Mario Madness

I love video games. I just adore them. And in particular, I adore old video games. That's why I really love my wii.

You see, when I fire up an old NES or SNES game, I'm instantly transformed into me at age 11. OR 14. Or even 22, depending on the game. But seriously, the nostalgic effect of video games is wonderful to me. On a lot of levels, old console games are simply more fun than the new games that I play, console or computer. They just are. I can't explain it, but sometimes when you take away all of the gaudy flash and realism and you make the game a simple mechanic of move + jump + fire, the result is much more fun and relaxing.

Then again, it can be incredibly frustrating. I won't deny that I had my fair share of controller tosses and the like at ages 11 - 22. It happens.

I'll get back to that. I had a wonderful and fun, albeit low-key, NYE. Kerry and I did the hotel thing again this year, and it was a very good time. After my awful hangover from last Sunday, I decided to take it easy on NYE. And easy I took it. I drank more mountain dew than beer, and I was still able to go to sleep at 12:30. I woke up blissfully clear-headed.

Gwen had a huge nap yesterday afternoon, because she had been up late with my parents. Kerry decided to match Gwen nap-for-nap, which left me with a wonderful three hours of doing whatever the heck I wanted. This is where I get back to video games.

I looked through a couple of the old school gems on my Wii, and decided on a little Ninja Gaiden. I got bored with that rather quickly, and saw Super Mario Bros 3 staring at me...taunting me. I decided to make it my mission to go through the entire game. Every single level.

See, with other mario games like Super Mario World or Mario 64, going through every level ain't no big thing. You can save your game and go back to it at any time. Historically, with Mario 3 (and 2 and 1), completing every level was much more of an undertaking. Especially 3.

There's a reason that 3 is even harder to accomplish in this fashion than 2 or 1: 1 and 2 are very linear. If you don't warp, then you go through the game in essentially a straight line from point A to point B. Mario 3 introduced the overworld them, wherein you can go either this way or that way, and you often don't have to do every level in a world in order to get to the airship at the end. (Super Mario World continued the overworld theme, with even more levels, but see my previous comment on the ability to save).

Yeah, well things are different now. Now, when I turn my wii off and go back to the game, I'm in the same place that I was before. Mua ha ha.

So anyway, I've gone through worlds 1 through 5 thus far, and I've beaten every level available to me. It's been wonderful, and will be for the remaining three levels.

Also, that may seem like cheating, because I can now essentially save. To that, I must answer that once upon a time, Corey and I took it upon ourselves to go through every single level of Super Mario Brothers 1, 2, and 3 in one day. Pretty much one sitting. We did this on a 15-inch TV in my grandparents' bedroom. That was hardcore.