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Platforming perfection

On October 23, 1988, Mario series creator Shigeru Miyamoto and his crack team of Nintendo EAD ninjas released Super Mario Bros. 3 in Japan. To coincide with its US launch 16 months later, Nintendo produced a commercial featuring kids clamoring for the game like it was the second coming of Christ. The hype was intense, and it worked exceedingly well. The game went on to exceed the first one in sales, fandom, and legendary status. Mario and the crew had undeniably hit their stride.

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Thank you, Brad, Vinny, and Alex.

Welcome to another episode of Nerds Without Pants! Wait, that sounds like a hackey YouTube intro. Hey, welcome back here with another video! Like, what else would it be? It’s a video platform, you don’t need to point out it’s a video. Also, take it down like, 8 notches. You’re talking about video games, not the second coming. Anyway, it doesn’t matter what I put here because no one reads the show notes. VIDEO GAMES!

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An exercise in futility.

After playing Duck Hunt as a child in 1987, I became an instant fan of Nintendo's Zapper peripheral. There was something magical about pointing the orange & grey gun at the screen and seeing the game respond to my attempts at shooting the waterfowl flying about. As the years passed, I played other enjoyable Zapper games like Hogan's Alley, Wild Gunman, and Barker Bill's Trick Shooting. After such great experiences, I was convinced that all Nintendo-developed light gun games were as good as the previous ones I played. "They can do no wrong!" I said—famous last words of a naive fool.

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Sinister Geometry

The original PlayStation console opened new doors of innovation in game development. Its hardware capabilities gave designers greater freedom to present fresh experiences from well-established genres. And in some cases, it would attract outsiders that previously had no background in game development at all. Such was the case with Masahiko Sato- known for his brilliant TV commercials produced in Japan (and a bevy of other talents). Though not a game designer by trade, he created Intelligent Qube- a new type of block puzzle game to challenge curious minds.

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As Told by Gunpei

The Game Boy- created by the late Gunpei Yokoi- was Nintendo's first handheld system to mix the portability of the Game & Watch with the seemingly infinite possibilities of interchangeable cartridges.  Although Tetris was the pack-in game with every unit, Nintendo still wanted to have at least one title in the 1989 launch lineup that their consumer base would instantly recognize.

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