How Nintendo's dual-screened wonder captured my imagination and reignited my passion for video games.
It's hard for me to imagine a time when I'd consider leaving video games behind. I can think of no circumstances that would precipitate my abandonment of a hobby that brings me so much joy and manages to so wonderfully stir my imagination. Quite simply: I hold the video-game medium in the highest regard, and its creative, inspirational works will forever find a place in my life. Yet that's not how things were back in 2003, when I had grown so disenchanted with video games that I was thinking about moving on from them.
For a variety of reasons, I'd lost my love for consoles: (1) The anticipated follow-ups to many of my favorite games from both the current and previous generation--a list that included Super Mario 64, Mario Kart 64, The Legend of Zelda: Ocarina of Time, Mario Golf, Super Smash Bros., Metroid Prime, Ratchet & Clank and Grand Theft Auto III--had disappointed me, since not a one was appreciably better than its predecessor; they, like most sequels of the era, played it too safe, their creators choosing constant iteration over evolution. (2) Games were getting too long and too complicated. (3) All of my favorite genres (platformers, puzzlers, adventure games, and arcade-style games) slowly disappeared as publishers began to chase trends and consequently the market became saturated with big-budget first-person shooters and contentless "experience games." And (4) even those in which I'd taken interest for their perceived reinvention of old formulas--games like Rygar: The Legendary Adventure and Mega Man Network Transmission--left me feeling underwhelmed for one reason or another, be it their adherence to the aforementioned trends or their plain-ol' mediocrity.
And the Game Boy Advance wasn't exactly lighting my world on fire. I mean, I had some fun with its Castlevania games and Mario vs. Donkey Kong, but I just couldn't get excited about a system whose aim was to rekindle the SNES era but with a number of troubling compromises to the hardware (no backlit screen, lower screen resolution, crummy sound system, less buttons, etc.). My collection totaled a paltry five or six games, with two of them being the bundled Super Mario Advance and the boredom-inducing Wario Land 4, which I credit as being the game that pushed me past the threshold and forced me to start being honest with myself--forced me to start questioning whether or not I actually enjoyed playing video games anymore.
The fact of the matter was that I could no longer generate any enthusiasm for new games. If I was buying them, it was because some inexplicably derived sense of obligation was compelling me to do so. Whenever I'd force myself to endure yet another formulaic 20-hour sequel, my eyes would continually veer toward a nearby clock, and it wouldn't be long before I'd check out mentally and start to wonder why I felt impelled to partake in this activity when my time and energy would probably be better spent elsewhere. Inevitably I had to admit to myself that I was simply throwing away countless hours of my life by continuing to partake in a hobby that was no longer offering me reward or stimulation.
So I stopped buying new games, and I ceased being active in the console and portable scenes. From then on, all I did was play old games on emulators, and all the while I'd wonder if this was all that was left for me.
My passion for video games was gone.
In truth, I didn't know what I wanted. It would occur to me, years later, that what was really happening was that I was thirsting for something new and different--for something revolutionary--but at the time, I couldn't think of anything--of any game or any product--that could make me care about video games as much as I once did.
That's when Nintendo announced it out of the blue.
It was called the "Nintendo DS," and let me tell you, man--it was met with the most massive wave of negativity I'd ever seen. Everyone around me believed that Nintendo had gone crazy. Game journalists held round tables to discuss how Nintendo had lost the plot and created the next Virtual Boy. Analysts predicted that it would tank--that Sony's upcoming PlayStation portable, to which they deemed the DS a "response," would absolutely wipe the floor with Nintendo's gimmicky handheld. Forum-goers everywhere, including those who posted on Nintendo's official NSider message board, were declaring the company dead. It was all over for Nintendo, they'd confidently proclaim; soon the company would be thoroughly humiliated, and Miyamoto and friends would be forced to abandon hardware manufacturing and develop games for PlayStation- and Xbox-branded systems. Celebrations of Nintendo's imminent demise could be witnessed in all corners of the Internet.
