The year 2000 had arrived, and for me, it came with an ideal prospect: the likelihood that I'd be able to spend weeks'-worth of after-school hours playing and enjoying all of my new N64 games!
That, I thought, would be an opportunity that I'd be really excited about. I was sure that the idea of spending the post-holiday-season period with my new games would dominate my thoughts and monopolize my focus. Because that's how it had always been.
But this time, it wasn't happening that way. At that point, on January 1st, I wasn't able to focus on my new games because I was distracted by thoughts of the enlightening event that had occurred on Christmas Eve a week earlier.
Up until then, you see, I was completely oblivious to what had been happening in the gaming world in the previous few years. I hadn't been to an arcade in almost half a decade, so I had no idea how that sector had been evolving, and I was desperately out of touch with the console scene. I simply assumed that the console landscape was still being shaped by the N64-versus-PlayStation war and that there were no other serious competitors in the space (I figured that the Saturn had probably died off by that point).
That's why I was so confused by what my cousins from New Jersey showed me when they visited that Christmas (with my aunt and my uncle, of course): They set their green backpack down and pulled from it an unfamiliar-looking square-shaped console that bore Sega's logo. They told me that this device was called the "Dreamcast" and that it was Sega's recently released "next-generation console."
I was totally surprised by this news. I couldn't recall ever hearing or reading anything about such a development in the console scene.
"Isn't a little too early for one of these next-generation machines?!" I wondered in silence, still somewhat stunned by the sudden revelation. "I mean, the N64 came out only three years ago! Aren't competitive consoles supposed to hit the market once every five years and release in proximity to one another?"
I thought to question my cousins on the matter, but I refrained from doing so because my mind was all over the place and the words that I needed were escaping me. Instead I kept to myself and simply followed them down to the basement (my brother's domain).
After they finished exchanging greetings with my brother, James, they hooked the Dreamcast up to his big-screen TV and started giving us a demonstration of this new console. And for a few hours in following, we watched on as observers as they showed off its capabilities.
The first thing that they did was introduce us to its oversized controller. As I examined it, I noticed that it had a strange detachable-LCD device in its center, and I immediately came to the conclusion that this device was the company's other new product: a "next-generation portable system" that was somehow fully compatible with the console!
"What an interesting advancement!" I thought.
But my cousins quickly squashed that idea by informing me of what it actually was: a "VMU"--a specialized memory card that had a limited amount of power and was only there to display supplementary information.
I was disappointed by that news because it killed the visualization that my idea inspired: a future in which consoles and portables could be fully integrated and designed to communicate with each other!
"That would have been awesome!" I thought. "Too bad it's not the case."
Then they showcased some of the Dreamcast's launch-window releases and gave us a look at games like Sonic Adventure, Crazy Taxi and House of the Dead 2. They even let us play some of them!
I was impressed with every game in the bunch, but there was one in particular that stood out among the rest and absolutely blew me away: NBA 2K, whose visuals looked so amazingly lifelike that all I could do as I observed them was wonder about how console technology had advanced this far without me noticing (I also wondered about what this development meant for Nintendo, whose N64 was suddenly looking long in the tooth). Its level of realism was unbelievable!
And I was even more blown away by how the game played! I mean, I'd sampled many simulation-style basketball over the years, yeah, but I'd never encountered one that went so far as to replicate every aspect of the sport down to even the minutia! "This is unreal!" I thought as I played it. "It's like I'm controlling an actual NBA game!"
The game's mind-blowingly-realistic visuals and incredible degree of replication told me a lot about the Dreamcast. They spoke of the amazing power and potential of Sega's new machine.
The only downside to my Dreamcast experience was the trouble that I had trying to maintain my grip on the controller. Its analog stick's rubbery tip lacked friction, so my thumb kept constantly slipping off of it; and, also, its inexplicable wraparound-cord design put me in a position in which my fingers kept getting caught on the cord and, resultantly, I frequently fumbled the controller for a couple of seconds!
Neither of these design flaws prevented me from enjoying NBA 2K in the several hours that I played it, no, but still I couldn't deny that I was far from in love with Dreamcast controller (I ranked it as one of the worst game controllers I'd ever used).
In the end, though, I was highly intrigued by everything I'd seen that day. I was captivated by the Dreamcast's games and technology and particularly the message that they sent me: "The future arrived when you weren't paying attention," they said, "and now there's an exciting new world out there and one that you can start discovering and enjoying at any time!"
At the time, I wasn't excited enough to actually run out and buy myself a Dreamcast (mostly because I didn't have the money to do so), but I was excited enough to where I couldn't wait to visit my cousins and once again play around with the console and its games (especially NBA 2K!).
And these were the thoughts that were constantly running through my mind in the early weeks of 2000. They were the thoughts that were preventing me from giving all of my attention to my new N64 games.
