I'm not a big fan of rail-shooters. I'm not a huge fan of flight/space simulators - though I've been known to favor one or two. It's unclear what got me interested in this game, but if I had to guess I'd put the blame on Nintendo Power that I subscribed to from its inauguration until ... 200 issues, at least. I had a huge stack of those things in my bedroom. My mom was always trying to get me to throw them away, but I liked paging through them from time to time. It was the beginning of my video game "collecting" (aka hoarding). At any rate, I bought Star Fox and it was amazing. I really love Star Fox 64 as well, but no game in this series captured my attention as much as the original.
I was amazing at this game. I don't often brag about my skill in video games because overall I believe I'm an "average" player. Mostly due to the fact that I play a wide variety of games and I only play them for a few weeks before I move on to my next game. I rarely devote the time to a game to be truly excellent at it. This wasn't true back in the 90s, particularly the SNES era. I was a legitimate master of many of the SNES games, Super Mario World, Super Metroid, Link to the Past, and I proudly admit Star Fox. I was unbelievably good at this game. I fly an Arwing like a boss. I was doing loops, flips, flybys and of course barrel rolls. I was getting perfect kills without taking any damage. I was beating the game with 1-laser (no upgrades) and no wings (I'd break them off on the Corneria stage and never fix them). When I was a young teen, I only got one or two games a year (birthday & Christmas!) so I would make the absolute most of them. It was my Golden Age.
Sometimes I miss those simpler times.
- TOP
@TOPGamingBlog
Between the ages of 6 and 8, it was given that my best friend and I would play Super Nintendo every weekend. Like clockwork, we mashed the buttons in his small room until his mother threw us outside or our eyes could no longer stay open. Star Fox was a staple; we were obsessed with it. At school, we would doodle simplistic Arwings and come up with ideas for new levels. Those crude drawings may have been my first attempts at fanart!
Like many games we've been discussing this month, Star Foxwas a game that I couldn't put down despite my severe lack of ability. I loved playing through Corneria over and over again. It was one of the only levels I could actually beat! Luckily for me, I was treated to one of the most excellent video game songs in history. You could put it on repeat 24/7 and it would never get old.
In 9th grade, I got a new computer with a CD burner in it (Sweet!). Of course, the first mix I ever put together had this song included. During a long field trip to New York City, I rocked out. When "Corneria" came on, I lost it. Head banging, fist pumping, air shredding, and general chaos ensued. A girl (who would go on to be my girlfriend) called me a freak, but I didn't care. It marked an early instance where I wasn't ashamed of being a young gamer. We all know that music can stir any emotion in you. "Corneria" made me feel so good that I was able to ignore my pubescent urge to hide my true, geeky nature.
A memorable and powerful quote from one of my favorite
films, Batman Begins, has Rachel
Dawes express to Bruce Wayne with contempt, “…it’s not who you are underneath;
[but] what you do that defines you.” It’s ironic at the time because she does
not yet know that (SPOILER!) Bruce Wayne is Batman and is doing more than most
to help clean up Gotham City. This parable succinctly characterizes exactly
what I love about Samus Aran. From 1987 to 2010, Samus Aran has been defined by
the culmination of her actions and not by the person under the power suit.
I was seven when I first met Samus Aran while playing Metroid in 1988. It was among the first handful
of games I owned for the Nintendo Entertainment System (NES), the first game
console I ever owned. Metroid was the
first game for the NES that allowed the player to revisit previously explored
areas in attempts to find more hidden secrets with newly acquired abilities. It
allowed movement not only from left to right, up and down, but also vice-versa
which was unique at the time. Contemporaries such as Kid Icarus and Super Mario
Bros. only progressed in one direction and did not allow you to move your
screen back left once you had proceeded to the right. Metroid also had some surprise endings in store for me, which made
it the second game to have multiple endings after Bubble Bobble.
Metroid is such a
difficult game on the NES that I guarantee it took me over a year to beat.
