Like many of you, I've beaten many games over the years--too many to count. I beat Avatar: The Last Airbender last night (I'm reviewing it), and for some reason that got me thinking about the first game I ever beat. Much to my surprise, I couldn't remember the first game to ever surrender to my awesome game playing skills. I think it may have been Contra, but it could have been Super Mario Bros. or maybe some game I'm totally forgetting on the Apple IIe. But I'm pretty sure it was Contra, and here's the story:

I started playing games on the Atari 2600, but for the most part, you really couldn't beat a lot of those games. Most of them just went on forever, and the ones that had an ending were probably too difficult/boring to me since I was only five or six years old at the time. It was when my family moved from Indiana to Virginia that I was introduced to the Nintendo Entertainment System. Unfortunately, I didn't have one, so I had to go friends' houses to get my NES fix. Since I didn't have a system of my own, I kind of sucked and I spent most of my time losing to my buddy Jason in Double Dribble and Excitebike, getting pounded by the likes of Piston Honda in Mike Tyson's Punchout!, and just to mix things up I'd stink it up in Kung-Fu, too.

So we've established that I stunk because I didn't have my own system to practice on, but there was one game that even the crappiest players could beat (thanks to the ol' up, up, down, down, left, right, left, right, B,A,B,A, Start code), and that was Contra. The game was crazy hard with the measly three lives you were normally given, but the "Contra Code" gave you 30 lives to play with. Even better, you and a friend could play the game cooperatively and the code would hook you both up with 30 lives. If you ran out of men you could even steal lives from your buddy--always a good way to start an argument. Hooray for games that even the worst player on Earth can beat!

There was still some skill involved in my triumphant accomplishment, right? Maybe not as much as I once thought. As long as you were playing with someone good, playing Contra cooperatively mostly involved not falling off of ledges, keeping up with your partner, and letting them get the good guns so they wouldn't yell at you. The game didn’t feel super short back in the day, but in hindsight, it probably didn't take more than 30 minutes from start to finish. But finish it I did, and I got to watch the little island blow up as my helicopter escaped in the nick of time. 

So there you have it--the grand story behind the first game I ever beat. When I was a kid, beating a game was a real accomplishment and something I was proud of. It's still fulfilling to sit and watch the end credits roll, but it's not as exciting as it was 15+ years ago.

So how about you guys? What was the first game you beat? Is there a story behind it? Feel free to tell your story in the comments section or send an email to AaronT@GameSpot.com. If I get enough of them I'll post the best responses in a follow-up editorial.

*Since many of you have been asking, "Getting To Know GameSpot" will return this Friday.