Things you miss from a bygone era of gaming

[Ninjamohawk]

I thought this might be an interesting talk -- Things about video games that have disappeared. Things you hold fond memories of that just have no real place in games today.

I'll start: Loads of gaming magazines.
I used to love to buy a handful of different publications every once in a while. Some would have a set theme or come with goodies. Games journalism wasn't a serious business like it is today so you'd get all sorts of wacky humor and in-jokes for long time readers. It was great. As a kid it was like porn to me when my Nintendo Power, Game Informer, or EGM came in the mail.

Box *art*
Seems today what you get on the cover is some rendered image from the game or a setpiece. Back in the pre-32 bit eras (and even in the 32 bit age) you'd see all those different works of art on game covers, in the manuals, on the media itself. I cannot count how many NES games I bought based on their cover art.
EDIT: or LACK of cover art, like The Legend of Zelda. I hadn't heard anything about it but the spartan box cover was so mysterious. A wise purchase. Only time you see a very plain looking cover today is if it's in a special edition where the branding is all over the main packaging.

What are some of yours?

[Edmond Dantes]

I agree on both those points. To me magazines were a huge part of gaming. I enjoyed buying an issue of Gamepro or EGM or whatever and pouring over all the games they talked about, thinking about what ones I'd love to play the most. It was almost as much fun as actually playing the games. Sometimes, nowadays I find back-issues more fun than the games they discuss.

And cover art... oh man, even today, I base a lot of my purchases on how interesting the cover art is. You are so right that its a lost art and designers are getting increasingly lazy with it.

Now, here's some things I miss:

* Cartridges. I know there's good reasons the industry switched to more standard CDs and DVDs, but there was always something special about cartridges, like they gave gaming a unique identity. Movies came on tape, music came on CDs, games came on cartridges. In addition, one advantage carts have is their durability--you can play hackey-sack with an NES game and it will still work (as long as you clean the contacts). On top of that, they gave each system a unique identity--the NES just is not the NES without those gray cartridges with the ridged pillar down the side and that little knob you're meant to hold onto.

By contrast, Playstation and Saturn games come in boring jewel cases and would be otherwise identical if not for system logos on the packaging. But then, that's progress, and I suppose it can't be helped.

[M.Buster2184]

I know it's not completely dead, but I miss the wait and suspense of a good game coming out. There were no trailers for games or anything too often back in the day. Occasionally there'd be a sneak peak in a magazine, or an exclusive, but there wasn't the constant press and coverage that is around today.

[Daltone]

I know it's not completely dead, but I miss the wait and suspense of a good game coming out. There were no trailers for games or anything too often back in the day. Occasionally there'd be a sneak peak in a magazine, or an exclusive, but there wasn't the constant press and coverage that is around today.

I agree with this entirely. Watching 100 gameplay videos, pre rendered trailers etc spoils things fo me. A once monthly snippit in a magazine, backed up by some mysterious screen shots, was enough to get my attention.

Anyway, I miss..

*Shareware. More than a demo, less than the full game.

[SOL BADGUY]

Colors, nonhumans/Earth inhabitants as main characters, long games without the usage of DLC expansions on console games, 8 and 16 bit music, locations besides Earth and characters that didnt come from Earth.

[treismac]

* Cartridges. I know there's good reasons the industry switched to more standard CDs and DVDs, but there was always something special about cartridges, like they gave gaming a unique identity. Movies came on tape, music came on CDs, games came on cartridges. In addition, one advantage carts have is their durability--you can play hackey-sack with an NES game and it will still work (as long as you clean the contacts). On top of that, they gave each system a unique identity--the NES just is not the NES without those gray cartridges with the ridged pillar down the side and that little knob you're meant to hold onto.

By contrast, Playstation and Saturn games come in boring jewel cases and would be otherwise identical if not for system logos on the packaging. But then, that's progress, and I suppose it can't be helped.

This perhaps above everything else. Cartridges possess a personality and durability that discs can never, never have. You see a beat up cartridge at a flea market you wonder what its background story is. You see a beat up disc and you wonder how in the hell will this game play in ___ modern console.



I miss the whole oral transmission of secrets a great deal. The Konami code, the Super Mario Bros. through the ceiling short cut on 1-2, Justin Bailey, etc... yeah, learning those was like receiving some ancient thaumaturgica (http://www.thefreedictionary.com/thaumaturgical)l* incantation from another druid. Sure, Nintendo power or another video game magazine might have been the origin of the knowledge, but the way it was spread was much more hands on and magical. The easy access of video game knowledge via the internet rocks for the sake of utility, but it does unarguably kill the mystery of obtaining secrets in this day and age of Google Fu and game faqs.

*Sorry about the obscure word. I just learned it and you know how it is with vocabulary, use it or lose it, right?

[recorderdude]

I miss the limitations.

Look at today's games. You can practically draw the real world into them with the up-and-coming 3D graphics generation and you could damn near do it last-gen. Being able to do everything has made us revert to doing nothing special at all. The biggest game market has become FPSes focused on gritty, realistic environments, with forgettable orchestral scores, if any, and universally dull soldier characters, which, despite all that, are still at the peak of graphical and audial capability for the systems they're on.

Now, why exactly is every game looking and sounding as good as they possibly can a bad thing?

Breaking limits is what made the game industry THRIVE, and there's few left to break.

When gaming was first introduced as the Electronic Pong (and as an extension, the oddysey), it was huge. You could CONTROL the graphics? It was big for everyone.

Soon, everyone and their mother began making clones of the game, and the market became oversaturated. People had been seeing the same thing for a long time and they wanted something new...

Space invaders soon hit the scene from japan. It was huge. People had never seen a shooting game like it before. The aliens even had faces! Clones appeared once again, it got old even quicker...

BAM! Pac-Man, a game with a discernable main character. It was in color! It was fast-paced, and eating the ghosts was super satisfying! Everyone began to clone it, people got bored with maze games....

BAM! Donkey Kong, a game with a REAL STORY!....etc, etc...

The way that the gaming industry introduced itself to us was, essentially, through huge bounds of graphical, audial and general innovation and breaking the status quo of popular games to create a new one. This would go on for decades with Mario setting the bar and inspiring tons of platformers, a great deal of which added their own twist, sonic rushing the gaming masses into the 90s and a glut of animal mascot games, mario 64 setting the bar for 3D Platforming, etc etc..

