Fuck Video Games (Vol. 1)

The more astute among you will know that I'm not saying any of this to be somehow "contrary", to hate the thing everybody loves. Shit man, I was looking forward to Brawl as much as the next guy: even denied myself access to the "Dojo", a sly marketing technique on Nintendo's part whereby details of the game were steadily leaked until... well, practically everything was known. Naw man, I was already sold as a seasoned (if unprofessional) Melee veteran looking to Recapture the Glory. It's happened before, you know. Mario Galaxy was really fun, but --

-- but I don't play it, Mr. Miyamoto, I don't play it. That's a problem! If I'm looking for a good Mario game I'll dust off my N64 and look to "The Nineties", thank you! Leave my forwarding address with that elusive rabbit and take that Castle Secret Slide straight down to the fuckin' No Doubt concert! Starfuckers!

So is it the same with Brawl? Is it permanently overshadowed by Melee? No. The problem with nostalgia, Mr. Miyamoto, is that it's impossible to feel nostalgia for nostalgia. Brawl is a self-addressed Nintendo love letter more than a "game", that's no secret, but

any future love letters to Brawl will need to be addressed to its "original" properties, almost all of which find their way from down an inbred family tree beginning with the original "Game of '99", most of which were simply tacked on by HAL so as to minimally interfere with the Core Element: the Nintendo property.

Here's what that leaves us with: a cynical "self" that self-references a self-referencing self. Gaaame over! CONTINUE?

So I guess that's why I find myself playing Vampire: The Masquerade - Bloodlines again this week instead of partaking in the expected Brawl honeymoon. A lot of stomping can and should be done about this game, criminally ignored for being simultaneously rushed and ahead of its time, its many bugs corrected over the years by understandably-dedicated fans. But that's for its own article. Why's Bloodlines so hot? It ain't a video game, kids... it's a supremely successful film! Suck it!



Does It Offend You, Yeah? "Modern" video games are successful when they try their best to be totally transparent, to suck to the lies (if you will) of another medium altogether. Bloodlines for film, Rock Band for music... even No More Heroes, at first seemingly a celebration of "video gaming", is actually the product of mid-nineties Otaku culture: Japan looking at America while America looked at Japan. Shit went down.

And it's appropriate NMH should look longingly to the nineties, just as Brawl does: as attempted celebrations of gaming, they can only celebrate the past. What of "gamer gaming", then? The Legend of Zelda: Ocarina of Time, Super Mario 64 and Metal Gear Solid killed the practice to such an extent that it now consists hollowly of macho-shit-wankfests and bleary-eyed double-nostalgia trips. Hm... I'll take that to go, thanks! See ya in Gears of War tonight?

Fuck video games.