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[TheDarkKnight774]

Around 97-98. I started with psm's site which eventually became IGN

 

[Midas]

1995

 

[A Human Becoming]

Early 2001 when I made my IGN account. I remember the Spaceworld that year when they showed Wind Waker and Sunshine for the first time. Downloading the trailers on 56k was brutal.

 

[TedNindo]

I honestly dont clearly remember. My first internet experiences were because of gaming though. I did some gaming on 56k. I remember joining ign insider boards around the time the gamecube was revealed. And I remember visiting some dolphin site and planet gamecube a lot back then.

 

[Moff]

mid 90's too, I remember many of the mentioned urls here, very nice.
i immediately stopped buying print magazines, too. but not only because of the free magazines, mostly because of message boards. they are still my number 1 source for videogames and I just love to discuss.

 

[sajj316]

96 or 97. AOL as dial up. Gamefan.com, n64.com. Early days of IGN. SegaNET.com before there was SegaNET. PSXnation.com I think.

GAF is 90% of the time now ...

 

[Octavian]

1998, had just gotten OOT for Christmas. My first Zelda game. Got stuck right in the Deku Tree. Had to light the torches with the deku stick, but had no idea. Went NOA's website where they had a little picture guide for the Deku Tree I think, or maybe it was different things to do and lighting torches was an example.

Then internet. But in the past 6 or 7 years I've only read/gone to GAF. Used to get EGM and Nintendo Power in the late 90s and early 2000s and getting those in the mail was the best time of month for me.

e: actually n64cc.com was my first forum/website... Right at the height of the Triforce rumors.

 

[efyu_lemonardo]

Happypuppy.com

First post Gaf

'95 or '96 for me. Took me a while between discovering the Internet and realizing enough people actually cared about games for there to be coverage

I still remember the anxious nights dreading a last minute connection hiccup would erase all progress on any download over 10 MB
Those were the days.

 

[Canis lupus]

First experience with the internet was in 1999 on school computers, a year later I discovered internet cafés, I checked gamenews on small Dutch sites.

 

[taizuke]

Didn't really have a reason to when X-Play/AOTS and G4 were in their prime. But, once those started declining...

 

[ShiroAmakusa]

I acquired my first (own) internet access in about 1997/98. I remember watching a documentary about Geocities and I was fascinated about how easy it was to create your own website. Dial-up connections had the bad reputation of easily being able to put a huge dent into your wallet when you're not carefull so my parents refused to get Internet. Eventually, I was able to make a deal: They allow Internet in our home and I pay for it by myself. About half a year after that, I had a nice flatrate I couldn't be draged away from my PC anymore.

While my own attempts of a Street Fighter II fansite died because of my lazyness, the web became my second home, GameFAQ was the place to hang out for me. I just wish I could remember my old account or at least the e-mail I registered it with. Until about 2003, I used internet mostly for FAQ, eastereggs and gaming music/artwork sites. Had a huge collection of the old OverClocked Remixes but most of the mp3s and the gaming artworks I saved died in a horrible hard drive crash. At that day, the term "backup" became "slightly" more important to me.

I turned out to be a late adopter in terms of internet gaming coverage. I tried to stay loyal to my fav gaming mags, but when my favourite Nintendo mag died in 2000 (Total!), there was only Video Games and Maniac!, both multiplatform, left (GermanGAF knows them). I don't remember the exact reasons when or why I stopped reading them but it was a slowly process. I read GamePro for a few years but the internet was always faster. The final turn away from the print media came when I started playing World of Warcraft. There was no way to stay up to date without the internet and since WoW was my most played game for many years to come, information about other games wasn't that important anymore.

TL;DR edition: First Internet access in 1997. I tried to stick to print media as long as I could (until about 2005).

 

[Roarer]

those weird websites about final fantasy that used to be laid out like a final fantasy town and each building would have like one thing, like the inn would have artwork or whatever. circa 1996

Yes! I used to hang out on sites like that all the time in the summer of '96. I especially remember Bob Rourk's SquareSoft Land and Eblana's Café.

Those sites were the shit. My 14 year old self thought they were the pinnacle of web interactivity. Boy how things have changed.