Oh, it got really bad. On GameSpot's message board, where I'd occasionally post, they'd down-talk the DS on a daily basis. There were a dozen threads a day discussing how the system was going to fail miserably. Every other poster's signature was an image that depicted a Nintendo character running toward the PlayStation Portable, the text overlay below reading "Even [random Nintendo character] wants a PSP!" The hatred and resentment were palpable.
Me? I was kind of stunned by the announcement. Really, my emotions were all over the map. To start, I was shocked that Nintendo was apparently going to kill off its big moneymaker, the GBA, which was on pace to sell 100-million-plus units. Thinking about it filled my head with questions: Was Nintendo in a rush to push this new portable out because it was afraid that Sony's aggressive, disparaging marketing tactics would work to flatten the GBA's sales--make it look completely obsolete? Or was it that foresight told Iwata and crew that the current path, though it would continue to generate success, was ultimately a dead end, so they were going to take a hit and attempt to get ahead of the coming storm? Was the DS really a preemptive response to the PSP? Was all that talk about the DS being a "third pillar" just a cover, or were Nintendo's developers seriously going to endeavor to support three separate platforms at once?
I didn't know what Nintendo was hoping to achieve with the DS, but my interest was certainly piqued. The idea of a portable with two separate displays actually sounded genuinely intriguing to me. I was, after all, a creative fellow, so a whole bunch of ideas immediately began floating through my mind immediately upon viewing images of the system. When Nintendo later announced that the DS would also feature touch input and wireless play, my enthusiasm grew; I started to dream about the possibilities--about all of the possible combinations of inputs and displays that could be implemented. This was looking to be a versatile little system, and I couldn't wait to see the games Nintendo was planning to bring to it!
Still, I couldn't deny that I was worried for Nintendo. I could deal with the negativity, since I'd been an Internet denizen long enough to become desensitized to it, but I was concerned about what it might breed. I wondered if third parties would see this reaction and reactively limit their support: Would they fearfully pass up the opportunity to showcase their talent and creativity on a platform whose unique values were incompatible with the traditional devices for which they'd been developing since the 80s? Would they want to make games for a 3D-capable system whose specifications were modest compared to the currently available consoles' (the DS was speculated to be "somewhere between the N64 and GameCube" in terms of power, though we were all hoping that it would lean more toward the latter)? Would they allow their decision-making to be affected by detractors and system warriors, who would surely attempt to throw a wet blanket on the DS--distort Nintendo's messaging and stamp out any potential excitement?
Truthfully, I didn't fear Sony or its marketing. Oh, no--I was much more concerned about the potential influence of the hordes of angry "hardcore" gamers and nasty forum-dwellers, who were "video-game enthusiasts" like I was a succinct blogger.
But I was excited for the DS' impending release. When it went up for pre-order on Amazon.com, I wasted no time in nabbing myself a bundle. In the months leading up to its release, all I could think about were potential applications for the DS' distinct technology; I'd wonder about all of the groundbreaking, imaginative ideas that Nintendo was surely dreaming up. I had interest in the new 2D Super Mario Bros. game and the Prime-style Metroid Nintendo was demoing at trade shows, sure, but I was hoping to see a large focus on new types of games. I wanted Nintendo to let its creative spirit run wild--to take me to exotic new places in lieu of making the same three games over and over again.
I have vivid memories of the day the DS arrived at our doorstop. The atmosphere was one of excited curiosity. A feeling of expectancy permeated the air around me as I reacted to the ringing of the bell and headed toward the front door, where I picked up the UPS package. As I was hurriedly unboxing my new system in the den, my brother walked in, curious to know what all of the rustling and plastic-crumpling were indicating. He was as eager to see my new toy as I was to show it to him. We took it to the kitchen and set it down near the most accessible wall outlet on the red counter whose usual occupants were the coffee-maker and the pastries. Though the instruction manual suggested that we not, we decided to boot up the DS as it was charging and test it out.
It was a rather unattractive-looking system, yeah, but that was Nintendo, the company known for producing big gray bricks. It was part of the character of Nintendo's products--the distinguishing characteristic.
