Daniel85

Despite being universally hailed as one of the most frustrating games of all time, the original TMNT game on the NES does have one thing going for it: the instruction manual is a work of literary genius.

Just read the introductory prose piece:

PREPARE TO SHELL OUT SOME PUNISHMENT

Steam rises from Wall Street sewers like hot breath from a pack of wild dogs. Just below the pavement’s puddle strewn surface, the Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles (TM) have gathered around the leftovers of a family-reunion-sized sausage pizza with extra sauce. Usually these party dudes would inhale the mozzarella platter as if it were the last “‘za” on Earth, but not tonight.

You see, only hours ago, their trusted friend, April (TM), was kidnapped from her mobile news van by the vile, ruthless, terrorist bully SHREDDER (TM)! He’s a Slice-O-Matic crum, a villain more vicious than an army of mind altered Bruce Lees.

With their lovely cohort held hostage, the fearless foursome must concoct a way to rescue April before Shredder brain washes her into joining his Ninjitsu Foot Clan. They’ll combine this treacherous task with the mission they’ve been on since their mutated beginnings- to thrash Shredder and capture his Life Transformer Gun, the lone piece of technology that can turn their rat friend, Splinter (TM), back into the man he used to be.

So take control of these heroes in a half shell, and either claim total victory over New York’s premier Kick Man… or lead them onto the menu at McTurtles (Home of the Quarter Flounder with Cheese).

Brilliant! The first paragraph, anyway. Puddles, steam, sewers, pizza! It’s totally Turtles. ‘Turtles’ is actually an adjective that describes just how reminscent of TMNT a street, building, or urban tableau is. You should all start using it in everyday conversation. Example: “Melbourne Central is pretty Turtles. I half expect to be jumped by a group of Foot Soldiers every time I wait for the 3:09 to Glen Waverley.”

But yeah, that first paragraph is masterly. It paints such a grim, foreboding portrait. The Turtles don’t wanna eat pizza? What’samatterthem?!

Some of the terms are pretty questionable, though. Hands up if you’ve ever heard the slang term “‘za” for pizza? How do you even say that? Is it “zah” or “tsah”?

And what the hell is a “Kick Man”? It sounds like a generic enemy from a side-scrolling beat-em-up like Double Dragon or something. Yeah, you got Kick Men, Punch Men, those gay Cartwheel Men…

The McTurtles thing is just silly. I think maybe Michael J Fox’s coked-up writer character from Bright Lights, Big City got a job writing manual copy for Konami. Why would they serve a Quarter Flounder at McTurtles anyway? It’s fish, and the real McDonald’s already has the Filet-O-Fish, so it’s not that much of a stretch. God, I know it’s only for kids, and kids are dumb, but JESUS. That is the worst pun ever, based on the most tenuous analogical link the writer could make.

To go from that brilliant first paragraph to ‘Quarter Flounder with Cheese’… I just don’t understand it. Couldn’t he just have fallen back on the old standby ‘Turtle soup’ line? I’m mad.

Ah, Julian Foord. ‘Hooly’ to some. ‘Sir’ to everyone else.

I believe Lewis Carroll said it best when he wrote:

He would joke with hyenas, returning their stare
   With an impudent wag of the head:
And he once went a walk, paw-in-paw, with a bear,
   “Just to keep up its spirits,” he said.

(From The Hunting Of The Snark)

I won’t say ‘good luck’, Hooly, because Holden hates it when people say that. I will expect you to call out ’sleep tight, ya morons!’ in your residence at least once in the middle of the night, though.

I just did this cos it’s cheaper than a text message.

So the Australian launch date and price for the Nintendo Wii have been announced. It’s coming out on December 7, and will set you back $399.95. (That’s compared to the PS3 which is tentatively scheduled for March 2007, and will cost a ridiculous $829 for just the basic package… $1000 for the premium set-up). It doesn’t take a genius to see that Nintendo is in a very good position to gain some serious ground on Sony in this new generation of the console wars. 

I’ll admit that I’m an unabashed Nintendo fanboy, and it has pained me to see Nintendo slip so much in market share this decade. I’ve been trying to look beyond the fanboy haze, though, to examine just what it is that I like about Nintendo so much, and why I support the company so ardently.

