I was born in the 1983, not an especially unique achievement. Over 3.5 million other people enjoy this distinction in the United States alone, but this fact sets the stage for everything I would encounter in my lifetime and how I would to perceive it.
In late 1987, my parents rented a NES entertainment system from our local video store.
Not Blockbuster or Family video, but Jon's Liquor & Video.
I remember the experience very well to this day, despite being only 4 years old.
With the NES system, (which would have to be back the next day by 5:00pm)
they rented 2 / 3 games.
Super Mario Bros / Duck Huntand Kid Niki
In all honestly I can tell you, the first video game I ever played was… Kid Niki.
Granted Super Bros would endure and hold a special place in my heart for years to come but in that moment, Kid Niki was amazing, the protagonist was an adolescent like myself, he possessed a magic sword which he wielded with such proficiency it seemed to whirl and spin like a Baton of Death.
After alternating turns for awhile between: my parents, my sister, and my aunt and uncle it was my turn again, and I was determined to win.
At this point in time winning was simply, getting past where the others had fallen to a cow eyed bad guy or devious swooping albino bat.
Mustering all the focus a preschooler could, I managed to reach the 1st level boss, what I assumed was the boss of the game, nay, the most powerful and deadly creature ever encountered by a mortal child.
He was called "Death Breath" and we all had a hardy laugh about it, what was so memorable to me was how the adults could be so whimsical about this very imposing nemesis and his moniker.
These video game things seemed to be able to bring people together.
I didn't defeat Death Breath then, in later years I've killed that fool in the name of nostalgia dozens of times, but on thatfatefulday in rural Wisconsin an insatiable love for interactive digital media, or video games for short, was born.
Fast forward a few years, and my parents had brought us to Orlando, Florida for vacation.
Disney World!
A trip which was almost a rite of passage for kids growing up in my day and age, after all whatever the Tanners did on Full House, we all wanted to do too.
It really wasn't all that great. You know that castle isn't even real?!, its just a giant archway. 
But what made the trip was that my birthday coincided with the vacation and it was to be celebrated in a warm and sunny place, it was February in Wisconsin after all.
More than the welcome change of climate was the exaltation of receiving exactly what I wanted.
In a hotel room, on an early February morning, I eagerly tore away the wrapping, to reveal the best birthday gift I ever got.
The Legend of Zelda, I was so happy, I stared at that golden cartridge, and examined that gray shield's emblems like an archeologist struggling to understand their significance.
My parents hadn't had the foresight to bring the NES (which we had since purchased) to Florida, so I had to wait at least three more grueling days in sunny, subtropical Florida to get back to a frozen wasteland and play it.
In hindsight, it probably was for the best. After all, had I been able to adventure through the Land of Hyrule, I probably wouldn't have appreciated anything else Florida had to offer. After all transplanted palm trees and plastic hats with ears couldn't hold a blue candle to moblins and shield stealing Like Likes.
The years of gaming have gone by, and I can still recount many milestone moments with perfect clarity:
1987
The steps at the end of World 6-1 in Super Mario bros. Lives x [Box] [Crown]?!
1988
Beating Contra with a friend (With the Konami code , of course ^^), dying over and over when someone went too far forward, and becoming so angry with the other persons ineptitude, although it was virtually unavoidable in that vertical Waterfall level.
1991
Accompanying my parents to the mall, where the brand new SNES was setup to play Super Mario World. That Bullet Bill was larger than life and put 'Death Breath' to shame as I realized that video games were only going to get bigger and more epic.
1992
The day a friend gave me a brand new copy of Final Fantasy II, still in the original wrapping. His father was a foreman at a factory that shrink-wrapped products, apparently he had brought home a copy of the game for his son (a stolen loaf of bread?), only to discover that the video game system his son owned was a Sega Genesis.
1995
Finding my Christmas presents early (underneath my parents bed, too easy.) and surgically opening them (what I considered surgical anyway) in the dead of night whilst the family slept to discover in 2 short weeks 
I would have in my possession a copy of Mechwarrior 2 (though I didn't recall a MW1) and a Microsoft Sidewinder 3D Pro Joystick (the very first edition…the one that if you eventually opened it up, you would discover the four buttons on the base had no wires attached to them (which would explain why they never worked, and the instruction manual simply ignored them in its diagrams…was this just me?)
Additionally, my family having to spend an extra 100 dollars to buy a 'special chip' that added a whopping 4MB of something called RAM, because the game couldn't run on our 66 MHz Packard Bell without it, the opening video would freeze just as that mech crushed the bleached skull.
1995
Wanting a Virtual Boy, playing a Virtual Boy, not wanting a Virtual Boy anymore.
1995
Winning a tournament of Donkey Kong Country 2the objective was to collect as many nanners as possible, so I just kept entering that room with Cranky stowed away and exiting to a clump of fresh bananas 
1995
Playing Chrono Trigger. Wishing Robo was better, hating Ayla only slightly less than her effeminate companion, Kino
Pride in myself for convincing Magus to join my party, being forced to go back and grind because the Lavos Spawns on Death Mountain were too much to handle (or I was attacking it's shell, idk) leaving poor Robo to plow a field for 400 years, inadvertently crippling Lucca's mother, and finally defeating the boss inside Lavos with the awesome Triple Combo, Arc Impulse…and then fighting some chicken astronaut and it's egg nodes. :/
1996
Riding with a kid I barely knew, his Mom and his clearly ADHD cousin after school to Wal-Mart, just to buy a Nintendo 64, with my own money that I had saved up from many Christmas Birthday cards and some odd chores.
