Maybe this should be in the retro thread but I'd like more to see this.

If I have a favourite game ever it's Asteroids. Anyone who knocks around the retro and shmups threads will know this. I own a Deluxe cabinet and it's one of the few games that I will buy associated tat for. It's a great game - timeless in my opinion. The basic rock busting mechanic, merged with Newtonian motion and randomness create a non linear game and no two waves are the same. But that isn't the only reason I love the game. It goes back to my teens when I was an arcade denizen and I got my 2600 in July 1982.

The funds for that 2600 came from a matured endowment policy. My parents promised me £100 of that. This was a big deal. Money was pretty scarce. I'm from a humble but solid and practical background. My father grimaced when he handed over the £99.95 for it but he followed through on his promise. At this time I had already got into computing in school. Had written some programs on the school Apple II and my interest was picqued. The shine had long gone off our Pong console and the 2600 was THE thing to get at the time.

It came with Combat. Major releases then were £30 a pop (>£100 today). But by pure chance we found out that there was a promotional deal in the newspaper. If you sent away your proof of purchase of the 2600 you got Asteroids for free.  Asteroids was a terrifying tyrant in the arcade. It's black and white images had aged by then so my coins had started going elsewhere due to its difficulty and waning star. So while I was pumped about getting a 2nd game it wasn't one I would necessarily have picked.

The next month we were on holiday in a caravan at the seaside when it arrived. My aunt and uncle drove up the night before we were due to come home (they would drive us home the next day) and brought the package with them. Caravans in the 80s had no electricity so I had to sit and look at the cartridge and read the manual all that night! The journey home the next day took forever but I got home and went to my other uncle's house who had borrowed the 2600 while I was away as it intrigued him. He had introduced me to video games by buying a pong console several years earlier so he had an interest.

We were both blown away by Asteroids. For its time it was a pretty solid port and my uncle absolutely loved it. He kept turning up at our house to play the following week and when he made up his mind to get his own 2600 the promo deal had ended and that put him off (£30 back in '82 was a lot of money on top of £100 for the console).

My brother and I played Asteroids every day for at least a year (game 39) and when our cousins visited it was one of the favourites too. When we were pushed off the main TV by my parents we played on an ancient second hand black and white TV we had in our bedroom. Many , many happy hours. No other video game has had quite the same effect on me.

My uncle died quite young (at 49) and I always associate the great summer of '82 with the game but also have a tinge of sadness when I think of his death which was around 6 years later. It's a bitter-sweet memory which is stoked with nostalgia. The 2600 lit the spark in me which ended up with me making my living in IT , and my uncle gave me a little nugget of advice about next steps in my education to pursue that - so you can imagine what that little game means to me.

Like an idiot I sold my entire 2600 collection a few years later and pissed it up against the wall. I have since hoarded games. Had to have a clear out a few years ago (which funded the Deluxe cabinet purchase). I have since got a couple of woodys (or is it woodies?) - one PAL and one NTSC modded for composite. Also have a Harmony cart which lets me play any game I want by copying the ROM onto its sd-card.

But.....Just got this in the post. I simply could not resist it. The game is complete with manual.



I might take the cart out and put it in my woody - but I probably won't. I just wanted to own this.

Just wanted to share this wee story.