Posted on September 16, 2011
Good news, bad news
I found all of my old video game magazines! I am super pumped about this! The only problem is that they’re buried behind a ton of other boxes and mattresses, and it’ll take some effort to get to them.
I’m hoping the aforementioned picture of the NES Game Boy converter can be found… so long as I didn’t burn the GamePro issue it was in.
We had a wood stove in our house, and not knowing where to put my alarmingly huge magazine collection as it grew, I *may* have burned a few issues of Nintendo Power. I don’t think I recall burning any EGM‘s or anything else, but you never know. If I were to go back and talk to my 12 year old self, I’d give him an earful!
“Listen, André… why throw these out? You’re eventually going to have a blog to laugh at all this stuff, and it would be awesome just to go back and check these out for nostalgia purposes. And for goodness sake, KEEP THE BOXES YOUR GAMES COME IN. It’s not just packaging. GOD.”
Posted on September 12, 2011
Super Metroid (Super NES)
As mentioned yesterday, Super Metroid was introduced to me by a friend I met in University. Before then, I had heard a lot about the awesomeness, but never experienced it first hand.
1994 - Super NES (Nintendo)
When this came out in ’94, my interest in video games was waivering a little bit. I wasn’t growing out of them, so much as I was just looking for that next jump games would take. I was somewhat obsessed with the Mortal Kombat titles at the time, if only for the fact that the subject matter seemed more adult, which is what I needed (even though I was only 11).
When Super Metroid was plastered all over my issue of Nintendo Power, I wasn’t really up for trying it. I had gotten some enjoyment out of the first game, but its Game Boy sequel had me less than enthused at the time… this was just another one of those titles with “Super” tacked onto the front of it.
I was way, way wrong about that.
*Fast-forward to nine years after the game is released, in 2003.*
A bunch of friends and I had gone to see Terminator 3: Rise of the Machines in theatres. I enjoyed the campiness of the movie quite a bit, and I believed it was a great addition to the franchise – many others didn’t seem to think so, but I’m pretty easy to please when it comes to sci-fi flicks.
After the movie was done, the group headed to the good ol’ Smythe St. apartment, and my friend Mike wanted to show me his “mad skills” with Super Metroid, a game he was appalled I hadn’t played yet. He told me he could have the game beat in less than two hours, so I sat and watched as he played through.
Two things struck me right away – the very first objective is to get the maru mari (more commonly known as the Morph Ball), which means returning to the exact area that started Metroid for us all back when it came out for the NES. Those who know me know just how much I love anything retro, be it music, video games, or television. Going back to this room had me wanting to play it pretty badly.
The other thing was the music. Oh my, the music. It sets the tone so perfectly for each portion of Planet Zebes, from the swampy marshes of Crateria to the hell-fire depths of Lower Norfair. The best music in the game, however, is also the simplest little tune.
That bass in the background is enough to give me the creeps when I get to the “red soil” portion of Brinstar, never mind the haunting melody that comes with it.
After Mike’s quick introduction to the game (his quest ended rather abruptly after battling a one-eyed monster named “Phantoon”), I headed home, downloaded a ROM, and tried to explore every little nook and cranny this game had… that certainly kept me busy for a while. So many missile expansions, energy tanks, hidden paths and fancy gadgets are stashed in the least obvious places, which is fantastic for those who just love to look around and feel like they’re a part of a strange environment.
I had to split this relatively short movie into two parts, just due to the fact that Windows Movie Maker was being a pain…
This playthrough was definitely the most thorough I have ever done for any game, and it often wore me down. Don’t get me wrong, GameFAQS is a great resource for walkthroughs, but I’m thinking YouTube just might work better for future games. My head would hurt after reading countless phrases like “go down two corridors, down the elevator shaft, then the second door on the right, but not the first one, because you’ll only be able to benefit from it later, and then down the path on the right from the door; there’s a hidden passage underneath the statue, next to the special-looking rock here, so bomb it, and roll through.” It wasn’t bad for a while, but I would dream about all these various paths I could be taking, that didn’t really exist in the game… not really conducive for getting a good night’s sleep.
Somehow, I managed to follow the walkthrough to a T (though I’m not sure why people follow T’s in the first place… that’s U’s job) and I pulled off 100% item completion in under three hours… so the “sexy Samus” ending was achieved.
