h2g2 The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy: Earth Edition

On Saturday I was out looking at washing machines and I happened to notice a strange item on sale: it was a computer game "controller" like the controller that comes with the Playstation. This one, however was for a Sega Megadrive - that iconic games machine of the 90s. But the strange thing was that this had the complete Sega Megadrive built into the controller. You just put a few batteries in it, plug the lead into your television and start playing.

It has five built-in games, four of which are rubbish; the one remaining game is Sonic (the Hedgehog) and Knuckles, which is a good game. There's no way of adding any extra games, so basically it is a custom Sonic-playing machine. It even comes with a second controller which plugs into the first for two-player mode.

So why should I fork out for an ancient game?

Because it was only €5, that's why. Yes, 5 euros. I bought it.

Every time I am with my ten-year-old grandson he says 'can I use your phone' (an iPhone) and downloads a new free game. They aren't great, but they are fun. The latest one is 'Monkey Flight'. You set the trajectory (thrust and elevation) of a monkey which is then flung out to bounce off elephants and clouds, picking up fruit.

This is remarkably like the first computer game I ever saw. In 1971 I taught maths to a first-year class in secondary school (The High School, Dublin) and for an end-of-year treat I brought them to visit the computer department of UCD where my friend Bruce was doing his PhD.

On a computer the size of an SUV we typed in the thrust and elevation of a missile, which was then virtually launched toward a target whose distance we had been given in advance. We waited a minute and the computer typed out how far we had over- or undershot.

The first-year boys got quite good at it after a few tries, but I (being already 23) got nowhere. No graphics though, no bounces and no fruit.

I had a Megadrive back in the day. Sonic ans Knuckles was fun. Amazing how they can shrink the technology (not only of the system itself, but also all of the information contained on the cartridges) to the size of the controller.

What are the other games?

Computer games have passed me by. I feel like I'm missing out on an enormous part of contemporary culture. I'm also missing out on an opportunity for bonding with my sone, who talk of little else.

(That said...the youngest is in the middle of constructing some sort of elaborate den/vehicle/whatever from an enormous cardboad box and several metres of sellotape.)

The other games are a tetris-type game, and three games where muscle-bound men in tights beat up aliens.

Nostalgia!

We never had a Sega, but I remember Sonic the Hedgehog on a neighbour's PC - or was it their TV screen? We had Nintendo. When did the Sega die?

Computer games was the only subject my three could always converse amicably about - and for hours on end. The problem was the age difference - there is a 7-year gap between the oldest and the youngest.. but the Nintendo games always united them. Happy days.

My eldest bequeathed me this laptop I now use, which is equipped with lots of silly computer games. I can't cope with run-and-jump games (despite the "men in tights") but I'm a sucker for Tetris games and the old Nibbles - not to mention the DOS Gorilla game which sounds very similar to the one Recumbentman describes above.

Sega are still going - they don't make consoles any more though, but it would have been a console that you remember - that stopped after the Sega Saturn (I think) which did terribly against the N64. They are continuing to release Sonic games, bizarrely now for the Nintendo Wii and DS...

Oh wow, Nibbles and Gorilla take me back. Those were my favourites when I was little--that and a rather strange PC game called "Spelling Jungle" where you (rather unsurprisingly, I suppose) completed puzzles by spelling words, while a bizarre character in a bathrobe intoned "wise" phrases at you. Good times.

my son had a DVD disc, with 1000 Sega megadrive games on it,in like a file form?? but the coding required to open/play them on the PC, I could not understand

I tell a lie. It wasn't a den or a vehicle. It was a robot. Or it was at one point, leastways.

A couple of years back I picked up a similar self-contained video game controller that included several old classic stand-up arcade games. I think it had Galaga, Ms. Pac-man, Burger Time and fPole Position.

It was a great party favor among my friends who are mostly in their 30's and 40's. It had us giggling like teens.

And, yes it was well worth all $5.

???

http://www.consolepassion.co.uk/sega-megadrive-games.htm