Your biggest wow moment of each gen you've lived through

[Landale_Star]

So this is just consoles, no PC, no handhelds no arcade games. Those have wowed me too but they aren't defined the same way as console generations.

Gen 2: This is a bit weird, I didn't have a gen 2 console but I did have an Atari 7800 which played Atari 2600 games. I didn't even realise it at the time but I guess looking back, if I had to choose my wow moment from that selection of games it would be River Raid. Not for any really impressive reason, just that it was maybe the only 2600 game that I owned that I really liked. It was the first scrolling shooter I ever played too.

Gen 3: SMB3, the whole game just blew my mind with all the secrets and variety. Sometimes a coin ship would appear, or you could fly over a level and find a warp whistle. There were giant enemies and the game goes up into the freaking clouds. Oh and there's a frog powerup. Kirby's Adventure is the other contender, more powerups than Mario 3, saving, the ability to revisit levels and graphics that seemed like they could be on the SNES all helped to make this my favourite NES game at the time.

Gen 4: Either Sonic the Hedgehog or DKC both seemed unbelievable. Sonic had a pseudo 3D look to it's background with the parallax scrolling water effect in the first level, the speed and different routes felt completely new. DKC just looked and sounded unbelievable, it looked like the next gen to me.

Gen 5: I think it's Virtua Fighter 2, seeing the intro with the 3D fighters made it seem like consoles could now do anything, it also had something that just looked so good that I would eventually identify as 60fps (or 50 I guess) years later. FFVII is another contender not so much for CGI cutscenes, but for allowing them to flow seamlessly into or out of gameplay. Also for showing me how massive a JRPG could be. Mario 64 would be the last contender, although later than VF2 and other 3D games, it showed how my favourite genre at the time could be done in 3D. On a non technical level FFVIII just absolutely wows me to this day, FFVII laid the groundwork very nicely and then VIII just improved everything from tech to the game as a whole. My favourite game ever.

Gen 6: Probably Gran Turismo 3, the graphics and smooth 60fps (yeah it was really 50 again but 50fps on a 50hz screen doesn't seem weird like 50fps on a 60hz does) seemed like more than I could possibly have hoped a console could deliver. FFX really impressed me too with the seamless battle transitions and much improved graphics/animation and Jak and Daxter had no loading times which I was amazed by.

Gen 7: Maybe Uncharted 2, the graphics and animation were very impressive and I thought it was a true leap ahead of the last generation. This generation was where I began to think that the real leaps forward were over, so I find it harder to think about what just seemed unbelievably impressive.

Gen 8: At first I thought this was going to be difficult because although a lot of PS4 games have been impressive in one way or another, none really stand out. FFXV did get me excited when I saw the car taking flight for the first time, Spider-Man also impressed me for various reasons but then I remembered the real wow moment and it's a big one. VR, specifically the PSVR has wowed me like some of the earlier gens. It really feels like a brand new way to play games. The standout moments for me so far have been Driveclub on day 1, were I just sat and looked around my car for ages looking completely stupid to others in the room, Wipeout felt like the moment where I fully appreciated how VR could actually enhance the game past the novelty and Astrobot filled me with joy at how VR could be implemented into another genre.