The way Mario moved was my first glimpse of true 'virtual freedom'. Flipping and diving and jumping the length of a swimming pool, while fighting tooth and nail against a camera system and with a controller not equipped to provide proper navigation through a 3d environment
1996
Convincing a friend to buy Tobal No. 1 just to play the FF7 demo packaged with it. The $60 game was crap. But that 20 minute demo was glorious.
1996
Playing Duke Nukem 3D, editing .con files and making BUILD levels and feeling like I was a real programmer. 
1996
Installing amazing Quake mods like AirQuake and QuakeRally (which I suspect is what the upcoming free roaming buggy/FPS game RAGE is inspired by , and even watching a feature length movie, filmed entirely in engine, what would eventually become known as Machinima
1997
Seeing 3D accelerated graphics for the first time, when a friend (the same one that bought Tobal, rich B$&%@#) bought something for his blazing fast 133Mhz Pentium 2 computer called a '3DFX card' it was as long has his forearm, but Quake II looked like an entirely different game.
It was as if I had been playing in black and white all these years.
1998
Getting a Playstation and Resident Evil 1 for Xmas, but no memory card.
I played the first 20 minutes of that game at least 20 times, getting past that room where the two dogs jumped through the window was a modern day Death Breath encounter.
1998
GoldenEye. Multiple TVs. 'nuff said.
1999
Superman 64 exceeding the entire industries expectations and revolutionizing games as we know it…j/k 
1999
Doing tricks in The Warehouse for 2:00 at a time for 100:00:00 in Tony Hawk Pro Skater
2000
Approaching the final dungeon in Final Fantasy IX, and in a fit of anger, having died by some white dragon for the 5th time, yanked the controller away from the screen, accidently pulling my Playstation perched precariously on the edge of the stand to the floor, it landed hard, Final Fantasy disappeared replaced by a blue screen mocking 'Aux Input', and when the smoke settled, my off brand 256 slot memory card had neatly cracked in half, never to be recovered. To this day I still have no idea how that game ended. :,-(
2001
Stopping by a friend's house and finding a group playing a new game called Grand Theft Auto. Sitting down and being blown away by how visceral it all was, and dying quickly as the FBI rolled up.
2002
Playing Morrowind on a computer I built myself, at full settings, crossing endless miles of ashen wasteland and stumbling upon massive dungeons and catacombs that could be explored for what seemed like days.
2003
Becoming so proficient with the pistol in the Halo 1 map, Hang 'em High that I could effectively kill with one clip from a football field away.
2004
Deciding I was going to win in that sitting and fighting the final boss of Prince of Persia: Warrior Within over 50 times (was she that hard, was it that late, or am I exaggerating? idk), learning her plethora of 'tells' to opportunistically take a few pixels off her screen wide health bar.
2007
Building up a level 70 Paladin Tank to T4/5 in WoW at the height of burning crusade, belonging to a raiding guild who could do Kara blindfolded, was mastering Gruul's and heading for Serpent Shrine whilst constantly playing diplomat to 30-40 different 'individualistic' individuals.
I could go one for awhile…but I digress.
Now I'm in my late twenties, and I still love games.
They've changed a lot in the last few decades. Almost as much for the worse as for the better, but that just makes the real jewels shine all the more.
Video games have shaped my perspective of the world, the friendships I've maintained, taught me about healthy competition, trained my hand eye coordination, abstract reasoning and spatial sense to peek proficiency, led me to pursue a career in programming, and have been a constant companion, a welcome escape and an extension of how I experience life.
I feel I know enough about games now, to know which will be good and which will be bad a year before they are released, I play games with an appreciation for what was put into their creation, like a diehard film buff or an art critic.
I am a collector and ambassador of video games. Buying games I've won before just so that if the day ever arises and a friend says "I want to play a game where you ride a dragon."
I can cry "Drakan!" and proceed to clamor on about Rynn and the magical, near perfect world she lived in, where powerful swords lie waiting to be discovered, clutched in the bony hands of a 100 year dead warrior inside a hidden cave halfway up a mountainside. Where goblin like creatures died by spurting fountains of blood after being decapitated by your spectacular Lora Croft-ian acrobatics…but I would also be forced to acknowledge Divinity 2 as it is a more modern interpretation of the same theme, though lack luster in my experience.
I've given video games as gifts to friends, family and lovers.
I like to be able to share the unique experiences I've had playing some of the best games with others, forming a permanent bond between two individuals.
Can you hum the tune to the first two levels in Super Mario Bros?
Can you tell me what is the only thing that can kill Ganon?
Can you name the first Final Fantasy character with a prosthetic?
Exactly.
Video games permeate the soul and enrich our lives, giving us new experiences and perspectives to draw our opinions from.
So I guess what I really want to convey to you, dear reader, is this:
"Video Games are awesome."
Please note some of my facts, order of events and observations may and likely are wrong, this is because life is long and memory has the tendency to flex and warp, I am writing it as I remember it, how I perceive I experienced it, and that for me is my truth.
Thank you for reading.
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