Now, when we look at these games today, we say "Sure, super mario bros, that was a great game"....was. We're not blown away with its colorful worlds and unique cast of enemies like we once were. We've gone through generations of graphics, innovations of every sort, and....I can't help but feel we've run out of them in the mainstream view. Every FPS now has a "super epic" trailer with dark music and outlines of all the amazing graphics, and, honestly....it doesn't impress me anymore. Nothing breaks the mold enough to say "Hey! This is new! This is groundbreaking! This is something no game has ever done before! No game has ever looked, sounded and played this good!"...and this is the model that video games have been following since their very start. For long-time players, it's hard to get interested anymore when the entire formula of a successful game has changed from innovation to the "follow-the-leader" titles that were once only mildly successful; the industry encouraged new concepts despite the risky business for doing so because the payoff would be so great if they actually worked out. Nowadays, with the investment of time, money and labor required to make a full-scale modern game and the uncertainty of doing something original merely breaking even, making yet another mildly successful FPS that anyone could do is a wiser investment.

That's not to say that there aren't still some great games this generation that aren't FPSes, but they're really not limit breaking. I've seen so much done on modern super-consoles that it's very hard for my senses to be blown away anymore by what indie games can do. Despite that, I still say "wow, the genesis could do THAT?" every time I reach the moth boss of alien soldier, or say "damn, they got the NES to sound THAT good?" every time I listen to the soundtrack of Mr. Gimmick. Limitation breeds creativity, and limits are few and far between by now. We can still be entertained, but we've been so spoiled by EVERY popular game reaching the pinnacle of graphical and audial capability that we can no longer appreciate games that really try to be something amazing but pale in comparison to the might of the rehashes.

I know that I can't hold back the march of technology and I pray that I am wrong, but, at this point, I doubt it.

[spman]

This may seem like an odd one, but I miss going to the video store to rent games, especially the independent mom and pop stores that would often have a larger selection with more obscure titles than Blockbuster did. I remember driving my mom nuts because I'd spend a half hour studying the boxes trying to figure out which game to rent, hoping I didn't pick a loser. Back in those days you didn't have the amount of media covering every single new release that came out, so often times you'd find games you'd never heard of, sometimes you'd find a hidden gem, othertimes you'd waste your money on a dud. The worst was getting the dud and being forced to keep it for the full 5 days and having to wait to rent something else.

[bb_hood]

or say "damn, they got the NES to sound THAT good?" every time I listen to the soundtrack of Mr. Gimmick. Limitation breeds creativity,

Sunsoft actually created a soundchip for gimmick that allows it to play 16bit music on an 8 bit machine. So yes I would agree that limitation does breed creativity.

I would say the thing i miss most is the raw challenge you can get from some nes games. Finishing Gauntlet on nintendo 1 player using the Warrior (without cheating) or continuing is mega hard. Most current gen games really arent that hard.

[treismac]

I miss the limitations.

Look at today's games. You can practically draw the real world into them with the up-and-coming 3D graphics generation and you could damn near do it last-gen. Being able to do everything has made us revert to doing nothing special at all.

...

Limitation breeds creativity, and limits are few and far between by now. We can still be entertained, but we've been so spoiled by EVERY popular game reaching the pinnacle of graphical and audial capability that we can no longer appreciate games that really try to be something amazing but pale in comparison to the might of the rehashes.

I know that I can't hold back the march of technology and I pray that I am wrong, but, at this point, I doubt it.

I am with you on this one, recorderdude. When the 16-bit days first ushered in, I wanted better more realistic graphics and hardware horsepower. It was evolution. My NES could never hope to give me the experience of Street Fighter II, after all. Now that video games have "evolved" into movies with slightly worse scripts that you can play, the experience is as banal as the the formula for today's video games are cookie cutter. I don't want my games to look real anymore. I live in reality; I don't necessarily want to play there digitally. Too few developers put out games that explore worlds peripheral to reality (i.e. B action movie tripe) either out of laziness, lack of creativity, or fear of commercial failure. Who knew quirky and stylistic Katamari would be such a big hit and turn into a Namco franchise? Who would have thought that a game as amazing as Okami with so much heart would be Clover's last game for Capcom? I suppose in any market innovation will be the exception rather than the rule, and even in the case of innovation it is all too easy for it to devolve into gimmick [*cough, cough Nintendo, cough*], but I do think there could be a convincing case for there existing an inverse relationship between the personality of (main stream) video games and technological progress.

[Satoshi_Matrix]

What I miss most? Simplicity.

Take just about any 8 or 16-bit game and chances are you can figure out what to do almost instantly, you can dive right in without having to wait for a dozen company logo splash screens to load, and said games will have lasting appeal.

That isn't to say I don't absolutely adore modern complex games like Skyrim, but at the same time I wish the complexity in modern games was streamlined to the point of being accessible like retro gaming.

[JSoup]

I miss the mystery that breeds creativity in design. These days you can tell how long a game is or how many secrets/bonuses it has by glancing at the achievements (or lack there of). I find myself looking up the achievements lists for games I'm interested in before committing myself to a purchase just so I can make doubly sure I'm not tossing money away on a short, overpriced game. Then I think back to some of my favorites and how that wasn't a problem, almost literally unlimited gameplay, mostly because we had no goddamn clue how much crap was hidden in a game. I was the first person in my ring of friends to fully complete Super Mario World, was wowing kids in 6th grade at "how the hell did you find 70 stars?" in Mario 64. And then there are other games that we essentially already know everything about and that everything constitutes a lot of information. I've been discovering new little things in Mario RPG and Harvest Moon on just about every playthrough I've done since getting either game.

A videographer friend once told me that the problem with modern film making is a lot of creativity that you saw during the 70s and 80s is gone, simply because you no longer need to figure out how to do something neat and then try to sell the idea. Now you get a bunch of computers and throw money at them until the job is done. I see that being true for games as well, except instead of money you toss internet at the game and everything is solved.

Which brings me to the second thing I miss, a time when the internet wasn't a required tool for playing a game. I like the connectivity the web has brought to the people, I like the competitive statistics we can build against each other simply from enjoying our games....but I hate the gamers themselves. Seriously, all this online crap has done is made the more annoying community members more annoying and a hell of a lot more hostile. When someone died on the team during a Golf Land playthrough of the Simpsons arcade game, we didn't all drop everything and start calling the guy a faggot, for example.

[Emperor Megas]

I miss the limitations.

