Video games have always been a part of my life. When I look back, they were present at many seminal moments in my life. This is one of them.

When is a video game a video game?

This is probably the worst philosophical question of all time, but I do have an example that illuminates this very conumdrum, direct from my past. Take the porn game. Is it a legitimate video game where players actually try to complete objectives? Or is it an elaborate masturbation contraption?

Honestly, I’m not sure, as my only experience with one is in my pre-teen days. Like many kids (I presume, at least), I used to go through my parents stuff. You would always find all sorts of awesome things: a forgotten five-dollar bill, Dad’s stash of porn, Christmas gifts, hunting knifes that you weren’t allowed to play with when adults were around.

On one adventure, I found a pornographic CD-ROM computer game in the shrink wrap. This posed a very serious moral dilemma. Do I leave it be and make sure that no one knows I found it, or do I steal it and see what this thing is all about?

In for a penny, in for a pound. It was mere minutes before I had it installed.

I actually don’t recall what the game was, other than it wasn’t that impressive and that it didn’t make much sense as a game. And I do believe that it was light on the porn. All around, an inferior product.

A couple days later, I was called into the living room, where Mom and Dad looked very grim. I sat down.

“Something went missing from our room. It was something that we bought for a friend. Do you know anything about it?”

What weirded me out is that both of them were there. I could handle Dad asking me about it  -- I knew he had a hidden collection of adult material, but Mom knew about it? And they were acting in unison? I couldn’t handle it! Mom and Dad as sexual beings? Gross!

I lied, of course. But they knew. And I knew they knew. And they knew that I knew that they knew. They let it slide, and I got off free, acquitted of all charges. I'm not even sure they were prepared for the event in which I admitted to the theft.

A couple days later, I took the game out of its hiding spot in the computer room closet and ran to the nearest stand of trees where I buried it, never to see it again.

I didn’t want to!

I think there’s a moment where every kid realizes what their parents are and what they do together, and that is an image that can’t be unthought. I did not want any reason to remember it, that’s for sure.

Part 1: My Father and the Warp Pipes

Part 2: Doomed

Part 3: Tony Gwynn Gets His, to the Delight of All

Part 4: Bonk's Late Night Adventure

Part 5: Hockey Fight in Canada

Part 6: Ambush!

Part 7: I Have a Dream...cast

Part 8: You're Not From Around Here

Part 9: WHERE DO YOU WANT TO FART