Performer: Marvin Gaye
Songwriters: Marvin Gaye,
James Nyx
Original
Release:
What’s Going On
Year: 1971
Definitive
Version:
None.
I
don’t know about you, but I’m pretty exhausted after the past three (unfinished)
entries. Today we’ll cover something shorter and much less consequential.
I’ve
always been a video-games junkie. I was much more so when I was younger,
although considering how much time I spend on Angry Birds and their many
variants, I guess I still am. But all I have is my iPhone. I don’t own a newer
video-game console. As I mentioned more than two years ago (good ol No. 877),
my hard-core home video-gaming ended with the Super Nintendo.
But
in the early Nineties, I wasted a lot of time playing Nintendo. I can’t
remember whether it had been a Christmas present or a self-purchase, but soon
after I took the gig at The Flint Journal, I had a Nintendo system, and I
played it all the time.
Actually,
it was the perfect thing to have after I started working in sports. Because I
worked overnights, I needed to keep an overnight schedule on days off to
maintain a regular body rhythm (and not having kids, I could do this).
Having
HBO, as I did for the first time in Grand Blanc, helped. So did having a VCR,
which Mom bought for me as a Christmas present in 1988. However, HBO’s
programming got a little shaky after about 1. And one could watch
Bull Durham only so many times.
I
was done with Strat-o-Matic, so I turned to the Nintendo. I’d put on my CD
player with its six-disc changer and veg out. So, when I hear this song of
social protest and angst, what do I think of? Mario. Specifically Super Mario
Brothers 2.
I
played a lot of Tetris, too, but Super Mario 2 was my favorite for a number of
reasons. It was funky—different from all the other Mario games in terms of
characters—and it had no score. It was just pure puzzle quest and getting as
far as you could. In many ways, it was the trickiest of the Marios to master.
I
was secure enough in my masculinity that I’d play The Princess, not Mario or
Luigi or—for sure—Toad. The practical reason for being The Princess became
obvious almost right away, or as Scott pointed out once: The Princess has some
serious hang time. When you superjumped the princess, you could clear chasms
that were nigh-impossible with any other character. Really, to play anyone but
The Princess was silly.
I
was going to say a waste of time, but that’s what playing video games is, isn’t
it? Yes, I wasted A LOT of time paying Nintendo, time that in hindsight would
have been much better spent reading, writing, learning a new language, cooking,
hell, visiting the Dort Highway dance establishments.
My
time-wasting activity was acceptable amongst some of my peers thanks to the
killer app: Blades of Steel. If you weren’t familiar with Blades of Steel, you missed
out on something. It, of course, was a hockey game that could be played against
the computer or—better—head to head against Bill, Dave or Robb to much
merriment. (One day at work, Bill brought in a homemade videotape of he and
Robb playing that included on-screen game action and reaction footage—with
commentary—intercut. It was as ridiculous as it sounds.)
Blades
of Steel featured a couple of hilarious features. First, it had fights. If the
digital hockey players bumped each other enough, the game changed from and angled
view of the ice to a one-on-one standup fight. The winner got the puck while
the loser was carried off the ice to the shame of his manipulator.
Second,
if you scored, the goalie threw a fit while the other team celebrated. And if
you won, you skated around the ice proudly. If you beat the computer in
tournament mode, where each game got more difficult, you were handed a trophy
for the postgame skate.
We
called it Lord Konami’s Prized Chalice (pronounced shall-EZE) in tribute to
Lord Stanley’s prized shalleze, or chalice. He who paraded around The Konami Cup
was to be held in esteem.
Who
said playing video games was a waste?
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