Look at today's games. You can practically draw the real world into them with the up-and-coming 3D graphics generation and you could damn near do it last-gen. Being able to do everything has made us revert to doing nothing special at all. The biggest game market has become FPSes focused on gritty, realistic environments, with forgettable orchestral scores, if any, and universally dull soldier characters, which, despite all that, are still at the peak of graphical and audial capability for the systems they're on.

Now, why exactly is every game looking and sounding as good as they possibly can a bad thing?

Breaking limits is what made the game industry THRIVE, and there's few left to break.

. . .

The way that the gaming industry introduced itself to us was, essentially, through huge bounds of graphical, audial and general innovation and breaking the status quo of popular games to create a new one. This would go on for decades with Mario setting the bar and inspiring tons of platformers, a great deal of which added their own twist, sonic rushing the gaming masses into the 90s and a glut of animal mascot games, mario 64 setting the bar for 3D Platforming, etc etc..

Now, when we look at these games today, we say "Sure, super mario bros, that was a great game"....was. We're not blown away with its colorful worlds and unique cast of enemies like we once were. We've gone through generations of graphics, innovations of every sort, and....I can't help but feel we've run out of them in the mainstream view.

. . .

That's not to say that there aren't still some great games this generation that aren't FPSes, but they're really not limit breaking. I've seen so much done on modern super-consoles that it's very hard for my senses to be blown away anymore by what indie games can do. Despite that, I still say "wow, the genesis could do THAT?" every time I reach the moth boss of alien soldier, or say "damn, they got the NES to sound THAT good?" every time I listen to the soundtrack of Mr. Gimmick. Limitation breeds creativity, and limits are few and far between by now. We can still be entertained, but we've been so spoiled by EVERY popular game reaching the pinnacle of graphical and audial capability that we can no longer appreciate games that really try to be something amazing but pale in comparison to the might of the rehashes.

I know that I can't hold back the march of technology and I pray that I am wrong, but, at this point, I doubt it.I've never encountered this problem yet (knock on wood). But then, I don't play drab FPSs, or really any that aren't fantasy, or science fiction based (aliens, zombies, mythical creatures, etc.). I've never stopped being impressed with what developers can create, but I'm pretty selective in what I play. I'm far more blown away by amazing writing (like the Silent Hill and Metal Gear Solid series), creative visuals (like El Shaddai: Ascension of the Metatron, and Child of Eden) and immersive gameplay (like the addictive active reload gauge in Gears of War, feeling Yorda's hand tugging when I run with her in Ico, using the Spirit Camera in Fatal Frame, being forced to walk at pace through the dark in Dead Space because I need to use my gun sight as a improvised 'flash light' and you can't 'run' and aim at the same time) than I ever was impressed with raw graphic prowess when games really pushed the system like back in the day.

I'm still constantly impressed with game play innovations and developer creativity.

I DO have an issue with a 'lack of limits' on certain types of games though. Like 3D platformers. I just like platform games better in 2D; and I really don't care for sandbox games at all either, because I like games to have a focus, and sense of urgency. I like to feel that a game is very structured and scripted rather than open ended.

[Emperor Megas]

I also REALLY miss arcade style games that you can end in a couple hours, or less. People complain about games that are ONLY 10-20 hours long. That's crazy to me. Usually the time that people gamers saw a game takes to complete takes me about twice as much on average. Games that are supposed to be really short (by today's standards) take me tens of hours to complete, which usually translates to several weeks of playing as I don't game for hour and hours on end like most 'hardcore' gamers.

[segafan1989]

I miss arcades and they skating rinks they went it!

[brainerdrainer]

Yeah I miss the old artwork on the cartridges. That was always awesome and sometimes misleading. A game might have awesome looking artwork but then the game is completely oposite

[BydoEmpire]

Games that were games, not (poorly written, deep-as-a-puddle) interactive stories. You play to beat your score, play to beat your time, and you just keep playing the game because it's fun. The aspect of classic games that you can almost always get better. Even 20+ years later, I can still pop in Yar's Revenge or Missile Command and try to get a little better. There's a depth there because the games were designed to be always replayable. At the same time, you coudl play a complete, fulfilling game in just a couple of minutes. There wasn't a big learning curve, there weren't layers of controls to remember, there wasn't backstory to remember. It was just game. Easy to learn, difficult to master.

I like that games of the 80s & 90s were actually more mature in scope and content. There were so many simulators - from Solo Flight to Falcon 3.0 to 688 Attack Sub. There were tons of turn-based strategy war games like Battle of Antietem and Panzer General. The variety was huge, and the subject matter was a lot more mature than what you see nowadays (with some exceptions). There were games that required thought and strategy. Today it seems like blood, boobs and swearing is substituted for maturity.

I like that older games required you to use your imagination because you couldn't have hyper-real graphics and 5.1 sound. You had to make your own backstories, you had to use your imagination to transform that square into a knight. I liked that, it made the games more personal.

[Graham Mitchell]

I miss pounding the crap out of an arcade cabinet that isn't mine, and leaving the arcade sweaty.

[Flam]

I miss the pop culture aspect of gaming like it was in the 80's and 90's.

I also have fond memories of (don't necessarily miss) rushing into a Toys R' Us and trying to be one of the first ones to snag one of those voucher tickets off the gaming rack and redeeming it at the 'gaming' office.

[Ninjamohawk]

Ha! I used to work at Toys R Us when they did that would take the tickets for me and any friends I had who wanted a soon-to-sellout game.

I agree with, surprisingly, every point in this thread so far.

It's like the magic is gone from video games. Maybe it's just being an adult versus being a kid and maybe kids today will have their own magic stories to reflect upon their gaming memories but I ... doubt it. Everything is samey.

[Xander]

I miss when companies could not patch their game for bugs after publishing them. It forced them to devote real efforts into testing their software.

My 3 toon on Skyrim on PS3 (around 200-300h of gameplay in total) are all unplayable now, despite the patching. Within 30 minutes of playing any of my 3 saves, the game will freeze. I have not played Skyrim in over a year now and it still pisses me off thinking about it.

[Flam]

[QUOTE=Ninjamohawk;1958468]Ha! I used to work at Toys R Us when they did that would take the tickets for me and any friends I had who wanted a soon-to-sellout game.[QUOTE]

I think I specifically rushing through the doors when Zelda came out.

[Flam]

Also of note. The Toys R Us where I live is still in that same location. The build out they made where they kept all the NES carts and where you would have to go to exchange your ticket for a game is still standing. Brings back memories everytime I go in there with my children.

[snes_collector]

I miss having nice colorful manuals to read to go along with games. Or just manuals in general, as most new games hardly even have one.