This was mostly a testament to how awkward and difficult the pass-code
system was for a seven year old. They were 24 characters long and you were done for if you put a “0” instead of an “O” when writing it down. It was truly terrible and I was
not the most organized seven-year-old. Therefore it took me a long time to
work my way through the fortress planet of Zebes and stand toe-to-toe with
Mother Brain. Times were different back then. The internet as we know it didn’t
exist. Playing video games wasn’t the mainstream thing all the cool kids were
doing (quite the opposite) so it wasn’t a heavy subject of recess
conversations. I lived in a spoiler-free world. I had no idea what was about to
happen once I defeated the final boss. I had no idea that Samus would remove
that suit and personally congratulate me. I was not prepared for it.
He's so cool.
The ending of Metroid
is ranked #1 in most “Memorable Moments in Video Games” for me. That moment
when Samus sheds the power suit and reveals for the entire world to see that
she is actually a woman underneath was monumental for me. It isn’t really so
much that Samus is a woman that’s important, but that I had been led to believe
otherwise prior to her unveiling. In the wonderful world of 8-bit gaming, the
only story you got was detailed to you in the manual itself and then you were
left to your own devices to work out the plot as you progressed through the
game. Most games only got a paragraph or two, but games like Legend of Zelda and Metroid got considerably more. Metroid
got 8 pages of background story explaining in detail the rise of the Space
Pirates and the Federation turning to their last resort, Samus Aran. I remember
rushing to consult this story while keeping my eye on Samus on my TV in case
she was about to do anything else equally mind blowing. Just as I had thought!
It continuously refers to Samus as a man. What was Nintendo of America playing
at here? Had they intentionally tried to deceive me or was this some horrible
inattention to detail while translating from Japanese? I honestly would not
know for many, many years (again: no internet).
Great!! You fulfilled your mission. Also, I'm a woman! Suprise!
As a child, I thought it was so cool that Samus is “a girl.”
It endeared her to me for reasons I couldn’t adequately express. I couldn’t
articulate why it was cool in any other way than it surprised the hell out of
me one fateful afternoon. I didn’t see then that it was so rare to be playing a
woman rather than saving one from a castle and so the entire concept was
stimulating to me. It was the first time I ever played a strong, independent
female character. The video game industry has always been so overpopulated with male
protagonists that it didn’t even cross my mind to question the ruse laid out in
the game’s manual.
In 1994, I was next reunited with Samus in Super Metroid, after missing out on Metroid II: Return of Samus for GameBoy.
Now, Super Metroid is my favorite
action side-scrolling game ever made and I won’t dwell on that, but I think it
is video game perfection. Super Metroid does not attempt to hide Samus’s gender in
any way. In fact, every time you fail as a player, you see her power suit fall apart and
the woman within die. It is a constant reminder that while she is strong and
powerful, she’s also only human.
It's true we get to see her underpants for a brief instant, but hey, it's hot in Chozo battle suits.
There is a stark contrast to my reaction of seeing Samus in her power suit and without it. When I see the image of Samus as a woman, it strikes me as beautiful and
delicate. Although I still wouldn't say she appears weak, she certainly appears vulnerable. When I see her in the
power suit, I still know she is a woman underneath, but all I see is strength
and power. She appears indomitable and invulnerable. I think this contrast is what
makes Samus so unique and important. Most women in video games are
under-dressed for their occupation, so even the strength of their role is
undermined by their lack of clothing. Those types of women ask me to suspend disbelief that they can wage wars in their underpants, simply so I can see quite a bit of skin. This is not so for Samus. Much
like Batman putting on his suit to do the things he knows Bruce Wayne cannot
do, Samus wearing her suit is doing the things many of us are groomed to think
women cannot do – and that’s why it’s so amazing she can do them and she does so
without sacrificing her dignity or suspending my disbelief with her outfit. Samus defies and redefines gender roles unlike any other character in video
gaming. That’s why I thought Samus being a girl was so cool when I was young,
but I just didn’t understand all the implications and nuances of society to
express it.
