Push-Start’s Top Gaming Moments – Issue # 2
Breaking bones, first kisses, learning to drive; all monumental moments in our lives. These moments also come to those who involve themselves in entertainment. Shakespeare’s novels, Alfred Hitchcock’s films and Carly Rae Jepsen’s Call Me Maybe all leave an impression on people (okay, maybe the last one is just me). Video games have been present in various forms for over 60 years now and they’ve become increasingly popular since the 1980’s, so, to quote Push-Start’s own Tom Collins, picking three moments out of three decades of gaming is not an easy thing to articulate and you can read what his choices were right here.
It would be impossible for me to count how many games I’ve played, let alone how many of these moments I’ve experienced. You can suddenly be immersed into a game by its soundtrack, or the cunningness of its villain, or maybe you’re just enjoying the freedom of an open world. What I’m trying to put forward is that every gamer will have their gaming “moments” and they’ll be unique to them, which is great. It’s what I love about this hobby, people are so passionate about it, sometimes too passionate, but we all have a laugh and share these experiences with each other. I could go on for hours about why I love games, but I’m here for a reason, my top three gaming moments. So, without further ado.
Gaming Moment #3 (GoldenEye 007) – Multiplayer
If you’re a first person shooter fanatic and don’t know about Rare’s 1997 masterpiece, you’re not worthy of the controller you use. It’s hard to say something about Goldeneye 007 that hasn’t already been said, it’s a milestone in video games, much like Pong, Pacman, Super Mario Bros. and Doom before it. If a modern FPS player were to play this game today, they wouldn’t appreciate what it did to the genre, because almost every game that came after copied its model. I could go on about how it’s the greatest game based off a movie of all time, how it still holds up relatively well today and still managed to sounds great, but the one thing that impresses me the most, was only developed in six weeks and without Nintendo’s knowledge. The multiplayer.
Some games in 2013 don’t match up to the multiplayer depth that GoldenEye 007 provided in 1997. This was an era before online multiplayer and, well, console multiplayer was really a new concept. Few other games at that point in time provided the same experience that GoldenEye did, Mario Kart 64 was probably its closest neighbour. GoldenEye had four-player multiplayer, several different weapons ranging from pistols to machine guns to mines, tons of different characters, levels and the ability to change the scenarios, ranging from You Only Live Twice (two deaths and game over) to Man with The Golden Gun (get points by killing opponents with the golden gun). This level of customisation is still missing from recent games, often later added in as DLC of which you are charged a pretty penny.
Also sorely missing from more recent games, cheat codes. Grand Theft Auto has shown that cheat codes can be fun and GoldenEye did it too, big head mode, floating guns, paintball mode. They all added to the experience, all made it fun. Shooting the corpse of my brother’s dead character, whilst enabling paintball mode to make him look like a piece of contemporary art made us all laugh. We were all in the room together, playing together and there was nothing else like it at the time.
Of course, the single player campaign was absolutely fantastic too, the entire game in fact, just brilliant. What Rare accomplished at the time is mind-blowing, GoldenEye 007 is one of the primary reasons why so many long for the Rare of old to come back and create something similar.
Oh, and Slappers only, no Oddjob.
“For England, James?”
“No, for me.”
Gaming Moment #2 (Metal Gear Solid) – Ending
“A strong man doesn’t need to read the future, he makes his own.” This and so many other quotes from Metal Gear Solid have shaped my life. I have never looked up to celebrities or an athlete, Solid Snake was my idol and every single time I play this game, I have a new sense of understanding about life, war, or politics, or even love. Initially I played this game first when I was probably around ten years old, and I make sure to go through it at least once every year, learning something new every time I do. But the real reason I love this game so much? It was the first game to make me feel like the protagonist, whether it was the brilliant writing, David Hayter’s exceptional execution of Solid Snake’s voice, the boss fights or even a mixture of it all; I spent the following weeks crouching around my house, stealthily stealing food from the fridge, even trying to imitate Snake’s voice. I didn’t feel like I was spectator to all the action, I felt like I was really the one shooting down Liquid’s helicopter and being tormented by Ocelot’s torture.