Here’s Super Metroid in “movie” format, from acquiring the first item to defeating the Mother Brain in one of the more epic boss battles in gaming history.
Posted on September 11, 2011
September 11th, 2001
Looking at today’s date, I’m not actually reminded of anything other than the dreadful events that happened ten years ago today. Nothing will ever erase those images from my mind.
It was a very important time in my life, as it was my first week of class at Saint Thomas University, here in Fredericton. During Frosh Week the week before, I had the opportunity to meet a ton of new friends from all over the country. It was somewhat surreal that I was leaving the high school life behind, in favor of a more “adult” education.
Several of those friends have disappeared from my life entirely, but I do still consider a few to be great pals to this day. One of them is my buddy Mike.
On September 11th, 2001, I didn’t have class until 1:30 in the afternoon. I felt like going in early, just because you never knew if you’d get a parking spot after lunch! I hung out with my good buddy John (who was a close friend in high school, as well) and Mike at Saint Thomas, before John made the choice to go and hang out at the University of New Brunswick’s Student Union Building (UNB and STU two universities, on one campus). It was a fantastic place to kill time, and we’d often do so for hours at a time.
Only about ten minutes later, however, John rushed back up the hill. This was odd… what is he doing back so soon? And why is he jogging towards me?
He told me about the Twin Towers in New York City, how planes had crashed into them, and eventually both had collapsed entirely. At that point, rumors were running rampant about a good ten other planes in the sky that were not accounted for, and there were reports that the Capitol building in Washington was on fire. Not only that, but a plane had apparently crashed into the Pentagon, with one on the way to the Sears Tower in Chicago.
This was all a bit difficult to imagine. I had to confirm with him… The Towers are down? Completely? Both of them? My mind flashed back to the Oklahoma City bombing in ’95, and I could only imagine how many people could be in the wreckage. It was horrible.
John decided to go back to the SUB, knowing there was a TV there… Mike and I hung back, and talked about how this was one of “those events” that would probably end up being talked about forever. I was majoring in Journalism, so this would no doubt change our curriculum a bit. We talked about our families, and how my dad was a police officer. I found out Mike had a girlfriend back at home in Woodstock, NB, and he was wondering what she was up to…
Then it dawned on him – his cousin lived on residence, and just had cable TV hooked up! We rushed into the dorm, found his room, and watched coverage of what was happening on his tiny 14-inch TV. It was quite appalling.
After a while we left, and I ended up going to Physical Anthropology. We went to class, and the teacher was nowhere to be found… someone eventually opened the classroom doors and said Ms. McLaughlin was not going to be there today, as she was holding meetings with officials in New York about possibly being recruited to identify those lost. A gruesome job, but she was among the few qualified to do it.
She ended up not going, and the year proceeded as normal. Something felt different about the world, though. I couldn’t quite put my finger on it, but somehow, even my own corner of the universe changed that day.
Back to Mike…
That day in the STU courtyard, I was inquisitive about about his girlfriend during our conversation. I asked a very specific question about her anatomy, and he replied with “oh yes, they’re big”.
(Please note that I’m not exactly proud of this moment, but I was young and – in retrospect – kinda dumb. Well, as dumb as your average teenager would be about girls at that point.)
Fast forward to five years later, and I’m on a “blind date”. I ask the girl if she happens to know “Mike so-and-so from Woodstock”, and she and her friends laugh in unison. “Uhh yeah, he was my prom date, and we went out for several months!”
So I’m now married to this woman. She was Mike’s girlfriend when he and I had that very descriptive conversation. Interesting how things work out…
If you’re wondering how this relates to games, Mike was the one to introduce me to the next entry’s game – Super Metroid for the Super NES. More on that tomorrow.
This post got a bit off the gaming topic, but I do believe it’s important to remember. I have had the chance to visit New York City since then, and it really does leave a mark on you. It’s quite the spot, and I can’t imagine what being there that day would have been like.
Posted on September 9, 2011
Zelda II: The Adventure of Link (NES)
This next entry deals with a “black sheep” of sorts, even though it’s a tremendously awesome game in its own right.