[A.C. Sativa]

A couple I thought of

Carts: They're practically indestructible, if you buy a used cart and it looks OK there's about a 98% it's going to work. In fact, I don't think I've ever bought a bad cart, I've bought a few bad discs that looked totally fine but still didn't work. No load times is a big plus too.

Reliable Systems: This kind of goes back to carts, because cart systems don't have moving parts. Think about it, a good portion of the SNES, N64 and Genesis systems that are still out there still work like they were new (and most NES systems will work fine too once you solve the 10NES issues), most disc-based consoles have mediocre-terrible hardware failure rates. Nintendo has been pretty good about it (which is funny considering they had the cheapest console for the last two generations), but with a Sony or Microsoft console you know there's at least a 50/50 shot that you'll have to either repair or replace that shit within 3 years.

Second-Hand Prices that Aren't Insane: This is self-explanatory, I would think.

[PreZZ]

Complete games with no DLC, no loading, no bullshit. Amen

[Ninjamohawk]

I miss having nice colorful manuals to read to go along with games. Or just manuals in general, as most new games hardly even have one.


Oh yeah for sure. I used to bring the manual for the game I was playing with me to school to pour over on the bus.

[Az]

Speaking of covers, has anyone noticed the back covers of modern games? Literally 2/3 or more of it is taken up by legal notices, system requirements, EULA's, and other mumbo jumbo. Most games have, at most, 2 screenshots and a sentence or two of text. It's as if the idea of selling a customer on a game at the retail level is gone; they assume if you're standing there looking at their product you already want to buy it from the previous media onslaught.

What I miss the most is an abstract concept, one that for me is hard to put into words. I guess I hate the carrot on a stick psychological motivation appeal in newer games. It's like they can't design a game (especially a single-player one) that you play just for the sake of enjoying the game, or to have fun. Games are designed from the ground up to have all but the most basic of features locked, and the player's motivation for playing the game isn't because the game is good or fun, but to unlock shit. Or people play a game for the sole purpose of achievement points or trophies. Then, once everything is unlocked or achievements won, the game is never touched again. Really? You slogged through a shitty game purposely just for that? At least my excuse was that I was a young, stupid, broke kid without anything else to play when I tortured myself with shitty games.

How many times in game reviews or comments have you heard that there was no motivation to play the game after everything was unlocked? Or conversely, if a game didn't have something to unlock, it was somehow less fun? I can think of dozens of games I've beaten or games I've played to death and basically seen everything it had to offer content wise, but even 10-20 years later I plug them in because they're fun to play. I don't play Final Fight to make my e-penis gamerscore larger, or have the psychological equivalent of someone patting me on the head telling me I did a good job. I play it because it's fucking awesome. And it's just as awesome today as it was in '89.

Maybe that's a chicken or egg thing, because it wouldn't exist unless buyers didn't seek it out, so maybe my gripe isn't with developers but rather with the change in gamers' mindsets.

[Steven]

I agree with pretty much everything everyone said in this thread. Namely:

-Toys R Us gaming aisles that seemed to stretch on for miles and miles. The thrill of nabbing the final "ticket" to take to the gaming office... there was nothing like that. Remember peering through the glass window and seeing HUNDREDS of video games? It was jolting. Something that never leaves you...

-Renting games. All the rental store options. Mom n pops... making that Saturday trek with your dad. Getting in some quality time while looking forward to that brand new game to play for the weekend. The joy of watching Saturday morning cartoons, having breakfast and then heading out to the gaming rental store(s) around 11AM to noon to rent the latest NES/Genesis/SNES video game

^ BTW I have such a fondness for those good old renting days that I even shared my trials and triumphs here:

http://www.rvgfanatic.com/7443/259301.html

http://www.rvgfanatic.com/mediac/400_0/media/DIR_791115/1110071901.jpg
My childhood Hollywood still standing, well, at least in 2006 when this pic was taken. Not anymore today :(

-Box covers, box backs, and game manuals. Pretty much what everyone else has already covered

-Arcades

-Here's a new one though. I'm going to say 1992-1995 were very special years in terms of playing the latest arcade game, knowing it would come out for the SNES, and then getting a faithful translation (not in all cases but many) that blew you away, yet you still played the arcade original whenever you went back to the arcade hall, because as awesome a port say MKII on SNES was, the arcade was still THAT much more powerful. Still, your old SNES gave you a hell of a port at a fraction of the cost. That was one of my favorite things as a kid. Playing games like Fighter's History, World Heroes 2, Power Instinct and so forth in the arcade... then waiting for the SNES port... and then not being disappointed by the port. Some were crap, but the majority (more than) captured the essence and spirit of the arcade originals IMO

It was just different once 32-bit came and beyond. '92-'95 were no doubt the golden years for SNES fans

-Magazines... 'nuff said. I love 'em so much I've devoted a whole section to them on my website

-The feeling of getting a new video game (or system) on Christmas morning!

-The feeling of hearing the last bell ring in June, knowing you have 3 whole hot summer months to rot away with your best friend :D

-The good old days when your gaming crew had nothing but time to talk, discuss, speculate and play games to death. I can't count the number of hours that my gaming crew and I wasted on Saturday nights throughout the early-mid '90s bombing each other and dunking on one another (Super Bomberman 1+2, NBA Jam TE). There was a real innocence to those olden days. I guess that's why my childhood was so special. Great family, great friends and great games. What more could a robust suburbanite kid growing up in the heartland of America ask for? They were the "Wonder Years" :)

http://www.rvgfanatic.com/mediac/400_0/media/DIR_883315/TheWonderYears.jpg

[Loganm187]

I agree with pretty much everything everyone said in this thread. Namely:

-Toys R Us gaming aisles that seemed to stretch on for miles and miles. The thrill of nabbing the final "ticket" to take to the gaming office... there was nothing like that. Remember peering through the glass window and seeing HUNDREDS of video games? It was jolting. Something that never leaves you...

