Yes and no. My family had a VCS (2600) early in my youth, and it was our only electronic entertainment for years. My mom brought home an early model A2000 from one of her business trips when I was 6, and we stuck with Amigas for over 10 years. I never knew any kids my age who had an ST series Atari... but then again, I also didn't know any other kids who had an Amiga, or even a Mac. In America of the late '80s, playing video games meant you had a Nintendo, and using a computer already meant an IBM clone.
It wasn't until I was packing up for college that one of my high-school buddies mentioned his family was selling his old ST. By that time, both sides had lost the "war," and I was curious what the old nemesis competitor had to offer. So, for $100 I picked up a 520STfm with a boatload of floppies and began my journey into vintage computer collecting. (A few months later I bought a VIC-20, then a Mac Plus... At my worst, I've had nearly 100 computers in various stages of repair... That's still my only Atari, though.)
I wasn't terribly impressed. The midget SC1224 screen was tiny. GEM looked even cheesier than AmigaDOS 1.2 (who picked out that color of green? and is that cursor a bumblebee?). And the games I played were not as enjoyable as the ones I still played on my Amiga at the time.