They continued to haunt me until late January, when, on a random day, I arrived home to the news that we'd been invited to my uncle's house in New Jersey for a little post-holiday get-together, which meant that I'd soon be reuniting with my cousins for more Dreamcast-fueled fun! "Finally I can stop thinking about the console and actually play it!" I thought to myself with enthusiastic energy.
During our visit, I got a chance to see more of NBA 2K, as I hoped I would, but in an unexpected turn, I wound up being taken by another game--one that I found to be even more compelling. It was called "Marvel vs. Capcom" (I didn't notice that it had a subtitle), and it was one of the most awesome-looking games I'd ever seen!
The idea of the game, alone, blew me away. I'd always had a fascination with crossover battles (even those that involved properties in which I wasn't particularly interested), and Marvel vs. Capcom, which paired up two companies that I held in the highest regard, sounded like one of the best crossovers you could possibly conceive! And its having a cast of combatants that included (a) superheroes that I'd obsessed over as I was growing up and (b) hero characters from games that were made by my second-favorite game developer of all time immediately put it on the fast track to potential god-tier status!
And indeed, as I expected, I was able to jump right into the action and begin tossing projectiles and throwing uppercuts like a master!
Though, the two games, I found, were similar only at the base level. In truth, Marvel vs. Capcom had many more layers to it. There was so much more going on in each of its matches: Fighters were bombarding each other with screen-filling super attacks! Assist characters were flying in from all angles! Heroes were pairing up and stringing together ridiculous combos! And spectacular explosions were continuously rocking the entire battlefield!
Marvel vs. Capcom was, basically, Street Fighter II with the dial turned up to 100, and I was having a great time with it despite my inability to fully grasp the complexity of its action and its numerous gameplay systems.
The whole time, I was in awe of the game's chaotic energy. I was hypnotized by the fighters' lightning-fast, intense interactions and the blazing explosions that were resulting from each of them.
"What an amazing spectacle!" I continued to think as I observed the game's action.
I was also enamored with the game's tag-team battle system and how it allowed you to swap in a partner at any time. It added a cool tactical element to the gameplay and also functioned to incorporate one of best wrestling-game mechanics into the action. As a wrestling-game fan, I strongly appreciated its inclusion.
I especially loved that Capcom created an additional "Special Partner" system for the purpose of packing in as many secondary characters as it could. I was, in particular, delighted to see Ghosts 'n Golbins' Arthur, who upon being called in would assail opponents with his classic spear weapon. I was happy about his inclusion because it showed that Capcom had a deep reverence for its classic characters, and that expression meant a lot to me because I was such a huge fan of the company and its history. I was excited to know that it hadn't forgotten about its earliest characters and was eager to recognize their importance by including them in its all-star mashup.
Arthur's inclusion also spoke of the incredible diversity of the game's cast. It said that any character from any genre was welcome, and that was exciting to me because it meant that it was possible for characters of disparate types, from cartoony to realistic to fantastical, to enter the fray and duke it out with each other! The game's containing such a wildly mixed cast was a huge part of its allure.
And then there was the best part of the package: the potential match-ups, many of which bordered on surreal. In this game, unbelievably, Ryu could tangle with Spider-Man! Mega Man (who I knew would instantly become one of my mains) could trade blows with Wolverine! Strider Hiryu could engage in combat with Captain America! And the Incredible Hulk could wrestle it out with Zangief!
"These match-ups are insane!" I thought to myself as I considered all of the potential fight combinations. "And I love that they're possible!" (Though, I had to apply some suspension of disbelief when I was forced to grapple with the idea of Capcom's fighters lasting more than a few seconds against Marvel's superheroes, all of whom were supremely overpowered. I had to invent my own logic for how it would be possible, which was something that you always had to do when you were dealing with crossover battles.)
"How did a game of this magnitude manage to slip under my radar?!" I wondered as our session with Marvel vs. Capcom came to an end. (And I did so without realizing that I had now become oblivious to my own obliviousness.)
During our ride home that night, Marvel vs. Capcom was all that I could think about. I hadn't yet played enough of it to decide whether or not it was a great fighting game, but, really, that wasn't even something that was on my mind at the time, no. I was too deeply under a spell to care about such an issue. I was hopelessly entranced by my memories of my Marvel vs. Capcom experience and all of the spectacular mental images that they were inspiring, and thus reason never had a chance to factor into my thought-processes.
And in the end, I could draw only one conclusion: Marvel vs. Capcom was an awesome game, and I absolutely had to have it!
But there was only one problem: I didn't own a Dreamcast! And the fact was that I couldn't possibly afford to spend $200-plus on another console when I'd just recently purchased an equally pricey PlayStation. I simply didn't have enough money left to do so!
Still, I wanted the game really badly. So what I decided to do was take to the Internet with the hope that I'd be able to find a good deal on a Dreamcast. I had no desire to own a used Dreamcast, since I strongly opposed the practice, but I figured that there might be another way to get the console on the cheap. There was a chance, I thought, that some obscure Amazon vendor was selling a Dreamcast-Marvel vs. Capcom bundle at a discount price.