1988 – NES (Nintendo)
Before I was even born, our next-door neighbors were very close friends with my family. Two years after I came around, the couple welcomed a daughter. As time went by, the daughter and I became friends as well, joined at the hip (although, not literally – can you imagine???). The plan was that we would eventually get married and have babies and live together forever – we had plenty of pretend kids by the time I was 7.
In any case, her father was into computers, trains and ocean liners of all things. He also owned an NES with very few games, but one of them happened to be a shiny gold cartridge. Intrigued, I pressed for more information on it… was it similar to The Legend of Zelda? It was gold, sure, but it said “LINK” in blue (not “ZELDA” red) on the front of it, so I couldn’t quite tell what it was.
As it turned out, it was Zelda II: The Adventure of Link… Wait… I wasn’t playing *as* Zelda in the first game? Of course, my reading skills weren’t quite at 100% at that point, and my only concern was playing through the game. The story wasn’t that important to me, so I would never wait for it to scroll up after the title screen.
I was struck by how different the game felt from the first one. The simple change from the overhead perspective to the side-scrolling portions blew my mind. Not only that, but Link looked like a grown man! He was so short and stubby in the first one, and he was given the gift of limbs for the sequel. Fantastic! Every dungeon from the first game had a different colour, but this game’s palaces had different colours AND differently shaped bricks. I thought, perhaps just a wee bit too much, that that was AWESOME. The dungeons also felt somewhat similar to those in Super Mario Bros., which definitely didn’t go unnoticed.
I know levelling up is a standard procedure now, but being introduced to it with Link had me somewhat confused. I just killed a bad guy! Awesome, now onto – OK, what’s with this screen? Yeah, OK, whatever. Start. Let’s keep going. Perhaps my friend’s dad had explained the concept to me, but again, I was probably just too busy with the game itself to listen to what he had to say.
When I’d be done playing the game, I’d go back to playing with Barbies with the little girl, or whatever her random thing of the week was…
Cabbage Patch Kids. There were certainly many of those in her room…
Fast forward a few years, and they would be set to make a move closer to the city. Though we were both just past ten years old, it was tough on us kids, never having known any other neighbors, or knowing how often we’d see each other in the future. Her father gave me two parting gifts, however. One was a very old book about the Empress of Ireland, an ocean liner that sank with great loss of life in the Saint Lawrence River – his love for boats such as that one was passed onto me, and that vivid interest exists to this day.
The other was Zelda II: The Adventure of Link, with the box it came in and the instruction manual to go along with it. Of the hundreds of cartridge-based games I own, that is the only one I have with the case intact. Needless to say, it’s a valued possession.
When her father suddenly passed away recently, it was remarkable how hard it hit me. It wasn’t just the silly game, or even how he had been the first to show me what the Titanic was. It was yet another reminder that life, though each passing day seems so slow, actually goes by a hell of a lot quicker than you really want it to.
Time. Heh. The Zelda series knows a few things about that, too.
Even though I cheat through some titles, just to make it easier to complete the game and record the clips I need, there was no such luxury with Zelda II.
At the title screen, the game’s title just sits there for about… ohh, what feels like two minutes before the story scroll begins. A bit too long for my movie’s purposes. I had to cut a chunk of that minute or two out of the video, but then of course, the music would be cut out too, making it all weird. I had some help with that, however!
Way up there on my “HOLY CRAP I OWN THIS?” list.
This is a rare import from Japan I’m glad to say I own! It helped bridge that title-screen-to-story-scroll music gap quite nicely, as I muted the audio from the video clips, and just let the music play.
I also had to include the introduction to each boss fight and Link’s journey through certain towns. Otherwise, this would have been a fairly short movie. Also, how could I *not* include Link’s interaction with a man named Error??
Here’s the story of Link as he travels through Hyrule on a quest to break the curse holding Princess Zelda prisoner… in her own slumber. DUN-DUN-DUNNNN!!!
Posted on September 2, 2011
28 Years Later…
Today is my 28th birthday, and I spent the day looking up old NES games… not for any particular reason, and not necessarily because it’s my birthday, but because I can. Wikipedia is a wonderful place to kill time.
Just looking at the black NES boxes gives me a sense of nostalgia that almost makes me sad. Sad for all the years that have gone by, sad that I never truly appreciated certain things as I grew up, and even perhaps even sad that I couldn’t own them all! Not only that, but why oh WHY couldn’t I have kept the boxes all my games came in??
