A few weeks ago Retronauts discussed a relatively rare arcade cabinet running Nintendo's Punch-Out. They discussed how Nintendo had a huge warehouse full of monitors because they over ordered Donkey Kong pieces thinking they would sell through.
Genyo Takeda and Shigeru Miyamoto were tasked with coming up with ways to burn through this inventory.
They attempted to figure out ways to make racing games using two monitors, but short comings in technology prevented them from rotating images in the way they wanted.
Instead they came up with the concept of a boxing game where the top monitor would display images of the fighters, the time left in the fight, and several meters used in the game.
I was intrigued by this story, not really knowing where to find this thing, I put it on my list of must plays if I ever came across it. And then I happened to stumble upon it at one of my favorite breweries in town.
Release Date: December 13, 2002 / September 20, 2013 Played On: Wii-U
The 3D Zelda games only recently clicked with me. I always tried to start with Zelda 64, trying to understand the magic so many people experienced only to find the game really hard to stick with. It's one of those games that didn't age particularly well and runs on the fuel of nostalgia.
It wasn't until Twilight Princess that I truly enjoyed a 3D Zelda game.
I've made it my mission to go back and play some of the other 3D Zeldas to fill in this gaping black hole in my video game life.
I knew very little about Wind Waker other than the relatively young internet losing their shit over toon link. I vaguely remember my brother sitting feet from his SD TV, the hum of the tubes only drowned out by the uplifting adventuring music, sailing across the great sea. I remember briefly trying to track down a used copy for the GameCube around 2007 and finding that the price was above the original $60 for a used copy. But other than that, I knew nothing about Wind Waker before going in.
Walking past a skate park had my thinking about extreme sports video games this weekend. It's the first time in a long time I've thought of these games. The last time I considered them was SSX for the PS3.
The X-games inspired sports games really hit their stride and peaked during the PS1 era. You had the ESPN Xtreme trilogy (that wasn't super great), Tony Hawk (and all of its Razor Scooter and Dave Mira clones), and Cool Boarders.
But there was a generation of games before that on the NES. They were games that promised the action of these extreme sports, but you sort of had to squint a little and pretend that it felt super extreme.
Skate or Die - 1988
Skate or Die was one of those NES games that just sort of showed up in your best friend's collection. He doesn't remember buying it. His parents don't know how it showed up. If you asked around, no one but everyone somehow had it. It was like this invisible game in your collection that only friends could pull out and play.
Despite the ever extreme conundrum of skating or die, the game never clicked with me. It felt sluggish and unresponsive. The music felt more suited for a beat-em-up like Ninja Turtles. And I always had a hard time figuring out what the hell the game wanted me to do.
The one thing I did like was the art. For a Nintendo / ZX Spectrum game, Skate or Die looks great. Lot's of clean lines, large distinguished sprites, and a sense of a large city.
California Games - 1987
Unlike Skate or Die, everyone owned California Games. This was the ultimate package of 6 very distinct events that could be played with multiple people.
California Games had a nice rhythm to the events that once it clicked, you would be able to win the event for the rest of your life. I'm serious, haven't played in 15 years, go ahead and try foot bag, bet you can still score a ridiculously high score. I bet you can still knock that bird out of the sky.
The half pipe was one of those events where people either didn't know how to do it and would just beat their knees up with the skate board until out of lives, or they could go forever.
Roller skating had you zooming down the beachfront on your best quad skates, but this was also the most littered beach front in the world. You had to dodge everything from puddles to ice cream cones, while doing tricks, and try to get to the end.
Like skating, the BMX course was a treacherous affair where after dodging a whole mess of holes in the ground, barrels, and puddles, you were expected to stop on a platform at the end, despite for the entire 5 minute course, never using your brakes. This usually ended with me pressing every button desperately trying to stop as I fell off the other side of the peer.
And inevitably, one of your friends would realize that you got points for ever jump you did, so they would just bounce down the track until they crashed away all their lives.
