When were you introduced to

[Mad_Jack]

Did it have a gun attachment too in addition to pong?

Nope - I have searched the internet since the late '90's for a system that matches the thing I remember, and have never seen one, lol.
I don't recall any sort of logo on it at all. It only had one power switch and one 1-2-3-4 switch to change the games, and the smaller Atari 2600 style paddles. I got it secondhand at a yard sale, without the box or any instructions.... Since it was at least two or three years after the 2600 had been released, I can only assume it was some cheap off-brand knockoff.

 

[Hades#2]

Hmm, let's see how old I am.

Star Trek- watched some episodes of the original series in the 60's as a kid. I had a babysitter at the time that watched it.
Battlestar Galactica- 1978 original series and movie
Star Wars- watched the movie in the theater in 1977 with some friends from high school
Magic the Gathering- never got into playing it oddly enough.
D&D- heard about it in the early 80's. I remember seeing it at the local K.B. Toy and Hobby store. Didn't start playing until the mid 90's with some coworkers. Played a few other rpg's before that though.
Harry Potter- I was aware of it in the early 2000's when I worked at a bookstore. I never read any of the books or watched the movies.
Doctor Who- I heard about it in the 70's and had a friend that was a huge fan back in the 80's. I watched several episodes with Tom Baker but couldn't get into it. I thought it was too cheesy and the monsters not very threatening. Started watching again with Eccleston. I've been watching since.
Earthsea- I read The Lathe of Heaven and watched the tv movie. I never read any others.
Marvel\DC- Late 60's. Started reading Captain America, Batman. Superman, Spiderman and a lot of war comics in the 70's like The Howling Commandos, Haunted Tank.

 

[Ralif Redhammer]

And just for you youngsters, Star Wars wasn't released on home video until 1982. So when I was watching Star Wars on the VCR in 1980 it was a bootleg copy.

We had so many copies of movies taped from television when I was a kid. Many of them starting with this:

Home video game systems?

The first videogame system I ever played was an Atari, though only at friends' houses and that was it for a long time other than going to arcades. At home my dad eventually got an Apple IIgs, and we played games on that when he wasn't using it to do boring adult stuff. We didn't get a proper home videogame system in the form of a NES until about 1988 or 1989. My brother and I both had to get good grades, and I was so worried my brother was going to mess up his side of the bargain. But he didn't.

 

[Mad_Jack]

We had so many copies of movies taped from television when I was a kid. Many of them starting with this:

Before we got HBO at our house, and for the other pay channels, I actually managed to train my brain to be able to look at the scrambled channels (which all showed up as fuzzy and jumpy in sort of snowy black and white with the left half of the picture on the right side of the screen and vice versa, with a thick wavy rainbow line down the middle) and translate them into watchable form, lol.

I still have two VHS tapes that I recorded - one has Wild Thing, The Fugitive and Highlander on it, and the other one has Circle of Iron and Babylon 5: Call To Arms...

 

[Ralif Redhammer]

Not going to lie, there were a couple of old home-recorded VHS tapes I held onto for quite a while, despite having the movies on Blu-Ray.

I still have two VHS tapes that I recorded - one has Wild Thing, The Fugitive and Highlander on it, and the other one has Circle of Iron and Babylon 5: Call To Arms...

 

[Dannyalcatraz]

We still have working VHS machines in our house, primarily for playback.

Of the stuff I recorded myself, I have a few episodes of The Headbanger’s Ball & Yo! MTV Raps!, plus a few hours of shows I recorded on a DVR that was malfunctioning, and I couldn’t watch all the shows on it before we replaced it.

 

[Ulfgeir]

D&D In 1984 as far as I recall. Wasn't my first game though. That honour goes to Drakar och Demoner. Not entirely sure if it was 1e or 2e.

Star Wars: 1978 or 1979 I believe

Earthsea: Not sure. early 80's.

Harry Potter. Can't remember. Only read the first 2 books, but seen all the 8 movies in the original series.

Magic the Gathering: 1994.

Marvel/DC: early 80's. I recall Legion of Superheroes was my thing back then. And later early 90's started reading X-men.

Dr Who: late 80's or early 90's. Tom Baker was my first doctor.

Star Trek: Saw some of the original series in the early 80's. Seen more later on. Not a Trekkie. Original series was best imo, and no they weren't good.

Bilbo/LotR Early 80's.

Narnia: Early 80's. And I hated the Christianity in it even back then.

Sandman: 1990 as far as I remember. Think they had some of it in Swedish version of Heavy Metal.

Buffy the Vampire Slayer: early 1990's

 

[GreyLord]

Home video game systems?

I started with a Pong set as soon as they hit stores, and we got the extra paddles so we could play doubles.

From there, I got an Atari 2600, again, pretty early on. We bought a lot of cartridges, mostly Atari, but also Intellivision and a couple others,

For along time, we didn’t buy another console. The only games we bought were for our computers (Apple IIe, IIsi, and assorted Macs) until the Wii dropped,

I remember a Pong machine we had. We attached it to the side of the TV. It was black and white. It had paddles, but also had a gun which you could shoot at the moving dot on the screen. You could play "tennis" (you hit the dot back and forth across the screen), a form of a game where you both hit it against the side and each hits it back, and a solo version of that. There were screws on the back of the TV where you hooked the game system into the TV. That was decades ago.

I also had an Atari 2600?? (or was there a 2500??) later. We had Pacman, Defender, Combat, and one other game to start with. Still love Defender (though sometimes it goes by other names) to this day.

My kid just got this mini-atari system (actually probably about a year ago) about the size of two inches (with TV screen)! It is amazing what they can fit into computer chips today compared to what was there in yesteryear!!!

 

[Eyes of Nine]

So, what year were you introduced to the big following things:

D&D
Star Wars
Earth sea
H.Potter
Magic The Gathering
Marvel/ D.C

Other big-name geek stuff that I may have left out.

For me my introduction to D&D would have had to be in 2003 or 2002 during high school, Star wars would be in the mid-90s when the special editions came out. I had no clue what earth sea was until Sci-fi did a horrible job, Potter I got into it due to a cousin gifting me the first book. Magic would have to be also during High school so 2003. Marvel/D.C the 90s when the cartoons were happening. Stargate happened when the movie came out.

I'm old so:

• D&D - 1977, Basic D&D
• Star Wars - 1977, saw it at the Charles Street Theatre in Boston sometime in May or June of that year I think
• Earth sea - Good question this one. I believe i got a little box set around the same time. I just checked, the printing of mine was around 1977-78
• H.Potter - When did the first book come out? 1997-8? Then-ish
• Magic The Gathering - My first pack was Beta, so 1993
• Marvel/ D.C - My first comics were japanese manga (wish I could remember which ones); but I very clearly remember a Fantastic Four issue with El Diablo on the cover - maybe FF #194? But of course I was probably watching Batman TV show reruns before that - however not sure when I first started those

Other properties:

• Star Trek - for as long as I can remember, so probably reruns in the early 70's
• Middle Earth - for me it was the Hobbit, received as a gift in probably 1976

 

[ThorinTeague]

D&D 1985 I think
Star Wars 1980
Earth sea I’ve never heard of it
H.Potter Actively avoided this garbage since the first film
Magic The Gathering 1993
Marvel/ D.C 1980s, can’t say for sure