Years ago, when I moved out of my parents’ house, my brother and I split our shared gaming collection. As part of the agreement, he got everything related to the Nintendo 64 and Gamecube. Recently, I went back to my old home to get that stuff, as I have the room for it now and my brother wasn’t planning on doing anything with those old games anyway. Well, at least that was the plan.
Nintendo has recently filed trademark applications in Europe for a number of different things, including the Nintendo 64 controller. Odd choice, as the system has been long dead. Unless…it’s set for a resurrection. Business Insider, among others, are speculating that this move coincides with Nintendo’s plans for a Nintendo 64 Classic. While I’ll be first in line if such a device were to exist, but there seems to be a number of logistical issues that Nintendo would need to work through to make this happen.
When Mario’s not busy saving the princess from the clutches of Bowser, he and his friends know how to have a good time. Whether they’re racing go-karts, making the rounds on a giant board game or just beating each other up, they sure have no shortage of things to do. Mario Golf on the Nintendo 64 was their first foray on the links. In my opinion, Nintendo hit a hole-in-one with this one.
When most think about the F-Zero franchise, their minds immediately head towards the Super Nintendo original. There’s no shame in that, as the original F-Zero is a classic. For me, when I hear the name, my head speeds towards my fond memories of the Nintendo 64 sequel F-Zero X. Though I feel it was highly overlooked, it was easily one of my favourite games on that system and one of my favourite racing games of all-time.
Before WCW vs. NWO World Tour, wrestling video games were very basic. Wrestlers were cartoony, move sets were limited and they primarily offered an arcade-like experience. For video game players of that time, this genre of game was fun for what it was. However, the genre definitely was lacking in the (dare I say it) realism department. As a wrestling fan at the time, I was disappointed in the fact that most of the games in the genre had only a handful of characters, a single shared move list across all characters except for finishers, and limited use of weapons (if there were weapons at all). I wanted to play a wrestling game that felt more like I was actually playing a WWF match, rather than playing a beat-em-up that just so happens to take place inside a wrestling ring.
Then I played WCW vs. NWO World Tour.
Microsoft’s Kinect has been out for about a week now, and it appears as though Dance Central is the launch game to get. With every launch (at least the good ones), there’s usually at least one killer app that early adopters flock to or raise in high regard.
The launch of Kinect got me thinking about previous console launches and the games that came out alongside them, which ultimately lead me to the question, “What is your favourite launch title of all-time?”
For those with a jones for retro gaming, the Nintendo Wii Virtual Console was supposed to be a dream come true. It was supposed to be the home of every old Nintendo game you could ask for. As time passed, the Virtual Console grew to include the Sega Genesis, TurboGrafx-16, Sega Master System, Commodore 64 and arcade games. It’s been almost 5 years since the launch of Virtual Console, and we as consumers have access to over 300 games.
On the surface, that sounds decent. I’ve been able to buy a few favourites, try older games I’ve never played before and even grab a Japanese import game that never came out here (in my case, the very awesome Sin and Punishment). However, that number isn’t even close to representing the full catalogue of platforms represented in Virtual Console. Between the NES, SNES, SMS, Genesis, TG16, N64 and Neo Geo, the Virtual console has only made 10% of their combined catalogue available to consumers. It’s only going to get worse, as the once weekly updates have slowed to once a month, if we’re lucky.
What started out as an amazing idea is fizzling fast. How did Nintendo screw up what should have been a sure-fire win?
Last year, my 7 year-old cousin at the time discovered Modern Warfare 2 through my 12 year-old cousin. Ever since that day, my now 8 year-old cousin has become enamored with the Mature-rated Call of Duty series. For him, Modern Warfare 2 was his Mortal Kombat; it was his gateway drug to Mature-rated games. As of now, he owns Conflict: Denied Ops and Sniper: Ghost Warrior, which he brags about being M-rated all the time.
I didn’t bring this anecdote up to talk about parenting. I don’t approve of him playing content I would deem inappropriate for him and I do what I can to keep that stuff away. The reason I bring this up though, is because my 8 year-old cousin now views that M rating as a symbol of cool. He loves the fact that he owns games that he knows he’s too young to be playing. They’re his forbidden fruit and he’ll take anything he can get at this point.
All of this made me think about my video game collection and how it relates to the ESRB. Once upon a time, the Mortal Kombat series was my forbidden fruit. Did my catalogue of games evolve in relation to the ESRB guidelines or did I overdose on forbidden fruit? I do the math to answer these questions and highlight any insights regarding gaming as I grew up.
1998 was a monumental year for gaming. Metal Gear Solid rocked the faces of Playstation One owners, while Half-Life revolutionized first-person shooters and the single-player experience on the PC. I’m sure there are other examples of gaming brilliance I can discuss, but the one I want to talk about here may be the most important game to come out of 1998. It played a major role in revolutionizing 3D gaming and to many, still stands as the gold standard of this entire medium.
I’m not here to debate its place in the pantheon of video games. What I am here to say is, the Legend of Zelda: Ocarina of Time left an impact on me in 1998 that I still feel today.
It was the year 2000. Clutching my pre-order receipt that I’ve been in possession of for over a year, I went down to the local video game store to pick up my copy of Perfect Dark. Its spiritual predecessor, Goldeneye, blew my mind with a great single player campaign and at the time, God-like multiplayer. I must have put in hundreds of hours into that game, easily. Everything from trying to unlock all of the cheats in single player to all-out assaults on my friends and loved ones in multiplayer. Looking back, Goldeneye is one of those games that defined that whole generation of gaming.
In Third Person 