And then there was surfing, which arguably was actually a better half pipe game than half pipe, and featured a shark that would menacingly eat your character randomly.
Then the least extreme games, foot bag (hacky sack) and disk throw rounded out the package. (I guess the possibility of bear attacks in disk throw was pretty extreme)
T&C Surf Design - 1988
T&C Surf Design was fast and responsive, challenging but not impossible, and so colorful.
It featured characters from the actual T&C Surf Design shop like tiki man, some cool surfing gorilla who I believe was named Joe Cool, and a fucking terrifying humanoid cat in tights. Actually, I don't know what the hell was going on, but I liked it.
The skate boarding felt great and was by and far the best on the NES. You could gather tons of speed, get so much air, and actually perform simple tricks like Ollies to dodge obstacles.
There were things to jump over and ramps to go off of. There are still a few ramps over holes that I've never managed to land and to this day believe it was a sick way to take health on an impossible jump.
The surfing took a lot more to figure out. It was some balance of gaining speed going down the wave, but then turning around and ramping up to score points. You had to dodge birds and some dude on a raft, and if you did right, the wave wouldn't crash down on you and you would end in the pier and get scored.
I remember sitting there listening to the waves crashing on the title screen for long periods of time. Sometimes starting the game while I ate a snack, just so I could listen.
There isn't a ton of money in these sort of games anymore. Tony Hawk poisoned the well with too many lack-luster outings. The X-games in general have lost some steam.
I'll admit, I was burned out on these games for a while. I almost picked up the ever so broken Tony Hawk 5 just to get a taste, but my senses screamed otherwise. I'm putting a ton of stock into Ubisoft's Steep. It looks incredible. A nice combination of actual mountain ranges mixed with team Red Bull like sensibilities.
Nintendo recently announced that the Zelda Wii-U game that they kept promising would be Wii-U exclusive that was still coming... is now going to be cross platform. This essentially means we're going to get a Twilight Princess situation where the NX version isn't as good as it could be and the Wii-U version is going to be missing whatever gimmick the NX version has.
I have a Wii-U and a Vita. Both are probably the most depressed of fan bases in the mid-2010s. It's interesting to see how each handles it.
Vita
The Vita fanbase started getting really salty the first E3 that Sony didn't mention the Vita. I can't remember the exact year, but I think it was 2014.
I think Sony's marketing has long been the issue with the fans of the Vita.
The PSP fans were generally people that liked weird or Japanese games, were into home brewed systems, or wanted console experiences on a handheld. All three of these groups were very happy with what they got.
Well, Sony said the Vita would be almost as powerful as the PS3 and promised AAA console games on the run. Their first big marketing campaign backed Call of Duty: Black Ops: Declassified. The commercial had a bunch of teenager / 20 somethings dudes jumping around and fighting.
Generally the more sub-titles in a game title, the larger the dumpster fire it will be. And it was. This game was critically and commercially panned.
Another AAA third party title came in Assassin's Creed, but it was an incredibly boring adventure. They took the worst parts of Assassin's Creed, slowed the combat down a ton, and soon people weren't sure they ever wanted these games in the first place.
Well, it was too late to pull the plug. Killzone and Uncharted were already coming, so Sony doubled down on the "this is a console in your hands."
And a significant percentage of Vita owners bought the handheld on the promise that we would be seeing Drake's adventures, Helghast being assassinated, perhaps even a new Infamous or Grand Turismo.
Well, things went from bad to worse. We learned that Bioshock Vita was never going to happen. There wouldn't be a new Infamous. Hell, there wouldn't even be a second Call of Duty or Assassin's Creed.
Soon indie developers were put to the forefront of the Vita marketing. Some Japanese games like Freedom Wars filled AAA gaps. But the one thing we weren't getting was the AAA console games we dreamed of.
It was impossible to go to the internet forums and not see people throwing so much hate toward Sony. They felt abandoned, ripped off, swindled.
