But when I consider my remark now, it reminds me that I’m at the end of my first full decade of gaming seriously. And, as such, it’s worth a nostalgic look back at my favourite videogame-related moments the last ten years:
Getting the Metal Gear Solid 2 demo disc with Zone Of The Enders and playing the tanker level over and over and over again. As great as the finished game was, it never quite measured up to the memory of the demo.
Making it to the end of Area 5 in Rez and wondering if this is how the first audiences felt upon walking out of Stanley Kubrick’s film adaptation of 2001: A Space Odyssey.
Months after playing Sega’s Virtua Tennis on Dreamcast to the point of developing blisters, challenging a fellow game journalist to a best-out-of-three match on the arcade version at a Sega Joyopolis in Tokyo – and winning.
Coming close to setting up an unprecedented roundtable conversation among Shigeru Miyamoto, Hironobu Sakaguchi, Hideo Kojima, Yu Suzuki, Shinji Mikami and Kazunori Yamauchi... only to have it all fall apart when Sakaguchi has to return to Hawaii to continue directing Final Fantasy: The Spirits Within. Thankfully, Tetsuya Mizuguchi and Tomonobu Itagaki agree to join Mikami for a group discussion. Disaster averted.
Wishing I’d started playing games a decade earlier after getting sucked in to Metroid Fusion on the Game Boy Advance.
Getting my first pistol in level four of Rockstar North’s Manhunt, and realising that what had previously felt like a single-minded, monochromatic experience was finally opening up into a multi-hued palette of brutality.
Sitting at PlayStation’s US headquarters watching the developer play God Of War, then taking over and very quickly wondering how an American developer was able to make a thirdperson action game feel as smooth as those made by the best Japanese creators.
Failing to understand how to play Lumines, even with Tetsuya Mizuguchi standing next to me, patiently explaining it, during the Tokyo Game Show ahead of the PSP’s launch. After the two shipped the following spring in North America, Lumines and my PSP were inseparable.
Playing a demo of Q Entertainment’s PSP title Every Extend Extra at Sony’s booth during E3, then coming back the next with my own PSP so that I could download the demo and keep playing it after the show was over.
Watching the introductory cutscene for the boss battle with The End in Metal Gear Solid 3: Snake Eater and saying to myself: “No way – they aren’t going to…” and then realising, oh yes, they are. That and finally locating The End by the glint of light reflecting off the scope of his sniper rifle.
Realising that Criterion has fused the arcade racer with the fighting game in Burnout 3.
Nodding in agreement when a friend tells me that even though he no longer smokes and never will again, he’ll always be a smoker. Because that’s how I still feel about the fiendishly addictive and equally brilliant Desktop Tower Defense more than a year after having given it up.
Using the Saved Films feature in Halo 3 to (a) get prominent journalists to send me screenshots of their first multiplayer kill, (b) make Tex Avery-like short films based on entertaining kills, and (c) drop behind enemy lines in the campaign and try to experience the game from the point of view Covenant forces minding their own business, only to get cruelly mown down by The Demon (Master Chief) and The Heretic (The Arbiter).
Falling asleep during the fourth hour of Rock Band’s Endless Setlist – then waking up near the end to help get our band, Manny Being Manny, over the finish line.
Faced with my first Harvest or Rescue moral choice in BioShock, and, unable to make a decision, calling friends and family from 2K Games’ New York offices searching for advice.
Crowing on Twitter about beating my Xbox Live friends’ high scores on Geometry Wars: Retro Evolved 2... only to have them respond by jumping back on to retake their leads.
Making it to safety on the helicopter in Left 4 Dead, then running all the way back to the radio to save a downed buddy. Martyrdom never felt quite so satisfying.
Those are some moments out of time from my first full decade of gaming. May the second be just as rewarding.
N’Gai Croal is a writer and videogame design consultant. You can follow him online at ncroal.tumblr.com.