Early NES titles had that huge, pixelated picture of the game right in front of you, telling you what the game was all about, and only two small screenshots in the back for good measure. Even for the games I owned, I’d sit at our local Co-Op store and stare at the boxes they had for rent… maybe I thought the game would jump out at me if I stared at it long it long enough.
What's hilarious is that Mario is seen here, dying a fiery lava death somewhere in Bowser's Castle, shooting a fireball as a last ditch effort to kill... the wall. We didn't care, though. These boxes were awesome.
It struck me that I have pretty much grown up with Nintendo characters. Donkey Kong was released in ’81 to ridiculous success, and pretty much single-handedly revived a dying industry. Mario games surfaced shortly thereafter, and I’ve been able to follow almost every step of the way from there.
Scary thought, even though some would argue they remembered more, just from playing Atari and Intellivision as kids… a fair argument, I suppose.
Not much of a post, but a real one will come later!
Posted on August 30, 2011
TMNT (NES) and Mega Man 3 (NES)
It might seem strange on the surface, but for me, these two distinct titles are forever linked.
1989 - NES (Konami\Ultra)
And…
1990 - NES (Capcom)
When Mega Man 3 came out, I was fortunate enough to have gotten it for Christmas. I was so excited to finally own a Mega Man title, that it actually ranks up there in my “Favourite Christmas Moments of All Time”. The game was just that great.
What wasn’t there to love? The bosses could be fought however the heck you wanted to (without any one perfect route), Mega Man had a nifty slide move, and best of all, you had a sidekick worth keeping in Rush “The Robodog”. I don’t know if his surname ever stuck, but it sure worked better than “1”, “2”, and “3” from the second game.
Even though it was many times tougher than the prior games in the series (mostly due to the re-appearance of the Mega Man 2 bosses), I managed to zip through it and have it almost beaten by the time I went back to class after Christmas break. I can remember the excitement of getting to that first Wily Stage upstairs in my grandmother’s bedroom, which is where I kept my NES hooked up on the longer trips. That under-water boss fight was intense!!
The first time I beat the game, my best friend and neighbor Josh was there. We found out we had to beat Dr. Wily using the most ridiculous power up ever conceived for a Mega Man game (up until that point, anyway).
The Top Spin...
The credits rolled, and I couldn’t help but find the music incredibly sad. The entire game’s soundtrack was amazing, and the 5-note Proto Man intro music was no exception. So, when they took it and wrote an entire 3-minute tune out of it, I had gone from thinking “awesome tune!” to “did Proto Man die??” The part of the credits where his image is in the sky certainly helped push me into thinking that.
With the game complete, I did as I often would do with certain friends – trade one game for another, just for kicks. Josh got Mega Man 3, and I got Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles.
I always thought it was a tough game, and I always thought that if I could get past the dreaded Dam level, I was golden! I managed to do that a few times, and even made it as far as rescuing Splinter at the end of the confusing Turtle Van level. In my mind, I had rescued both April O’Neil and Splinter – why bother with the rest of the game? My job is done. Let Shredder terrorize New York City, cuz I’m quitting. See you at the beach…
When it came time for the re-swap, Mega Man 3 could not be found by anyone. Not Josh, not his parents, not me when I’d go over to “play”, but really to look for the game… it had vanished. Josh and his family even moved two or three times in the following years, and the game was still nowhere to be found. I was sad at losing such a great game, but to make amends, was allowed to keep TMNT. Hardly an equal trade, but I took it.
I’m pretty sure the game accidentally got returned to our corner store, as Josh’s dad used to own it. Perhaps the game was brought back to my house, and somehow got hidden. My family hasn’t moved in 30 years, so I guess you just never know.
As I see things now, that sort of thing happens. It killed me as a kid, knowing it was out there, not being played. To this day, I still go to flea markets half-expecting to have it show up. It had a little tear on the sticker on the top of the cartridge, close to the “3”, and I keep an eye out for it. For all I know, someone could have ripped the entire sticker off of it by now.
As you can see, I was marked for life by this series of events.
Not only is it a completely different kind of game, but the first Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles title shares pretty much nothing with its cartoon TV show counterpart. I didn’t know this until recently, but the comic book the Turtles franchise is based on is much, much darker. The basics are there, and your typical “Turtles save either April or Splinter (or both) then foil Shredder” plot is intact.
