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ALL THE GAMES SYSTEMS MY STUPID PARENTS WERE TOO CRUEL TO EVER BUY FOR ME

13/10/2016

20 Comments

 
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Being a parent isn't easy, they say, but in my book it's the easiest job in the world: all you have to do is show your kids that you love them. Piece of cake. It hardly even takes any effort.

Still, showing they cared was clearly too much effort for my parents, who couldn't even be bothered to buy me any of these games systems that I really, really wanted, and never got.
INTELLIVISION
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Two pictures may be worth a thousand words, but no amount of words would have ever convinced my parents to get me an Intellivision, because - apparently - I should've been happy with an Atari. 
COLECOVISION
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It didn't make a difference to my parents how much better the ColecoVision made the game - they weren't going to get me one. They made that very clear, on a number of occasions. 

"You've got a Spectrum," they would sneer, "What more do you want?"

"A ColecoVision," I would reply through tears, to their utter disinterest.
VECTREX
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I wanted a Vectrex more than anything ever. And why wouldn't I? Just look at the faces of that family; everyone's happy. It's the dream isn't it - to have a family where everyone feels mutually supported and loved? The kids are happy to have a Vectrex, and the parents are happy because they've made their kids happy. My parents didn't want that for me, apparently. Whatever gave them succour, it certainly wasn't my contentment.
DRAGON 32
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"See that?" asks the boy of his happy, smiling family. "That's firing my imagination, that is."

"See that?"
I would say to my parents, whilst pointing at a blank wall. "It's doing nothing for me."

"We don't care," they would reply in unison, like the cruel and unsympathetic bastards they were.
BBC MODEL B
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To a 13 year-old boy in the early 1980s, the BBC Model B was the equivalent of, y'know, how most of us feel when we look at rich kids on Instagram twatting around on yachts. It was something to aspire to, that would've elevated me to the ranks of the school's glitterati. But no. The bourgeoisie wasn't for the likes of me. I had to stay in the gutter with the rest of the manure-coated proles... all because my parents never had a computer when they were growing up. IN THE MIDDLE AGES.
AMSTRAD CPC
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This gentleman is so dismissive of his Amstrad that he's belming at the screen. I would never have been so disrespectful, if my parents had cared enough to buy me one. Did they ever take that into account? Did they ever ask whether I would belm at my Amstrad? Of course not. They just dismissed my requests without even bothering to ask. 
NES
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"Now the entire family can get in on the action."

Not my family though. My parents didn't buy me one, of course.
ATARI LYNX
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Yeah, alright, I had a full-time job by the time the Atari Lynx came out, but was that any reason to penalise me? My friend Phil's parents bought him one for his birthday. Must've been nice for him, knowing that his parents loved him.
VIRTUAL BOY
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Nobody I knew had a Virtual Boy, but my parents never considered that by buying me one they would've made me stand out among my peers. Clearly, all they ever wanted for me is to just blend into the crowd, not draw attention to myself. Be as nondescript and ordinary as possible. Well, fine. Message received loud and clear, mum and dad. Message. Received.
PC ENGINE
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The PC Engine was only available on import back in the 90s, or by travelling to Japan to purchase one. Obviously, there was no way my parents were going to go to that effort just because their adult son wanted one. I mean, fine, y'know. I'd been raised without becoming a criminal or a drugboy, so I suppose they figured their work was done, and that I had nothing to do with it. Of course I didn't deserve a prize or reward. I ask you: how is that motivation?!
FROM THE ARCHIVE:
THE REAL THREAT FACING BRITAIN: GIANT MIGRANTS
15 THINGS WE LEARNED ABOUT NOEL EDMONDS FROM HIS WEBSITE
TEN ACTUAL FOOTBALLERS WHO MISUNDERSTOOD MY INSTRUCTIONS, AND URINATED IN MY GARDEN

BUY STUFF!
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20 Comments
Chinnyhill
13/10/2016 12:16:12 pm

I love that CPC advert. All of Amstrads 80's stuff had money spent on it and always looked great in glossy print. The mastermind in charge of it? Nick Hewer!

Reply
Trevor Cod
13/10/2016 12:30:49 pm

On the plus side your awful parents' cruelty has resulted in me now knowing that 'belming' is a thing. Let that give you solace.

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Wil
13/10/2016 01:39:34 pm

I never knew it was called belming and I'm definitely not saying what we called it!