And if we were in need of a showcase title, we didn't have to look any further than the little folding cardboard case that was included in the packaging. It contained the specially crafted Metroid Prime Hunters: First Hunt--a demo that was designed to "demonstrate the touchscreen's accuracy and promote the system's wireless capability." (Though, only the former was of interest to us.)
First Hunt's uniquely styled gameplay was quite revelatory, sure, but I'll always remember the demo more for the lively conversation it sparked. My brother and I had a great time discussing how this platform would be great for first-person shooters--particularly old-school shooters like Doom and Quake--due to how its touchscreen basically could function as a tiny mousepad and at the same time a persistent map.
The burgeoning FPS scene we envisioned never materialized, of course, due to publishers' dismissive attitudes and the DS' graphical limitations, but still it was fun to talk about the possibilities. Truly I have strong nostalgia for the events of that day.
As for the demo, itself: My experience was all about experimenting with the pen and thumb-strapped styli--about testing out their accuracy and comfortability. Both had their strengths and weaknesses: The pen's pointed tip allowed for greater precision, but its use demanded that you hold the DS with one hand and sacrifice balance; whereas the thumb stylus allowed for the more-desirable two-handed control, but you had to stretch your fingers in unnatural ways, and the strapped hand would block a large portion of the bottom screen. I settled on the pen, since I valued, you know, being able to see what I was doing.
But it played well either way. I wasn't sure that this particular control input was a good fit for Metroid games, no--since they were normally heavy on precision-platforming, and I wasn't convinced of double-tapping's reliability--but still I was amazed that they could make a game that looked remarkably similar to Metroid Prime run on a system whose power was roughly equivalent to the N64's! Also, I was strangely taken by the game's sound effects, which had an indefinably remindful vibe, as if it were a match for the output of some game or system I'd played in the past. Though, I could never figure out what it was.
First Hunt made a very good first impression. It had done well to keep me engaged and get my mind churning. I couldn't have asked for anything more.
Metroid Prime Hunters, the game for which it was demo, was delayed when Nintendo felt pressured to implement online play; it arrived some 14 months later. By then my interest had simmered considerably, but I was still curious to see what it was. And, well, it was OK. I'd say it was a solid action-adventure game but only a middling Metroid game. It was obviously a vehicle to draw in FPS fans and the multiplayer crowd, and I didn't know how to feel about that. I still don't. It is what it is, I guess.
After the DS was all charged up, I took it back to the den and snapped in the amply suffixed Super Mario 64 DS. Truthfully, though I was intrigued to know that it featured more content than the original (three additional playable characters, extra worlds, more collectible stars, and local multiplayer), I was kind of cold on it. I wasn't convinced that I needed to play an otherwise compromised version of one my N64 favorites; using a d-pad to simulate analog movement sounded impractical, I thought, and in practice it surely was. The controls were cumbersome enough to where I considered not playing it. And there was no way I was going to attempt further use of the touch controls, which were proving to be entirely insufficient for accurate 360-degree movement.
Really, I stuck with Super Mario 64 DS because I was short on options; I had two games, and the other was the rather-short First Hunt demo. So I had no choice but to work around the inadequate control scheme.
Still, it was sort of surreal to be playing Super Mario 64 on this small, compact device when just eight years earlier it required this large, bulky machine to run it. "It's amazing how quickly technology advances," I thought to myself. And I was able to extract some enjoyment out the game; it was rather interesting to play as Yoshi, Wario and Luigi and use their unique abilities to advance through the game in new and unexpected ways.
I played it for about two hours or so before making my final judgement. Flaws aside, I liked what I was seeing. I could imagine that the DS would be a great platform for games whose values were a match for those from 32- and 64-bit era--more so if Nintendo were able to find a way to sneak in an analog stuck or sell some type of analog-simulating accessory. "Actually, that's probably exactly how it'll work out," I figured.
It was right then that my heart sank as a completely deflating thought came to mind: "But if a large portion of the DS' library is going to consist of traditional 3D games, then who's going to choose it over that other portable device, whose superior power will allow for it to render games that closely resemble those on the currently available consoles?" Mine was a sinking feeling.
