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Printer-Friendly ModeVideo games not a preferred pastime for every guy
September 21, 2009 —
It’s time for me to come clean about something. It’s such an improbable revelation that I can envision no outcome other than the Associated Press catching wind of it and bumping what would then seem like trivial health care reform stories off the front page.
I don’t like video games.
I wouldn’t go so far as to say I hate video games. “Hate” is a strong term that should only be reserved for select travesties such as long lines, yellow Starbursts and Fox News.
To get to the root of this violation of the young man’s handbook, you have to go back to the days when the original Nintendo Entertainment System was king.
Any kid wanting to dodge social ridicule owned an NES or at the very least had access to one. My brother and I shared joint custody of one, though I usually assumed the role of spectator any time the system was actually on.
That’s because I was absolutely terrible at almost any game we jammed into the system. Terrible things happened any time that controller wound up in my hands.
While my brother and his friends sent Mario off to complete adventures in the clouds or on battleships, I struggled to get that poor plumber much further than midway through the second level. I must’ve held an unofficial record for sending Mario to his plunging demise.
I’ve admired the great strides the industry has taken since its eight-bit, two-dimensional beginnings. But I’ve rarely been able to shake the feeling that for the most part, video games are a tremendous drain on time.
That doesn’t mean I didn’t spend many dateless nights in high school mastering my Mario Kart 64 skills. But when push came to shove, I was usually too aware of the hours piling up. Or in the worst cases, I wasn’t aware at all.
One Christmas, I made the brilliant decision to buy my brother the new Donkey Kong 64 game. Had I gone a different way and bought him something practical such as a nice robe or war bonds, we could’ve avoided the mess that unfolded.
But I didn’t and when the dust settled, we had barely made a dent in the game’s gigantic mission, he nearly suffered a Donkey Kong-induced mental breakdown and I looked up and wondered where my two weeks off from school went.
Even universal sensations such as the Wii and Guitar Hero provide only temporary entertainment for me.
While I credit Nintendo for coaxing gamers off their couches or out of their gaming chairs (because we all know someone who has one) and making them simulate activities such as tennis and bowling, it raises the question, “Why not just go do the real thing?” Like most people my age, I went through a Guitar Hero phase. And then it struck me that if I invested as much time into a real instrument as I was with the game, I could probably reel off a pretty mean rendition of “Carry on Wayward Son” on an actual guitar. Plus my inability to get my pinky over to the orange button with any regularity ensured that I’d never be a true guitar hero.
Naturally, my dislike for most video games has led to some awkward moments with friends and left certain events foreign to me.
I’ve never staked out a GameStop at midnight to buy the new Madden or bought a case of Mountain Dew in anticipation of a Halo game.
Maybe that will change one day. But I probably need to get Mario to the third level before that happens.