These are the same people however that spoke of how they put 100 hours into Persona 4, played through Uncharted 2-3 times, loved Gravity Rush, could not wait for Tearaway to be another bullet point on why the Vita is so great.
But they hated Sony.
I feel like an outlier. Maybe I'm just part of the silent and happy. Until I got my Wii-U, I sat on the couch almost nightly embraced by the warm glow of my Vita. I'd play through PS1 JRPGS while watching TV. I spent several hospital stays with Uncharted, Killzone, and Persona 4. I was happy with what I got out of my Vita.
I wish the handheld wasn't dying because it truly is one of the greatest devices I've ever used, but sometimes you have to let things go.
Sony made several missteps. The marketing being the obvious one, but they created what was supposed to be a "console" experience with two touch screens but no bottom triggers. This has recently filled the Vita releases with phone ports. And don't even get me started on the memory cards.
Wii-U
The Wii-U crowd reacted a little differently.
I think because they were one of the "three major consoles" this generation, they've been beat down by every non-Wii-U user for years telling them how much their console is inferior and how it's sales are the worst.
People that bought a Wii-U after launch knew that they would have to stay out of general gaming forums because it would just be punishment.
But the other thing Wii-U owners felt was that Nintendo would never abandon them. Until the news of Zelda being ported to the NX, the forums were still filled with people saying, "Nintendo promised us that if we just waited this would be a Wii-U only Zelda." Fans took the countless delays with grace.
And now they feel hurt. It's much less anger. Much more depression. It's like when dad goes out on a cigarette run and never comes home.
If you look at the Wii-U library, there are some insanely good games. New Mario Wii-U, Super Mario Maker, Splatoon, Zombie-U, Donkey Kong Country Tropical Freeze... but half the library is filled with ports of Nintendo's Gamecube games.
I've killed the battery on the gamepad a dozen times playing Twilight Princess, Mario World, and Mario Maker on the couch.
I do wish the console had another year of life. I felt like I was just hitting a great stride, but at the same time, I've gotten many hours out of the Wii-U and I haven't touched large portions of the library like Pikmin 3, Donkey Kong Country Tropical Freeze, New Mario Wii-U, Wonderful 101, and Smash Brothers.
There's a part of me that wishes the internet was more widely used in the 90s. I'd love to see how the Sega Saturn and Dreamcast fans dealt with the quick death of their consoles. Or the couple hundred people that bought into the Virtual Boy learning that they would never see more than the 30 or so games they got.
It's a weird situation we have nowadays. We're more than happy to shell out more than a console for a new phone every two years, a tablet, a TV. But we have this expectation that our game consoles should be around for 7-8 years. Do we need to shift expectations or is the list of traditional consoles so close to be over that we just complain for the next couple years and get on with our lives?
Played on: Wii-U Release date: March 4, 2016 (Original November 19, 2006)
Many people don't like Twilight Princess because it's very vanilla. It rehashes a lot of stuff from Ocarina of Time. And they changed Link's sword hand. But we got this because everyone complained about Toon Link when Wind Waker came out.
All of those things mean nothing to me because:
I never had a Nintendo 64, so I never played Ocarina of Time.
I'm not a man baby when it comes to Toon Link, sword hands, or all the other things Zelda fans complain about.
I actually really enjoyed my time with Twilight Princess on the Wii in 2006. I have a Wii-U, so when the HD version of Twilight Princess was announced, it was a no-brainer, I was going to pad my Wii-U collection with this.
Played on: Nintendo Wii-U Release Date: November 21, 2013
I never owned a Nintendo 64.
The brief moments I got with it were spent with Mario 64 and MarioKart 64. It was a world of wonder. There was something so much more impressive about Mario 64 than all of the 3D platformers found on the PS1 like Gex and Spyro.
I didn't play more than a level or two until I got a DS a decade later. I bought Mario 64 DS, playing about 6 hours of it, and hated that the magic wasn't there. It's one of those situations where you wish you didn't meet your hero because they turned out to be terrible.
