Poll of the Day > "No, I was born before video games were popular"...really?

(+) Yeah! (+)

There can't be that many people who voted in this poll that are over ~50 years old. How did that option get so many votes?
---

You think video games were popular in 1968?
---

Videogames didn't get popular until the 90s
---

I think it depends on what they think popular is. Lots of people think video games only became popular recently. And a lot of people might not even know the age of some games. They may think that they are older than a game by a few years when it's really the other way around. I would have expected choice 4 would be more popular than 5. But I guess not...
---

Video games really exploded in the late 70's/early 80s. I was born in '80, so there are a FEW games from before my birth that hold up, but I'm not exactly jamming Pong in my free time.

I called the same thing but was slightly more right about it.

Was decided that games got popular in 1985, where most people who would play were six or seven years old at the time, making them about forty today. It's still surprising that that many people who use GFAQs are that old.

And tbh, around me, mentioning that you played games was still taboo through the 90s. It wasn't until after my high school in the 00s that it was really alright to say you were a gamer.
---

I was old enough to be creating games when the Apple II and TRS 80 came out, so yeah, considering the number of games that predated that were extremely small (At least in households), it's not that hard to believe.

Anyone born before 1975 or so, probably didn't play any games older then them basically. Pong I think was 1972 and lunar landing...might have predated that (don't remember).

Anyway Basically if your 45 or older, you almost certainly have never played a game older then you. If you played the original pong, then you might have played one older then you if your 40-45.

Pong was re-released many times and was not the original magnovox version (Think that was the original), or was there a seperate system for it initially...again too long ago. It's more likely many people played later versions of the game and not the original.

And yeah, there are alot of people on this board over 40.
---

It seems like a bunch of people don't know when video games got popular. Arcades were HUGE in the 80's, and it's still easy to say that games were popular in the 70's. I'd be surprised if there were a lot of people in their 40's on this website (but it's cool that you're here!), but even someone born in 1978 would have been born after video games became popular.

It does seem like a lot of people might just think that video games weren't popular before they were born. We all grew up in the "golden age of gaming", obviously... ;)
---

They shed much of their negative stigma and gained mainstream acceptance probably late 2000s.

Before that they were popular as kids toys at best or basement dweller stations or worse.

Oak_Tea posted...

Arcades were HUGE in the 80's, and it's still easy to say that games were popular in the 70's. I'd be surprised if there were a lot of people in their 40's on this website (but it's cool that you're here!)

This sounds contradictory to your OP. You did sound surprised.
---

No one can be over 50 years old

Its impossible
---

RedSeaisAlive posted...

You think video games were popular in 1968?

This, pretty much. The arcade boom didn't even start until the late 70s or early 80s.
---

I already said this in the other topic about this that was on the front page when you made this, but video games didn't have sustained popularity until the NES, so I consider 1985 the cutoff year. Even well into the 90s they were still viewed in the mainstream as just a type of toy, not their own separate thing.

JOExHIGASHI posted...

Videogames didn't get popular until the 90s

Then explain the rise of the NES. In the late 80's, everyone I knew had a NES. You probably weren't alive in the 80's. That's the only way you would think that. I was there. I know

Oak_Tea posted...

There can't be that many people who voted in this poll that are over ~50 years old. How did that option get so many votes?

I was born in 1984. That was definitely before video games were popular. Only nerds played video games back then. The NES hadn't even been released in America.
---

I was born in '77. While I do play pinball older than me, there aren't any video games from before my time that I really play now. I do still have all of my consoles and thousands of games.
---

Zikten posted...

JOExHIGASHI posted...

Videogames didn't get popular until the 90s

Then explain the rise of the NES. In the late 80's, everyone I knew had a NES. You probably weren't alive in the 80's. That's the only way you would think that. I was there. I know

I'm older than you, and you're wrong. Now go sit in the corner and be quiet.


---

Metal_Mario99 posted...

Oak_Tea posted...

There can't be that many people who voted in this poll that are over ~50 years old. How did that option get so many votes?

I was born in 1984. That was definitely before video games were popular. Only nerds played video games back then. The NES hadn't even been released in America.

Bullshit. The arcade boom was HUGE (not to mention the Atari 2600). I was a kid during that time and it was insane.
---

I say if you're in your mid-30s (or older) you were born before games got popular. There was the initial video game popularity rise in the late 70s, but then the industry crashed in '83 and video games weren't popular again until the resurgence a few years later.

