My generation was the first to have video games in our lives. We were the first to marvel at the pixels jumping around on our screens. We had Space Invaders, Pac-Man, and mall arcades as far as the eye could see. We consumed as much as we possibly could with the money earned from either doing chores around the house, or from getting good grades in school. It was a treat to pop in a quarter and watch our favorite characters come to life. It was a glorious time as home consoles were introduced, we received cartridges for Christmas or birthdays, and our friends got to come over and see what new game you got. Then, we got greedy. Suddenly, these pixels weren’t good enough, and we demanded the next generation of games to deliver on promises we made to ourselves in our minds. Has it happened? Have we reached the precipice of our graphical desires?
I was that kid. You know, that kid that tugged on dad’s shirt asking for a quarter when seeing an arcade game at the grocery store. Video games have been in my life since birth, so I was no stranger to the joystick and push buttons. I was clearing levels in Donkey Kong by the age of four, and I knew every map in Pac-Man by the age of six. Every trip to visit my uncle’s house meant I got to play his shiny Atari 2600. I had that cool uncle who would show me how to play the games, regale me with crazy stories, and let me watch “Conan The Destroyer” with him. Atari video games were amazing, and I could care less about blocky pixels. To me those weren’t blocks; they were Pac-Man, a spaceship, and a warrior, heroes that I controlled.
The first time I’d ever touched a Nintendo Entertainment System was in the electronics department of Sears. They had a set up with one game, Excitebike. I played that game over and over. The ugly blocks were gone, replaced by a better quality of pixelated blocks that actually looked like something. I didn’t have to use my imagination anymore, in my face was a dirt track, a guy on a motorcycle, ramps, and mud traps. This was amazing! All I could do for the next few weeks was talk about how amazing this thing was.
It wasn’t until my eighth birthday that I was actually able to finally get my own Nintendo. I had the new hotness that everyone I knew raved about. Super Mario, Link, Samus Aran, Mega Man, and Kid Icarus all became my new best friends. Thanks to video rental places, trading with friends, and the occasional gifted game, I was able to make friends with lots of other lesser-known characters. Bayou Billy, Thomas from Kung Fu, Little Mac, Kin Corn Karn, Billy Lee, and the Battletoads all became my friends as well. I didn’t think anything could ever top the Nintendo Entertainment System. Sonic the Hedgehog proved me wrong.
Sega Genesis debuted in 1989. Sonic the Hedgehog was everyone’s introduction into the 16-bit era. The graphics were better than anything I’d ever seen. Since Sega had a two-year jump on Nintendo as far as consoles went, they pounded their rival company to the ground. “Sega does what Nintendon’t” was one of Sega’s slogans, as was “Welcome to the Next Level.” Sega Genesis didn’t just have prettier graphics, they had something I had only seen in the arcades, and that was voice. “Holy crap! The game is talking to me!” Granted, Intellivision’s Space Spartans was the first game to use voice. Also, Bad Dudes on NES had a clip claiming, “I am bad!” It wasn’t until Altered Beast that I clearly heard a voice in a console game talking to me. “Rise from your grave,” and “Welcome to your doom,” both became iconic sounds. Sega used this to their advantage when selling their new game system to the market. Also, Sega knew that their audience was getting a little older, and could probably handle more heavier themed content, such as Altered Beast, Streets of Rage, Golden Axe, Shinobi, and red blood in their Mortal Kombat port.
The 16-bit era of video games opened the floodgates for the console wars. Not only was Nintendo battling Sega, but Turbo Grafx also became a thing; as well as Neo Geo, 3DO, Phillips Cd-I, and a slew of other fly-by night operations. The schoolyard conversations about video games were no longer about difficulty in games or high scores; the talking points suddenly became “how good are the graphics?” After a few years Sega’s constant need to stay on top of the graphic trends lead them to a point where they were reduced to nothing but a barely adrift wooden raft in a sea of fully armed and loaded naval vessels. The big console hubbub soured me on video games, at least for a few years.
A few months into high school is when the Sony PlayStation was released. I went to a friend’s house to play some of his games, and they blew everything out of the water. I thought Sega and Nintendo were both done at that point. After the failure of the Sega CD and the Sega 32X, all that company was to me was a discarded box of tangled cords, cables and controllers sitting in the a corner. Sony PlayStation was beyond anything I had ever seen. Resident Evil was the first “horror” game to ever actually give me a fright. Previous games of that genre did nothing but anger me with their unbelievable difficulty and lack of explanation. Resident Evil actually succeeded in an area that had been previously reserved for movies and books. Both Sega Saturn and Nintendo 64 paled in comparison to the power of the Sony PlayStation and what it could do. Then, Psycho Mantis appeared in Metal Gear Solid and blew my mind with the now classic memory card trick he did. I won’t go into how amazing full motion video was at the time. I paraphrased George Costanza and shouted “video games are back, baby!”
Then we got greedy. I could almost pinpoint the moment it happened for me. Sitting in my friend’s apartment, he popped in the Metal Gear Solid 2 demo he had received for Sony PlayStation 2. He said he wanted to show me something. The game loaded up and he showed me one of the coolest things ever, it was raining in the game. Solid Snake put his night vision goggles on, and raindrops fell onto the goggles. That was the most amazing thing I had ever witnessed in my entire life. Video games did it again! At the time I had a Sega Dreamcast, and while some of the games were impressive, none of them did what Sony PlayStation 2 did. Holy cow! I had suddenly been pulled back into the world of video games.
From there all I read was a sense of entitlement from gamers. Every game had to be the best graphics wise or else they weren’t buying it. Games had to be a certain frame-rate or else it was terrible. Games were given bad scores simply because they weren’t as pretty as people wanted. Call of Duty. Grand Theft Auto. Halo. Gears of War. These games and their respective franchises came and went, some being lauded for their graphic achievements, while other lesser-known franchises were spited because they weren’t up to par. I once read a review where the author mentioned, “these look like PlayStation 2 graphics.” I wanted to scream out like the tour guide in the movie The Wizard: “Please, sit down and have fun! Just, just sit down and have fun…”
I, as an old school gamer born in 1980, have luckily noticed a trend. Classic Pixelated games have been making a comeback, if not on consoles then on iOS and other mobile platforms. It started with games like Mega Man 9, Bionic Commando: Rearmed, and the much talked about Sword & Sworcery. In fact, one of the most celebrated games of the decade is the much talked about Fez, which has as its playground a 2D pixelated world, creatively meshed with a 3D universe. Independent developers have singlehandedly seen to it that games without awe inspiring graphics can be just as good, if not better than, big budget games.
While gamers who love their graphics continue to be a thing, it no longer dominates gaming discussions as it once did. Graphics are a rather passé thing to me. Yes, video games continue to blow my mind with what they can do. Soon virtual reality systems like Oculus Rift will be released, and my jaw will be dropped once again. The 21st century brought us some of the craziest graphics we’ve ever seen. Whether the complaining and the entitlement is the fault of my generation or the one that came after, it doesn’t matter. I love video games. I love controlling my character across the screen. I love going on quests. I love solving puzzles. I love party games and multiplayer games. I love couch co-op games. I love the immersive online experience that comes with Xbox. I love PlayStation’s never say die attitude. I love Nintendo Wii U for allowing me to go back in time to when life was simpler and all I had to do was collect coins and stomp on Goomba. Here I sit, 34 years old, and video games continue to amaze me in ways I never thought possible.