5 Obsolete Things Every Gamer Over 30 Years Old Remembers

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If you didn’t experience the 1990s, some things might seem strange to you. Although it wasn’t that long ago, the world – especially technology – has changed a lot. While those changes are mostly positive, there were also perks to growing up as the internet became popular. Modern video games look amazing, but that doesn’t automatically make them better, and honestly, I’m happy some things from back then are gone for good.

Here are five things everyone from the ‘90s will remember, for good and bad.

5) Getting Kicked Off the Internet When Your Mom Needed the Phone

Picture this: you’ve just gotten your hands on EverQuest and are excited to play with friends online. But it’s Friday night in 1999, and your family is still using dial-up internet. After enduring the painfully slow process of AOL connecting, you finally get online for just five minutes before your mom needs the phone line to call your grandmother, abruptly ending your game session.

Most kids today wouldn’t recognize dial-up internet, but it was how many families connected online in the 1990s. It worked by using your phone line, which meant you couldn’t make calls while someone was using the internet.

If you were fortunate, you had a separate phone line just for kids, which meant you could use it for internet access. If not, you had to share a line with the family, making it difficult to spend much time online without getting in trouble.

4) School Yard Rumors

Rumors among kids still happen today, just like when we were in school. But things were different in the 1990s. Back then, it was much harder to check if the stories your friends told you – especially about things like video games – were actually true, because the internet wasn’t readily available like it is now.

Remember trying to unlock secret characters in old video games? Things like Blaze in Mortal Kombat 2 or wondering if the Mew glitch in Pokémon Red and Blue was actually possible? Today, finding answers is easy with a quick online search. But back in the ’90s, gamers would spend countless hours experimenting, only to often find out these secrets weren’t real.

People definitely still lie online, and that’s not likely to change. But it’s especially easy to disprove old rumors, like the one from fourth grade about unlocking Sheng Long in Street Fighter 2 – the idea that you could beat the game without taking damage, then simply wait out M. Bison to unlock him – is completely false.

3) LAN Parties

While LAN parties still exist today, they aren’t as frequent as they used to be. Now, you’re more likely to see a large, organized event, whereas before, it was a casual get-together with friends – often just to play games like Halo together in person.

LAN parties aren’t as popular anymore because most people are already connected online. Instead of physically carrying a PlayStation 5 to a friend’s house to play games like Battlefield 6, it’s much easier to connect through Discord and play together online. Just like dial-up internet became obsolete with the rise of wi-fi, LAN parties have become less practical now that everyone has internet access.

2) The GameShark

Out of everything on this list, I really miss the concept of free in-game cheats. It wasn’t so much about the GameShark device itself, but the ability to unlock features without spending extra money. Do you remember when Assassin’s Creed started offering ways to pay to speed up your progress? Ubisoft let you pay a fee to earn experience points faster and level up more quickly.

Back in the 1990s, gamers could enter special codes to unlock features or use devices like the GameShark. The GameShark was a separate cartridge you connected to your console, and it came with a huge library of cheat codes for many different games. You’d put your game cartridge into the GameShark, then choose the cheats you wanted to activate.

While the GameShark cost a little bit of money, it usually ended up saving you more by eliminating the need to print out cheat codes. Plus, the Nintendo 64 version had a great feature: it could bypass regional restrictions, allowing you to play games from other regions on your North American console.

1) Video Game Rentals

Man, I really miss the days of Blockbuster – or whatever video store we all used to have! We didn’t realize how great it was until it disappeared. When Netflix started delivering movies right to your door, it sounded amazing, and honestly, it was awesome back then. And for us gamers, GameFly quickly became the go-to – it was basically Netflix, but for video games, and it worked really well.

Without a store to visit, both services were unreliable. You’d subscribe and hope they sent you games you actually wanted. Unlike Blockbuster, where you could simply browse and, if a game wasn’t available, request it without a monthly cost, these services felt like a gamble.

While late fees were frustrating and there was always a risk of losing your game progress with older systems, rental stores offered a unique experience. That feeling hasn’t been matched in today’s world, and it’s something many people fondly remember.

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2025-11-01 21:41