The problem is the poll ambiguously equates 'classic games' to 'games older than you.' This is an acceptable definition as modern games will eventually become classic games at some point. But it makes speaking about categories of responses more difficult. When one person says they were born before games got popular what they're referring to as popular or classic games may be different than what you consider popular or classic games. A twenty year old might very well refer to a game from '98 as a classic game. While a thirty year old would see the same game as much more modern than a game he grew up playing that was made in '88. But both games are the same age as the person considering them 'classic'.

The poll is also worded poorly as is normally the case. Therefore you need to creatively reason why you choose an answer that isn't entirely true but as close as possible to your actual response.

Do you regularly play games that are older than you?

No, I don't regularly play games older than me.

Yes, I love playing classic games on old systems

Well what do you mean by classic games? Are classic games games that are older than me as in what the question asked or games on older systems as in this response? I do love playing classic games, not necessarily on the old hardware. So maybe I should pick this response despite it being completely opposite of my true answer.

Sometimes, I'll play retro games now and then

Probably appropriate for me, I'll revisit old games every once in a while. So the frequency here is pretty accurate. But again are we talking my interpretation of retro or do we mean games that are strictly older than me?

Rarely, I've only played a couple of the classics

This might work too, I tend to play only a couple of old favorites when I play classic games. However these few classics are younger than me. And it isn't a rare occurrence for me to play these few titles.

No, I only play newer games on new systems

This negative response matches my response to the question, but the specific reason does not match my reason for not playing games older than me. I don't only play newer games. I will play older games, they're just not often older than me.

No, I was born before video games were popular

Wait a second, the question was about "games older than you" not "games older than the popular period of gaming". This is the only negative response that I don't play games older than me that most closely matches my reasons. I'll just have to assume they are allowing me to interpret when games got popular as I choose.

The classic old favorites I'll return to play are around 25 years old, which is younger than me. The poll is just missing, "No, I was born before all the old games I play." And the last response is the closest approximation.


---

GinsuVictim posted...

Bullshit. The arcade boom was HUGE (not to mention the Atari 2600). I was a kid during that time and it was insane.

And to be fair, the arcade boom also died off fairly quickly in the early 80s.

That's the real problem - how do you define "when video games became popular"? The first time they became a fad? The first time a significant number of people owned home consoles? The first time it actually became somewhat acceptable for older teens and adults to play games regularly and not be treated like nerds or socially-immature weirdos? The first time video games started to have a regular and prolonged presence in pop culture?

There are a LOT of ways to interpret the question, and none of them are really inherently more objectively correct than the others.

I know I was absolutely a hardcore gamer in the 80s, and I wouldn't even remotely have said that gaming was "popular" at the time. I certainly wouldn't have thought it was something trendy or "cool" to do. I'd almost be willing to argue that gaming "popularity" is something that didn't really happen until the PS2 era (once the average age of gamers started tipping towards adults and college gamers started proliferating), regardless of whether or not there were earlier boom periods.


---

I can believe it. I'm pushing 40. PO is a hair older than me. I know there's at least one reg here that's got a decade on us.

I can remember playing Pac-Man, ET, and a few other games on an Atari 2600 that I got from my cousin back when I was like 3 years old. One of my uncles was a hardcore DND player and I can remember him playing Adventure on both ours and his own Atari.

I also have many, many fond memories of my NES and my childhood best friend's NES and Genesis. I 'member the turbo grafix 16, neo geo, Atari lynx, and my own og Gameboy.

By the time of the PS2, the average age of a "gamer" was 32. I'm squarely well within the lower bracket of the generation where gaming was a normal thing.

And this is all excluding PC gaming. I even had Bungie's Pathways into Darkness, and Marathon 1 and 2 on my Power Mac 6100 back in 96 when I graduated high school.

I totally believe there are people in the range between my own upper 60's parents and the octagenarians.
---

Energy Surge posted...

but then the industry crashed in '83 and video games weren't popular again until the resurgence a few years later.

We never slowed down on gaming during that period. They were putting out more than we could consume. From the late 70's forward, gaming never lost steam with its audience.
---

Dammit PO, I knew we were going to have to represent here on principle. As always, you beat me by like 3 seconds, lol.
---

And everything here is ignoring the literal shortage of the availability of US quarters during the Pac-Man craze in the early 80s.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ZrwnAdqBCg0" data-time="
---

I was born before the video game industry recovered from the 1983 crash, so... yeah. Anyone 33 or older pretty much qualifies.
---

GinsuVictim posted...

