About Me

Hello! My name is Tyler and I have a passion for video games, new and old. My love of gaming started as a child in the 80s. I was born too late for the Atari craze, but I have many fond memories of the Nintendo Entertainment System. When I was young, buying/getting a game was a rare treat reserved for birthdays or holidays. Unlike today when it seems the majority own multiple consoles and get each game upon its release. At the end of the Nintendo Entertainment System's life span, my personal NES library topped out at 9 games total. How was I able to play more games? I often traded with friends or rented games.

In 1991, my parents got me and my brothers a Super Nintendo for Christmas. In a family of 4 boys and being the youngest, I was often stuck watching my brothers fight over "who's next?" to play and it was seldom ever me. However, none of them wanted anything to do with the old NES. So began the tradition of hand-me-down systems that would make their way to me. This is most likely where my passion for retrogaming came from. I could play the NES all I wanted and every time I went to the rental store, there were still plenty of games to rent. Most of the time, they were in stock as few were interested in renting for the old systems.

My brother got a Sega Genesis Model 2 in 1994. Making the SNES another had me down. Although from time to time we would swap so my brother could play Star Fox, a mind blowing 3D game. Then I could play some Sonic 2. As the next generation of consoles kicked off, my parents didn't want to buy another gaming console and instead got a computer as they felt it would be more educational. They were right but not in the way I think they hoped. Instead of helping with my math homework, I learned how to build websites, code, and how computers worked.

I was first introduced to the Playstation in the summer 1999. My brother had some minor surgery, but it had a long recovery time. My parents decided it was ok for him to sit and play video games all day. We all had no idea what a memory card was for. We quickly found out as my brother would refuse to turn off the system for days at a time so he could finish a game. Since then, I have been hooked on Sony. If I had to pin-point where my game collecting hobby started, I would say my journey started with the PS1. Getting the PS1 so late into its life-cycle meant that there were several used games available at much lower prices then buying games new. As a result, I was able to buy and play much more than on previous consoles.

We were successfully able to lobby my parents for a PlayStation 2 in Christmas of 2000. Soon after, I started getting back into NES and SNES games through emulators while in high school and college. Suddenly every game every released for the NES, SNES, Genesis, Game Boy, and more were at my fingertips. I was also introduced to systems I didn't know existed, such as the Turbografx 16 and the Sega Master System. This broadened my knowledge of gaming and I had fun playing them on my laptop.

The biggest problem for me is I had to play games using the keyboard. This is not an easy way to play console games. I constantly struggled trying to play games this way. Eventually I bought a USB Game Controller. Another issue I noticed was that not all games played correctly. Some had graphical glitches, ran slow, or had a very noticeable input lag.

When I graduated college, I started collecting the vintage games and hardware to experience games as they were meant to be. This was easy at first, as I could find many 8-bit and 16-bit games and they were cheap. However, more recently this has been both fun and frustrating at times, mainly due to the rising costs of collecting retro games. The market went from a solemn few trying to relive their childhood, to an industry onto itself. It was also around this time I noticed that people started posting video game reviews and playthroughs on YouTube. Even then, I never thought I would one day be apart of it.