System Overload: Level III

Hello again. Here is the third instalment of my gaming nostalgia, or as I like to call it, These are the Games of Our Lives. Click here for the first column where I was but a young nerdling, losing my gaming virginity to a swarthy gentleman in overalls and a porny mustache. Click here for the second part where I really started to attract girls with my prowess at Final Fantasy III. And now without further adieu, the Golden years of Nintendo…

N64 (1996)

I remember walking into a Toys R Us and seeing a 3D Mario head floating in infinite space, hovering over a plastic dome, reflecting light onto the next generation of 3D gaming. I was spinning, pulling, pinching and distorting Mario’s famous visage with so much delight that I ended up buying Mario 64 before I was able to buy the system to play it on.

I wanted it. I wanted its children. I made some half-brained deal with my mom that I would pick up chestnuts fallen from the trees around my elementary school and sell them to her for $.10 each. The system launched for around $300 so you can imagine that was mucho nuts. Not only that, games were $119 each at the time. I don’t recall if I picked all the required nuts to pay for the whole works, but to this day (15 years later) we still have a planter filled with them.

I still recall the hours spent playing Killer Instinct in the local arcade, hearing its promise of coming to the “Nintendo Ultra 64” when in reality a watered down port finally came out, 86‘ing the awe-inspiring FMV cut scenes and beautiful backgrounds. This was not my only disappointment with the Big N’s latest cartridge-based console…

Since cartridge games cost an arm and a leg compared to their optical-based counterparts, it took some time to acquire enough funds to buy the latest titles. I distinctly remember my desire and disappointment while trying to get my paws on Mario Kart 64 and GoldenEye 007.

GoldenEye - No other game that I have ever pined over has given me such a roller coaster ride of emotions. Oh, the sheer amount of hours dedicated to this game. The one lesson I learned from this time in my life was to never, under any circumstances, pre-order video games from the Real Canadian Superstore. This was the time before the Internet, and all we gamers had to rely on for release dates were monthly video game publications. Historical documents (Wikipedia) state that GoldenEye was delayed many times, primarily due to the incorporation and polish of the now famous multiplayer mode. All that I knew was that Superstore employees were being douche bags and not giving me all the information I needed. I gave them my $10, they gave me my collectable GoldenEye Golden Bullet Keychain. This was not good enough. Since I was convinced they had lost my pre-order, I persisted to call every two days to see if they had it in stock yet. Finally, two months later I called, they said they had it in stock, and my belly swelled with joyful anticipation. With much enthusiasm I persuaded my dearest mother to drive me to the store to claim my prize. With all the excitement of Christmas morning I slid up to the counter, put down my pre-order receipt and asked for my copy of GoldenEye. The clerk looked at me with a bit of confusion and walked to the VHS wall, pulled a copy of James Bond GoldenEye off the shelf and asked if I was the one who called about the movie. The 7 stages of grief flooded over me all at once and I left on the verge of tears. We walked away and drove off. I’m still scarred to this day. I ended up getting the game somewhere else.

This did not sully my love for the title – almost every day at lunch, for an entire semester at school, me and a few friends would come to my place, skip the block after lunch and play nothing but multiplayer. I remember wincing when I saw how many times I was marked tardy on my report card that year.

Mario Kart 64 was also on my “to-own” list, but was well out of my financial reach. After many nights of begging and pleading with my mom to take me to the local video game store and buy the game for me, I finally gave up and started sulking loudly on the couch. A few minutes of this must have been torture for her as she eventually in disgust, turned to me and said “I’m tired of hearing you breathe, let’s go.”

And go we did.

– The Jolly Gamesman