That was my mood as I switched over the Rec Room mode, which was home to a collection of touch-based mini-games. As I was feeling a bit dispirited, I wasn't terribly interested in messing around with some random mini-games, since I didn't think that there'd be much to them.
That's when it all started to make sense.
Playing these mini-games was an eye-opening experience. They were inventive; they were fully realized; and they were just plain fun! I'd never played anything like them before. Suddenly the DS was showing me its true potential. Sliding puzzle pieces, tossing projectiles about the playing field, frantically poking at airborne objects to keep them afloat, tapping objects in rhythm, drawing platforms of any shape and size and at any angle--there was so much exciting stuff you could do with this touchscreen technology! For the next few hours, I had an absolute blast smashing shells into each other, defensively launching cannon balls into armies of parachuting Bob-ombs, and drawing bouncy platforms to assist groups of helplessly plummeting Marios. It was grand.
But then I was quickly brought back down as another troubling thought entered my mind: "But you know what?" I fearfully posited. "With just these twenty or so mini-games, Nintendo has probably already hit upon all of the best ideas--perfected them in a way that's likely to steal everyone else's thunder and render many of its partners' games redundant before they even hit stores! In fact, Nintendo might have unwittingly exhausted all of the possibilities right from the get-go! I mean, what if I was wrong and this, right here, is really all that you can do with touchscreen technology?!"
Maybe this wasn't going to work.
That appeared to be the case. Nothing else could have explained the dearth of innovative and compelling new games--from even Nintendo.
As the months dropped off, I didn't get much use out of my DS. I tried to remain interested: I'd continue to mess around with Super Mario 64 DS' mini-games and Sega's bizarre Feel the Magic: XY/XX, my first non-bundle purchases. Against my better judgment, I bought myself a copy of the shallow-looking Yoshi Touch & Go, hoping that it would provide any kind of fuel to the dwindling fire; predictably it was a bad call, as the game did nothing for me. It was seriously lacking for meaningful content--a worrying sign when you consider that Nintendo thought that something so vapid was worth $40.
The writing was on the wall: The Nintendo DS was in trouble. The system was too unfocused. The majority of its games were of subpar quality. And the big third-party companies seemed to be avoiding it. The future looked bleak. And as we headed into spring, I wondered if maybe it was time to jump off, liked I'd planned to do just before the DS was announced.
And then there was the game that helped to turn everything around--the game that made the DS for me. It was Pac-Pix, one of the most inventive, breathtakingly original games I'd ever seen. I knew that I needed to have it in my library the moment I saw it in action.
And it worked just as advertised: I could draw the most hideously deformed and mangled Pac-Men imaginable, and suddenly they, my sloppy creations, would spring to life and move all about the screen! I could draw two or three of them at the time if I so desired! And I could redirect my ghost-chomping monstrosities by obstructing their paths with specially sketched directional lines! "This is wild!" I enthusiastically uttered. "What a concept!"
I'd never played anything like it. I was so glad that didn't listen to those jaded game journalists, who dismissively labeled Pac-Pix a "glorified tech demo." It wasn't. It was so much more than that. It was the kind of game I loved; its brethren were those "arcade-like" games of which I've spoken fondly in the past (Duck Hunt, Hogan's Alley, Excitebike, Wrecking Crew, Balloon Fight, etc.)--the ones that were able to so effectively establish new formulas and create strong foundations for freshly released systems. Forget Yoshi Touch & Go and the like; it was Pac-Pix that showed me the true potential of the DS. It was the portable's true proof of concept.
Above all, Pac-Pix showed me that there were plenty of new ideas to be explored on the DS--far more than I realized. It was as inspirational as it was fun. I just loved it to pieces.
I played through it multiple times in the first few months and after that in bite-sized chunks--whenever I could find an opportunity. If ever there was a time when I was bored or in desperate need of a way to kill an hour, I could always count on Pac-Pix to fill the void--to entertainment and amuse me like few others could.
