Month of Video Games: Day 1

I'm going to take an idea from the blog of a friend, which he in turn borrowed from someone else, and write a month's worth of quick posts about video games. He's got a six day head start, and so if I have sufficient time and inspiration, I might try and knock off more than one in a day to try and catch up. My goal of this though, is just to do something that should be quick, relatively easy, and fun to try and kickstart this, since this blog has been festering for a while again, something which I seem to be saying at shorter and shorter intervals. Anyway, here we go:

Scheduled:

Day 1 - Very first video game.
Day 2 - Your favorite character.
Day 3 - A game that is underrated.
Day 4 - Your guilty pleasure game.
Day 5 - Game character you feel you are most like (or wish you were).
Day 6 - Most annoying character.
Day 7 - Favorite game couple.
Day 8 - Best soundtrack.
Day 9 - Saddest game scene.
Day 10 - Best gameplay.
Day 11 - Gaming system of choice.
Day 12 - A game everyone should play.
Day 13 - A game you've played more than 5 times
Day 14 - Current (or most recent) gaming wallpaper.
Day 15 - Post a screenshot from the game you’re playing right now.
Day 16 - Game with the best cut scenes.
Day 17 - Favorite antagonist.
Day 18 - Favorite protagonist.
Day 19 - Picture of a game setting you wish you lived in.
Day 20 - Favorite genre.
Day 21 - Game with the best story.
Day 22 - A game sequel which disappointed you.
Day 23 - Game you think had the best graphics or art style.
Day 24 - Favorite classic game.
Day 25 - A game you plan on playing.
Day 26 - Best voice acting.
Day 27 - Most epic scene ever.
Day 28 - Favorite game developer.
Day 29 - A game you thought you wouldn’t like, but ended up loving.
Day 30 - Your favorite game of all time

Day 1 - Very first video game(s).

The first games I have real memory of are old DOS and Commodore 64 games. Here's a couple that I can remember relatively clearly and that the internet acknowledges the existence of.

Gorf

As is probably pretty clear, Gorf (I remember one night my golf-obsessed uncle coming over for some sort of family function, saying "Wow, you can play golf on this thing!" and then getting really disappointed when he realized it, in fact, said "Gorf") was kind of a Space Invaders rip-off. Well, I guess, they at least made four levels with slight variations to the basic concept of shooting aliens that repeat themselves perpetually. So basically, they took Space Invaders and crossed it with Donkey Kong. I do love how completely insane the concept of the final "FLAG SHIP" level is. "The humans will never discover our weakness! Why would they think to shoot the part of the ship that has a hole in it? It's just illogical!" The guy doing this playthrough doesn't quite get that far before managing to hit it, but I remember actually spitting the entire ship in two before managing to hit the weak point, and the two pieces of the ship just keep flying in unison with each other. Good times. Anyway, I remember being absolutely amazed by this when I was about six years old, and watching a YouTube of it now... um... yeah. It's a testament to both how easily amused you are as a little kid and how accustomed we are to modern technology.



The Jetsons: By George in Trouble Again

Downloaded a DOS emulator to play this game again, which is now abandonware, and I can confirm that, no, I haven't misremembered from my youth. The game was, in fact, completely off-the-wall-insane. Apparently the good people at Hi-Tech Expressions felt the best way to capture the essence of the Jetsons cartoon in a video game is to take place George in some sort of surrealist nightmare where pipe wrenches and pliers come to life and start trying to murder him and at any moment a conveyor belt might carry him off to some unknown abyss below. As to why there's a conveyor belt leading to certain death in almost every room of Mr. Spacely's plant in the first place, I do not profess to know. Seems like an unsafe work environment.


Next: Day 2 - Your favorite character.