 

[tim.mbp]

GameCube era Nintendojo, I think that's when I got my first non dial up connection. Not having to share a line with a phone really increased my browsing time.

 

[jsnepo]

Late 90s CheatCC

 

[squall23]

happypuppy and GameFAQs in 1996 with friggin' dial-up. I was still a naive little kid so I actually followed internet rules and didn't actually apply for accounts until I was 13 unless the sites had no age restriction. Pure lurker stage.

 

[Nostremitus]

Late 90's Gamesages (My cheat code HQ back then) was purchased by IGN. I started reading up on the recently announce Majora's Mask and rumors about something called "Dolphin."

 

[pswii60]

For me it was probably around '98/99. I remember sites like Segadojo and The Magic Box, but I frequented the IGN forums back then too.

 

[shandy706]

In my own home...sometime around '94-'95

"NO ONE MAKE A CALL OR PICK UP THE PHONE!"

 

[terrisus]

Oh yeah, here's a picture of a mousepad I had with the Nintendo Power Source AOL area from the mid-90s on it.

That was an amazing place. I know people laugh at AOL now (with very good cause, of course, it's a shambles), and have for years, but it used to be a pretty amazing place back then.

 

[djtiesto]

1995 at my 9th grade library to access nintendo.com and look at pics of N64 games from Shoshinkai.

 

[Kimawolf]

For videogame coverage?

N64.com baby, seeing those exclusive first ever screen shots of Super Mario 64 they would release monthly, I loved them. I was around 16ish so i'd print them out and take them home to oogle at how amazing Mario looked.

 

[Somnium986]

Early 2000s for me when I really started to get into gaming. Didn't have a computer with internet till I got out of high school, and that was like 2005 :/ . I would use the computers in the school library/computer room. Cheat Code Central, Resident Evil Fan: A new blood, Silent Hill Haven, and a crap load of other fansites. Gamespot for news.

I would also go to the city library too. Remember pissing off the staff there because I was printing out too many pages for a Silent Hill FAQ. Ahhh the memories.

 

[4Scarr]

Late 1993 early 1994 was when I started using Internet to find out about games. Searching frantically for info and pics on the 3do 64 bit upgrade M2 before that is bulletin boards on the old dial up

 

[NekoFever]

Around 1996, and I can remember videogames.com being one of my first destinations when I got online. I was a lurker on GameFAQs for a long time after reading about it in EGM before eventually registering in January 2000, where I now have a Sage level account purely from length of membership, because I certainly don't post there any more.

 

[Crimson_Gold]

Random video game sites back in 1997. I would go anywhere video game related and just look on with envy. Those were the days before I got a 32 bit console.

 

[mrlion]

In 1998 broadband internet kick started and my family was one of the first ones to have cable internet here in the city by Time Warner (before they had horrible customer service). I just found random sites for gaming stuff using Altavista (wasn't a fan of Yahoo Search for some reason, Altavista was simpler).

I also discovered GameFAQs but it wasn't until 2002 that I created my account and its been with me since.

As a side note, I also started emulation in 1998 and got really fascinated by it. My first emulated game, first RPG I've played, and first longest game was Chrono Trigger, which to this day still my number one favorite game of all time and still holds a special place in my heart.

 

[Krafter]

Roughly June-July 1996, right after Quake, right before Daggerfall.

 

[baphomet]

The Japanese n64 launch. I remember using like $100 worth of ink to print out every picture I could find of all the games. I already subscribed to 5-6 game magazines, but it must have been after the launch because I remember seeing a lot of images that weren't in the magazines at the time. That was the first thing I remember using it for related to games. I remember my dad showing me a games related usenet, but that was when I was about 8 or 9 so I was too young to understand what it was.

 

[Jawmuncher]

I think it was E3 2003.
First time I really remember using the Internet for gaming news was that. Because I remember the PoP:Warrior Within Reveal trailer.

 

[ThatStupidLion]

mid-late 90's when IGN was some cheat code website.. with a list of all the consoles as blue hyperlinks centered in the page.

 

[frankie_baby]

n64.com back in 96, before i even got my n64

 

[Naked Snake]

Back when IGN was n64.com

 

[Solid warrior]

most likely 1998
http://www.cheatcc.com/

 

[Pop-O-Matic]

Finding info on Pokemon in 1998, though the first site I remember visiting regularly and lurking the forums of was Planet Gamecube back in the early 2000s.