Pac-Pix was exactly the kind of game I'd envisioned when Nintendo announced the DS. It's what I was here for. My decision to go all-in on the system was sparked by a desire to get out of my comfort zone and try new things--to give myself over to new types of experiences and let them take me wherever they may--and Pac-Pix was the game that took me by the hand and showed me the way forward.
The attitude among those in the online community and the gaming press was still highly negative, of course. Still as disdainful as ever. It was sad how most of them were trying to will the DS to fail, sometimes for the pettiest of reasons. They'd do anything to tear it down. The shining example was IGN's coverage of the DS' Japanese release: Anoop Gantayat, the person chosen to report on the event, pointed to the muted activity of a single district and used it as anecdotal evidence that Japan simply wasn't interested in the system, and he ignorantly contrasted the "lack of excitement" for the DS with the festive atmosphere surrounding the concurrent launch of Dragon Quest VIII, which was a hotly anticipated game released for an enormously popular console (the PS2). The reporting was proven to be bunk, of course, as the DS had sold very well, but naturally IGN's editors stood by their man and continued to downplay the numbers.
But I didn't care about what they thought anymore. I didn't care if I was alone in my thinking. I was excited for the DS' future, man, and there was nothing anyone could do to bring me down!
And indeed the tide turned in a big way: The DS caught fire. Within a year, it was topping sales charts all across the world. So, too, were its games; driving the system's success were dozens of innovative, industry-changing games. For an enthusiast like me, it was the best of times; hell--I was picking up a new game every week, which was a far cry from the time when I was playing exclusively on consoles and buying only three or four games a year. The DS was dominating my life at that point. Dual-screened, touch-controlled gaming was for real, and I couldn't get enough of it!
There were so many DS games that meant something to me--so many games that had positively impacted my life, sometimes profoundly so. I wish I could talk about all of them, but that wouldn't be possible; there simply isn't enough space (though, I'm sure that I'll cover a lot of them individually in future pieces). So what I'm going to do, instead, is take a few moments to present a small sampling of the games that helped cement the DS as my new favorite system.
I hadn't played any of the previous WarioWare sequels, so WarioWare: Touched! was a revelation. Before then, the idea of "series of three-second mini-games" sounded suspect to me, since I interpreted it as Nintendo tending toward its worst trait: trying to make the most amount of money with the cheapest, most-bare-bones products possible. I couldn't have been more wrong; the WarioWare series' core concept was actually brilliant. Touched!, it turned out, was a fully realized, high-value video game. It was Nintendo at its most creative, the company showing what it could do when free from the shackling iterative design-formulas to which its increasingly rigid core consumer base demanded it adhere.
More so, it was just pure frantic fun! It was a great choice of quickly accessible entertainment if ever I needed to fill a half-hour while I was waiting for company to arrive or while dinner was cooking. I put it in a group with Feel the Magic: XY/XX (which it clearly inspired) and Pac-Pix, Touched! another one of those foundational games off of which future games could springboard.
It doesn't seem to be anyone's favorite, but I sure love it. It's my favorite entry in the WarioWare series.
I never would have imagined that anyone would want to make a game about a humdrum procedure like surgery or that I'd actually be interested in playing it, but there I was hyperactively making incisions, suturing lacerations, and zapping highly mobile parasites with my surgical laser! Screw the patients--sometimes all of that frenzied swiping and tapping left me feeling more concerned about the touchscreen's health (I was always paranoid that I'd scratch or crack the screen if I pressed or tapped on it too hard).
Still, I was having an amazing time! I couldn't put the game down.
I mean, who knew that surgery could be so entertaining? The answer is "Atlus," of course, and I was thankful that its talented developers had endeavored to show me the light. Trauma Center wasn't some slapdash mini-game collection wrapped in a surgical theme, which I originally suspected it would be; rather, it was an ambitious, fully fleshed adventure game that paired engrossing storytelling with fun, often-intense touch-based gameplay.
Trauma Center proved that you could make a worthwhile game about anything if you had a solid vision. And the DS was the perfect platform on which to carry it out.
"How did I ever live without these types of games?" I wondered.
