A Life With Nintendo

Here’s a tale of a child that could have been something great and/or famous but instead gets roped into an obsession that will drain countless hours and dollars from him and leave him with piles and piles of plastic in his home.  I’m gonna apologize to Kary for the length of this article beforehand…sorry dude, but I have purchased a lot of video games in my day.  From Atari to Microsoft, they all thickly populate the shelves in my living room, but one company has sucked more dough out of mine and my loved ones pockets than any other.  Nintendo’s their name and boy do I own a lot of their crap!  Here’s my personal story of triumph, peril and how I came to a mass such a ridiculous amount of Nintendo stuff.

Chapter 1:  Nintendo Entertainment System!!

1985 the NES is released in America.  I didn’t get one immediately seeing as I was only 2 and my parents would have been fools to give a 2 year old a gaming system.  Around 1989 I get an NES for Christmas and my life is suddenly changed.  Little did my mother know that by getting me this immensely popular system, she was starting an addiction that would rival crack.

I play classics like Super Mario Bros 2, Excitebike, TMNT, The Goonies 2 and Kirby’s Adventure.  The music after you lose your final life from the first Super Mario Bros still makes me think that its bed time (this is an inside thing, if you want to know, ask.)  Moving on…

Chapter 2:  Mom, can I play Tetris now?

I don’t remember ever actually wanting a Game Boy, but I guess my parents assumed as much because of my love of the NES.  1990 I get my very first Game Boy and my first taste of green screened Tetris, but outside of that and Super Mario Land; I didn’t own too many other games.

Most of what I ended up playing was whatever I mother could find at garage sales.  After the initial spark of fighting over the Tetris game wore off and when the epiphany hit me that my mother wasn’t into buying batteries in 24 packs, my Game Boy collected a lot of dust.

This effected my overall opinion of handheld systems for years…but we will get to that later.  I have since gone back and found some gems of games for the original Game Boy, but playing on that tiny green screen is probably gonna give me catarax later in life.  During this period I was still playing the crap out of my NES and building a huge game collection.

Chapter 3:  Now you’re playing with Super Power!

1991 The SNES is released stateside and I show a lukewarm interest in the system.  My mother had taken the stance of “why should we get the Super Nintendo if it doesn’t play the old games?”  I, being a big momma’s boy, took the same stance, until I played the system at my good friend Jason’s house.

After playing Super Mario World, I had to have that new machine immediately.  Around 1992/93 I get an SNES for Christmas to much rejoicing.  Between the years of 1992 and 1997 I played SNES like the cure for cancer was hidden somewhere in the middle of a game. Games like Super Mario Kart, Mortal Kombat, Star Fox, and Donkey Kong Country easily kept my attention for that half of the decade.  Both single and miltiplayer games got massive amounts of gameplay.  My NES started to get really hard to boot games in (anyone who owned an NES knows the cart blow, cart stack, and cart jiggle techniques) and I really began to lose interest in anything on it outside of Dr. Mario on the NES.  What’s next? Get ready to break into the 3^rd dimension.

Chapter 4:  What’s up with that tiny ass joystick?

I vividly remember getting an ad for the N64 in the mail at my Grandmother’s house.  My first thought was, “Mario looks stupid and boy is that controller funny looking,” but that year after standing in line to play Mario 64 at Wal-mart, I was convinced it was the greatest gaming experience ever!

Come 1997 and I was hoping so hard that I would get the much coveted system for Christmas.  I didn’t get it, but my brother Ben did.  Ben didn’t seem very excited about the gift, and since it wasn’t my present I had to contain my excitement.  To give you an idea of how I felt inside…picture me doing this.  I was kind of confused and upset that Ben had final say over who plays the machine, but overall it was an awesome Xmas.  Mario 64 marathons continued for years.  Super Smash Bros, Donkey Kong 64, Mario Kart 64, Banjo Kazooie, and Star Fox 64 were extremely well received in the Lugo household.  The N64 got played throughout High School and well into college.

When I moved out, I had to leave the N64 at home because ultimately it wasn’t mine take.  My roommate Brad had a Nintendo 64 though and a new brand of competition began in 2002 when we started playing NFL Blitz 2000.  My social life hindered me from enjoying adventure games and I turned into a casual multi-playing social gamer.

Chapter 5:  Damn, I’m broke.

