1997-1998

Why dedicate a separate page for only two years of my childhood? Well because these two years felt like twenty in a child's brain with so many new discoveries and pop cultural cornerstones that exemplify what the 90s was about.

Nintendo 64

Although I was content to be a PC gamer, when word got around about how amazing the Nintendo 64 was going to be I felt the urgency to get it. Considering my last console was the NES I felt like I was missing out. I put pressure on my mom around Christmas to get me the system, but in 1996 it was incredibly hard to find and many of the launch titles were out of stock everywhere. Somehow she found a unit that came with Super Mario 64 and she got Shadows of the Empire separately for me. Playing these was a milestone in what I thought games could do. Having gone from Doom to fully 3D worlds in Super Mario, the feeling of awe was palpable.

I keenly remember being blown away by the graphic advancement and immersion of playing the Hoth battle against AT-ATs in Shadows of the Empire. This was a far cry from say, the Top Gun NES game from almost 10 years ago which was all I knew. In short order the Nintendo 64 took a majority of my gaming focus and I was playing all the great titles: Goldeneye, Wave Race, Hangtime, WCW vs NWO, Mario Kart, and countless others. My mom certainly spoiled me with buying N64 games. Most of the other kids in my neighborhood had an N64, so our couch co-op sessions were a blast. The joy of four buddies playing Mario Kart or Goldeneye was something I wish every kid could experience.

Warhammer

On visits to a local game and comic shop called Alternate Worlds, I was about 10 when I came across their magazine section with a distinctive cover: White Dwarf. It had these futuristic soldiers with bright blue armor. Perusing the magazine was a revelation and I had no idea what any of this was: toys, models, statues? I bought the magazine with the limited spending money I had on me as a kid and from there a love affair began with Warhammer.

Soon my dad was getting me whole boxes of Warhammer figures. The very first one I got was a small box of Ultramarines. I didn't know what I was doing with model assembly and used the wrong glue, didn't cut the handles off of the guns/knives so they were crudely attached to the space marines' fists because my little brain didn't understand. I acquired more White Dwarf magazines and took them with me every day to school. I looked at the illustrations, painted models, and elaborate photo shoots of armies in dioramas.

Eventually I convinced my mom to buy me the starter set for Warhammer 40,000. I got serious about assembly and learned what to do and began painting. It blossomed into a full-blown hobby and soon my neighborhood friends were joining in on it. Warhammer was spread by word of mouth in those days. Nobody at school knew what it was until I shared my White Dwarf magazines and showed them. By 1997 I had a massive tabletop set up in my basement with numerous painted armies: Ultramarines, Eldar, Orkz, and Necrons.

My friends built their own armies too. Sometimes my mom would take us on field trips to Games Workshop locations a few hours away. We were certainly on the younger side of the Warhammer audience. I remember going to one local game shop where they hosted game nights to teach Warhammer. Again, I was the youngest there. These are some of the happiest times of my childhood thinking back on Warhammer in the 90s. It was so different back then as a niche hobby. I couldn't conceive it would become as mainstream as it is today. This Warhammer period was roughly between 1995 and 1998, although my interest was most intense in the late 90s. By early 1999 something new came along that changed my life for the next 4 years.

Music

As a young kid, music was more on the periphery of my life. I had so much else grabbing my attention and absorbing me that the only time I listened to music was on audiocassette in my mom's car or in my portable Walkman on the bus ride to school. Early music my mom played was Led Zeppelin, Queen, and Phantom of the Opera musical. Once I found MTV on cable and the modern music scene was producing some astonishing new bands in the mid 90s, I started to gravitate towards a harder metal sound. My first beloved band was Prodigy, whose album The Fat of the Land in 1997 was a landmark. Their grimy and spooky music videos for Firestarter and Breathe were enough for me to buy the cassette, and I found that I really loved the range of their sound between industrial techno dance to more beautiful introspection like in their epic song "Naryan."

Once Korn hit the scene, introduced to me by my best childhood friend, Joey Moraniec, I found the band for me and a music genre that I'd feel perpetual affinity for to this day; a genre now called "nu metal" but which had no such label at the time. We just called it metal or the band name. Genre labels were unimportant. Korn was my jam. The heavy distorted guitars and headbanging riffs were exactly what I liked. Soon I was listening to Limp Bizkit, whose first album, 3 Dolla Bill Ya'll, was really heavy. Coal Chamber had a similar sound to Korn and soon I was cruising MTV for more videos. Joey Moraniec, my best friend, really helped introduce new music to me including Marilyn Manson. By the late 90s I was drawn to Orgy, Kittie, and Slipknot too.