 

[Muku]

Got the internet, well... AOL on horrible dial-up (2400 baud modem came in computer we purchased some time before), was in January 1997. Seems like so long ago, but at the same time doesn't. I immediately headed to the Nintendo Power Source area of AOL. I'd remember reading a few months before a section in a Nintendo Power. About their "online jocks"... LOL. Paul, Amy, and Travis. I kept moving with the Nintendo community until the shocking day we all went to the forums and got the immediate shut down notice and ability to see board for next week before it went away. The days on AOL, despite AOL being a joke now... were really awesome.

So, I can pretty much say day one it became a place for me to scrounge up video game news. I lived on the Nintendo section of AOL. Even sometimes visiting the PSX area of AOL. Lots of fanboyism all around back then. Shit was in your face then. Visited places like happypuppy.com (wow what a blast from the past), n64.com, n64cc.com, GamePro, Nintendo.com (obviously), IGN, and Nintendojo. Feel like I'm missing a very big Nintendo site.. I even ran, sad as it sounds, my own video game newsletter back on AOL. Man, really takes me back.

As for first E3, not sure. I pretty much would read my Nintendo Power for Space World coverage, and some other magazines and some online articles for E3 since the beginning. But for videos and actually watching? Not sure.

Man, lots of memories floating to the surface after thinking about this. Especially about Nintendo's old website. Horrible frames and the elevator from hell on their website. That was mainly because dial up was slower than hell.

 

[grosvenor_92]

mid to late 2000's I guess

 

[VeryGooster]

1998? I kid you not, I typed "videogames[dot]com" on a whim and that is how I discovered GameSpot.

AOL had their games channel and I also remember ANT.

 

[Muku]

1998? I kid you not, I typed "videogames[dot]com" on a whim and that is how I discovered GameSpot.

AOL had their games channel and I also remember ANT.

Holy crap, forgot all about ANT. Wow, really is a blast from the past.

 

[slightconfuse]

When 1up was created in 03

 

[GarthVaderUK]

I would say early 2000s, when I started Uni.

 

[Lightning Count]

About 2002, I stumbled upon gameFAQs while looking for some game tips, from there it just snowballed.

 

[EagleEyes]

1997 was my first taste of gaming websites. Don't know how I found it but IGN and Videogamespot were my first ones. I was trying to find out information on the new football games coming out(Madden 98 and Gameday 98) and decided on Gameday cause they were the first football game to use polygons lol.

 

[Jay Shadow]

Mid 90s with all the Quake sites that eventually evolved into broader game news.

 

[InsaneLuchador]

I can remember going into the "Doom room" AOL chat room in the mid '90s when my family first got a computer.
But Ign.com and videogames.com (gamespot) were the first gaming websites I really started frequenting, I thing sometime around 1999. It was pretty much triggered by the coming launch of the Dreamcast.

 

[Muffdraul]

Whenever Next Generation Online went live, I guess. Or whenever I first discovered it. I remember the first issue of the magazine I bought had a Virtua Fighter 2 cover, it was probably not long after that. Late 1995, early '96? They eventually became IGN.

Before that it was basically about reading posts at BBSs and hoping the shit being posted was true. And in those days, I think it usually was, actually.

 

[Bending_Unit_22]

Sometime in the late 90's, maybe 2000. I had the internet since 96 or 97 but other than downloading CivII scenarios and patches I don't recall using it for videogames until I found Gamespot, somehow. I had stopped reading magazines as well, so even something as big as Zelda64 came as a complete surprise to me when I saw it in the store one day.

1998? I kid you not, I typed "videogames[dot]com" on a whim and that is how I discovered GameSpot.

Probably how I found Gamespot as well.

 

[IllumiNate]

Back in the days of gamesages.com

 

[Ragnarok]

probably like 1999-2000. I think the website was called gamerweb.com . Does anybody remember that site? The forums were just flame wars and troll fests but it was fun for my 14 year old self. I was a hardcore dreamcast fan at the time and remember being pissed about PS2 lol.

 

[Neff]

 

[Heart Attack]

circa 2004-2005.