What my search turned up, instead, was the revelation that there was also a PlayStation version of Marvel vs. Capcom!
Initially I was hesitant to even consider making such a purchase because I was certain that the PlayStation's inferior technology would compromise the game in a number of ways (and I'd been burned many times in the past by stripped-down ports). But still, I knew that buying the PlayStation version was, realistically, the only way that I'd be able to get a copy of the game without seriously setting myself back.
So I went out and purchased the PlayStation version.
The problem started at around the ten-minute mark of my first session. That was the point in which I could no longer deny that I wasn't really enjoying the game as much as I thought I would. By then, I started to feel as though its action was simply too fast and chaotic for its own good and thus difficult to control, and consequently my enthusiasm for the game began to evaporate.
I mean, I still loved the idea of Marvel vs. Capcom (heroes from highly disparate universes battling it out and vying for group superiority), but I just couldn't develop the same type of fondness for its gameplay. I couldn't connect with it or remain engrossed in it for longer than a few minutes.
Because Marvel vs. Capcom wasn't as similar to Street Fighter II as it appeared to be. It didn't actually share the same values. That became clear to me when I played it solo and took the time to more closely examines its systems, the process of which helped me to see that it had a complete disregard for the Street Fighter II's simple, accessible gameplay and thus wasn't interested in appealing to newcomers and those who were incapable of achieving fighting-game mastery.
There was simply too much going on in the game. There were too many meters to keep track of. Opponents were always ceaselessly unleashing super-attacks without any obvious restriction (and I thought it was silly that the "Hyper Combo" gauges would fill substantially even when attacks whiffed), and all too often, they'd wipe me out in a matter of seconds with an endless string of them. And there were so many different types of complicated combos, guards and counters that I got dizzy just thinking about them.
I played Street Fighter II specifically to get away from fighting games in which your entire health meter could be depleted by a single inescapable combo-chain, yet here I was in a position in which I now owned what was clearly the standard-bearer for fighting games of that type! And that certainly wasn't where I was looking to wind up when I made my decision to purchase Marvel vs. Capcom.
What I was looking for, rather, was a Street Fighter II variant that happened to star Capcom and Marvel's greatest heroes, and Marvel vs. Capcom simply wasn't that game. It was too overly complex to meet the requirement. (I was fine with the tag-team battle system, though, and very much in favor of making it a standard feature in Street Fighter II variants--just as long as it was contained within a separate mode.)
So in my desperation, I attempted to play it as I would a Street Fighter II-style game, and I did so by selecting Ryu and employing a traditional strategy of tossing fireballs and punishing defensive jumps with Shoryuken uppercuts. Unfortunately, though, this simple approach yielded little success because, as I learned, it put me at a disadvantage against CPU opponents who weren't operating under such limitations and were thus able to hit me with missile storms, partner-assisted tank attacks, and ridiculous combos that would invariably nullify any offense that I could muster. (I couldn't stand fighting Strider and the Hulk, both of whom were the absolute worst in this regard.)
And eventually I started thinking to myself, "If this is the only play-style that I care to engage in, then I might as well just play Street Fighter II instead."
After that, though, I was pretty much done with it. I shelved it and went back to playing the N64 games that I got on Christmas.
And I haven't returned to it since. Over the past 15 years, my experiences with it have been limited to watching other people play it.
But don't get the wrong impression: I don't think that Marvel vs. Capcom is a bad game, no. On the contrary, I feel as though it's brilliant in multiple ways. It's bold in concept, wonderfully imaginative, masterfully designed, and visually and aurally breathtaking (its character-select music is definitely the best ever heard in a Capcom fighting game).
It's just that its style of action simply isn't for me.
But still, I love that Marvel vs. Capcom exists, and I'll forever remain an advocate for what it represents: the promotion of incredibly fun and interesting crossover battles and the reverent celebration of legacy characters.
In the end, that's what Marvel vs. Capcom means to me: It serves as the best reinforcement of my long-held belief that you can strongly appreciate a game even if you don't enjoy playing it.
So even if I never play it again, I'll continue to have fondness for a lot of what it does, and I'll continue to acknowledge that it holds an important place in my memory.
Because, really, any game that allows you to pit Mega Man against Venom should never be forgotten! Any video game that does that is tops with me!
But the only thing that really mattered was where was I arrived as a result of my journey: I'd been awakened, and resultantly, I was now able to see that the gaming world was much larger and more vast than I realized and absolutely worthy of being eagerly explored. It was, I now knew, a world brimming with Dreamcasts, Marvel vs. Capcoms, and other wonderfully fun and imaginative products that I would stand to miss out on if I foolishly chose to refrain from keeping up with the times.
And that was the point in which I vowed to never again miss a development in the gaming space.
The second phase had begun.
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