I was honestly wary of Kirby: Canvas Curse because I wasn't high on any of the Kirby games I'd played in the past; I found them to be painfully easy, particularly because you could freely fly over most of the levels and avoid anything resembling platforming or enemy interaction. Also I was skeptical about the idea of taking established genres and replacing their button-input with less-reliable touch controls; it just wasn't a viable replacement.
But that wasn't my experience with Canvas Curse, which was a fresh new take on the platforming genre. You didn't directly control the characters; rather, they rolled forward automatically, and your job was to guide their movement--help them along to a stage's exit--by tactically drawing platforms and neutralizing surrounding dangers with tactical pokes. Also, a platform's degree of curvature dictated the momentum with which Kirby and pals would launch off of it, so there was also an element of strategy.
It was a simple idea, yes, but Hal Labs was driven to build an expansive, memorable game around it. And its efforts resulted in something truly special. Canvas Curse had it all: a novel concept, great level design, a wonderfully whimsical aesthetic, and a whole lot of content. It turned out to be my favorite platformer of 2005.
What really motivated me to become interested in Phoenix Wright: Ace Attorney was all of the incessant praise that was being thrown its way. Before then, I'd largely ignored both the game and community's reaction to it. I mean, I had a fondness for point-and-click adventure games, yes, but I wasn't sure that you could craft a compelling narrative around defending clients in some stuffy courtroom.
It was those like Trauma Center that showed me the error in that line of thinking. So now I was open to the experience; I had reason to believe that there might be something to this lawyer game. Without any hesitation, I clicked over to Amazon.com and ordered myself a copy of Ace Attorney.
And as I expressed in my Spirit of Justice piece: I found myself thoroughly engrossed in the unforgettably epic Phoenix Wright: Ace Attorney, which managed to firmly implant itself inside my head and take over my life in a way that no other game had done before. I was completely invested in its narrative, its mode of interaction, and its characters' individual story arcs. For weeks all I could think about were the plights of Phoenix Wright, Maya Fey and Miles Edgeworth--about their tragic worlds and all of their bizarre, memorable friends.
I couldn't think of a platform on which Phoenix Wright would have felt more at home. And I couldn't think of a better time to be playing it. This was fate.
Capcom made a great decision to port it over from the GBA. Phoenix Wright served as further proof that point-and-click adventures were a natural fit for the DS, whose touch-based interface rendered investigation-style sequences more intuitive and expeditious. I was hoping that the genre would make a big return on the DS. Heck--I even emailed Infinite Ventures to inquire about the company's interest in bringing a new Shadowgate to the DS. The respondent gave me the ol' "We have nothing to announce at the moment, but anything can happen!"
Sadly, it didn't come to pass. But that was OK; there would be others--among them the Ace Attorney sequels I'd snatch up and relish all the same.
And then there was Professor Layton and the Curious Village. It was actually my unquenchable thirst for Ace Attorney-style games that led me to Professor Layton, which looked to boast similar values.
I mean, here we had a point-and-click adventure that was said to feature hundreds of brain-melting puzzles! That sounded like a dream! Purchasing it immediately was an easy call.
Taking a page from the likes of Trauma Center and Phoenix Wright, Professor Layton sought to weave a complex narrative around its main gimmick. And as did its contemporaries, it was able to succeed in telling a story that kept me engaged for its entire duration; I was deeply enthralled by its tale of a world that wasn't what it appeared to be at first glance. I could't wait to see what each new twist would entail. I'd spend my free time thinking about how it was all possible--about the mystery behind St. Mystere's existence.
Also, I couldn't get enough of its ingenious puzzles, which came in great variety. I'd always be looking forward to discovering the next one in the series; and if ever it appeared that I'd cleared an area of puzzles, I'd grow so desperate that I'd resort to spasmodically poking all over the screen hoping to find just one additional puzzle. "Just please one more," I'd beg.
Oh yeah--this game had me tightly in its grip.
