Namco Museum Vol 1 was the first video game I ever played and I know that for a fact since it was the first game for my family's PS2. It's a collection of classic Namco arcade games inter-spaced between a 3D environment that you navigated around in in first person. Where the "Museum" name came in was that each game on the volume had its own wing with a bunch of assorted fun facts and trivia about the game. At the end of each wing would be a special room heavily themed on the game, like for Galaga the game room is the bridge of a space ship or a race track in the case of Rally-X. As a kid I spent much more time just milling around in the museum than in the actual games. The early PS1 graphics coupled with an ambient track that looped over and over again created a truly surreal experience especially since I couldn't have been older than four when I first played it. My older sister would always complain that the game gave her strange dreams.
I have much more fond memories with the second game I ever played, Pac Man World 2, which I believe is what is responsible for making vidya my lifelong hobby but Namco Museum still holds a special place in my heart alongside everything else that defined the earliest part of my childhood.