By 2002, I was waist deep in college and struggling to pay rent with my puny little part time job pay check.  I had met my future wife and was trying to get moved to Hattiesburg and somehow acquire a Gamecube.  Two auctions on eBay were a bust, one being broken on receipt and the other never arriving at all.  Clutching my girlfriend, all my worldly possessions and my unused copy of Super Smash Bros. Melee I moved to H-burg, hoping to get a job and somehow feed my Nintendo fix.  Finally, for Christmas 2003 Jackie gets me the Gamecube Zelda bundle (It contains Legend of Zelda, Link’s Adventure, Ocarina of Time, and Majora’s Mask.)

The Gamecube, reinvigorates my interest in adventure single player titles.  Super Mario Sunshine, Star Fox Adventures, and the The Legend of Zelda: The Windwaker proved to be hours upon hours of fun.  The Zelda Bundle that came with the system shows me how great Zelda is and that solidified my gamerdom.  The next chapter is my absolute favorite.

Chapter 6:  The hunt begins.

Finally, by 2005 I had worked my way into a position where I had some extra money.  I immediately explored my impending Nintendo options.  Between the years of 2005 and 2006 I happened upon several portable Nintendo systems.  First I got a Game Boy Advance at Wal-mart the day after Thanksgiving.  It was a soccer mom war and my buddy Trey was able to come out of the pile with a Light Blue Game Boy Advance SP.  At first I was hesitant to buy another hand held system because of the sedated reaction I had to the original Game Boy.  The Legend of Zelda: The Minish Cap, eased those worries.

Wal-mart ran a similar sale on the Game Boy Micro the following year.  I then got a Game Boy Color off eBay in a huge lot of game systems that I won.  I decided to keep it because I didn’t have one.  About three months later I saw a Game Boy Pocket on eBay for $5 and I couldn’t pass it up.  There I am with 5 different versions of the Game Boy.  By this time Jackie and I are living together alone and I am able to bring all my old gaming systems out of the closets they were hidden in and start playing some classic stuff.  I replaced the pin connector in my NES which made it like new again, and I was well on my way to building an arsenal of Nintendo systems.  I picked up a DS Lite on release date and rejoiced as I played through New Super Mario Bros.

With all of this Nintendo fandom oozing from my apartment it was hard to believe that one system was missing, the hugely unpopular, eye sight ruining, neck cramping, goggle look-a-liking pimple of a system the Virtual Boy.  I set my sights on one on eBay and BAM the collection was pretty much complete.  Seeing that Jackie didn’t leave me during this weird ass period of my life, I married her in late 2006.  Next up…Wii!!!!

Chapter 7:  Hey, get your hands off my Wii!

The Wii launched November 2006.  Everyone knows how hard it was to get.  I didn’t get one on release date because it was too hard to find but Carl did get one, so I bought a controller (that’s right I dropped $40 on a controller for a system that I didn’t even own yet) and got to playing Wii Sports.  I was really, really excited!  For an idea of how excited…see the Nintendo 64 video above.

I ended up getting a Wii for Christmas after Jackie tricked me into thinking she hadn’t gotten one.  I took the Wii to my parent’s house that Christmas Eve, and we played it for hours.  I have been playing titles like The Legend of Zelda: Twilight Princess, Super Smash Bros Brawl Metroid Prime 3 and Super Mario Galaxy frantically ever since.  With the Wii purchased there is no major Nintendo console for me to pine over for probably the next 3-4 years.  What shall I do?

Chapter 8:  Ok, this is getting excessive.

Since my initial purchases of a GBA and a DS Lite I have picked up a Pink counterpart of each for my wife and I grabbed the NES styled GBA.  What more could I possibly want…well, the classic sideways GBA caught my eye on eBay and thanks a too a broke cousin I was able to knock out that one as well.  So that puts my total at 2 Game Boys, 1 Game Boy Color, 1 Game Boy Micro, 1 Virtual Boy, 4 Game Boy Advances, and 2 DS Lites.  Maybe I’ll stalk down an original DS and that new DSi looks enticing.

Well, before I’m done, I ask.  Is there something wrong with me?  In addition to all these systems I have hundreds of games for them, and this is just Nintendo.  My complete collection is way bigger than this.  At least no one can say that I don’t have a hobby.