As mentioned above, the credits made me sad when I watched them the first time. Even though it’s a toss-up between this and Mega Man 2, I always truly believed that this had a slight advantage in terms of which was the better game. I always argued that the content was what had the edge, but looking back, maybe it was the better story…
Posted on August 25, 2011
Metroid II: Return of Samus (GB)
Though I couldn’t stand this game when I was younger, I decided to go back and play through it.
1991 - Game Boy (Nintendo)
I only marginally liked the first game, but when Metroid II was finally released in ’91, I couldn’t wait to get my hands on a copy of it. I’m not sure why, really… maybe because everyone else wanted it. Anyhow, on a trip to my Aunt’s in Bristol, CT, we picked up the still relatively new title. It was a rare treat not to have to wait before returning home to Canada to play a new game. This was going to be great!
Or, so I thought…
The game’s controls were decent enough, and it was pretty straightforward. I just never really got into it. Here’s this massive area to explore, and the Game Boy’s tiny screen shows even less of Samus’ surroundings than the first game did… if a game could feel claustrophobic, this one certainly did.
So here’s this game I owned, and I barely touched it… until this baby came out.
My gaming Holy Grail...
Long before the Super Game Boy converter even came out, I was looking for it. Well, not it specifically, but something like it. GamePro Magazine had printed a photo of an NES cartridge with a “pop-out” Game Boy game slot where the NES game sticker went. It was apparently only available in Japan at the time, but I was hell-bent on finding it in silly ol’ Canada.
I had my sisters looking for it. I once got an excited call from one of them, saying they had seen something they had never seen before… after a closer look, it was just Dr. Mario. Foiled again!
Eventually, I gave up my search. Of course, shortly after I did that, the Super Game Boy was announced. Score!!
Ironically, it was on another one of our yearly trips to Connecticut that we picked it up. It was a week of torture – here I was, 10 hours from home with a fresh, new, Super Game Boy, and no way of playing it. I just read my Instruction Booklet and hoped the rest of the week would go by as quickly as it could.
When we got back home, sitting at the bottom of the huge pile of mail our neighbor brought in for us…
Yet another benefit of being a Nintendo Power subscriber!
The Super Game Boy allowed you to enter 12-digit codes to fully customize the colors for whatever games you played, and this guide gave you specific codes for each level… just to give that extra sense of depth. Each Link’s Awakening dungeon felt different, each world in Super Mario Land had its own character, and each area in Metroid II: Return of Samus… felt exactly the same.
Once again, I put Samus on the back burner.
This project of turning games into movies inevitably reached the Metroid series, and I was torn about whether or not Metroid II should be skipped. I bit the bullet, followed an online walkthrough and took my time in trying to enjoy this game I had so long ago set aside. Though I often cheat with games I suck at, none of them worked for this game… I was on my own.
I’m really quite glad I did go back and play it. Yes, all the areas look alike. Yes, it’s a heck of a lot more linear, and yes, the bosses are a bit more repetitive and boring. It still plays like a solid action game, though, and if you know where you’re going, it helps… a lot. Be sure to collect every last missile tank, because of the 250 maximum that Samus carries (just where does she store them, anyway?), 150 of them are needed to kill the final boss – the Metroid Queen.
Speaking of which, I didn’t know you couldn’t pause the game during the final boss battle!! That was crazy! Since I wasn’t cheating, I had to rely heavily on save states as to not look like a complete buffoon playing the game. A chance to pause and get my bearings would have been nice, but no, I had to Shift-F1 quicker than a mo-fo!! As you can see, I made it through the game fine eventually.
Even though I made sure to take my time and collect every item, I managed to beat the game under three hours and get the “good” ending. So, here’s the story of how Samus’ visit to SR388 progresses from title screen, to battling bosses and collecting items, all the way to crawling out of that cumbersome space suit.
PS: If I can somehow find that old GamePro and post that picture of the Game Boy conversion cartridge for the NES, I’ll be posting it! I might still have that issue at home!
Posted on August 24, 2011
Mega Man (NES) and Mega Man 2 (NES)
I remember looking at the box art for this and thinking…. “When has Mega Man ever been blue and yellow? Since when does he have a pistol, and where in the game does that building appear??”
