So it's been fifteen years. That went by quite quickly. Fifteen years since I first held a game controller in my hands for the very first time. Almost, actually. We haven't come to the exact date yet, but it's fast approaching. Basically, this blog post is going to be one of (hopefully) fifteen posts in a series entitled 15 Years of Gaming, which commemorates the very first time I played a video game, something which I've since dedicated a strong portion of my life to. Basically, how this thing's going to work is I'm going to work on this over the next two weeks. I aim to make this a pretty hefty blog series, seeing as I don't do it all that often. This'll let you guys know all about my gaming history. From May 23, one post will be posted each day until the final day, June 6, 2013, which marks an incredible 15 years since I started playing games. It's not only going to be gaming-related, more like an overview of my life so far and how gaming ties into it. I'll also have a little reader interaction by posting a question at the bottom of each part so that you can tell me a little about your history.

Describing my childhood can be a little hazy. My parents always seemed to be fighting, from what I've noticed, not that I could remember any of it. A few years ago I heard of the time my mother belted my dad in the face with that steel part of a vacuum cleaner hose. Ouch. To put it simply, I don't have a single positive memory of the two together until their divorce about three or four years after I was born (I tell people the divorce was finalised in 1999, but I really have no idea for sure, not that I care enough to ask my dad about it). However, there are some moments that simply stand out as things I'll never forget, no matter how long ago it was. There are some moments from my childhood I remember from when I was two or three, and stuff I forget from recently even though it only happened within the last few years. As a long-time video gamer, one of the most treasured moments was the first time I played a game. It was almost breathtaking. This idea of actions done on this controller turned into movements on the screen, in this case, a car.

You see, the very first game I played was the original Gran Turismo. It was on June 6, 1998, little over a month after its release, and it remains an important date in the brief history of my life (as stupid as that sounds). You see, as a three-year old, I kind of lacked the motor skills necessary to play a racing sim like Gran Turismo, what, with its (then) highly realistic physics engine and all the engine tweaking and tuning that to this day I still am clueless at what half the settings do. So I'm basically sitting on the couch, watching my dad play. A busy day home from work, he just wanted to relax and put his feet up, ignoring whatever argument was going on between my parents. I don't remember what made me want to play, probably the fact that I had an interest in cars from a very young age.

When I was around this age (actually, June 6, 1998 would be exactly three years and three months old, which I only just realised), whenever I would go for a drive with my parents, I would often look around at this great big world I was in and just how immersive it was. My dad essentially has a GPS wired directly into his brain (not literally, of course). What I mean by that is that I've rarely seen him need a street directory: he just has a knack for knowing which street to turn into, even in places he rarely goes into. He told me a story a few weeks ago of this time when he was about five years old, and he was going to see relatives in Carnegie, from Fairfield. Now, his parents had been there once before, but had forgotten how to get there, and thought it would be rude to ring up and ask for directions (don't ask me why, I would've done it). But my dad basically said to my grandfather, "I know how to get there," to which my grandfather gives him a look that simply says "Shut up, you little brat. You're going to get us lost." But he was so confident, he told my grandfather which streets to turn into, which roads to go in, which direction at intersections, and he led them to the front door.

Essentially, my dad looks for key landmarks and remembers them. Soon enough, he'll learn the fastest ways to get from A to B, taking into account things like traffic and roadworks. I kind of had this similar instinct, but instead of recognising certain landmarks to get across town, I'd stick my head up and look all around me. I'd see cars all around me and start remembering the shapes of cars and putting them to their names. I could do much more than say that red one or that black one. I used to be able to identify Holden Commodores, Ford Falcons and Toyota Corollas before the age of three. I could recall each badge I saw, the differences between certain models, like how a Ford Falcon EF looks different to a Ford Falcon AU. Even though they look different, I could still tell you that they were both Ford Falcons, but this one is an EF and that one is an AU.

That's something that irritates me though, when people can't identify cars straight away. I understand that not everyone is a gearhead, and really, put me in a garage with a car and ask me to fix it, you'd achieve better results faster if you asked a horse to do it. But I'll tell you something, say I'm walking down the street with friends (and this has happened several times, at least enough to become a nuisance). One of them will see a car that they like, and they'll say something like "I like that blue car." I'll be left with one of two options. Either (a), I'll notice several blue cars around me and ask them which blue car they're referring to, only to have them reply with "the one off in the distance," meaning I can't identify it, or (b), I'll tell them "you mean that Toyota Camry over there?" Only to be met with blank stares and awkward silence.

Anyway, back to Gran Turismo. He offers me a seat in his lap and places the controller in my hand, then places his hand over mine. I'm holding a Sony DualShock controller. Boy, this is something. He tells me that the X button selects things and the Triangle button goes back. So he leads me into the Arcade Mode. Wow. Look at how good the cars look on that menu screen. Amazing. Well, they look quite dated now, don't they, but back then, this game was groundbreaking in terms of its realistic graphics. So he says to press the X button on Single Race, and choose the Easy difficulty. And when I proceeded, Ah, I thought, I recognise these makes (or manufacturers, as they were called in the game). At that moment, manufacturer became the longest word I knew of at the time, which is something that's completely irrelevant.

The level of detail used in the cars in this menu screen blew me away at such a young age.
The in game models did the same thing as well, don't worry. 

So with my car selected (a Honda NSX), I jump onto the Clubman Stage Route 5. My dad helps me with the controls. He controls the steering, I'm in charge of acceleration and braking. So it's simple. Hold the X button to speed up, and hold the Square button to slow down. Dad's got the cornering, so we just have to keep the car moving. And move it we did. It took me just a few seconds to get into 5th place (you start from 6th in Arcade Mode, qualification only occurs in GT Mode) and I shot into fourth just coming out of the tunnel. Those who know the track can probably visualise this race. Fourth came before long, third just before that final left-hand turn coming on to the final straight, and I was into second place just as the second lap began.

I couldn't seem to catch that pesky Impreza WRX that was leading. I made ground on every car up to that point, but I was only slowly reeling in that first place. It all came down to the final turn where I had moved into second place one lap ago. I kept the speed really high through the corner and was able to use the power of the NSX to cross the finish line in first place. My first race, at three years of age, resulted in a victory. Granted, I wasn't controlling the steering, only the speed, but I was able to pick up the win. I consider it a monumental moment in my life because I used to be a sore loser. Badly. Had I have lost, I may not have picked up another controller again. But I'm glad I did.

What was the first game you played? Let me know in the comments section below.

Contents:
Part 01 | Part 02 | Part 03 | Part 04 | Part 05 | Part 06 | Part 07 | Part 08
Part 09 | Part 10 | Part 11 | Part 12 | Part 13 | Part 14 | Part 15