The entire Metal Gear Solid series has several awesome moments and if this was a top 10 gaming moments, you can be sure this list would be 50% Metal Gear Solid games. The attention to detail in Metal Gear Solid 2 with bottles that accurately break when you shoot them, ice cubes that melt, frying pans that make different noises when you shoot big and small ones; Metal Gear Solid 3 and its incredible theme song; Metal Gear Solid 4 and its overbearing and unforgettable (for better or for worse) cutscenes. The original stays champion due to the impact it had on me, mainly due to its ending. I’ll leave it below for you all to see.
You mustn’t allow yourself to be chained to fate, to be ruled by your genes. Human beings can choose the kind of life that they want to live. What’s important is that you choose life… and then live.
Of course, it all sounds pretty cheesy in modern times, and it’s the typical “Male protagonist defeats terrorist and saves the girl to ride off into the sunset” cliché you’d find in most contemporary films, but this really hit my pre-teen self like a ton of bricks. Don’t let people tell you what to be, choose your own path in life. That along with so many other themes present in the game, deception, love, genes, fate, family, trust and much more, they taught me how to live my life. Finally, there’s always one quote that I will never forget:
We’re not tools of the government, or anyone else. Fighting was the only thing… the only thing I was good at. But… at least I always fought for what I believed in.
Thank you Kojima, Konami, David Hayter, everyone who worked on this game that I regard as a masterpiece. The first cinematic video game I ever experienced could not have been a better one. All the members of Fox-Hound have their own personalities, the relationship between Snake and the people he calls his allies, the soundtrack, the boss fights, the mind games, plot twists – everything. I’d never completed a game with the feeling I had finishing Metal Gear Solid and until this day, no other game has recreated that feeling, that experience, that conclusion. The culmination of the hours I spent playing this game couldn’t have been better.
Then I played the sequels…that’s a different story for another time.
Super Mario Galaxy might be the finished painting, Super Mario Sunshine may be the paintbrush but Super Mario 64 is the canvas, the easel, the foundation on which almost every 3D platformer would come to use again. I can’t accurately remember how old I was when I first clutched that three-legged controller, slowly shifted my left thumb from the D-Pad to the joystick and had everything I’ve ever known before simultaneously erased from my mind, only to be replaced by that Italian Plumber himself, Mario. I’d gone from precise 2D platformers like Ninja Gaiden, Wonder Boy in Monster Land and of course Super Mario Bros. 3 to suddenly this 3D courtyard. I didn’t know how to use the controller properly, it was new, different, unique. My tiny hands wrapped around the legs of this controller were slipping off due to my palms sweating from excitement, I knew, I just knew that this was the start of something absolutely magical.
I walked around the courtyard, listening to the sound of birds, I climbed up trees, got an extra-life, swam around the water and entered this gigantic castle to collect my cake. I jumped into paintings, raced a turtle and threw the king of Bob-ombs off a mountain. I flew around by putting a hat with wings on my head, then firing myself out a cannon. As a child, that was just the coolest thing I’d ever experienced. I swung Bowser around by his tail, then threw him into a mine! At the time there was nothing else like it, multiple worlds filled with lava, ice, Boos and Stars, so many Stars. 120 in fact, which took me the span of a decade to complete. I had completed the game before, but I never collected every single Star; so when I returned, around 14-15 years old, I collected every last red coin, discovered every secret and found all the Stars. The reward? The ability to use the previously unusable cannon in the courtyard, to which I blasted on to the castle rooftop, found Yoshi and finally completed my quest.
It was in that single moment of time that playing games is what I wanted to do for the rest of my life.
(Writing would come later.)
I still play it to this day, every so often I’ll boot it up and see how quickly I can get 25 stars or I’ll watch a speed-runner exploit the game and I’ll see if I can do the same. Super Mario 64 has become less of a game to me and more of a home. It represents possibly the single best time in my life so far, as sad as that may be to hear. There’s a lot of personal issues that came after that, but in the time of 64, I was young, I wasn’t on gaming forums, I wasn’t aware of a Nintendo and SEGA feud, I wasn’t aware that the PlayStation was outselling the N64, I didn’t know Nintendo were doomed as many proclaimed. I was happy, content and pure, which is why I think that Super Mario 64 is the best gaming moment in my life, because it was also the best moment of my life. I refer to what I said earlier, we all have defining moments in our lives, personal experiences you share with only a few and only tell to certain people.
And me and Mario 64…well, we’re best buddies.