Metal_Mario99 posted...

Oak_Tea posted...

There can't be that many people who voted in this poll that are over ~50 years old. How did that option get so many votes?

I was born in 1984. That was definitely before video games were popular. Only nerds played video games back then. The NES hadn't even been released in America.

Bullshit. The arcade boom was HUGE (not to mention the Atari 2600). I was a kid during that time and it was insane.

Agreed. If the poll includes arcades then yeah, it was standing room only in the late 70's and into the 80's.
---

I was born before video games. What option could I have voted for?

The way the poll is worded, someone who was born in 1990 but only plays video games from the 90s might vote for "I was born before video games were popular" just because that would be the closest answer for them. Voting for that option doesn't necessarily mean they were born before video games were popular, but just that it's the best answer for them of the choices.
---

GinsuVictim posted...

Energy Surge posted...

but then the industry crashed in '83 and video games weren't popular again until the resurgence a few years later.

We never slowed down on gaming during that period. They were putting out more than we could consume. From the late 70's forward, gaming never lost steam with its audience.

But the audience at the time was never really as large as you think it was (for all that it was the cornerstone of gaming at the time, the Atari 2600 never sold more than 30 million units worldwide). Nor was the hobby as accepted in the mainstream consciousness at the time as it later became.

It's part of why each successive generation absolutely did better than the one before in terms of sales and user-base penetration. And, in turn, became more of an accepted and entrenched cultural artifact.

The real question is just at which point on the upward curve do you say, "Yes, this here is the precise and objective point where video games became "popular"."



WhiskeyDisk posted...

I can believe it. I'm pushing 40. PO is a hair older than me. I know there's at least one reg here that's got a decade on us.

There's at least a couple older than us, and a few close behind us. And that's just on PotD. The demographics skew higher on some other boards on the site.

That being said, it's probably worth noting that when I was born, arcades weren't actually a thing and the Atari 2600 didn't exist (Pong did, but video games were niche as fuck back then in the pre-cartridge era). The arcade successes that made them a huge fad like Pac-Man wouldn't come along for another few years. So even if you point to the later 2600 era or even the early NES era as the definitive turning point, that still means you're talking about people who are at least 7-8 years younger than me being "born" beforehand.


---

Playsaver posted...

I was born before video games. What option could I have voted for?

Whichever option fits you the most... Which option would that be?
---

GinsuVictim posted...

Energy Surge posted...

but then the industry crashed in '83 and video games weren't popular again until the resurgence a few years later.

We never slowed down on gaming during that period. They were putting out more than we could consume. From the late 70's forward, gaming never lost steam with its audience.

I'm not saying you didn't play lots of games back then. I'm just saying that gaming wasn't popular at that time. And an industry crash is pretty good evidence of the lack of popularity. But all of this arguing over when games became popular is a moot point.

To reiterate my post, I have to interpret what 'popular' means to correctly answer the poll. I don't regularly play games that are older than me but I do play older games. If I equate classic games to games older than me and popular games as games younger than me, exactly as the poll equates them, I can use the last response to accurately answer it.


---

Video games never died off after the Atari came out, not even a little. It was at most Boys clubs, if you didn't have a system a few of your friends certainly did, there were movies like Tron (which was released in 82), that had mutliple arcade games and some video games released for it.

I grew up through those years and ever since they started being common (when I was in elementary school), games were a big part of most kids lives.

Me more then most, heck, I learned to code in basic from LOGO and created my own video games back in the floppy disc days before there were even game stores or a way to get PC games from a store, but I also had a friend who paid $70 bucks for a copy of Tengan Tetris (special version) back in the nintendo days. Games where a big deal from the mid 70's on. Some years were better then others, and there were certainly some slow years (years where during the summer I just replayed the original Might and Magic games until Phantasy Star Online and D2 came out)...but there was no point in time where video games died or came close to dying.

There is not one year I can remember where I didn't have at least a few games I really liked.
---

ParanoidObsessive posted...

I'm older than you, and you're wrong. Now go sit in the corner and be quiet.

do you know my exact age? I was born in 1981.

and I don't care what you say, everyone I knew had a nes by like 1987 or 1988

wolfy42 posted...