I've tried to recapture that magic on the DS, 3DS, and now the Wii-U, and I'm realizing that magic may be gone, but that doesn't mean there's not a good game there.
I was unexpectedly given a WiiU for Christmas this year and my mind immediately started making the checklist of games and accessories I would want.
One of the games toward the top of my list was a puzzle game I thoroughly enjoyed on the Gamecube, Pikmin.
I added Pikmin 3 to my Amazon wishlist, and I was astounded to find a game that was only two years old was going for $120 on Amazon. I know Nintendo first party games have a reputation for holding their value, but I had never witnessed a game double in price while it's system was still on sale.
So I started digging around and I found if retailers had copies of Pikmin 3 in brick and mortar stores, it would only cost me the normal $60.
I've not had this dumb, childlike grin on my face in nearly 20 years.
In a way, I've been chasing the feeling of playing Mario, Sonic, Metal Gear Solid, and Resident Evil for the first time. These moments in gaming that are forever burned into my memory, causing me to buy every single entry in the series against my better judgement. (I'm looking at you Resident Evil 6.)
Super Mario Maker is the first time I've felt like a game has changed what I think about games since probably the original Gears of War.
There have been level editor platforming games before like Little Big Planet, but none of them quite nail the addictiveness and fun of Super Mario Maker.
Over the weekend, I actually got my hands on a real life WiiU, in the wild.
My brother bought a WiiU a few weeks ago after getting a new job. He's always been a huge Zelda fan, so it was really only a matter of time. Well that time is now.
We played the new MarioKart and while it was fun, I did find myself missing older titles.
Some of the courses contorted and bent like a roller coaster, sending you in and out of water, really distorting what was happening. This was especially bad since we were playing with three players and had small screens.
I'm not saying MarioKart has always had courses built on the laws of nature, but at the very least, you could see how this track could exist. MarioKart 8 did not have this.
I also hadn't held a Wii-mote in nearly 3 years now. It felt foreign to me. I struggled to remember which hand to hold the nunchuk in. I couldn't remember any of the button names as my brother yelled out controls mid-race. After 4 or so races, I had a good enough grasp to hold first place in every race for the next hour.
The WiiU tablet thingy didn't feel right for me, but it seems to be a matter of preference. Those that were accustomed to DS or 3DS handhelds found it really comfortable.
We raced a good 20-25 races before calling it quits and as I left my brother's house, I couldn't help but think how much I would love to play the original MarioKart or Double Dash. (I never owned a N64, so there wasn't nostolgia for that version)
Something didn't sit right having extra characters show on the roster that are going to be DLC later on. Staring at Link and Tanooki Mario on the last row, knowing they would be paid DLC (and for a good price at that) felt so un-Nintendo. I'm used to Nintendo being that one company that releases their full game on one disk and that's what you get.
It's weird because on paper, this game is MarioKart. The tracks feel right, the carts feel right, most of the powerups feel right (except the sonic music thing, that felt like something from Vigilante 8) but somehow it didn't click.
When I was in college, I had one of those terrible months where my car required an $800 repair, my electric bill was $150 more than the previous month, and rent was due.
I had to sell most of my media to pay for everything. I sold my Gamecube, NES, Playstation 2, and about 150 DVDs and 200+ games.
I've slowly been rebuilding my collection now that I make adult wages.
One genre I noticed does not really exist on current platforms was the light gun game. Yes, the Nintendo Wii and Playstation Move have made it possible to have similar games, but there's nothing better than feeling the click on a Nintendo zapper's trigger and killing some ducks.
I wanted to buy Area 51 (again) for the PS1, but could not find a way to have a light gun connect to my PS3 to play it. So I started doing some research and found out that light gun games do not work on modern HD TVs.
I read a ton of technical explanations from computer science and electrical engineering students that I did not understand. I'm more of a visual guy. So the best explanation is to watch a video.