There is something to be said about the dark tone of the "Metroid" series as well. Unlike Nintedo's other series which feature bright colors and backgrounds, the "Metroid" series is dark and eerie. While Mario might have to look for his Princess in another castle, he can be sure that his trip there will be bright and cheerful, slapping shiny stars and picking fire flowers. Samus on the other hand will be scouring the dark corners of Brinstar, colored with a darker pallet and emphasized by haunting music, to find her power-ups. Not only is Samus strong and brave, but her game environments and the accompanying music were among the first to test the bravery of the player as well. While Metroid titles aren't on par with Silent Hill, I can certainly tell you I have been nervous running through the dark corridors of Super Metroid, and literally scared out of my seat by Space Pirates in the dark rooms of Metroid Prime.
Samus has more evolutions than most Pokemon.
Samus Aran is an amazing character. Not only is she a
warrior and a hunter, but she is the best at what she does. Raised by
an ancient, mysterious race of anthropomorphic bird warriors who were thought
to be extinct, she was trained in their combat style and given her powerful
suit of armor that only she can utilize. She has saved the Galaxy numerous
times, and driven a dangerous, powerful species to the brink of extinction. She
is strong and quick-thinking. She is fearless. It is her determination and her
skill as a warrior that defines her. Everything else about her has always been
a footnote. It is an important footnote, however, because Samus's ability to defy stereotypes and be a proud, strong woman is part of her identity. This article wouldn't exist if she weren't a woman, and while she would be a cool character, I wouldn't feel quite so enamored by her strength if she was simply meeting the status quo of most video game characters - either a man, or a scantily clad woman.
Playing as Samus remains a unique and rewarding experience for me even 25 years later.
In 2010 Nintendo attempted to redefine Samus in the Wii
title Other M. Next week I will
discuss how well I feel this redefinition did at fleshing out Samus Aran as a
character.
The tale I’m about to tell is a dark
and horrifying story of one boy’s decent into a mind-addling fear that would
scar him and his family for life. It is not for the faint of heart or weak of
mind. I take no responsibility for the ensuing nightmares or revolting dinners
you may find yourself trapped in after I have passed on this story to you. I
recommend no child under the age of eight be subjected to these terrors
contained within, as I was on those fateful weeks shortly after Christmas of
1987. This, my friends and readers, is the tale of how Kid Icarus warped my
mind and ruined my appetite. Now you may have heard of Kid Icarus recently as a
sequel called Kid Icarus: Uprising is about to hit store shelves on March 23, 2012 – no doubt to mentally
cripple a new generation of children not ready for the horrors of Angel Land.
Let this article be a warning to all 3DS owners and curious Nintendo Entertianment System (NES) enthusiasts.
Kid Icarus is dangerous!
I was seven years old when I
unwittingly unwrapped an NES on Christmas morning. I
was not amused. As any irrational seven year old might react, I was angry. I had wanted an Atari like my cousins had at their house. Instead I awake to find Santa had gotten this goofy looking thing
with a man stomping mushrooms for a game. In retrospect, I assume that really hurt my parents' feelings who had tried to "one-up" my Atari Christmas wish. I believe it was an attempt to sell me on the superiority of a NES when they began playing Kid Icarus, but what started as a demonstration grew into a huge addiction from my perspective. I'm not sure if it was all a show on their part or if they truly did grow an appetite to consume 8-bit pixels for
breakfast, lunch, and dinner. Whatever it truly was at the time, my mom and stepdad began to play the hell out of
those first two video games, Super Mario Bros. and Kid Icarus. They
particularly enjoyed taking turns playing Kid Icarus and I recall coming home
from school several evenings over the next few weeks and not being able to get
a game in edgewise due to their rampant addiction to MY game system and thus I grew indignant. If there was ever a way to make me want something I thought I didn't want, it was to play it in front of me and not grant me access to it when I demanded access to it.