-Renting games. All the rental store options. Mom n pops... making that Saturday trek with your dad. Getting in some quality time while looking forward to that brand new game to play for the weekend. The joy of watching Saturday morning cartoons, having breakfast and then heading out to the gaming rental store(s) around 11AM to noon to rent the latest NES/Genesis/SNES video game

^ BTW I have such a fondness for those good old renting days that I even shared my trials and triumphs here:

http://www.rvgfanatic.com/7443/259301.html

http://www.rvgfanatic.com/mediac/400_0/media/DIR_791115/1110071901.jpg
My childhood Hollywood still standing, well, at least in 2006 when this pic was taken. Not anymore today :(

-Box covers, box backs, and game manuals. Pretty much what everyone else has already covered

-Arcades

-Here's a new one though. I'm going to say 1992-1995 were very special years in terms of playing the latest arcade game, knowing it would come out for the SNES, and then getting a faithful translation (not in all cases but many) that blew you away, yet you still played the arcade original whenever you went back to the arcade hall, because as awesome a port say MKII on SNES was, the arcade was still THAT much more powerful. Still, your old SNES gave you a hell of a port at a fraction of the cost. That was one of my favorite things as a kid. Playing games like Fighter's History, World Heroes 2, Power Instinct and so forth in the arcade... then waiting for the SNES port... and then not being disappointed by the port. Some were crap, but the majority (more than) captured the essence and spirit of the arcade originals IMO

It was just different once 32-bit came and beyond. '92-'95 were no doubt the golden years for SNES fans

-Magazines... 'nuff said. I love 'em so much I've devoted a whole section to them on my website

-The feeling of getting a new video game (or system) on Christmas morning!

-The feeling of hearing the last bell ring in June, knowing you have 3 whole hot summer months to rot away with your best friend :D

-The good old days when your gaming crew had nothing but time to talk, discuss, speculate and play games to death. I can't count the number of hours that my gaming crew and I wasted on Saturday nights throughout the early-mid '90s bombing each other and dunking on one another (Super Bomberman 1+2, NBA Jam TE). There was a real innocence to those olden days. I guess that's why my childhood was so special. Great family, great friends and great games. What more could a robust suburbanite kid growing up in the heartland of America ask for? They were the "Wonder Years" :)

http://www.rvgfanatic.com/mediac/400_0/media/DIR_883315/TheWonderYears.jpg

Man, this thread is killing me and your post specifically has made me want to cry... Oh! There goes a tear :( I miss those days so much and they are gone.

I guess today's children will just remember the days when they would scream racist things at one another via headset while "teabagging" eachother. I feel sorry for them.

[Nesmaster]

I miss the magic. Going from Super Mario Bros. to SMW, was a magical leap. Then stuff like Donkey Kong Country, Yoshi's Island, and Super Mario RPG, really showed what the SNES could do. Mario 64 on the brand new kiosk, waiting in line and taking control for the first time, magical. Even stuff like Metroid Prime and Smash Bros Melee, quite the advancements in technology. I still think F-Zero GX looks quite nextgen for its time.

Magic is lost in a lot of new games. Sure there's still moments, like making your way to the surface of the water at the very beginning of BioShock, or emerging from the sewer/vault in Oblivion/Fallout 3 respectively, but for the most part these magical times exist only in memory these days.

[Ninjamohawk]

Also those current gen magic moments could almost be achieved in a movie.

[JSoup]

Also those current gen magic moments could almost be achieved in a movie.

Sort of. I'm generally of the opinion that you can't manufacture magic, it kind of just happens all on it's own due to good design. Disney and Nintendo haven't quite caught on to that yet.

[TonyTheTiger]

I miss when companies could not patch their game for bugs after publishing them. It forced them to devote real efforts into testing their software.

Heh, go play half the NES library and see just how much testing actually went on.


It's like the magic is gone from video games. Maybe it's just being an adult versus being a kid and maybe kids today will have their own magic stories to reflect upon their gaming memories but I ... doubt it. Everything is samey.

I think it's definitely an age thing. We could easily compile a list of things from past generations that pissed us off. Things like manipulative marketing with nonsense buzzwords, peripherals that never worked as advertised, long and labyrinthine games that had no save or password feature, punishingly unfair difficulty, and game software that barely functioned with no recourse to the poor sap who bought it. It wasn't perfect. But it was ours. And it was that innocence that made it special. It was before the "seen it all" cynicism kicked in. So while we may look upon the PS3, Wii U, and 3DS with a weathered eye, there's a 10 year old kid somewhere out there seeing it all for the first time. Video games may not be "for kids" but, in many ways, its best when they are. Because only a kid can be so dazzled.

[recorderdude]

As far as the "magic" goes, I think what made it for a LOT of us was the well-composed and instrumentated music, and the graphics complimented that. Some of the best examples I can picture:

This first one I never even played before a week or so ago. The soundtrack is literally the main reason I got myself a cartridge, and grew to love the sim gameplay after that.

SimCity (SNES) (1991) - Title Screen:


http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=fxSYzCesxfU

Without music: It's a city at night. Cool.
With music: This is pure childhood.

This one I never SAW as a kid because I could never best the final boss, but it's still magical.

Sonic The Hedgehog 2 (1992) - Ending


http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=a75gm_ovvsY

Without music: They escape the boss and fly off. cool.
With music: It all concludes with a daring escape, sonic descends as the song builds up to its finale...the day is saved, and all is right in the world.

This final example is one I remember fondly from my childhood.

Yoshi's Island (1995) Ending/Credits


http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=qiiMtfnVhcQ

Without music: well, this is nice. They gonna loop this flying animation forever?
With music: THE TEARS WONT FUCKING STOP. OH GOD, THAT MARIO CLEAR THEME AT THE END. I'VE GIVEN HELPLESS CHILDREN A LOVING HOME. I AM A HERO.

At least, that's how I see it.

[segafan1989]

I think it's definitely an age thing. We could easily compile a list of things from past generations that pissed us off. Things like manipulative marketing with nonsense buzzwords, peripherals that never worked as advertised, long and labyrinthine games that had no save or password feature, punishingly unfair difficulty, and game software that barely functioned with no recourse to the poor sap who bought it. It wasn't perfect. But it was ours. And it was that innocence that made it special. It was before the "seen it all" cynicism kicked in. So while we may look upon the PS3, Wii U, and 3DS with a weathered eye, there's a 10 year old kid somewhere out there seeing it all for the first time. Video games may not be "for kids" but, in many ways, its best when they are. Because only a kid can be so dazzled.




WORD! Could not have been explained any better.

[Haoie]

Mascots with attitude!

[SOL BADGUY]

You know, I saw the Golden Mullet Awards of 2006 and Sonic 06 has a decaying city scape in a level, damn was that the cliche of all cliche's this past generation of games. What happened to happy backdrops to levels?

[Tron 2.0]

Red Book audio that synthesizer sound you got on the sega-cd and turbografx-16

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=xPXK0OkB04U
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=wJnMXlDq6cs

[Genesaturn]

Most of my things I miss have been covered and I agree with pretty much everyone.