When you are not playing and pay close attention, you'll notice when the trigger is pulled the screen flashes black and the "hit box" around the bird flashes white. That was how light guns determined if it was a hit or not. The gun looked for that white box and if it did not see it, you missed.
If it did not see the black flash because you were pointing the gun off screen, some games would register that as a reload.
Out of all the theories I've read on why this exactly doesn't work, the two reasons that seem most logical are:
Timing issue caused by refresh rate
PaRappa the Rapper is supposedly really hard to play on an LCD because of the minor delay between sound systems and the picture on the screen.
I had trouble beating the first level of Space Channel 5 HD for the same reason.
Even a new game like Rocksmith is hard to play on a HDTV because of this same delay.
Brightness / no true black screen on an LCD
I am sure someone will figure this out. I have read a few threads where people claim that their super awesome TVs have a quick enough refresh rate to where it will register hits sometimes. I have a feeling the fix will be on the software side (HD collection for Wii and Move?) but who knows, maybe our televisions will become so crisp and fast that we will not need a software fix.
With the Nintendo WiiU launching back in November, there
still isn’t an impressive library. My local game store has one half shelf
dedicated to WiiU games. Most of the real estate has Wii overflow from the full
Wii shelf next to it.
When you think about it, besides the Mario game that came
packed in with the system, most Nintendo launches were weak on the software
side. You got that one killer app, but for months, nothing else.
I’m going to break down the classic Nintendo 1st
party game, the biggest 3rd party game, and the worst game at
launch.
NES (1985): The
NES had a soft launch, only releasing to FAO Schwartz in New York originally
and eventually would find its way everywhere. It obviously wasn’t a blockbuster
seller immediately, but this is the system that built the Nintendo name.
1st Party: Super Mario Bros
3rd Party: Kung-Fu
Worst Game: Gyromite
Gameboy (1989): Again,
hard to get concrete numbers and dates, the Gameboy managed to sell really
well. Most people mostly used the portable as a Tetris machine for the first
several months of its life, but eventually the Gameboy would go on to sell more
than 118 million units.
1st Party: Super Mario Land
3rd Party: Tetris
Worst Game: Baseball (bad port of original NES game)
Super NES (1991): The
Super NES has one of the smaller launches in Nintendo history, but they
launched with a much greater quality of games.
1st Party: Super Mario World
3rd Party: Sim City
Worst Game: Gradius 3 (It’s not a bad game, just the
worst out of the launch titles.)
Nintendo 64 (1997): Quite
literally there were only two games at the launch of the N64 as far as I can
tell, but both games were fantastic.
1st Party: Super Mario 64, Pilotwings 64
3rd Party: N/A
Worst Game: Pilotwings (?)
Nintendo Game Cube
(2001): The Gamecube is often frowned upon as one of the worst Nintendo
systems to hit the market. I believe it was the best. But the launch was mostly
ports from other consoles.
The Gamecube launched with 13 games. Not only did it have
the weakest 1st party launch title in Nintendo’s history, Luigi’s
Mansion, it also only contained games that could be purchased for other
consoles.
1st Party: Luigi’s Mansion
3rd Party: Star Wars Rogue Squadron II
Worst Game: Fur Fighters: Viggo’s Revenge
Gameboy Advance
(2001): The Gameboy Advance had a fairly limited launch line up. It had
many games, but was almost all ports from other systems.
1st Party: Super Mario Advance (Super Mario 2
Repackaged)
3rd Party:
Castlevania: Circle of the Moon, Earthworm Jim, Rayman Advance
Worst: Army Men Advance
Nintendo DS (2004): The
Nintendo DS had a mildly better launch than the Game Cube. Since most games
didn’t know how to use the touchpad yet, most had little reason to actually be
on the DS, other than the cheap production value. The worst game, Ping Pals,
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1st Party: Metroid Prime Hunters: First hunt
3rd Party: The Urbs: Sims in the City
Worst Game: Ping Pals
Nintendo Wii (2006): Nintendo
Wii had a weak launch lineup with bang up marketing. Games that were broken
like “Red Steel” were pushed like the second coming. The strongest non-pack in
release, Zelda, was a Gamecube port. Now Wii fans have been treated to at best,
three worthwhile releases a year.