I think that there is a certain simplicity and communality that Nintendo brings to video gaming that harks back to the Golden Age of kids flocking to arcades to play Space Invaders, or loungeroom Pong contests on Atari and Intellivision. Before gaming became a largely antisocial pasttime, that is.

I’ve never really been into Xbox, partly because of the Halo effect. I love violence in games as much as the next guy, but that’s all Microsoft has. No Halo, no Xbox.

The PS2, on the other hand, is a system I’ve had to grudgingly admit my love for. It’s the NES of this generation of consoles, and I don’t think I really have to explain the comparison. One of the things I’ve been most impressed with are the innovations in peripheral gaming in the final days of the PS2, with stuff like the EyeToy, Singstar, and Guitar Hero breathing new life into the system and providing for good old-fashioned communal fun.

I’ve always thought that Sony and Microsoft are more concerned with pushing the technological envelope (brute system power), while Nintendo is more interested in gameplay. It’s this philosophy that saw the simple Game Boy completely dominate the hand-held market for more than ten years, even in the face of vastly technologically superior competitors. 

Further, Sony and especially Microsoft seem to go for the hardcore gamers, while one of the major emphases of the Wii is its simplicity and accessibility to new gamers. This reminds me of the state that the comics industry is in at the moment, with its insulated in-crowd mentality having turned it into a fatal ourobouros with dismal prospects for the future. The simple message of this is that if you create an elite, closed-off customer base, you are doomed to failure.

Actually, that’s what could have happened to Nintendo– the GameCube was basically a system for fans of Nintendo’s first-party franchises, and that’s no way to market a console. It’s lucky that Nintendo is still around for another shot at hardware, cos if they went software-only like Sega, I think I’d die. Seeing a Mario game on PS3 or Xbox 360 would be too much for this fanboy to take.      

Anyway, I’ve ranted for too long. I better give it up now before I start frothing at the mouth.

Long live video games.

(Oh, and that lovely 80s image at the top is from the box of the NES Action Set. It pretty much sums up my sentimental, schmaltzy feelings about Nintendo. Look how fuckin’ happy Colonel Potter and his family are to be playing Mario!)

The caravan park where my grandparents’ holiday house lies is one of those more up-scale affairs, which kind of defeats the purpose for me. I like tacky caravan parks, with broken signs and thirty year old vending machines. One of the good things about holidaying at dodgy caravan parks and motels is that after a couple of days you forget all about the crappy life you wanted to escape from for a week or two, and just can’t wait to get back to it.

But anyway, regardless of how nice the gardens and hygienic the communal toilets, this place was pretty boring. There’s a rule that you have to over 55 to live in the park (I’m not making this up), and because it’s not summer holiday season, there were no holidaymakers there. So it was just me and the seniors.

The good thing about this is that when I discovered the games room (about halfway through my stay), I had it all to myself.

The idea of arcade games at caravan parks appeals to me, cos of how the movie The Last Starfighter. Unfortunately, I didn’t get recruited by Star League, but I did get to waste my hard-earned on the couple of machines that held any interest to me.

It’s a good thing there was no-one else around, actually, cos otherwise I probably would’ve felt too creepy taking photos of a games room.

Pretty standard fare in there. From left to right: Hook pinball, Strikers 1945, Sunset Riders, X-Men vs Street Fighter, unknown out of commission game, another Sunset Riders, and Final Lap 3.

Oh, and that sign up on the far wall?

Half the fun of arcades is stuffing your face with Cheetos and slamming down Pepsi while playing Mortal Kombat or something.

The machine I was most interested in playing was Hook pinball, cos Hook is one of my favourite movies.

I suck at pinball, but I think I got my dollar’s worth in the light-up eyes on the skull. And at least now I can say I’ve played the NES, SNES, and pinball versions of Hook.

The only other game in the room that interested me was X-Men versus Street Fighter.

Aww jeah. Two of the biggest franchises of the 90s, thrown into combat most mortal.

The X-Men in this game were based off the animated series, which makes sense considering how huge that show was in the day.

My line up was:

Wolverine and Gambit! Could it get any more 90s?

Choosing Wolverine was a no-brainer; the guy fights like a mofo. His character animation there looks like he’s taking a humongous crap, though. And Gambit… well, I ain’t the biggest fan, but I love playing as him in games cos he gets to throw those charged playing cards. Tell me that ain’t several kinds of awesome.

I got sent up against Cammy and Rogue in the first round, and they kicked my guys’ asses.