Always remember you first.

[Lord S. Binkleheimer]

I think my first was Wasteland
At the age of 7 or 8.
My god, I would play it for hours on end, getting no wheres.
Never did beat it though.

 

[FangShadow]

The one i can remember is star fox 64 story wise. I can't remember my first 100% completion

 

[Valiance]

Streets of Rage.

And first 100% is starfox 64, and I mean medals on every map, every route, unlocking hard mode, every medal/every route on HARD MODE, etc...

world record on area 6 for a while...etc...

 

[Castratikron]

My first gsme was the original Smash Bros. for N64, Pokemon was probably the first game I beat

 

[Rett Silvari]

Legend of Zelda: A Link to the Past. I just smiled.

 

[Zacharine]

Mine was Space Taxi for Commodore 64. It was one of the first games we got and boy did I end up using a lot of time on that one. In the end, I managed to complete all the stages, but that took a whole fricking lot of work.

EDIT: And I was 7 at the time I beat it.

After that, (S)NES games and more particularly the Megaman series was a natural extension of almost ridicuously hard games to beat that you just had to get to the end of. I did manage to beat Megaman 2 and 4-6.

 

[Georg8]

To tell ya the truth, it was really DOOM for the computer online with my dad.
I was like... 6?
Now i'm wondering how the hell i managed to play it with my dad without failing too much, I guess that explains why i'm good at First Person Shooters...

That was actually the first online game I ever played. It showed me the glory of killing someone being immediately followed by shit talking.

same that was the first game I ever played I beat it when I was six, I'm a youngen. Then after that it was Duke Nukem 3D then ... Half-Life the original

 

[MetalBride]

It was either Shining Force or Lufia II rise of the sinistrals .. damn it what one was it >.< thats going to bug me now

 

[YuheJi]

Probably Super Mario Bros. And it took a long time for me.

 

[sage42]

Spyro the dragon for the PS1 to this day I still laugh when Nasty Nork gets his ass burned

 

[Nemorov]

There was this stupid Rugrats game a long while back that I beat in one sitting. I was so impressed with myself... I was ten and I'd never beaten a game before, although shortly before that I came real damn close with the first Myst on the PS1. I've always had an obsessive little nack for those kinds of games. However that stupid sound maze thing... ugh.

 

[Mookie_Magnus]

The earliest game I remember beating was this side-scrolling Japanese game called Valis for the Sega Genesis, where you played as this blue-haired girl with a magic sword and skimpy armor. I was squealing for like 5 minutes after beating the final boss.

 

[AbsoluteVirtue18]

The Legend Of Zelda.

....I think...damned old age....

 

[Arkhangelsk]

I can't remember the first game I finished, but the first game I played, Super Mario Land, was brutally hard, could only get to the third level. The gravity, the time limit, and the annoyingly strong enemies were excruciating.

 

[WhiteFangofWhoa]

The first game I beat is also the only one to make me destroy a system, ironically enough- Super Mario Land. Not sure if I consider it harder to beat than the NES game it was supposed to be based on (fewer stages but a sharper difficulty gradient and no warps), but this is one case where the level BEFORE the final boss takes most of your lives away: World 4-2, the tunnel of much evil and lava and death. No mere vehicle stage can compete. Made worse due to the fact that Game Over really MEANS Game Over, starting you right back at World 1-1! They played rough in those days...

 

[wgreer25]

I know Super Mario Bros. on NES (yes I used warps) as well as Mega Man 2. I never beat Mega Man (the first one), I could get all the bosses, but could never get through Willy's stage.

But to the point of your post, games are getting easier. Yes they are, and they have become so to be more accessible to more players... i.e. more mainstream, and this is a good thing. I know that I, as an older gamer, do enjoy the lower amount of frustration in games as I don't want to die 100 times to get to the end.

However, I think the industry has done a very smart thing to appease the hardcore gamers out there, Achievements/trophies. Not only can you say you did this awesome thing in a game, you now have an electronic stamp that you did it. So the game is beatable by a casual gamer and has a reward for the more serious gamer for doing something difficult. Mirror's Edge no gun achievment comes to mind as well as COD4's Achievement for beating levels on the hardest difficulty.

 

[damselgaming]

The Lion King on the Megadrive.
The end music makes me cry to this day!
... such a loooser.