1st Party: The Legend of Zelda: Twilight
Princess, Wii Sports
3rd Party: Call of Duty 3, Red Steel
Worst Game: Tony Hawk's Downhill Jam
Nintendo 3DS (2011): I’m
still confused about the 3DS launch. As far as I can tell, there pretty much
wasn’t software at the launch of the 3DS. Literally there were games, but not
really. Most were rehashing of other games or games that hadn’t figured out the
tech quite yet.
1st Party: Pilotwings Resort, Nintendogs +
Cats
3rd Party: Super Street Fighter IV 3D Edition,
Worst Game: Combat of Giants: Dinosaurs 3D, Asphalt 3D
Nintendo WiiU
(2012): Jokes aside, I want this
console to work. Failing consoles are good for no one. Still, it seems Nintendo
rushed the hardware out the door knowing that it's tech specs wouldn't be able
to compete with PS4 and Xbox One. There weren't a lot of launch games and
besides the release of Pikmin 3, there really haven't been many game releases
since launch.
Most of the third party games are ports of older games
from this generation like Mass Effect 3 and Batman Arkham City.
1st Party: New Super Mario Bros U
3rd Party: Mass Effect 3: Special Edition
Worst Game: Game Party Champions
I guess my conclusion from looking at all the Nintendo
launches is that I should stop expecting these insanely great pack in launches
like the SNES and N64. The launches weren't as bad as I thought, but there weren't many stand outs.
The business model has changed. Xbox 360 launched with
nothing. Playstation 3 took forever to get some great exclusives out. Kinect
and Move are both jokes. PS4 and Xbox One both have weak launches.
I guess I held
Nintendo at a higher level. But nowadays, it’s all about the hardware sales. No
one wants to take a risk on an unproven console and install base.
Usually when someone talks about the greatest of the Mario games, either Super Mario Brothers 3 or Super Mario World are argued for.
Sure, there is the occasional person that throws Mario 64 or the original Super Mario Bros into the mix, but generally I think Mario 3 and World are the two best of the pre-2000 core-Mario games.
If I took an official vote, my bet would be that Mario 3 is the overall favorite.
It was the first game with the diverging paths world map, insane amounts of secrets, memorable boss battles, and that ridiculous combo of the maze like world 7 and difficult world 8.
I sat cross legged, challenging myself to beat the game without using whistles and saving that P-wing until the flying fortress level for several years.
Mario was fine tuned and indeed, Mario 3 is probably the best game on the NES, but I always tend to have a soft spot for Super Mario World.
It's partly because I didn't actually own a SNES and didn't get as much time with Super Mario World. There was a point where I did have some Mario 3 fatigue.
Super Mario World has its own bullet-ed list of features that could go bullet for bullet with Mario 3, like an even larger world map, more secrets, the introduction of Yoshi in a Mario game, and a diverse set of levels.
But I think it's more about the social aspects of the game. I remember setting up a 27" standard definition television on the bottom bunk of my cousin's bunk bed, his window open allowing the crisp autumn air to blow against our shirtless bodies, and draping sheets over the outside to give us a cave to fully escape into this other world. (It sounds like some pre-teen, homoerotic adventure now that I've typed it out)
We would scream, laugh, talk about small world's issues, discuss what we were going to blow our allowance on, and beg his mom to order us pizza.
It was a game that couldn't be beat in one weekend. We grew with the game. Sure, we might have beat Bowser after just a couple weekends, but that 55% completion on the save screen mocked us. We spent months finding all of the secrets we could, until we were forever stuck on the 5th Special level.
