Gaming, Donkey Kong, and XBLA
Recently, someone pointed me to this video on YouTube and it got me thinking about my gaming history...
In my early years, I was never a big arcade game player. My parents just didn't believe it was a worthwhile way to spend my time. (Sadly, we had neither an Atari nor an Intellivision, so I didn't get to play those cool Activision titles.) My limited exposure to arcade games was at my weekly bowling league or at pizza parties, after soccer games...but I mostly just watched...since quarters weren't in large supply. Also, the games that were around at that time were most of the "classics": Space Invaders, Asteroids, and a new game called Pac Man.
So while I got to see, and play a bit, my real love and exposure to gaming came when our family got our first computer, an Apple II+. It was primarily for "educational purposes", but after 30 minutes of typing I got 30 minutes of gaming. I played games on a green screen for hours upon end.
Games like:
Still, with regards to the arcade, things didn't change for me until I walked away with a *full-size* Donkey Kong machine from a raffle at the local bowling alley. (And just so we're clear, Scott/Kevin, I didn't just walk away with it, I was the actual winner.) Sure, it wasn't the newest game by the time I got my hands on it, but it was *huge* and it was *free*! (And it had a cool cigarette burn near one of the buttons.) New friends came out of the woodwork to just come over to the house and play DK in the garage. (If you're wondering if I still have the machine, the answer would be a disappointing "no". I "sold it" to a family friend who was moving out of state...in order to help his kids make new friends...for only $100...boy do I miss it...)
So, fast forward to today, and it should come as no surprise that I absolutely *love* XBOX Live Arcade (XBLA). Not only is my chance to "get back" at mom and dad, but it's also just good clean fun (without utensils). In fact, I didn't even realize how much I liked it until I had to re-download all my purchases to my new Elite system. And the final count ended up at more than 25 games! Not only have I purchased some great oldies (still no DK), but some of the new stuff is pretty original, and *all* of it is amazing compared to the "standards" set in the seventies.
All that said, I'm still looking for my DK fix, but I doubt it's coming anytime soon to the XBOX. I guess this is always an option...yeah...right!