Before the Nintendo Entertainment System blessed the world with its introduction, and completely blew me away with its advanced graphics and sounds, I spent my gaming time on the Atari 2600. Before I played the Atari, I watched people play the Atari. I watched as my big brother mastered Fast Eddie and Circus Atari. I watched as my big sister played Pitfall and Defender. Before that, I watched my parents play Kaboom.

Kaboom. A game that didn’t use the joystick. Instead, you plugged in the “paddles,” a steering wheel-like controller. The premise was simple. You were a stack of three tubs of water. Above you, a criminal dropped bombs. You steer the dial on the paddle left and right to catch the bombs. The criminal dropped ten bombs in the first round, twenty in the second, thirty in the third, and so on for ten rounds. You received one point per bomb caught in the first round, 2 each for the second, and so on up to 10 points per bomb in round ten. To make the game even more challenging, bombs were dropped faster and faster as the rounds progressed, becoming nearly blinding around the eighth round. Miss even a single bomb and you lose a barrel and go back one round.

It was my favorite game to watch. Not for the graphics nor for the premise of the game. Instead, I was hypnotized with the scoring. I don’t remember how young I was (maybe my mom will weigh in with a comment), but I would sit on the floor and try to race the scoring system. It was my goal to yell out score updates just before my parents caught the next bomb.

“1.. 2.. 3.. 4.. 5.. 6.. 7.. 8.. 9.. 10″

“12. 14. 16. 18. 20,” continuing to 50.

“53 56 59…”

You get the picture. Now that I’m a gamer myself, I realize that this had to play hell with my parents’ concentration. Of all the games my parents had (Space Invaders, Combat, Night Driver (we never owned Joust. Why would we not have Joust?)), my favorite game to “play” was called Atari Math. An equation appeared on the screen and the player had a limited amount of time – 10 to 20 seconds, if I remember correctly, depending on which setting you choose – to correctly display the answer using the joystick and the single red button.

And I loved it. Knowing that I could take two numbers and make a third by adding, subtracting, multiplying or dividing awed me. I don’t mean to brag, but I kicked ass at that game. I could even figure out remainder on the division problems. The timer was usually just an afterthought. It buzzed me a few times when a particularly difficult equation got the best of me though.

Twenty years later, plus some change, Sarah and my step-dad are playing a game (secret targets???) on the Nintendo Wii. It astounds me how much has changed. The Atari could display sixteen colors on the screen at any given time, and had a total palette of 128 colors, whereas current systems are capable of millions. Tyler will likely never know what an 8-bit or 16-bit system is. My step-dad is holding the controller like a bow, and pulling his arm back. A sensor captures every movement and displays a bow and arrow on the screen for him to aim at a target. *swish… THWAP*

“Seven,” the game voice-over announces.

Sarah steps up and takes aim, the screen mirroring even the most delicate movements of Sarah’s arm. While I reminisce about a system that had a controller with five inputs (up, down, left, right, and a button), Sarah’s motions are being tracked, wirelessly, on three different axes. *swish… THWAP*

The screen flashes to an instant replay of her near bulls-eye as the announcer shouts her score. “Nine.”

“Ninnne,” Tyler replies with enthusiasm.

My boy, I think. That’s my boy. If this doesn’t prove that he truly is his father’s son, I don’t know what does.

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