My ‘era of gaming’ ended several years ago when I left home and went to university. Now I only play computer games on the rare occasion I’m at a mate’s house and we’ve got nothing else to do.
The mention of eras, however, made me think back to a time when I was feverishly excited about getting a new computer game and would spend/waste an entire Saturday night playing on it because I wasn’t old enough to like beer and I was too young to go out anyway.
Nostalgia and the talk of eras are reminders of age, and I realise there is already a generation of kids who will never witness some of the pathetic graphics I sat mesmerised by between the ages of 8 and 16. There might already be a generation of children who don’t even know what this sound is, or the frustration and arguments that it provoked:
So for those kids who have no idea how we got to Grand Theft Auto 4 and Call of Duty: Black Ops, and hopefully for the enjoyment of mates with whom I misspent my youth, I’ve collected some clips of the games that kept me rapt for too much of my childhood.
It’s a testament to how gripped and engaged I was by some of these games that the sights and sounds bring back such vivid memories, not just of the gameplay itself, but of friends, places and occasions connected to them.
The Super Nintendo Entertainment System
I daresay that the design of the SNES console reflects how the target demographic has changed in the games industry. It used to be children that played computer games; now that they're more sophisticated that's no longer the case. With its oversized buttons and chunky body, the SNES looks like it was designed for children or retards. No-one in their right mind would produce something that looked like this with young, aspirational adults in mind.
That huge grey letterbox shape is where the game cartridge used to go. You could expect to blow the dust out of there on a regular basis in order to get the SNES to work. Similarly, the cartridge itself needed a regular hoover. Not a great design but the best they could do.
I liked my SNES but not this much (right). You learn in life, and from Google image search, that there will always be people who take everything too far. Zelda wasn't even that good. I certainly wouldn't have expected a reasonably decent but slightly odd bird to have it betwixt her loins on the internet. Each to their own though.
Games
Super Mario World: The console came bundled with this archetype platformer. I would spend many months labouring towards the conclusion of this game whilst listening to a cassette of 2 Unlimited's sophmore album 'No Limits' with the sound of the game on mute. Christ knows what my mum thought.
Starwing: Revolutionary when it was released due to using *gasp* 3-D polygons, Starwing was a rather odd story about four reasonably shit animals who had been trained as fighter pilots and then tasked with saving the planet.
Super Mario Kart: This game has been revamped several times for more recent consoles but I presume none of the later versions had such a jerky frame rate and pixelated graphics. Bizarre how these games all appear in full HD when I'm remembering them.
Rock 'n' Roll Racing: Must be one of very few computer games to feature music by Black Sabbath, Deep Purple and Steppenwolf. The commentator, Larry Huffman, had a particularly memorable voice and there were some real epic two-player games that would occasionally see joypads get thrown or the console turned off if you blew your companion up too many times.
F-Zero: There are hipsters in Shoreditch listening to almost identical music at a rave while you read this.
NBA Jam Tournament Edition: Classic menu music, a total lack of realism and no longevity. The SNES wasn't powerful enough to allow five on five basketball games, so you got two players and the ability to score superhuman baskets.
Streets of Rage 2: One of the best examples of gaming in the 1990s. Contemporary music and sound effects throughout a whopping eight levels. This clip features some classic moments, including a bar room ruck with a leggy blonde called 'Electra' (at 5:10) in which our heroic protagonist gives her a bloody good headbutting. This game is also notable for its wonky perception of turkey's nutritional value; apparently eating a whole one regenerates your health, rather than giving you indigestion and a desire to lie down.