The idea of MTV's Total Request Live would seem alien to younger generations today. A daily show on MTV that counted down the top 10 songs of the day and played the music videos while crowds of fans stood outside the TRL studio holding up signs? Yea, this was a massive cultural hit show at the time. I remember it being the "in thing" in 1998. Music back then wasn't so stratified and niche. A lot of bands and different genres were popular and had crossover with fans. You could watch TRL and see music videos of Goo Goo Dolls, Rammstein, Aerosmith, Korn, Marilyn Manson, Natalie Imbroglia, and Usher all on the same day.

Lifestyles of the JNCO Skater

Around 1996 I got interested in rollerblading and the skating subculture. Again, thanks to my friend Joey Moraniec, who taught me how to skate. I couldn't have started at a better time because in 1997 JNCO jeans were all the rage. These wide-legged baggy pants with cool stylized patches sewn on the back pockets were what cool kids wore. I had a few pairs and wearing them was a real statement of fashion and personality. They were essential garb for any inline skater grinding on curbs and doing jumps off ramps. That plus the wallet chain, soap shoes to grind when not skating, and a large loose T shirt with KoRn or a skating brand name completed the outfit.

Wrestling

How I stumbled onto the professional wrestling world in the 90s I cannot recall. I think it was around 1996 that I started watching it on the TNT channel and very soon it was appointment television to watch Monday Nighe Nitro. I got so into it I started recording a lot of the broadcasts of classic WCW on TNT with all the NWO soap opera drama. Thinking back on it now it's so silly but I loved it: the glamorous machismo, spectacle, soap opera drama, memorable wrestler personalities, and The Nitro Girls--a group of babes dancing around like cheerleaders to open the show hit the spot for a 12-year-old boy. I bought action figures and ring, played the video games on N64, and had other paraphernalia I'd get from Spencer's gift shops. My dad noticed my burgeoning interest early on and would buy me NWO trinkets. A few buddies of mine were into it so it felt like a communal interest. We'd tune in to watch throughout the week and then talk about it at school.

The Internet and PC Gaming

We got the internet around late 1997 or early 1998 and this was one of the most exhilarating discoveries of my life. I had ICQ, the early chat and messaging systems--a forerunner to AOL Instant Messenger--and it enabled you to complete a profile and search for random people with similar interests. You could just strike up a conversation with somebody who had the same hobbies and it was so innocent and fun. The internet revolutionized gaming too. While my attention had been on the Nintendo 64, PC gaming was moving along quickly into new territory and I realized the days of 1994/1995 were old fashioned. New games had emerged like Diablo, Baldur's Gate, Dark Forces II, StarCraft and Age of Empires. We got a new computer--a Gateway 2000--with Windows 95 and I installed a Voodoo graphics card. From here on, I split my time between N64 and PC.

Diablo

Sure enough, I fell in love with Diablo and I mean in love. This was the first really important game for me that I poured my heart into. In 1997 I made a GeoCities website about Diablo. I have no idea if the wayback machine saved it, but I was proud of my work on this site. That world of the internet and computers in 1996-1998 was quite exhilarating and fun. From Diablo I graduated to StarCraft and have fond memories of playing both games online on Battlenet back in 1997.

Over time I dipped my feet into other games: Dark Forces II was a superb sequel, Baldur's Gate opened the door to more complex RPGs, and I dabbled in RTS games through Age of Empires. Very soon in March 1999, however, a new game would take over my life.

Magazines

It's hard to explain to someone in their 20s today just how influential magazines could be on a kid in the 90s. They were packed with visuals. The advertisements, illustrations, and layout really fired my imagination as a kid. I was naturally drawn to the gaming magazines, and I received a steady supply of PC Gamer, Electronic Gaming Monthly, GamePro, PC Accelerator, Inquest, Scrye, White Dwarf, and ToyFare.

Collecting the vintage ones lets you peek through a remarkable window of time into a geek culture of bygone eras. The articles were written with passion, intelligence, and often a good sense of humor. Look through a gaming magazine from 1998, especially PC Accelerator, and you 20-somethings will be nostalgic for a time before you were born. This era was confident, creative, and fun. PC accelerator knew who its audience was and made no apologies. Whenever my dad got me a new PC Accelerator, it felt like baby's first Playboy but with video games added to the mix of hot chicks. Gaming magazines often came with demo discs for new games or AOL internet trials.

Looking back on all this, my childhood was so rich with different interests, hobbies, stimulation, and pursuits of all kinds, with so much going on and crammed into a matter of 10 years. Somehow I was a computer gaming nerd, a Warhammer hobbyist, an inline skater wearing JNCOs and listening to KoRn, and I found time for pogs, Nintendo 64, Magic the Gathering, Nickelodeon, Star Wars toys, and WCW fandom.

1994-1996 1999-2005