Not quite on topic but:
When I think games and summer, I think back to the time summer mattered, specifically school. Now that was a time before the internets, so, plenty of time to game but no one to ask for advice if/when I got stuck, especially on facts that were readily supplied in the manual (uhhhh).
I was 12. It was nominally the last day of school, and we had a class trip to a certain tourist attraction. Just a month before, I'd finished Champions of Krynn, and was replaying it and gearing up to play the second part.
As I was waiting in the lobby, I met my best friend, 4 years senior, also a gamer, who had just finished school for good, so we stepped into a teacher's room and talked. There were no spoilers back then, only good advice, so I remembered to beware of the lich, and to follow the red doors, and to write down the damn password. The class assembled and went by the doorway in an orderly but raucous line. My mom, a volunteer TA, ran by the window holding a kid's hand, catching up. Still we talked, then said our good lucks, and I bought some pop-star-branded lollipops and went home to wait for mom to return and let me in, because I didn't have my own copy of the keys.
As for the attraction, sure it sounded exciting, but I'd thought I could always go there by myself, without an annoying teacher telling me to not lean on this or jump off that or whatever.
That summer, the attraction burned down.
No regrets.
Go buy the game that possibly cost me the best experience in my life right here, it's awesome. PS. The password is 'Denissa'. It's been a bloody eternity and I still remember.
