TekPr0n

A few nights ago I sat at the local watering hole with some friends and we got to talking about video games. We talked of the old and the new. It can be argued that games have come a long way, however I tend to lean more towards the notion that games have gone downhill. Sure, the graphics look amazing, the sound enveloping, and the plot deep but they just don't leave the same lasting impression that the games of old have. There are a few franchises nowadays that will probably stand the test of time, but I really don't see people sitting around in ten years saying, "They really need to make another Infamous game...". We do hoever have conversations that surround ideas like:

Best Final Fantasy game? 2 or 3?

Do you think they killed Metroid by making it an FPS?

I'll bet you beat Blaster Master using the Bomb-Pause trick huh you cheater?

And who can't recite the Contra code?

Now as I was saying, Halo, Call of Duty, and a few other franchises will more than likely still have thier followings down the road, however, can they really be spoken of in the same breath as the Mario's, Sonic's, and Mega Man's (Mega Men's?) let alone Castlevania, Zelda, or even the single titles such as Kid Icarus or even Excite Bike? They are so worried about creating epic games that they lose the qualities that make them epic. Zelda was not a gorgeous game but it was completely enthralling. It wasn't easy, it wasn't hard, and you couldn't change the difficulty. You couldn't play your friends but you all watched each other play and talked the next day about how far you each got and how the heck to find level 7!?!?! If you said the words Justin Bailey to a gamer years ago they would know exactly what you were talking about. Games didn't come out every week just to have new games out. Time was put into them and not just to hold them back so they wouldn't be competing with another release.

Now there is talk that stores such as GameStop and Electronics Boutique which both sell used games are killing the video game industry. When one can go into the store and buy a week old game for $10 less than the brand new copy sitting right next to it the software company doesn't see the profits and are now threatening to only release games in downloadable form. This makes borrowing games from friends a little tricky. Not to mention if you experience issues such as RROD you will have to re-download all of your content yet again once you or the concole manufacturer finally gets around to replacing your new paperweight.

There was something poetic about everyone having thier own routine for "fixing" thier NES games that would just end up looking like a bad vertical hold job. I was a blow in the cartridge/insert as little as possible to still push down/all the way to right kinda guy. We had connections to our games and our machines. I had just about every upgrade for my original GameBoy available. The light, the extra battery, the magnifier, the speakers, you name it! I remember when they tried to market the Virtual Boy. I remember Robbie the Robot and what games you could use him with, the Power Glove and its role in "The Wizard". Video games are a hobby now, they were a way of life. These kids today just don't know...