Video games never died off after the Atari came out, not even a little.

this too. the so called video game crash is exaggerated and misunderstood by those who weren't alive at the time. I never stopped seeing video games in stores. even during the time when it supposedly crashed.

Lets do this by year really quick.

1972 (pong)...while not a great game, most gamers alive at this time (or eventual gamers), probably eventually tried it...as there were very few options. Games had not really started to take off yet.

1973 (lunar landar)....most also played this, and the original version is in places like the exploritorium in SF so many have tried it many years later.

1974 Atari I think started making stand alone games like it's tank game this year, not much really happened but games still had not taken off.

1975 First very basic dungeon crawlers/dnd games were released, still nothing special.

1976 Breakout (brickout) was released. I made a similar game to this on my own, on the school computer. Few other racing games etc.

1977 Atari and PC games got going. Combat etc for Atari, Zork for PC...this was right before Underground PC games started to take off (many of which are not mentioned anywhere on the net now adays.)

1978 Space invaders and more Atari, along with plenty of underground PC games...which you had to literally buy from warehouses.

1979 More meh atari games, few decent arcade games, nothing great this year really.

1980 Now we are getting going!! Berzerk!!! Fight like a humanoid, Kill the destroyer. Dragon Quest. Missile Command. Pac Man. Rogue and a ton of others. This is...probably the year when games really started to take off. You could (and I did) get a version of Wizardry proving grounds this year...the first real RPG ever...it was world changing, awesome...amazing. This year was when I fell in love with video games.

1981+ I was going to make a list of every year, but honestly there is no point there was always at least a few greta games after 1981...galaga etc was this year, along with tons of other good games (bards tale was around here etc)....there was never a bad year after 1981.
---

ParanoidObsessive posted...

And to be fair, the arcade boom also died off fairly quickly in the early 80s.

To be even more fair, it's not like the popularity just died. There had been rapid unsustainable growth early on and, although that collapsed, arcades were still very much a thing until maybe the 00s when they phased out of malls. Arcade culture really had multiple periods of popularity, thanks to various genre booms.

ParanoidObsessive posted...

That's the real problem - how do you define "when video games became popular"? The first time they became a fad? The first time a significant number of people owned home consoles? The first time it actually became somewhat acceptable for older teens and adults to play games regularly and not be treated like nerds or socially-immature weirdos? The first time video games started to have a regular and prolonged presence in pop culture?

If you're being literal about it (ie, first time they became popular), then it should be the arcade boom.

ParanoidObsessive posted...

I know I was absolutely a hardcore gamer in the 80s, and I wouldn't even remotely have said that gaming was "popular" at the time. I certainly wouldn't have thought it was something trendy or "cool" to do. I'd almost be willing to argue that gaming "popularity" is something that didn't really happen until the PS2 era (once the average age of gamers started tipping towards adults and college gamers started proliferating), regardless of whether or not there were earlier boom periods.

If you were to arbitrarily pick a mainstream point, it would have to be much later than the ps2, doubly so since consoles *still* have some amount of stigma attached to them (and PC gaming has a whole other set of stigmas attached) and it's a dedicated purchase. Honestly, other than arcades, it's really just been mobile that really brought gaming to the masses

ParanoidObsessive posted...

That being said, it's probably worth noting that when I was born, arcades weren't actually a thing and the Atari 2600 didn't exist (Pong did, but video games were niche as fuck back then in the pre-cartridge era).

I thought you were 41 or 42?
---

I was born in 1972...
---

Your eyes are kinda like videos for your brain so I guess that makes anything a video game

Zikten posted...

I was born in 1981.

Zikten posted...

the so called video game crash is exaggerated and misunderstood by those who weren't alive at the time. I never stopped seeing video games in stores. even during the time when it supposedly crashed.

The crash was 83-85, making you at most 2 to 4 during the period of the crash. You wouldn't remember continuing to see games at stores, don't bullshit.

Also you people going "But I played games in the 70s!" are totally missing the point

Chewster posted...

Also you people going "But I played games in the 70s!" are totally missing the point

To be fair, it was a poorly-worded poll... like most Gamefaqs polls >_>
---

WhiskeyDisk posted...

And everything here is ignoring the literal shortage of the availability of US quarters during the Pac-Man craze in the early 80s.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ZrwnAdqBCg0" data-time="

There's a slight difference between "popular" and "fad". Or, at least that what this very board insists explains the Wii/360/PS3 generation.

