Happy holidays! The month of October is behind us and Christmas is just around the corner. Before you know it, gift-buying season will be upon us -- and for early shoppers determined to find unique gifts and pre-season deals, it's already here! So start thinking and looking for fun geek gifts now, or else you'll end up doing eleventh-hour Christmas shopping when the best gifts are sold out and best deals have expired!
But wait! The problem is what gift to give, right? And this problem becomes a lot harder when there are geeks on your Christmas shopping list. Geeks are a hard-to-please bunch; especially if the purchase made is not something he or she wants or needs.
You could start thinking about getting some game consoles (the Sony PS3 and PSP, as well as the Nintendo Wii immediately come to mind) or one of the latest game DVDs that are out in the market (again, there are a multitude of options here). These are great ideas if you are shopping for that hard-core gamer, and it might also provide a great deal of entertainment for you; today's generation of games are wicked cool, so much so that chances are you'll find yourself being drawn to one (if you aren't already an addict yourself).
The latest games and/or game consoles will always be popular gifts with game-playing geeks! If they already own the latest one, then you can probably go the "opposite" end of the spectrum and think of getting a collection of old (or "very old", as in DOS-era) computer games which would likely be a bit of a retro collector's item or a bona fide cult classic. In this category, what immediately comes to mind is Diablo and Diablo 2, two of the aforementioned "collector's item" or "cult classic" games known to mankind. But if you want an "older" one, try to look for the original release of a game called Command & Conquer". Not to be confused with "Command & Conquer 3: Kane's Wrath" or "Command & Conquer: Generals", or even "Command & Conquer 2: Red Alert" - get your titles straight to wow that gamer geek in your gift shopping list. These are later "incarnations" of the game. Just plain "Command & Conquer" will do or, if the salesperson is quite confused as to what you are referring to, just tell them, "Command & Conquer 95" (because it was released in 1995, and it was one of the games that made Windows 95 famous and unforgettable). This would make a rare gift.
Looking for something even older? Then try looking for a game called "Sokoban" or the very first release of "Sid Meier's Civilization". We're talking about DOS-era cult classics here, my friend. These are two examples of games that entered the gamer hall of fame ages ago, probably when the geek you are giving it to was still learning how to walk or wasn't even born. Be forewarned, however, that the "cheesy" graphics of these games (especially that of "Civilization") makes you exclaim, "And you call this a game?" You'd be better off trying out "Sokoban" instead. Believe me, when you see it, you'll probably think that you've seen this very addicting, mind-bending game before somewhere, but hey! This one is the original. You would be surprised to find out that a lot of game flavors today trace their roots to the good old DOS days. Case in point: the popular falling-brick game called "Tetris." It has plenty of variations, but the original version was programmed in DOS by Russians! By the way, for your edification, both the "Sokoban" and "Tetris" games were marketed by a company named Spectrum Holobyte. Just knowing that makes you cooler.
In closing, the great thing about retro (or very retro) games is that they often will not cost too much and some can even be downloaded on your home PC for free. When you say, "I still have to burn it on DVD, though..." you'll be happily surprised to find out that some can even fit on a 3½-inch floppy disk or even the "smallest"-capacity flash drives or a fraction of a 700-MB CD-ROM! We've come a long way.
Playing some of our childhood games always brings back great memories. Nothing compares to the nostalgic smile on someone's face when they recognize the game that they (or an older brother or sister) used to play ages ago!
