The Nostalgia Corner

A fine hello to you all and thank you for stopping by to read my musings about the topic of retro games and retro gaming in general. I very much enjoy writing (not so sure if I am any good at it to be honest) but there is something therapeutic about getting your thoughts down on paper so to speak, so I have thought to myself a blog would be a great start. There are many passions and interest in my life that I could choose to write about, family, travelling, fitness/work, sports, but I have chosen gaming as its something that has been there though out my life. I am fortunate enough to have witness the evolution of gaming from my days playing on the Atari 2600 as a eager youngster playing ghostbusters to current gen Playstation 4 and most consoles in between. At 36 I am and definitely feel like a veteran gamer, in another life I may have perhaps tried my hand as a You Tube content creator but also as a family man with a full time job its a commitment I could not commit too, for now I...

For someone who had had the pleasure of gaming for more years than id care to admit, you get to playing a fair share of games across many platforms, so much so if this was a paying job i could sit and type reviews for 8 hours a day 5 days a week, but its not a paying job, its passion, its history, its nostalgia, my memories, our memories as gamers, a loading screen, intro music, that first glimpse of those 8/16 bit graphics and so on. I have recently stumbled across a very random website whereby i can type in a console/computer, even a genre of game and as many game as i want numerically and hit generate it boom up pops a list, and i thought to myself, this is good, this is great in fact, there are probably hundred of games I've completely forgotten about, i wonder if this is a way to delve into this gamers archive and see what initial memories are pulled out from it, review if from recollection as well as going back and having a go again to see how it measures up to those memories...

So its been a minute. I sort of fell of the planet for a while, well in a writing sense that is, my bad, life has a way of doing that, i feel, since my last article the world has certainly changed, we survived through a pandemic, unfortunately there are other evils in the world with wars being waged which is sad. If anyone from these parts of our planet reads my heart goes out to you and i hope peace returns for you sometime in the immediate future. So yeah a hiatus came into play, i hit pause and lost the remote to press play again. I am a bit older, not so sure wiser, but I'm here and want to write again and i hope i can ask some to join me. My blogs to which there are 2 focus on 1. retro gaming (sometimes current) and my second blog titled Pint Size Pizza which focuses on craft beers and pizza, more to the point homemade (i spent my lockdown becoming a self proclaimed aficionado in both, i like to think you could bundle all 3 topics up and find something you like from any of tha...

Getting some free time to sit down and write is priceless when you have a young family, so having some time off from work and the kids at school means i can sit and game or even better research some ideas to blog, or both, today I am switching my time between writing this piece and getting stuck into more Mafia III, very much enjoying my time as Lincoln Clay. Today we are following on from something i touched on at the end of the last article, and that is top 10's, PS2 in particular, the top 10 series will hopefully prove both easy reading but also stir up nostalgia and debate, i doubt very much you would find one 10 ten then same , we all have games that resonate with us differently and games that were just that good its impossible to ignore them. I recently found a you tube channel called MetalJesusRocks, does what it says on the tin, retro gamer who has passion for games and mental who boasts a Jesus like head of hair. Good channel if you like retro gaming, a strong thum...

I hope the weekend has been a good one for you all. Productive and full or hearty gaming, me I've logged some hours on one of the free offerings from the PlayStation's PS plus, Mafia III. To my shame I failed to pick this up when it was released, being the cheapskate I decided to bide my time until it dropped in price and then hey presto there it was free to download, result. Any older gamer or one with a family will understand that sometimes we just can justify buying every new title out, family, kids etc can dictate a lot of our finances. Strong game so far. Good solid story of double cross/revenge seeking retribution, and our main protagonist is an absolute unit. Definitely check it out if you were like me and haven't played it. Anyways on with our main piece, cult classics and one in particular. Like movies from the past games and gaming franchises in general are now privy to the reboot magic, always a gamble if the game was a roaring success in its heyday, it c...

Its the weekend and this guy just feels like writing, as a family man there was plenty to be done around the house but it was done in record time so i could get down to the important business of brainstorming ideas for blogs and reviews with plenty of research and reminiscing about a lot of what i have got down on paper so to speak today. Racing sims today are a highly polished affair, slick controls, smooth as hell textures, fine detailing on the cars and the environments are just light years from the predecessors from years gone by, today we have the cherry on top with Grand Turismo and also others such as Project Cars, the F1 series, Forza and Need for Speed (underground 2, riders on the storm boys, riders on the storm), but for every finely polished current gen title racing sim there is a grandfather that has blazed the trail so that these games could exist. Today we look over and reminisce over some titles from the 80's and 90's, some may well still live in our mem...

Happy Friday, which means one thing to this gamer, the internal battle come midnight tonight, wrestling with the decision to game on or get some sleep, usually gaming wins and I end up like a extra from the Walking Dead (even after my first coffee) the next day having went to bed close to 3am, my fellow gamers with kids will understand (unfortunately kids have no pause button) and gamers without well you will reach that level soon enough. I digress, on to my piece for today, first person shooters, get the formula right for a first person then its like printing your own money. first and third person shooters are everywhere now but rewinding to the 90's, not so much, which for me makes it a pretty special time for this particular type of game. Now the good thing about gaming is we are not limited to picking just one game, we are allowed to have love for multiple games, but I pose the hypothetical of if you had no other choice which first person shooter would you choose. I have ma...

The Zelda series is synonymous with any gamer worth their salt, lets be honest.  I challenge anyone to admit there is not one Zelda title past or present they have played and not enjoyed. I will admit this, i have yet to play the newest instalment of the series, manly due to the fact i do not yet own a Switch, which is a travesty as i am all about Mario and Mario Kart so i think that is something i must rectify in the near future. I have owned multiple Nintendo 64 consoles throughout my years since its release, along the way they were sold to make way for other life priorities, college, uni and the copious alcohol that went along with said college and uni, but time and time again Mario, Link and the gang would find their way back into my life. Proud enough to admit i bought my first Nintendo 64 and also a copy of Mario Kart 64 upon the UK release via funds through jobs such as gardening and car washing (good old days indeed) eventually i bought myself a copy ...

New week new things to talk about. well not so much new as this is a retro gaming blog so old things to talk about I guess. Moving back from the opening blog on Broken Sword the time machine is going back again to an even simpler time in gaming, the late 80's and early 90's and for me this was when gaming really stating to come to the fore, we moved away from more keyboard based and we were introduced to the console, now I know consoles were around before this but the good old 8 bit Nintendo onwards is where things really started to go boom. I was never in one camp (Nintendo or Sega) I much preferred to be able to play both and at one stage or another in my youth owned one of the other and in later life with my  'ahem' unquestionable wealth I would have both. I sadly do not have a Sega product to my name at present, my retro console collection remains somewhat sparse (Super Nintendo, Nintendo 64, Nintendo Gamecube, Playstation 1 & 2) I do however like to use my ...