- Game Anticipation - With the wealth of information and coverage on the internet...nothing is really a surprise anymore. I remember a good game getting a several page layout in a mag and then that was it until you went out and bought it.

- Gaming Magazines - Growing up I read Gamefan like it was going out of style...which unfortunately it did. I have a hard time with current gaming mags, they just don't have the charm or excitement of the older mags.

- Packaging - This is a lot of different things....but I really miss all the cool stuff that we got in different games. I loved opening up games to find maps and posters. Also I miss the in depth instruction manuals..especially for RPG's...I'd spend a good hour just reading everything in the manuals before playing my new game! For those who grew up in the Working Designs days though...I think we were just plain spoiled :)

[sloan]

Light gun controllers that worked with your TV.

Controllers that went by the wayside like trak balls for Crystal Castles and spinners for Tempest and Arkanoid.

Games that used two sticks for control like Robotron and Crazy Climber.

Laser disc games like Bega's Battle and Dragon's Lair.

Arcade oddities like Darius that used three CRT's overlapping for an extra wide gaming experience.

Arcades that gave 8 tokens for $1.

[wiggyx]

- Packaging - This is a lot of different things....but I really miss all the cool stuff that we got in different games. I loved opening up games to find maps and posters. Also I miss the in depth instruction manuals..especially for RPG's...I'd spend a good hour just reading everything in the manuals before playing my new game! For those who grew up in the Working Designs days though...I think we were just plain spoiled :)

This is a large part of why I do what I do ;)

[courtesi1]

- Magazines, in particular Gamefan and Next Generation.

- I miss Funcoland. I always had good experiences at mine.

- Babbages :(

- I grew up with a Radio Shack CoCo. During those days Radio Shack was cool - now they are Best Buy-lite.

- As what others said: no software patches or DLC.

But most of all:

Games that make you wonder if they publisher included extra chips on the cartridge (Vectorman on the Genny come to mind.)

[Tron 2.0]

Most of my things I miss have been covered and I agree with pretty much everyone.
- Gaming Magazines - Growing up I read Gamefan like it was going out of style...which unfortunately it did. I have a hard time with current gaming mags, they just don't have the charm or excitement of the older mags.

This the original gamefan at least,it was one the few magazines that did cover a good deal of imports.

[Vigilante]

I agree with all the points here without much to add myself. The one thing I will say is that going to Digital Press in Clifton brings tears to my eyes of a long time ago. At the same time my 9 year old son wants to go there all the time and constantly asks when are we going again. So it's like I can relive the joy thru his eyes.

[BricatSegaFan]

Good music.

Ex lords of thunder. Elemental master, thunder force, devils crush, Gleylancer.

As a matter of fact I miss shmups

[Edmond Dantes]

Shmups are still made today.

Although I miss a time when "shmup" wasn't synonymous with "bullet hell."

[Dr. BaconStein]

It's hard to say. Much of what I like about old games is still around in some capacity, but it's become sort of a niche. There are still big box editions of certain games floating around, colorful platformers with memorable music, strategy guides which I never use anymore, and games that have a completely unique style of play to them.

Digital games are partially responsible for bringing some of this back, but even then there are still retail titles out there which do it just as well. I guess what I really miss is the heart that went into old games. Now it seems like all hype and no actual effort. All of the "big" franchises just have this depressing artificial feeling to them, like they are trying really hard without actually trying at all. It's always the most hyped games that end up being the shortest and easiest, too.

I guess the other thing I miss is the challenge. These days, trial and error seems like somewhat of a taboo in the game industry, but back in the NES and SNES era it was what kept you coming back over and over again.


Good music.

Ex lords of thunder. Elemental master, thunder force, devils crush, Gleylancer.

As a matter of fact I miss shmupsYou would probably like DeathSmiles a lot... if you don't mind the loli influence, anyway.

[BricatSegaFan]

Shmups are still made today.

Although I miss a time when "shmup" wasn't synonymous with "bullet hell."

Ok the only bullet hell I enjoy is dodonpachi dfk. I've played deathsmiles and its ehh. And agiain the music has to be excellent.

[Tenjikuronin]

I used to enjoy going to the Funtronics section in Sears (back when it was located in the children's clothing department) and seeing the SNES games in the glass display case. When you bought one, they would tape the Funtronics return note on the top of the game.

[Zama]

I remembered during the mid 90s, the flea market in my area was flooded with a lot of video game products at low to decent prices as well as a ton of fake Pokemon cards during the late 90s xD

[Rob2600]

One of the things I miss is 8-bit (and to a slightly lesser extent 16-bit) sports games. I'd much rather play Bases Loaded, Legends of the Diamond, Double Dribble, Blades of Steel, or Ken Griffey Jr. Baseball than the overcomplicated, ultrarealistic sports games of today.

Ultrarealism takes the fun out of sports games...and there are far too many buttons to memorize.

Wii Sports/Resort, Mario Golf, Beach Spikers, Virtua Tennis, and NBA Hangtime are pretty much the only "modern" sports games I can play.

[sloan]

Someone mentioned Babbages. I agree.

Also, I miss these other stores that had lots of good gaming deals:

Ames
Hills
Venture
Electronics Boutique
Kay Bee
Zayre
Montgomery Ward
Children's Palace
Woolco

[recorderdude]

One of the things I miss is 8-bit (and to a slightly lesser extent 16-bit) sports games. I'd much rather play Bases Loaded, Legends of the Diamond, Double Dribble, Blades of Steel, or Ken Griffey Jr. Baseball than the overcomplicated, ultrarealistic sports games of today.

Ultrarealism takes the fun out of sports games...and there are far too many buttons to memorize.

Wii Sports/Resort, Mario Golf, Beach Spikers, Virtua Tennis, and NBA Hangtime are pretty much the only "modern" sports games I can play.

If you're into retro sports games, I CANNOT reccomend the tiny toon adventures sports game on genesis more. It's got a ton of playable characters from the show, each with their own special abilities, multiple full sports and a few minigames. By the way it plays, it's VERY similar to the mario sports series...and has great original music, especially for a sports game...but would you expect any less from Oldschool Konami?


http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=pc54EwYmrp4

[ZP3]

I'm fairly young for a retro gamer, but I can reminisce and remember fondly the days of being a kid when you had to wait so long to get a new, badass game, usually until Christmas or your birthday. I remember wanting Pokémon Yellow SO bad, and had to wait around seven months to get it. Now, if I want a game, I whip out my debit card, and walk away. I miss the days of anticipation.

