re: First video game that blew your mind

It's hard to say, some games to this day still manage to amaze me. Born in 85, my father got me into gaming at a very early age. Started on Atari and NES, QBert, Warlords, Mario, Mario 3, Metroid, Contra, Double Dragon are among my earliest gaming memories. A neighbor let me borrow the original Final Fantasy when I was 6 years old, and it really caught my attention (yes, I could read pretty well that young). I didn't realize it but I was heavily into RPG games, with Final Fantasy and games like Faxanadu, Dragon Warrior, Legacy of the Wizard, Zelda, Milon's Secret Castle being among my favorites on the NES.

I think when I got a SNES on Christmas is when my mind was first truly blown. 16 bit graphics and sound was astounding to me. Super Mario World and Ultraman were my first games. Got Final Fantasy 2 shortly after release. Games like Secret of Mana, Chrono Trigger, Super Metroid, Earthbound, Doom, (my first 3Dish experience), Starfox etc all blew my mind at the time. They still do from time to time, I'll replay a few of my favorites every 4 or 5 years for the nostalgia.

Modern games like The Elder Scrolls, the newest Doom, Fallout series, Metroidvania games, Nier Automata etc, the advent of online multiplayer games like Halo, Overwatch, WoW (not exactly modern, but still) all carry that same torch for me.