Eventually we noticed girls and more adult oriented video games like Resident Evil took over our Friday-post-roller-skating-game-nights. Super Mario World was packed into a box and largely forgotten about. It wasn't until last fall when I was given a family member's SNES and about 15 games that I remembered the magic.
There was nothing worse than seeing two flashing colors on your TV screen when you should be seeing that glorious NES game title screen.
A un-countable number of comedians have already covered the subject of how everyone had their special way of getting their Nintendo to work and how you could only get your own NES working.
My cousin Ryan would lick the game and then press the game down as hard as he could. In desperation, I once licked a particularly troublesome game and remember tasting a dusty battery.
One of my best friend's in high-school had to use a Game Genie even if they weren't putting in codes. Without the Genie, the console wouldn't recognize a game was inserted.
My neighbor across the street would discard the warnings about only using the official Nintendo cleaning kit and would dab rubbing alcohol on a Q-tip and rub it in the games.
My wife's family would do a combo of blowing into the game, rubbing it down with a dry Q-tip, and in some cases shoving a Popsicle stick into the system to hold the games at the perfect height to make contact with the terminals.
I would blow into a game for exactly 30 seconds. I'd then push the game all the way into the system and then pull the game out just a pinch. And I could never push the game down into the system. If I pushed it down how you were supposed to, blinking color screens all day long.
You don't get these great stories anymore.
Telling the heroic tale of putting your red-ringed 360 into the official Microsoft casket and waiting two to six weeks for a refurbished console to make its way back just doesn't have the same comedic feel of laying in your pajamas on the floor at 6:00 a.m. getting dizzy from blowing into a game for too long.
With this new generation of consoles coming, the controller seems to be the most talked about feature. (You know, other than that whole DRM thing) I don't remember the controller design being all that important up until the Playstation 1 / N64 era. Moving into "3D" worlds required much more precision than ever before. Manufacturers had to concentrate on more than going left or right and having 2-6 input buttons.
The controller had to be an afterthought for most console designers before the early 90s.
The NES came with its harsh rectangle and stiff D-pad. The Colecovision had its calculator with the joystick at the top. Or the similarly designed Intellivision with the calculator at the top instead.
Sega seemed to have the worst designs. I never really got comfortable with the Dreamcast controller and the few times I held a Saturn controller I wanted to throw it out the window. Even the simplicity of the Genesis controller wasn't exactly perfect. I still have scars from the blisters that controller gave me when playing Royal Rumble.
There have actually been more controller failures than successes. But, being ever the positive person, I'm going to focus on my top three favorite controllers.
3. Xbox 360
There's no way this controller could be in the top list if the D-pad was used more often in modern games. We can all agree, it is probably the worst D-pad on a controller.
But in the age of the console first person shooter, this controller is the best. The triggers, bumpers, and placement of the sticks are ergonomically perfect for the modern console game.
It wasn't until I switched to the Playstation 3 when I realized just how perfect this controller is. And considering where it came from, it's design was no small feat. Just look at the original Xbox's controller (I count it among the worst) compared to where Microsoft brought the design for the 360.
2. Playstation Dual Shock 2: Specifically, the emerald green see through Dual Shock 2 controller.
The weight was great, the design gorgeous, and I could play for five hours without getting tired.
I loved being able to see through the case and see how the Dual Shock worked.
I used this bad boy so much that the analog sticks eventually stopped working. Not willing to throw it in the trash, I took the controller apart and figured out how the thing worked. Turned out one of the pads the joystick interacted with was lose. Just had to reseat it and it worked perfectly.
It felt solid to. I knew I could use it as a weapon if I somehow came under attack while playing games.
1. Nintendo Gamecube
A small confession, I might spend time on the weekends writing love poetry to this controller.
I don't hear this controller talked about often, but no other controller comes close to the Gamecube. My fingers instantly knew where all the buttons were. It was light, it had a lot of beautiful feminine curves, and it came in just about every color you could want.
