Despite how different the gaming industry is today compared to almost 30 years ago, there’s one constant that’s as true today as it was in 1997. If there’s a console waiting for a kid under a Christmas tree, you can almost guarantee they’ll lose their minds once they realize what’s hidden away under the wrapping paper. Provided you’ve got them the right one, of course. Console wars are for life, not just for Christmas.
Back in 1997, when I was finally ready to leave my Mega Drive behind, I didn’t really care which console I got next. That might have had a lot to do with me being a Sega kid up until that point and that, even at eight years old, I had accepted its consoles weren’t the future of gaming. I’d seen what the Saturn was capable of and wasn’t impressed.
I wound up getting a PS1 from Santa that year and, as PlayStation’s 30th anniversary campaign has demonstrated, my brand new console was technically already three years old by the time it found its way to me. Despite that, it continues to shape my gaming tastes to this day thanks to some of ‘97’s biggest releases. Before that, we need to cover the biggest gaming release of 1997, and what I was led to believe was in the big box with my name on it under the tree.
Nintendo 64 (Or a PlayStation In Disguise)
Console release windows weren’t as clear-cut in the ‘90s as they are today. Not only did Sega, Nintendo, and PlayStation not sync up their hardware release dates, but consoles would have staggered launches around the world. That meant Christmas 1997 was the Nintendo 64’s first festive season in Europe and the UK, and it’s why I translated hints that my Mega Drive would be replaced were pointing to me getting one as a gift.
I discovered years later that was the original plan. However, when my dad arrived at the store to buy my shiny new N64, he was talked out of it and wound up leaving with a PS1. My dad was swayed by the argument that there were far more games on the PS1 than there were on the N64 – 300 for PlayStation to Nintendo’s 30 was the exact wording, I’ve been told – which, to be fair, was accurate. I was quite happy with my PS1, but it’s fun to imagine how different my interests would be today had the shopkeeper not talked my dad out of buying me that year’s hottest gaming gift.
GoldenEye 007
Since I didn’t end up with the hottest console of 1997, I also didn’t end up with the hottest game of 1997 – GoldenEye 007. Even though I didn’t own the hardware to play it, like so many other kids my age, I played a lot of GoldenEye at friends’ houses. Four of us gathered around a tiny screen for a lot longer than we really should have been.
GoldenEye launched in August of 1997 which means those lucky enough to already have an N64, or knew they were getting one, would have had the James Bond classic at the top of their Christmas lists. Sure, going to your mate’s house to play it was fun, but that wasn’t the same as having it at home so you could practice, and so the GoldenEye gaming could continue when people came to yours.
Final Fantasy 7
One of the biggest games of the PS1 era launched in 1997 – Final Fantasy 7. Like GoldenEye, it arrived quite a bit before the holidays, but many kids would have had to wait until Christmas to finally get their hands on it. I’m assuming that’s still true today, at least for kids who care about more than just where their next V-Bucks gift cards are coming from.
Final Fantasy 7 opened up the idea of what video games can be for a lot of kids that Christmas. They can be more than just colorful platformers or sports sims. That’s certainly the revelation I had when playing it for the first time, and the hype surrounding Remake and Rebirth among people my age strongly suggests I wasn’t alone.
Tamagotchi
Enough about consoles and what you could play on them, time for some real, hard-hitting 1997 Christmas stuff. 1997 was the year the first Tamagotchi was released. A toy that’s about as ‘90s as it gets and if you’re in your early to mid-30s, there will have been a period in your life, probably around Christmas ‘97, when there was nothing you wanted more in the world than a Tamagotchi.
For the youths, Tamagotchis were small, usually egg-shaped devices with a screen on which a pet would live that you were tasked with caring for. You could feed them, play with them, and if I remember correctly, even discipline them if they started acting up which might be the most ‘90s thing about them of all. Then they died. People became so obsessed with the digital pets, I imagine they made some of you forget about the real-life puppy you had begged your parents for 12 months earlier.
DualShock Controller
PlayStation might have made the most significant change to its controllers in its 30-year history during 1997’s holiday season. While it wouldn’t arrive in the US until early 1998, there would have been a lot of PS1 owners in Japan who were treated to their very first DualShock controller for Christmas in ‘97.
As I discovered recently when handing one to my five-year-old son, giving someone under the age of 25 a controller without analog sticks will have them looking at you like you’re speaking a foreign language. PlayStation added them to its controllers in 1997 and until the PS5’s DualSense, each of its controllers since then has been an iteration of that original, 27-year-old design. RIP the PS3 banana pad.
Buzz Lightyear Action Figure
Yes, I know these were released in 1996, but they were so hard to find that I didn’t end up getting one. I’m including it here on the off chance my mum reads this since I’d have thought by Christmas ‘97 they were readily available yet I still didn’t get one. Care to explain, mum? You can just WhatsApp me, no need to leave an angry note in the comments, I get enough of those already.
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Considered one of the best FPS games ever made, GoldenEye 007 first launched on the Nintendo 64 in 1997 before being added to Xbox Game Pass and Nintendo Switch in 2023.
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Originally launching in 1997 for the PlayStation, Final Fantasy 7 is widely regarded as one of the most influential RPGs of all time. It follows Cloud, a mercenary and former SOLDIER, who joins a band of eco-terrorists – only to end up in a battle for the future of the planet. FF7 has spawned the Compilation of Final Fantasy 7, which includes a long-requested trilogy of full remakes.
- Released
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January 31, 1997