1987 - NES (Capcom)
What’s worse, is that I actually believed all of those things actually were in the game and tried to find them. Anyway, we’ll get to Mega Man in a second, but first, let’s talk about…
1989 - NES (Capcom)
Mega Man 2 was actually on my radar long before the first game was. The first time we rented it, it was after I was done playing a little league baseball game. I think that was the quickest post-game bath I EVER took. When I popped the game in, I enjoyed the rock-paper-scissors gameplay and found myself using my own strategies to defeat bosses. The game’s controls were easy to master, and the ability to copy a Robot Master’s ability had me hooked immediately. To me, playing Mega Man 2 was as enjoyable an experience as playing a Mario game!
Working at a library, my Mom had easy access to a photocopier. I once rented MM2 from the Co-Op store just out of town, took the instruction booklet from the game to the library and got her to copy a few of the pages. Just like that, I had Mega Man coloring sheets! I thought it was amazing technology with a very strange and skunky smell to it.
I colored a fair amount of Air Tikki's, in my day...
It was during one of these days waiting at the library that I found out there was, in fact, a Mega Man 1. No way!!! Really??!?! I had no idea such a thing existed!!
(The italics kinda make that look like sarcasm, but trust me when I say that I was somehow quite surprised about this bit of news.)
Before I knew it, my Mom was on the phone with a convenience store we didn’t usually rent from, and she was hookin’ me up. They had a copy of the game available to rent, and it would be ready for us when we got there. Score!! I couldn’t wait to battle more Robot Masters! I had no clue who they were, either! It was going to be a complete surprise…
Then, I played it. I’m pretty sure this played in my brain as I ran through the first few minutes of Bomb Man’s stage…
Not that it was bad, really… it was just so unpolished compared to the second game. The music was decent, but nowhere near as catchy and energetic as the second game. The power ups looked different, the enemies were somewhat uninspired, and there were a few graphical glitches here and there. It really was my own fault – I did, after all, play a refined sequel before the original.
Then again, you have to start somewhere. Super Mario Bros. 3 took everything that rocked about the first game and built on it, while Mega Man 2 did the exact same. The original Mega Man has stood the test of time and is still worth a shot. Just don’t expect the awesomeness and layed on, extra-thick charm found in the later games.
This has a bland title screen and nothing to lead you into the game, aside from the Stage Select screen. Aside from the credits, there are no storytelling scenes.
Watching the intro of this game will never get old. The way music builds into sheer epic epicness, then you press start… Mega Man’s helmet flashes on, because it’s business time.
Posted on August 22, 2011
The Legend of Zelda (NES)
I’m just hopping from one massively successful franchise to another, aren’t I?? That can’t be a coincidence.
1987 - NES (Nintendo)
Normally, I’d be flashing a spiffy box art cover… but this… this is legendary.
(I usually apologize for making puns, but not this time.)
I’ve made reference to this particular day before, but on that morning I woke up to a Nintendo mysteriously hooked up to our living room television, three (technically four) games had been rented with it; Super Mario Bros.\Duck Hunt, Ice Hockey, and The Legend of Zelda. The first three were obvious and instant hits with my sisters and I, and we picked up and played them with great enthusiasm.
Surprisingly, Zelda took a fair amount of convincing before I actually took a chance on playing it. My sister Tracey enjoyed exploring, going everywhere she could with the little man in green, and I loved watching. That first time she died, however… it scared the living daylights out of me.
"It's all red and dead-y!!"
How can that little man go all the way into a desert, and just die like an animal? Somehow, I managed to bypass that morally unacceptable moment, and go back to being the care free 5 year-old I was supposed to be. Maybe it was cutesy music playing after the main character had been cut down, or maybe it was the vast landscape that was all mine to explore, and finding secrets in areas that didn’t seem all that significant on the surface.
A fellow Grade 1 student of mine once told me “You can climb up trees in Zelda!! I know it, because I did it!!” I knew this particular kid was full of it, but as gaming evolved, I couldn’t help but remember that statement, and appreciate its irony – especially as I explored the Great Deku Tree in Ocarina of Time.
In any case, this was definitely a game that took me a while to beat. In fact, it was one simple little guide that helped me get through all nine dungeons and defeat Ganon!
My bible.
