasy VII. We didn't get memory cards, but it didn't matter. That day was wonderful, and Boxing Day provided us with the opportunity to get the cards.

[Flashback2012]

I want to say one year my little brother and I both got original GameBoy systems. My younger cousins still give me grief about it to this day because they all had to share systems. 

I remember right after the video game crash occurred we got a STACK of Atari games for Christmas. I have a Polaroid of me standing next to most of the stack somewhere.

When the NES came out, we were surprised with the Robot set and I want to say the following year we got the Master System (just the standard set as I remember having to buy the Phaser and 3D Goggles later on).

Not really sure if any of those count as childhood stories as I was a tween for the NES/SMS and a teen when the GameBoy came out.   

[wartoy]

One of my favorite memories was getting a n64 with Killer Instinct for Christmas one year. I played so much my parents refused to buy me anything game related after that even to this day.

[snyderec3]

I don't remember if it was for Christmas or my Birthday, but my cousins from Germany sent me Secret of Mana as a gift. (I thought the big box with the Strategy Guide was so cool that it's one of the few games I actually kept the boxes for since Childhood). The problem was neither they nor I realized that there was a difference between PAL and NTSC format video games. I still have the game but have never been able to play it as I still don't have a PAL SNES. I recently picked up a North American and Japanese copy, just to have a complete collection of SNES Secret of Mana games.

[gf78]

My fondest memory gaming-related was Christmas 1987. I got to open a present early on Christmas Eve while my parents were getting food together to take to my grandparents house. It was Castlevania II - Simon's Quest!  I opened that up and played until they drug me out the door. To this very day, it has left an indelible impression on me and the music is forever burned into my conscience.