When it was over, I could proudly declare that Professor Layton had done amazingly well to uniquely melding point-and-click-adventuring and puzzle-solving, the result of its labor a very special flavor of adventure game. It was yet another top-tier entry in the genre and also another shiny notch in the DS' ever-widening belt. I extracted weeks of enjoyment out of it--out of solving its puzzles and the mysteries that plagued Layton's world. And in the months that followed, I managed to wring out even more enjoyment via the free downloadable puzzles that Level-5 was releasing on a weekly basis.
I consider Professor Layton and the Curious Village and Phoenix Wright: Ace Attorney to be kindred spirits. For how they so similarly enraptured me, they will forever be intrinsically linked in my mind. Together they made the DS a special place for exciting new adventure games.
Thanks in large part to games like these, the DS blew up and became the hottest-selling video-game system in the world. It would be embraced by even those who had spent the previous two years deriding it and talking down its success. Soon it would grow to become a legitimate cultural phenomenon. The Marios, Zeldas, Castlevanias and other traditionally crafted games helped it to reach that status, sure, but it was wonderfully unique games like Meteos, Hotel Dusk: Room 215, Brain Age: Train Your Brain in Minutes a Day!, Henry Hatsworth in the Puzzling Adventure, Ghost Trick, Nine Hours, Nine Persons, Nine Doors, Scribblenauts and all of the aforementioned that pushed the DS over the top and made it a world-changing device that captured the imaginations of enthusiast and nongamer alike. They played the biggest role in shaping what gaming would become; people are currently enjoying thousands of games on their touch-controlled phones because of them.
Thank goodness for them. Thank goodness for the DS.
Epilogue
By the time it was nearing the end of its life-cycle, the DS had become one of my favorite systems of all time. Previously my top-5 list (NES, Commodore 64, Atari 2600, SNES and Game Boy) had been unapproachable--its entries but cemented in place--but the DS made the strongest of cases that I should reconsider their inertia.
I mean, there's no way the DS doesn't belong near the top of that list: I've dedicated more hours of my life to it than I have any other system I've ever owned. My collection of DS games is enormous, its library the most populous since my SNES' 80-plus. And I continue to gravitate toward the types of games it inspired. Those are top-tier credentials if I've ever seen them.
The DS had reignited my flame of passion for video games. I was excited to play games again. I was no longer buying them out of some inexplicably derived sense of obligation. There was no more watching the clock as I played--no more constantly having to invent the flimsiest of justifications to explain my continued participation in gaming. I'd rediscovered who I was: I was a video-game enthusiast in love with one of the greatest mediums ever created. The DS reminded me why that was, and I haven't forgotten since.
Today I'm nostalgic for that era of "DS versus PSP." It truly was one of the best times to be a fan of video games. That's why it's a shame, really, that people didn't realize what they had. To so many in the games community, the DS was viewed as the enemy; it was different and thus scary, so it had to be marginalized--treated as though it were some type of threat to "true" video games. It was nothing but a "gimmick with shovelware," the worst of their kind would repeat.
And, well, they eventually got what they wanted. Soon the big third parties grew so powerful that they were able to push everyone else out--basically destroy the mid-tier development scene--and gain the authority to dictate the market's entire future direction. And because standardization was their priority, hardware manufacturers were forced to conform. The result: The gaming scene we know today is all about the perpetuation of homogeneity and uniformity. How exactly games are better off for that, I don't know. Maybe some "true gamers" will soon wander on by and explain it to us.
All I can say is that I'll forever miss the days when companies weren't afraid to create and market wonderfully disparate platforms; I'll forever miss the days when we had real competition.
But it was a great ride while it lasted. We got an amazing thirteen years out of the DS family (DS plus 3DS, in all their forms). I'm going to be sad to see it go. I'm going to miss all of the beneficial features that its uniquely styled hardware provides (hell--even if it's just using a second screen to display maps and inventories, which is an unimaginative use of a second screen, sure, but still a highly desirable feature). Yet I understand that things can't stay the same forever--that eventually we have to open up our minds to new ideas. That's the way it should be. That's what the DS strove to convince us. That's its legacy.
So here's to the Nintendo DS, one of the greatest, most-transformative video-game systems ever created. May both it and its successor ride off into the sunset with victory their flag.
No comments:
Post a Comment