[Xander]

Hey ZP3, I still get it nowaday. I simply follow development for a few games I have high hopes for. Anticipation all around :)

[thom_m]

I miss having friends over to play. I know it's also a matter of age, but I believe that online gaming is more common now than a good presential showdown. Gaming is much more fun when you have your ally/opponent around to celebrate/make fun of while playing. IMing someone far away (or yelling at a headset, for that matter) is just not the same thing.

I sincerely miss that; I had the opportunity to play with a friend this weekend (while his 6-year-old daughter watched and rooted for him - which was a nice touch to it; after all, we wer influencing a new generation!), and had a blast! I wish I could do it more often.

[8-Bit Archeology]

I Fully agree, I love having friends over to play at the classics, but less and less are having even LAN parties. Having your friends around is part of the fun. A good amount of my collection is multiplayer and old school high score games. Its sad knowing they will get played only on rare occasion. We still have game nights once a week and when we have them at my house we try a retro night. I hate that most people now would rather be on a headset by themselves. I am 25 and still I believe texting, calling, or playing a game on live just is not REAL interaction.

Another thing that seems to be dying....Game Story Quirkiness*. I miss the goofy styles of the 90's games like Gobliiins and Conquer.

[SOL BADGUY]

Yeah people had to be "nice" to each other to play a game together, not like now with COD and other flame war environments.

[Tanooki]

I miss:
Buying a game and it being finished (no dlc).
Buying a game that's thoroughly tested so I'm not a stealth beta guinea pig.
No large downloads on console games just to get them started.
I don't have Xbox but I miss anyone being able to multiplayer games without added fees to use their whole game they paid for.
A solid fan or company based print mag like NP or OPM were.
The wide spread support for multiple genres vs the current horniness over fps, sports, wrpg and little else.
Buying a game and actually owning a copy vs digital rentals aka digital purchases.
Civility in multiplayer, act the way you do online on the couch, lose some teeth.
Stores like funcoland chains inw hitch GameStop murdered.
Buying a new game and if it sucked/didn't suit me I could return it, not trade in for 25% of value.

[Zing]

Two related things:
Intruction manuals and games that do not assume you are either an idiot or paraplegic. I don't need an hour of hand-holding, or worse, all throughout the game.

[WCP]

I miss checking my mailbox every single day, to see if 1 of 6 different video game magazines might be inside it. Getting my brand new issue of Die Hard Game Fan, or getting the newest issue of Next-Generation, was always a special treat. I couldn't wait to read those magazines cover to cover. Back in the really early 90's it was EGM and GamePro and VG & CE. I loved reading those mags back in the day. They had the latest information, even though the info was actually like 3 months old, or even 4 or 5 months old.

I didn't get on the internet until very late 1995. Prior to that, the internet was an unknown commodity to me, and I got my gaming info from magazines, and didn't have a problem with that. Sure, it was a long wait between the issues of the mags to get the latest news and gossip, but it was 100's of times more exciting than the way we get the news now.

http://media.bestofmicro.com/next-generation-unreal,A-Q-249218-13.jpg


Do you guys remember that issue of Next-Generation ? I remember when it arrived in my mailbox. I looked at the cover, and it had a picture of the brand new game from Epic, Unreal, on it, with the quote "Yes, This is an actual PC game screenshot!" . I remember looking at the cover on my way from the mailbox back to the house, and thinking... "Damn... I'm going to have to upgrade my PC to be able to play that game...". (in 97/98 at that time I had a PC with a 3Dfx card in it, besides my PS1 and N64 and Saturn)

[BlastProcessing402]

Man, y'all've already taken all the ones I wanted to say.

I guess I'm left with the rush from fiddling with DOS's config.sys and autoexec.bat files and managing to squeak out an extra few K of conventional memory to get the latest stack of floppy disks to actually turn into a game. With both mouse AND Sound Blaster support enabled.

[dbm11085]

The feeling of "newness" with every game that came out. Most of the game concepts had not been done before, and many of them were actually a lot of fun. Nowadays it just feels like companies are milking the old cash cows (Mario is a big example of this). Early RPGs were tedious as hell, but in the SNES era, they really shone nicely I thought.

[Queen Of The Felines]

Reams of graph paper.

[BydoEmpire]

Man, y'all've already taken all the ones I wanted to say.

I guess I'm left with the rush from fiddling with DOS's config.sys and autoexec.bat files and managing to squeak out an extra few K of conventional memory to get the latest stack of floppy disks to actually turn into a game. With both mouse AND Sound Blaster support enabled.Hah, I honestly 100% do not miss that! I do miss the early-mid 90s era of PC gaming though. What a great time. So much variety and quality.

[Wraith Storm]

http://media.bestofmicro.com/next-generation-unreal,A-Q-249218-13.jpg

Do you guys remember that issue of Next-Generation ? I remember when it arrived in my mailbox. I looked at the cover, and it had a picture of the brand new game from Epic, Unreal, on it, with the quote "Yes, This is an actual PC game screenshot!" . I remember looking at the cover on my way from the mailbox back to the house, and thinking... "Damn... I'm going to have to upgrade my PC to be able to play that game...". (in 97/98 at that time I had a PC with a 3Dfx card in it, besides my PS1 and N64 and Saturn)

I have that issue. I remember it well because there is a page where where they show a picture of an entire level from Unreal. I thought it looked really cool. A year or two later a friend of mine gave me the game and it had no resemblance to the what was shown. Regardless, i thought it was awesome, but I was surprised the game had changed so much throughout development.


Two things I really miss are instruction manuals and memorable music.

There was a time where an instruction manual would tell you everything you needed to know about the game and you didn't have to play through a tutorial. I miss the care and attention that went into manuals. I remember as a family going to the mall and my brother and I would go into Kay Bee and pick up the latest Game Boy, Nes or Genesis game and we would pour over the instructions before we got home. Some games would have such nice artwork lining the manuals and hand drawn pictures of various items and powerups. They might come with a foldout map or cool stat sheet all sorts of critical game information.

Now we are stuck with a crappy 1 page manual if were lucky and have dumb tutorials in our games that teach us how to jump, climb ladders, duck and other such basic things. These days with a two year old and 7 month old twins, my time is precious. I don't need a tutorial to cover the basics, I have been jumping, climbing ladders, ducking, etc. for the past 25 years.




