Demo discs and cheat codes: Millennial gamers explain what Gen Z wouldn’t understand about the 2000s

Millennial gamers have been getting nostalgic and telling Gen Z what they wouldn’t “understand” about life before the internet.

• READ MORE: Every ‘Tony Hawk’s Pro Skater’ soundtrack – ranked!

Taking to the hugely popular gaming subreddit, one user asked people 30 years and older, “what’s something from ‘back in your day’ that younger gamers today wouldn’t understand?”

“Getting demo discs in gaming magazines,” read one of the thousands replies from millennial gamers.

“The amount of hours I skated that warehouse on a Tony Hawk’s Pro Skater 2 demo disc… I’m going to be honest, I don’t think there is a single 30+ gamer who played that demo and game who does NOT just feel pure nostalgia hearing ‘Superman’ by Goldfinger,” said another.

“I probably put 40 hours into the Splinter Cell demo that came with my copy of Official Xbox Magazine. Most of it was just walking around staring at the real-time shadows,” wrote a third.

Another fan explained that the decision to buy a new game was based “entirely” on the box art and description. “Back in the day it was either word of mouth from friends, staring at the boxes or reading game magazines. Buying a game was always a gamble for me,” replied another.

“We didn’t have streamers and the wide availability of the internet to completely kill any discovery or secrets the games had, to the point insane rumours would start at school because no one could disprove it,” said another gamer, with others listing their favourite playground gaming rumours including the infamous Mew in Pokemon Red and Blue one.

“I’m not sure I want to know how many collective hours were spent trying to unlock Luigi in Super Mario 64 based on increasingly elaborate setups from the school playground,” reads another comment.

Other gamers reflected on their tricks for fixing hardware issues including having to physically clean the ball in their PC’s mouse, stealing batteries from the TV remote for their Game Boy and blowing on cartridges to get them to work.

I’m gonna go ahead and have to disagree https://t.co/paM52K3eC7

— Dusty Slay (@dustyslay) March 29, 2025

It comes after other gamers declared the “corporate greed” of modern developers has “killed gaming” after Microsoft announced “laughable” price rises for Xbox consoles and first-party games.

All models of Xbox Series X and S consoles have gotten more expensive and Microsoft has also warned that new games could cost as much as $80 by Christmas 2025. Last month, Nintendo announced a “variable” pricing model for the Switch 2 that will see games such as Mario Kart World cost £75.99. “We’re watching gaming go from being largely accessible to a luxury experience,” said one fan.

In other news, a video game adaptation of iconic horror Evil Dead is being shut down less than three years after it was released.

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