Smells that evoke your gaming past.

[Doddsy]

They say that your sense of smell is one of the most powerful senses to evoke distant memories. What smells bring back gaming memories for you?
For me, I was recently playing msPacman on a cocktail cab in a pub and the smell of the old machine really took me back to arcade gaming in the early 80s. Smells emitting from hot arcade cabs can never be emulated! In 1986 my mum bought a brand of soap and everytime I smell that brand now, bizarrely it reminds me of Fairlight by The Edge!

[TheNewMonkey]

That smell you get when you first open up a brand new fresh copy of the latest Retro Gamer magazine

[Liamh1982]

The smell of burning plastic makes me think of the SNES - another blown adaptor?

[TwoHeadedBoy]

The smell of chocolate Pop Tarts instantly takes me back to the first time I played Lemmings 2 (which was also the first time I'd eaten chocolate Pop Tarts) - likewise, playing Lemmings 2 today makes me hungry for chocolate Pop Tarts!

[shiftytigger]

Associative memory is great. Moms beef stew = Chequered Flag on the speccy.

Likewise the smell of the swimming baths reminds me of Treasure Island on the speccy - used to play it often after coming back from the baths.

Wizball makes me think of strawberry angel delight , thanks to a few wasted sunday afternoons at my nans!

[c0nfu53d]

That smell you get from old pubs reminds me of moon cresta. They had a cocktail cab in a hotel bar in jersey which I stayed in when I was a kid.

[noobish hat]

I actually have a document with a list of games/smells/music that are strongly associated with each other. Usually the smells are different aftershaves or perfumes that people in my family must have been wearing at the time. Sometimes when a person walks past me in the street, I get a wiff of something I haven't smelled in a long time, and suddenly get an incredibly strong memory of some game or other.

The Man Who (Travis) + Lynx Inca = Ocarina of Time. That's a good one.

[shiftytigger]

Lynx inca - man that takes me back. They should bring back Inca , Oriental and Java. remind me of getting ready for college.

[crusto]

The smell of sh!t reminds me of my old 2600.

[crusto]

Lynx inca - man that takes me back. They should bring back Inca , Oriental and Java. remind me of getting ready for college.

Dont forget Lynx Spice, that and oriental were my 2 favourite chick pullers back in the day

[The Laird]

The smell of sh!t reminds me of my old 2600.

Funny you say that, reminds me of my neighbours NES. Oh how everyone laughed at him, poor sod. At least he upgraded to a Mega Drive and a Lynx eventually.

[SJ_Sathanas]

I've said numerous times McDonalds chocolate milkshakes remind me of arcade Tekken 3 (and vice versa).

Slightly off-topic but Lynx Java spray stuff reminds me of going out to HMV and buying Akira on VHS and Boots Sun screen reminds me of car shows/meets at Billing Aquadrome in Northampton.

[Megamixer]

Lynx inca - man that takes me back. They should bring back Inca , Oriental and Java. remind me of getting ready for college.

Dont forget Lynx Spice, that and oriental were my 2 favourite chick pullers back in the day

Slightly more modern but I've never bought a can of Lynx since they stopped doing 'Phoenix'. No idea why they keep making 'Africa' to be honest since I don't think it's all that.

Anyway...waaaay off-topic

Does the smell of unsealing a game and smelling the fresh print on the manual count? Today with the amount of cheap games you can buy (not to mention that some don't even have manuals), I barely notice but when I had far less money, stuff like a brand-new manual was something to treasure and read cover-to-cover. Smelling it now reminds me of a simpler, skinter but probably richer (in terms of appreciating games) time.

[DreamcastRIP]

The smell of Boots The Chemist reminds me of the NES.

(That pungent aroma of aftershave combined with perfume, old fossils queueing for prescriptions and of course dust. Lots of dust.)

[crusto]

The smell of sh!t reminds me of my old 2600.

Funny you say that, reminds me of my neighbours NES. Oh how everyone laughed at him, poor sod. At least he upgraded to a Mega Drive and a Lynx eventually.

I only said it to provoke a remark out of you It certainly wasnt my favourite console by any means, probably my least, but nah, it wasnt sh!t.