by ape
You know, back in my day, video games were wholesome. You could bring your Atari 2600 over to your grandparents’ house and enjoy some E.T. with the whole family. It was controller-hurling fun for all ages. Sure, one could argue that Custer’s Revenge and other Mystique titles were offensive, but that’s only if you’re a communist.
Custer’s Revenge was an intelligent romance game that only became smut when filthy minds played the game and/or read the instruction manual and description of the game on the back of the box. It was about a doctor in the old west, Custer, who wields a flesh-colored scalpel at waist level. He then has to traverse through a deadly, maze-like, linear path towards this poor Native American woman who has a giant tumor protruding from her chest. Her tribe has obviously tied her to a post in fear of catching whatever disease she has.
This kind-hearted doctor makes his way to the woman and proceeds to struggle to try and cut her free from the surprisingly tough rope that she was tied with in order to effectively remove the tumors at a later date. The message that this game projects is so powerful that even the mountains in the background are moved…Look, one is even shedding a tear! You have to look closely, though, with 4-bits, it’s hard to tell. But don’t worry, I’ve drawn it out so you can see.
But anyway, this moving struggle is so intense that it looks adult-themed when a pervert plays the game. True story. Don’t even bother looking it up in Wikipedia. Wikipedia is wrong.
Anyway, those days were so awesome. How can you turn bleeps and bloops into sounds of murder? You can’t. How can you get controversial gore and nudity out of a red square and white rectangle? You can’t. The graphics were so strategically poor that even if Grand Theft Auto were made on the Atari 2600, you wouldn’t be able to make out any drug paraphernalia, hear any curse words, or find any hot coffee. This was a family system made by families, and for families.
Then Nintendo made an abomination called the Famicom (or NES to the North Americans amongst us)…and everything just went downhill. Super Mario Bros.? Lets use mushrooms (steroids) to get big quick. Get a fire flower and hook up with a princess (use weed, it’ll make women think you’re hot) because that’s what cool people do. Grab a star (alcohol) so that you can’t feel pain, and just plow through enemies. That’s why you needed to collect coins through the whole game…Those substances aren’t cheap. Nintendo can’t even argue their case because they printed this all in the game’s gall-darn manual.
Later versions of the game had modified manuals due to heavy parental complaints. ‘Roided Mario became “Super Mario,” High Mario became “Fire Mario,” and Drunk Mario became “Invincible Mario.” Nintendo may have changed the names, but the content remained the same and countless children were heavily influenced by this. And you know what? Being a stupid kid that was influenced by video games, and because I have mild brain damage, I once got suspended from school for trying to terrorize the place with an empty turtle shell. I’m ashamed to say that I threw the shell, and caused nine of my fellow classmates to tumble offscreen. But since all nine fell from one throw, it earned me a second chance and they let me back in the next day.
The immorality of video games has continued to this day. Heck, I played Babysitting Mama and was expecting Chris Hansen to appear out of nowhere to ask for a chat. Sticking your Wiimote into an underage child controller will bring that feeling out in you. I’m just glad I didn’t play this as an impressionable young lad or I’d likely be spending a few years in the old graybar motel right now.
I’d list more proof from other games….But honestly, I don’t need to. I’ve proven my point. I’ve proven the points of those genius politicians that understand how dangerous these games have become. I’m correct. That’s all you really need to know. There’s no reason to me to make-up more facts to prove my point.
Anyway, I hope I get through to someone…anyone…with this article. Video games these days are just too offensive. We need to go back to the days of blips, bleeps, and bloops. Days when dragons looked like ducks. Days when people would duel with one another while atop ostriches that could fly. Days when aliens trying to find pieces of a phone so that they can get back home consistently fell into holes and would have to stretch their necks to get out, only to fall right back in, restarting the whole process. Games have lost the art of these profound designs. Games have lost the morality of being a good influence on the children whose parents are having the game raise. Why should the parent be responsible if the game is the one raising them? The game did the crime now it should do the time. This industry needs to take a step back and look at the world of chaos that they have created and go back to a simpler time…a time where bouncing a square from one side of the screen to the other with your heavily drunken uncle, while he made unwanted advances towards you, was a popular, wholesome way to spend your evenings.
I hope and pray the we can return to that time of class and decency. That we can just hit the ‘reset’ button of life before this all just gets way out of hand.