Now I have to admit what I remember is them playing all night long, but in all honesty it could have simply been them asking me to wait for them to die and me being impatient. I can't really tell and who truly knows how much a 7-year-old's mind can blow things out of proportion. So I admit that I may have been completely off base in my assessment, but what I do know is I said something about it. I don’t remember what was said but whatever it was had a huge impact. My mom and stepdad stopped playing Kid Icarus that very night and (to my knowledge) never played a video game ever again. This would be the First
Great Rift that video games would cause between my parents and I. It didn’t
matter then. I finally had the game all to myself! I felt I had won a great
victory. The repercussions of what I had done wouldn’t be felt until much later
when a wiser 9-year-old version of myself realized I had robbed my parents of a
joy I would relish in the rest of my life. Truthfully, I felt guilty about it days later when I realized they simply weren't playing at all anymore.
Considering Playing Kid Icarus to Face My Fears
Kid Icarus appealed to me as a young boy because I was interested in Greek myths at an early age. I knew Icarus and I understood
his story so I was curious how the story of Kid Icarus would relate to this tale with which I was quite familiar. As it turns out, it doesn't. The titular character "Kid Icarus" is actually named Pit and is a guardian of Angel Land which is ruled by the goddess, Palutena. Pretty much everything in that sentence has nothing to do with Greek myths. The main antagonist is Medusa who retains her snake-hair (or I may have thrown this game in the trash!) but that's about as close to any real myth as this game comes. Due to my age, I was able to forgive the game for its transgressions against mythology - a courtesy that wouldn't necessarily repeat itself for offenders in the future. I spent days and days only
playing the first 3 stages over and over countless times without making
much headway in this truly challenging game. I developed a deep admiration and
respect for it despite it being frustrating and difficult. Little did I know that the true frustrations and most bizarre aspects of the game would come when I made it into the first Fortress, some many attempts later. It was there I
encountered my first of many horrific experiences with [pause for effect] the Eggplant Wizards.
These truly nefarious minions of
evil have the dubious task of protecting every Fortress in the game. They do
not truly seek to defeat you, though, only to engage you and harass you by
turning your upper body into an eggplant – restricting your arms and ability to
fight. Your only hope for survival against the raging hordes of OTHER (more
deadly) beasts in the Fortresses is to run and hop your way back to a Nurse who
will remove the eggplant curse. This situation was cause for many frustrating hours of
backtracking to the hospital zone, then fighting your way back to the wizard's room just to be cursed all over
again and repeat the process (or throw your controller, if need be). It was more tedious a process than I could aptly describe. I wouldn't be surprised to learn "advanced interrogation"
techniques involve getting past Eggplant Wizards and finding the hidden Nurse
in each Fortress over and over again.
FAAAAAAAAAAAAAARKK!!!!!!!!!!
I cannot even begin to impress upon
you how devastating this was to me as a child. I had nightmares for months of
being turned into an eggplant with legs and running around aimlessly trying to
get rid of the curse. By now you are probably raising an eyebrow if not fully
laughing at me, but I assure you this is not a joke. I truly fear and loath
eggplant. I won't touch it; I certainly won't eat it. The appearance and
thought of it makes me nauseous and sends chills up my spine. I have been known
to tell people I'm allergic to it simply so they won't serve it to me (or find out my dark
secret). Ten years after the initial trauma, I very nearly quit a job that
required me to prepare eggplant parmesan, though I managed to work it out with my boss
that I would never have to touch it. Google tells me this affliction has been
dubbed "melongenophobia" and I think its safe to say I am "cursed" with it for life. So think
carefully over how much you like eggplant when deciding on whether or not to
purchase Kid Icarus: Uprising for your children. I'd wager a guess that the new
incarnation of Eggplant Wizards aren't even remotely as devious or torturous as
their predecessors, but I've given you all the information necessary for an
educated decision. Your future dinners may hang in the balance.
The second video comes with some slightly annoying commentary. At 3:29 he encounters the first Eggplant Wizard and starts a full on rant about how vile they are. I feel his pain. Again at 5:39 he encounters a pair of Eggplant Wizards that force a retreat and a swim through lava just to avoid the curse. MegaFreak400 has a good motto for Eggplant Wizards that I'll paraphrase. "It's better to kill yourself than be cursed by an Eggplant Wizard."
