The Magic of Growing Up With Video Games “Back in the Day”
Every generation gets its own gaming memories. In the year 2026, the gaming landscape looks A LOT different than when I was a kid.
Todaay’s players have massive open worlds, instant (depending on your internet speeds) updates, Game Pass, Discord, and YouTube for almost everything you can think of. Honestly, it is pretty awesome. Gaming has never been easier to get into than right now.
But growing up in the 90s and early 2000s had its own kind of magic. Games felt mysterious. They were hyped up by word of mouth (in person). You had to figure most things out on your own. And yet, somehow, the limitations of the time created some of my favorite gaming memories.
Here are a few things younger player may never fully experience.
1. Writing Down Cheat Codes and Secrets
Before wikis, YouTube, or even Don’t Revive Your Friends, information on games spread through slower means of travel. If you were looking to get the “All Weapons” cheat for Grand Theft Auto 3, you either had to wait for the latest edition of Game Pro magazine or your friend had that locked up in their brain.
The same thing goes for secrets. Someone’s cousin unlocked a secret character. A friend swore Mew was under the truck in Pokémon. Another kid somehow knew a button combination that would unlock everything in the game.
Half of it was probably made up. We believed all of it.
I still remember having scraps of paper and little notebooks filled with cheat codes, unlockables, and random notes we wrote down so we would not forget them. Sometimes they worked. Sometimes we just spent an entire afternoon trying things for no reason. Regardless, it was fun wither way.
2. Passing The Controller
Multiplayer was not always online. Sometimes it meant sitting on the floor with friends or siblings, controllers everywhere, snacks spread about, and one simple rule:
“When you die, it is my turn.”
Oh yeah. That is how we played. You watched your friend make crazy jumps, you yelled directions at them. You backseat gamed. You’d also get blamed if something went wrong and their turn ended up being a little shorter than expected. “I get another chance! You got me killed!”
Looking back, some of my favorite gaming moments happened when I was not even the one playing.
3. Renting/Buying Games Based on Cover Art
Or just renting games in general. I would head up the road to our local Blockbuster and stroll the aisles for hours looking for the perfect game. Other than those previously mentioned gaming magazines, we had nothing to go off of other than the cover art and back of the box.
Sometimes you walked out with a hidden gem that became one of your favorite games. Other times you ended up with something that was…not so great.
It didn’t matter, though. That was your game for the weekend, and you were going to play it because there was nothing else to do.
4. Memory Cards
When you hit “Save Game” nowadays, it’s almost an afterthought on where that save goes. Back in the day, however, all these adventures lived on in tiny memory cards. Some of them eventually got pretty cool like the Dreamcast’s VMU, but most of the time, if you upset your sibling, they’d snatch that thing when you weren’t looking and hide it. No cloud back-ups. You were starting over until you found it.
While you may consider external hard drives a bigger memory card today, nothing can replace the terror of running out of space on an 8MB (yes, that is the correct number) memory card after a few hours of progression.
5. Discovering Secrets On Your Own
This is probably the thing I miss the most. Yes, there were guides that you could buy, but most of the time, you were flying solo. A friend and I were writing down specific moves and the damage they did to each boss in games like Super Mario RPG and Final Fantasy back in those days. When FF7 hit, we’d spend HOURS exploring and finding hidden weapons, accessories, and scenes.
Games back then still had that mystery to them. Even if your friend told you that you had to uppercut 50 enemies in a row off a bridge in Mortal Kombat to unlock a hidden ninja, you wouldn’t know unless you tried it. The internet wasn’t easily accessible so when you discovered something, it was a huge deal.
Sure, there are players out there who still love playing games this way, but whenever I’m on something like TikTok or YouTube Shorts, I always see “10 Hidden Easter Eggs in” video games. Nothing wrong with that, just makes me reminisce.
Gaming Changed and That Is Okay
I am in no way saying gaming was better back then. Modern gaming has given us experiences that I could have never imagined back as a kid.
Still, there was something special about not being able to know EVERYTHING. About being bored and trying random things because I could not quickly scour Reddit for answers.
Maybe that mystery is what made gaming so magical growing up.
Have any nostalgic memories you’d like to share? Leave a comment below OR check out some more Don’t Revive Your Friends content:
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