Episode 1 - What Happened To Fun?

I created this ... thing... last night in kind of a tired tizzy. That’s right, I said tizzy. Re-reading my "mission statement" nothing I said was a lie. While this morning I thought about going off on a rant about (I shouldn’t use about twice in one sentence) the two new consoles coming out in the next few weeks and how it will effect the distribution of games and all that... But I don’t want this to be a place where I rant about things. I'd like to have informed opinions. So I will go on in that route...

Nintendo. What can I say. Where once they played the same game as Sony and Microsoft (and Sega, we cant forget about them) Nintendo now has created its own game by itself. I think this was a logical step for Nintendo. If you look at most of their first party games most of them fit everything the Wii represents. Mario Kart, Mario Party, SSB… all are games that anyone (even girls... eww gross) can play regardless of weather or not they are "hardcore" gamers. Even with the more recent creation of First Party games on the DS they are fun and innovative. Mario vs. DK, and Mario Hoops are completely different games. Neither of which are easy, but both to are extremely fun.

Fun isn’t a word that I see in too many game reviews any more. They say things like Difficult or complex controls (i’m looking at you GRAW) or epic. None of these are bad things but what happened to fun?

When I think back on my childhood I think of the fun games that I played on my Nintendo and Super Nintendo. Games that I can still play now (if I beat up my Nintendo) and enjoy myself quite a bit. I’m not going to pretend I lived in the dark ages and say things like “it was amazing just to have the little man move on the screen,” because that’s bullshit and you know it.

Nintendo made wholesome games; even the games that were edgy for the time were pretty wholesome. Maybe this was because of limited space and technology, but I like to believe that it was a conscious decision. One based on the foundation of fun. The music combined with the sense of adventure really made the whole experience fun. Maybe the nostalgia is warping my brain but I cannot recall any games that scared me. Maybe because there weren’t enough colors and textures at the time (unless Gannon scared you at the end of the first Zelda… I could see that).

But lets talk for serious. The whole idea of playing a game of any kind is to have fun. I’m not saying team slayer in Halo on line isn’t fun, oh it is, but it’s a different kind of fun. Fun should not be frustrating, it should be liberating. That is what Nintendo has done. Nintendo has liberated people. Given them the option of what kind of games they want to play. While Sony and Microsoft cater to the “hardcore” (that word will be discussed in depth on tomorrows episode…) gamers Nintendo appeals to the child in everyone. It is as simple as that.