To all the young gamers out there – even the ones who just turned 20 – can you imagine not having the ability to look something up on the internet? Say you’re going up against Frank Fontaine (the final boss in BioShock, without giving too much away), and you’re just shooting and shooting, and the guy just won’t die. You don’t understand, and you’re looking for something, anything to tell you exactly what you need to do… but first, you have to go to a store and buy that information.
Owning one of these Nintendo Power subscription exclusives made me a resource of gaming knowledge, and being able to reference the detailed maps helped me plot my course through Hyrule.
I was King! Or… at least I felt like it… even though the game had already been out for three years… still, I WAS KING!!
Though I initally started making video game movies out of Star Wars games, I really couldn’t wait to make movies out of the Zelda series. The 8-bit games are pretty light on content, but all you really need to know is that Link needs to rescue Princess Zelda from the evil Ganon. Here’s his journey!
Posted on August 20, 2011
Defeat the Mother Brain!
My buddy Mitch mentioned that shock of discovering Samus was in fact a woman (not a man, or a robot) was a big deal, back in the day. That was indeed the case, but the comment jarred a memory of when I found out about it.
Learning to ride a bicycle came pretty easily. My first non-training-wheel-aided ride was red, and it had those (really lame and girly) multi-colored beads that would move up and down the wheel spokes when you rode it. I quickly outgrew it, and my folks knew it.
My Dad’s co-worker said that he had a son who outgrew his bike as well, and it would fit my needs perfectly. So, we got in the car, went to the bustling suburbia that is New Maryland (New Brunswick), and checked out this guy’s used bike. I can’t recall the bike’s brand name, but I just called it a “BMX”. That’s what was cool to have, after all. It was yellow, and the wheel spokes weren’t spokes at all – there were only five of them, made of plastic, and also yellow.
This was the bike I wanted. No if’s and’s or but’s about it. On the ride back home, I confirmed this with my Dad, and he set things in motion for us to eventually go back and buy it from the guy.
In the meantime, I thought of nothing but this bike. As I waited for my Mom to get off work, one day, I made this drawing… well, not *this* very one, but I remember the drawing very well, and I have re-created it thanks to the modern marvel known as MS Paint.
The one I drew as a kid was undoubtedly better than this one.
It was my future ride, sitting on a baseball mound, with the sun shining ever so brightly on my “BMX”. I was so excited about the bike and proud of my drawing, I showed it to my Mom! She thought it was great!
(I also once drew a picture of me pooping – she didn’t find that one nearly as charming, for some reason.)
Anyway, we finally headed over to the guy’s place and picked up the bike. I was psyched! I couldn’t wait to ride it! But, of course, there were formalities that your average kid doesn’t really understand. I don’t get it – I have the bike. It’s right there, in the car. Let’s go home, I’ll ride it, and everything will be great. No need to go in and socialize. Let’s just get out of here!
The guy invited us in, offered (kid) drinks and stuff. His teenaged kids were in the living room, playing Nintendo. They were playing Metroid, and were in an area I had never been before. “It’s near the end of the game!”, they said.
Intrigued, I sat and watched them play the last few minutes of the game. Once the battle with Mother Brain was over and the intense escape was completed, we were treated to the credits. All of us sat and watched as the ending text rolled in front of us, then Samus started flashing a bunch of different colours. Was she a robot and about to self-destruct?
Nope.
While the other guys ooh’d and aah’d, it didn’t really register on my give-a-crap-o-meter. Sure! Why couldn’t it be a woman? I never really pondered what could be under that suit Samus was wearing. If it was a woman, fine and dandy!
While the guys were all psyched to find out it was a chick in a unitard (“Oh man, she’s cute!!”), it didn’t really matter to me. I had a BMX bike waiting to be enjoyed.
I was thinking about what happened to that bike last night as I fell asleep.
One summer, we brought it to my grandmother’s in Baie Sainte-Anne, NB. Once in a while, I’d dig it out of my great aunt’s shed and ride it around the huge yard they had.
That was in the early 90’s.
My great aunt’s mini-home\trailer is no longer in that shared lot, the shed has long since been demolished (it was, in fact, they house they used to live in before the trailer), and my grandmother’s house was sold in early 2000. It has since been renovated, but barely resembles the house I once considered a second home.
It struck me that I have no idea what became of my precious BMX… not that that really matters, in the grand scheme of things.