It felt like the games were built around the controller, whether you were playing MarioKart or Resident Evil 4. Everything just worked.
I still boot up my Gamecube from time to time and just wish I could pair that controller up with my Playstation 3.
Watching Microsoft confirm our worst DRM fears and then the subsequent bitch slap Sony delivered only hours later made me think of the biggest E3 missteps. Konami is a perennial failure forcing Japanese executives to read intense English scripts about their games. And damn if there aren't always CEOs that obviously know nothing about games, nervously standing in front of the crowd, talking about games, spewing buzz words. All of these clips could be cut into a 3 hour montage on YouTube.
Here are 3 of my favorite failures at E3.
Nintendo 2008
E3 has only been widely available to watch for maybe 8 years now, and there have been some pretty pathetic pressers, but nothing was as disappointing as Nintendo in 2008 when they spent what felt like half their conference showing the future failure that is Wii music.
Sega 1995
I read this one in countless magazines and just couldn't believe it. I was a Genesis guy and was incredibly excited about the Saturn.
Sega decided they would surprise release the Sega Saturn the day of the conference, but only to some stores and with only 6 launch games. On top of that, the Saturn was $100 more than the Playstation. All these missteps culminated in the Saturn sitting in the 1990s shame circle right next to the Virtual Boy and Apple Pippin.
Sony 2006
Sony already had a misstep with their 2005 conference where they egotistically announced a $499 price point, but then came the realistic-battles-from-feudal-Japan-crab-battle. Just watch the video, it explains itself.
Last week, I did the unthinkable. I took my 10-year-old Smash Brother's Brawl save and deleted it. It had everything unlocked and a good chunk of the trophies earned. Something in me said I needed to earn all the unlocks once again. Something told me that enough time had passed that my 20-year-old self had earned things that my almost 30-year-old self didn't deserve.
Well I stare at Marth and Jigglypuff as my only two unlocked characters right now, and I think I made a mistake.
I remember seeing this commercial as a kid and freaking out. This premise was just too much for me.
I couldn't decide if this was an elaborate joke or if it were real. I knew Nintendo protected their first party creations, but then again they did allow the CD-I version of Mario and Zelda.
I did not own a Nintendo 64 and when I found out this was a real thing, I was jealous. I'd heard rumors that Sony was developing a similar 4 person fighting game involving ninjas, but like most things in this first 3D generation, it was an idea that never materialized.
It wasn't until several years later, when the Gamecube was released, that I finally got to play a Smash Brothers' game. It... was... glorious.
It was one of those Mountain Dew and pizza fueled game sessions that lasted seven hours. I was hooked. As the night went on, we unlocked most of the secret characters and levels, and we just kept going. Around 4 a.m. my buddy rubbed his unblinking eyes and went home. We repeated this several weekends in a row never getting sick of it.
Eventually I would go back and play the Nintendo 64 version. (which was just as enjoyable) I was never big into fighting games but something about the quick sessions and heavy hits had me hooked.
It was a fighting game that required some skill, but you could also win with luck and some good button mashing. It was the ultimate level playing field. (Don't get me wrong, I recognize when someone has talent.)
There was magic in seeing the Mushroom Kingdom, Donkey Kong Country, and Starfox themed levels rendered. The music, the art, and the power-ups were all deliciously Nintendo for something that on paper was not Nintendo. Had you come to me in 1992 and said, "Someday, you'll be able to beat the hell out of Mario while being Link," I would've told you to shut the hell up.
I remember when the Wii version was coming out, how excited I was watching the website update with new characters, levels, and power-ups every week. I could not wait to see what other achieved games would be tapped.
There aren't many games that bring out that excitement in me nowadays. I know with E3 coming in the next days, we're due to hear about the next Smash Brothers' entry. Again, I find myself without a Nintendo console. I'll be on the outside looking in, until maybe 5 years from now when I can revisit
