Anderson 1Logan AndersonAshley Humphries ENC1101-0022/3/15Paper 1 Final DraftI have been surrounded by technology my entire life. I feel fortunate to be born in a time when technology is evolving so fast. I was able to witness the first touch screen phones, flat screen televisions, and many more revolutionary devices. Over a dozen new video game consoles have been made since my birth on January 2, 1996. From not being able to tell if a character has a face to being able to see every wrinkle or drop of sweat on a characters face, the graphics of video game have changed drastically in the past two decades. Out of all the types of technology that have encountered in my life I believe that video games have helped shape who I am today the most. My first experience with video games was not a home console but instead at a pizza place in my home town of Tampa, Florida. The place was called Papa Louies Pizza. Not only did they have the best pizza that I have ever consumed but they also had a little arcade room to keep children from driving their parents insane while waiting for their food. My parents had been taking me and my brother to that place from when we were potato-brained toddlers up until the place closed when I was 11. The arcade had around 8 games in it but the ones that I remember vividly are Hydro Thunder (a boat racing game), Ninja Turtles, and the Punisher. I must have Anderson 2put at least 200 dollars of my parents money in those three games alone. Whenever we went there I would usually be able to invite one of my friends with me. The Punisher game was my favorite of the three. The game was about the Marvel character the Punisher and his friend (I do not remember the other guys name). It was a two player game so I would always play with either my brother or one of my friends. The objective was simple, just beat up all of the bad guys on the screen to be able to move on to the next level. This game is what really sparked my interest in video games and it made me want my own console that I could beat up bad guys on.The first time I played an at home gaming console I was around 5 or 6 years old and it was at my friend Deans house. He had four older brothers so he had just about every console at his house. The first console game I played was Super Smash Brothers for the Nintendo 64. I immediately loved the game because it was kind of like the Punisher game at Papa Louies Pizza. In both games the objective was to knock out everyone that was not on your team. After that day every time I went to Deans house we played Super Smash Brothers for at least an hour. My favorite thing about the game was that you could play with up to four people at a time. Dean would sometimes invite some of his other friends over to play while I was there and playing video games together made it easy for me to quickly become friends with them as well. Super Smash Brothers was not the only game we played though. We also played just about every game that had Mario in the name. Mario Kart was in my opinion the best one even though I was terrible at every racing game. Playing video games at his house just made me want a console of my own even more. Finally, after asking for a video game console for Christmas, I received a Play Station 2 when I was 7. I was way too excited to even care that the only game they got me was a 3D Anderson 3remake of Frogger. It was not even a Play Station 2 game, it was for the original Play Station but it still worked on the Play Station 2. This game was nothing like the games I would play at my friends houses. I was used to games where you had to fight enemies to survive not run away from them. It was probably the most frustrating game I have ever played but I still enjoyed it. In the game you play as a frog that is trying to get all of his other frog friends back. The objective was to avoid obstacles like cars or swarms of bees that were between you and your five frog buddies. I always tried to rush my way through the levels as fast as I could so I could see what the next stage was but I always ended up restarting because I would lose all of my lives. I eventually realized that I was going to have to slow things down a bit if I was ever going to beat the game. So I tried taking my time on each level and I ended up getting farther than I had gone before. This game taught me that if I am patient and take my time instead of rushing through things then I will have better results. About a year after I got a Play Station 2 my grandparents surprised me and my brother with a Nintendo Gamecube. My brother and I did not even ask for one they just randomly bought one for us. They also bought us a few games to go along with it. One of them was a Zelda game and the other one was the new Super Smash Brothers game called Super Smash Brothers Melee. I was never really a very competitive person when it came to any kind of games. I usually just played games for the fun of it but after a few weeks of owning Super Smash Bros. Melee I was a changed person. Although I still had a lot of fun playing the game with my brother and my friends, every round we played was an intense battle for the number one spot. We even set up tournaments with a prize for whoever came in first, which made each game even more competitive. The tournaments usually ended with someone getting too upset and Anderson 4yelling at the rest of the players for cheating. This game was responsible for several ruined, middle school friendships. After watching how this game brought out the rage in some people I realized that maybe it was better that I was not friends with those people anymore. Not only did this game make me into a more competitive person, it also showed me that nothing good can come from whining about a video game.I would not be the person I am today if I never played video games. Video games are still changing how I live today. They help ease the stress of schoolwork and are a good way to pass the time in between classes. There is still a lot more stuff to be learned from playing video games.