A brief history of one man’s gaming life from the early 90s to the present day. The first person to successfully list of all the game titles in this video will win a CD copy of Dan Bull’s debut album Safe. Send your answers as a video response. Download the Generation Gaming mp3 from www.zshare.net Buy or download Dan Bull’s debut album Safe from www.myspace.com/danbull Follow Dan on Twitter: www.twitter.com Connect on Facebook at www.facebook.com Lyrics: Monopoly was not for me; chess made me stressed out – so the only way I could get down was with pocket electronics and bleeps. Ever since my Game Boy made toys obsolete I’ve been a well behaved boy that played inside and stayed off the street. Yes, I got my electric shocks from Tetris blocks and Mario Land. Though there wasn’t much room for much but mushrooms I was the man, man. With a pad in my hand, hammering at it while eating my breakfast, being the best – that was the plan, beating the rest and leaving them breathless. Please believe me, nobody could beat me at Tetris, I fucking rock, dropping blocks like heads off chopping blocks, I was on some next shit. And I’ve still got a flame for puzzle games like HD Hexic, but when the PC came my gaming tastes became eclectic. This day’s grim. It’s raining, what wonderful weather for gaming. The sun’s blazing so let’s stay in, it’s wonderful weather for gaming. I was the geeky one, I really wanted a PC CD-ROM, then got it. Eight meg of RAM, a CRT screen, she was some top kit …

We pointed out why gadgets were more expensive 30 years ago, but it is also important to note that many of these gadgets were hilariously huge. I’ve collected eight examples, I’ll leave it up to you to add the rest.

In other words, feel free to use our new comments system to add photos of any oversized retro gadgets you have access to.

In the ’70s and early ’80s, it was trendy to offset tiny, crappy screens with enormous and ornate wooden consoles. My family had one of these when I was a kid—looking back on it, I understand why my father chose to put it on the lowest level of our house. It would have seriously compromised the structural integrity of any floor it was sitting on. [TV History]
This is what passed for a widescreen television in 1978. However, the GE Widescreen 1000 really wasn’t widescreen at all. In reality this absurdly huge cabinet housed a small CRT screen that used “a vertical deflection reversing switch to invert and laterally reverse the image, and a three element lens within a light-proof projection chamber to re-invert, magnify and project the image onto a forward projection type reflective screen.” In other words, the image was artificially enlarged through projection. Oh, and that beastly monstrosity sitting next to it is an early VHS recorder. Back in the day, video players like this one could weigh 30 pounds or more. [Flickr and RetroThing]
Surely you are familiar with the DynaTAC 8000X—the first commercially available mobile phone. Seriously, is Dr Martin Cooper making a call to his wife or calling in an air strike? [Puremobile]
The Walkman portable cassette player made its debut in 1979, but if you wanted a more feature rich portable player, you risked a dislocated shoulder picking up one of these ghetto blasters. ['80s Rewind]
Today we have camcorders built into our tiny cellphones. In the ’70s and early ’80s you had to deal with beasts like the Sony SL-F1 Betamax camera. Before the advent of the Betamovie BMC-100P personal camcorder in 1983, the camera and the portable recorder were not integrated into a single unit. [Wikipedia]
The JVC HR-4100 was the first ever “portable” VHS recorder, but this woman appears to be in over her head. This is definitely a “team lift” situation. [Rewind Museum]
We bitch about gas guzzling SUV’s now, but get a load of this ’73 Thunderbird. Seriously, there is enough metal between the cabin and the grill to take on a locomotive. [Corral.net]
Microwaves in the ’70s were big enough to crawl into. According to the owner, this particular model weighed around 80 pounds. [Forty Two]
Bonus: Glasses are not really a gadget, but honestly, what the hell was going on in the ’70s? I have to admit though, Wonder Woman still looks great with those telescopes attached to her face. Anyway, thank God for contacts and Lasik. [Blurbomat]