It's arguable that gaming wasn't really "popular" until The Sucking:
https://www.penny-arcade.com/comic/2001/06/06/the-sucking-origins

JOExHIGASHI posted...

Videogames didn't get popular until the 90s

I was a kid at the height of Nintendomania in the 80s and arcades were EVERYWHERE. It may have been considered a nerdy hobby for adults, but I didn't know a kid that wasnt obsessed with Nintendo and arcade games. Even if you didn't have a system,you usually had multiple friends that did and would play at their house.

Energy Surge posted...

GinsuVictim posted...

Energy Surge posted...

but then the industry crashed in '83 and video games weren't popular again until the resurgence a few years later.

We never slowed down on gaming during that period. They were putting out more than we could consume. From the late 70's forward, gaming never lost steam with its audience.

I'm not saying you didn't play lots of games back then. I'm just saying that gaming wasn't popular at that time. And an industry crash is pretty good evidence of the lack of popularity. But all of this arguing over when games became popular is a moot point.

To reiterate my post, I have to interpret what 'popular' means to correctly answer the poll. I don't regularly play games that are older than me but I do play older games. If I equate classic games to games older than me and popular games as games younger than me, exactly as the poll equates them, I can use the last response to accurately answer it.

The industry crash wasn't so much of a lack of popularity if games as it was the market being flooded with shitty games and Atari doing things like making more Pac-Man cartridges than they were consoles in homes at the time: The idea being every person. With an Atari would buy it, and people who didn't have one would buy a console to have it. Except the port sucked. Arcades were still doing fine between the home console crash and the NES launch. The NES success proved that it wasn't a fad: people just wanted good games. The home console market crashed in '83, and the NES launched in '85, so 2 years isn't that much time for it to recover.

DeathMagnetic80 posted...

Energy Surge posted...

GinsuVictim posted...

Energy Surge posted...

but then the industry crashed in '83 and video games weren't popular again until the resurgence a few years later.

We never slowed down on gaming during that period. They were putting out more than we could consume. From the late 70's forward, gaming never lost steam with its audience.

I'm not saying you didn't play lots of games back then. I'm just saying that gaming wasn't popular at that time. And an industry crash is pretty good evidence of the lack of popularity. But all of this arguing over when games became popular is a moot point.

To reiterate my post, I have to interpret what 'popular' means to correctly answer the poll. I don't regularly play games that are older than me but I do play older games. If I equate classic games to games older than me and popular games as games younger than me, exactly as the poll equates them, I can use the last response to accurately answer it.

The industry crash wasn't so much of a lack of popularity if games as it was the market being flooded with shitty games and Atari doing things like making more Pac-Man cartridges than they were consoles in homes at the time: The idea being every person. With an Atari would buy it, and people who didn't have one would buy a console to have it. Except the port sucked. Arcades were still doing fine between the home console crash and the NES launch. The NES success proved that it wasn't a fad: people just wanted good games. The home console market crashed in '83, and the NES launched in '85, so 2 years isn't that much time for it to recover.

See, exactly like I said. Thanks.
---

Why did turn into a video game conversation instead of someone just saying, "Yeah, we have some older people around here."

I mean really, isn't somebody around here like 70+? And I know there's a few over 50.

C'mon now

videogames were consider more of a hobbie back in the day and not an industry like it is today. I say the industry didn't take off until 360 and ps3 era. before then it was just a hobbie that was trying to figure out what they doing. it's the reason why we got odd games like incredible crisis, seaman and mr. mosquito. No a days we don't get cool expermental game unless it's indie stuff.
---

ernieforss posted...

videogames were consider more of a hobbie back in the day and not an industry like it is today

The question is about popularity, which is not even a question when it comes to the arcade scene of the late-70's/early-mid 80's.

It was not a fucking hobby.
---

Oak_Tea posted...

It seems like a bunch of people don't know when video games got popular. Arcades were HUGE in the 80's, and it's still easy to say that games were popular in the 70's. I'd be surprised if there were a lot of people in their 40's on this website (but it's cool that you're here!), but even someone born in 1978 would have been born after video games became popular.

It does seem like a lot of people might just think that video games weren't popular before they were born. We all grew up in the "golden age of gaming", obviously... ;)

They became popular around the time of the Atari release. So yeah people don't know when they became popular.
---

long story short, bad poll for not defining one of the answers.
---