Music is VERY important to me. As odd as it sounds, I would say in quite a few instances its more important to me than the game. I have played plenty of games that I don't care for just because the music is so good, and in a sense I end up enjoying the game. I have also had a horrible sound track ruin for me what is technically a good game.

Video game music just seems so uninspired and not very memorable these days. Part of the issue are the uninspired composers and part of the issue is that there aren't really any chip tunes. When every game out there is using an orchestra, regardless of how decent the composition might be, it all starts to sound the same. Nothing really stands out and most of it is forgettable. Variety...That's the Key word I'm looking for.

Back in the 8, 16, and to an extent 32 bit days every system had its own sound. You could play the same game with the same sound track on several different systems and audibly have a different experience. It was awesome! I love chip tunes! They helped to define each system and create an audible variety that we no longer have. But the lack of chip tunes is only part of the issue. The other problem are our current video game composers.

The older 8,16,32 bit music composers were just flat out more creative and inspiring than most of the current composers. To be fair, and make comparisons more accurate lets eliminate chip tunes. In the early to mid 90's once CD's started to take hold for gaming there were a lot of sountracks that were recorded in Redbook format. These soundtrack did not utilize the systems sound chips, and were like any music CD you would buy at the store. This is essentially what we have today. The music was composed, recorded and then just plays off the disc. That levels the playing field for comparisons between the old composers and the new composers.

Using essentially the same format or process as today, there was so much more variety, creativity and memorable compositions on the Turbo CD, Sega CD, Saturn and PSX compared to what we have these days. I can name an endless stream of, what I would consider exceptional soundtracks from that era. The soundtracks from this generation, or the last, that I do consider to be great still don't have the heart, passion and variety of the soundtracks back then.

[SOL BADGUY]

The music, 8bit songs were so cool to me, sometimes Id play Zelda 2 just to mess around and listen to the songs.

[Clownzilla]

I miss Nintendo and their gigantic propaganda machine they had going for a while. They were Gods when I was a kid:)

[RichardNES]

Somethings I really miss is the innocence and mystery of older games. Going into an old game store and staring at the backs of game boxes, and seeing if whats on the back strikes your fancy, and then taking the game home not knowing whats in store.

[pseudonym]

I miss those big manuals and extras that came with a lot of PC games in the 80s and 90s. Now the most you'll get is usually a 2 page booklet for the controls and that's it, or you'll have to buy the collector/limited/special edition for anything more than that.

I miss games without any DLC. Having a finished game without being nickel and dimed for every little thing.

I miss games without any hand-holding or on-rails type game play. Looking around without being told "you can't go this way yet" or being led by the nose to the next place you're supposed to go.

[Edmond Dantes]

Man, y'all've already taken all the ones I wanted to say.

I guess I'm left with the rush from fiddling with DOS's config.sys and autoexec.bat files and managing to squeak out an extra few K of conventional memory to get the latest stack of floppy disks to actually turn into a game. With both mouse AND Sound Blaster support enabled.

I don't miss that so much, but there are a lot of things I wish I had known back then. Case in point, right now I have my old games PC set up so that I NEVER have to mess with the autoexec or config--it instead boots to a menu that asks me what config I want (depending on what I'll be playing). Man, if I knew as much about DOS back then as I do now...


Music is VERY important to me. As odd as it sounds, I would say in quite a few instances its more important to me than the game. I have played plenty of games that I don't care for just because the music is so good, and in a sense I end up enjoying the game. I have also had a horrible sound track ruin for me what is technically a good game.

I'm the same way. Music can make or break a game for me. And its not always just games--part of the reason I prefer eighties cartoons is because they have memorable soundtracks, versus today's cartoons where the music seems to be almost an afterthought.

Besides the disuse of music these days, I'm simply not a fan of the styles that have become popular.

[Tron 2.0]

I miss Nintendo and their gigantic propaganda machine they had going for a while. They were Gods when I was a kid:)
I know miss nintendo vs sega and how these company's bashed each other,was amusing to watch.

[thegamezmaster]

Miss pretty much what's been mentioned. The main thing is the magic and newness of it all. Arcades, magazines and all of it.

[Captain_N77]

Yeah, everyone has pretty much nailed it already. I miss...

Incredible 8 &16-bit music. I love listening to the music from the old Castlevania, F-Zero, and Metroid games.

Arcades. I love the social aspect of arcades. A lot of kids with a common interest that you didn't necessarily even know. And, arcades were DARK and therefore, a bit mysterious and creepy to me. Now every arcade I come across is lit up, not by the arcade cabinets, but overhead lighting just like any other store. Plus, back then arcades had games for gamers, not forgettable games for kids that don't know any better.

Magazines and manuals. I loved the artwork in the old manuals. Sometimes the manuals were the only clue you had to the backstory and the characters and enemies. The magazines were great in that they showed us just enough to get us hyped, and they were the source for info, rumors, tips, and the gaming "community" at large. It's kind of like how so many people find old Hollywood movie stars so desirable. You didn't see your favorite actress or actor buck naked and humping like an animal years ago; back then it was a stolen kiss, a flash of leg, a meaningful look. Now games are like our movie stars, just get online and you can see it all...nothing left to the imagination.

Sports games indeed. With baseball season kicking off, I've been wanting to play a good baseball game. The newer ones are so over complicated and focused on hyper realism, it's such a drag to play them.

Anticipation! It's funny how so many of us miss this, but back then we would have killed to have enough money to get every game we wanted. I remember, beyond birthdays, Christmas, and any money me and my bro could scrape together, we would rarely get any other games. Still, mom n dad would occasionally buy us a game or two throughout the year if we both agreed on the game and both REALLY wanted it. That was always special, especially considering how our parents really didn't have the money for it and hardly ever bought things for themselves. That reminds me of one of my favorite moments as a kid....

We went to Toy R Us and mom and dad were going to buy us a game for the NES, but me and my (younger)brother could not agree on the game. He wanted Legend of Zelda and I wanted Excitebike(which I had played alot in the arcades). Neither of us would budge, but somehow I broke my brother down and he agreed we could get Excitebike. I was SO excited, but I could see in his face that he was crushed and had just given up. I was not always the nicest older brother back then, but seeing him like that did a number on me. I stopped mom and dad and told them we were getting Legend of Zelda. I remember my parents looking at me and telling me how proud they were of me at that moment. I guess that was the first time I really started to grow up in some small way and actually consider someone else's feelings more important than my own. And you know what, my bro was right, Legend of Zelda was the game to get that day. ;)