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Paulvw
13/10/2016 02:18:34 pm

The lack of parental love expressed by my parents not buying me a Vectrex still burns to this day. You've given me flashbacks now.

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sunteam
13/10/2016 06:00:36 pm

Life without a PC Engine is unbearable.

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Spiney O'Sullivan
13/10/2016 08:16:54 pm

Biffo, I'm so very sorry to hear about your terrible and traumatic childhood. Have you considered using Kickstarter to crowdfund your buying all these consoles now, or alrernatively to hire a cement lorry to block your parents in their house forever? After all, I think I remember them advertising the PC Engine by giving Johnny Turbo a slogan like "hey kids, if your parents don't buy you this totally radical system, cement all means of egress from their house shut forever! Awesome!"

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Spiney O'Sullivan
13/10/2016 08:40:40 pm

Incidentally, in the same year the PC Engine was discontinued, the police had to deal with a 1250% rise in cement lorry-related crimes! Radical!

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Scott C
13/10/2016 08:20:55 pm

I think you missed the Amiga of that list.

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Scott C
13/10/2016 08:26:03 pm

*off...fook. No edit button.

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Scott C
13/10/2016 10:00:44 pm

I've sussed it; you were so emotionally distraught by the hole in your life caused by the lack of getting an Amiga that you decided to pretend that you never even liked the Amiga, while being wildly jealous of all Amiga owners. You even went to the length of getting a job as a gaming semi-journo (currently manifested in this website) so that you could propagate the myth and hatred. You actually plan on spending all your Patron funding to buy all remaining Amigas in the world so that you can burn them and yourself in a massive bonfire, ending it once and for all with your final words: "All I ever wanted was an Amigaaaaaaaaaaaaa......." Nailed it.

roboJamie
13/10/2016 09:01:29 pm

No mention of the Neo Geo? That thing was so expensive and unobtainable that even now as a grown up who can spend £60 funding random Kickstarter ideas, I wouldn't splash out for one.

I had one spoilt mate back then who had an imported SNES before the rest of us. Once we had all 'caught up with him' a couple of years later after the UK launch and could play Super Mario World in our own houses, he traded the SNES and literally about 40 games for a Neo Geo with 2.

I never really asked him if he thought it was a worthwhile trade.

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Kendall9000
13/10/2016 09:25:14 pm

No Neo Geo on the list?

That was the console that always caught my eye whenever I flipped through C&VG in WH Smiths. I didn't know anything about it or its games, but a Cyber Lip cartridge alone cost more than my C64 (and a stack of tapes), so I knew it must be the bestest thing ever.

Plus, in keeping with its premium price, it certainly had the classiest advertising: http://www.hardcoregaming101.net/cyberlip/neogeo_ad_2.jpg

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Kelvin Green link
13/10/2016 10:34:49 pm

How could you want a BBC Model B? They had them in every school! Didn't you go to school?

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Scott C
13/10/2016 11:41:09 pm

Gypsies don't go to school, they are too busy stealing your clothes off the line, badly tarmacking drives, and selling lucky charms (or cursing people).

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Mr Biffo
14/10/2016 07:30:13 am

I wanted one at home as well.

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Kelvin Green link
14/10/2016 08:14:19 am

That's just greedy.

Or you could have stolen the school one.

colincidence link
14/10/2016 03:17:53 am

Rare advert appearance for Anthony Kiedis.

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CM Punk
14/10/2016 07:04:14 pm

Add another one to the "Neo Geo" list.

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Nick Carver
14/10/2016 09:31:05 pm

I remember that one year I was so desperate for an Atari Lynx that I wrote something like this in the Argos catalogue next to the picture of it:

'I really want this for Christmas, but I don't think my mum and dad will buy it for me.'

I think I had hoped they would be leafing through the catalogue and be so touched by my secret angst that they would purchase that 'handheld' for me. But alas, I think I got a Yamaha keyboard for Xmas that year. And you can't play games on that.

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Damon link
15/10/2016 04:06:34 pm

As someone who owned a virtual boy by only the accident that it came out on my birthday... Well, Wario Land is great. There's other good games but nothing else you can't experience elsewhere and with less eyestrain.

Had a bomberman version of Panel de Pon/Tetris Attack/Pokemon Puzzle Leauge/A Minigame in Mario Party 3/Columns/Stack The Cats which was nice.

Also Red Alarmwhich felt like the future on toast.

Reply



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