All twentysomethings grew up with Nintendo and Super Nintendo. I still have my SNES and a friend of mine still plays Battletoads on his NES. Nintendo was the company that dominated the gaming industry in the early 90’s and nothing Sega introduced could top it. The SNES had some classic games that are still played today and are hailed as masterpieces. To name a few: Earthbound, Final Fantasy II and III, Chrono Trigger, Secret of Mana, Breath of Fire I and II, and Legend of Zelda: A Link to the Past (as you can see, I like my RPGs). Nintendo’s SNES left me very happy in the world of video games as a child; There was nothing better than coming home from elementary school, going to the blockbuster with my dad, and playing a couple of games until the wee hours of the morning; Good times. So I became loyal to Nintendo and looked forward to their next console.

Enter Nintendo 64; Everyone had high hopes for it – it was a 64-bit processor, it had more color than the Playstation, and the use of cartridges meant there were no load times. It sounded like the best system at the time and games like Zelda: Ocarina of Time accompanied the release and gave players a good feeling about its longevity. I had an N64 and one thing that was noticeably noticed was the lack of RPGs. I was envious to see my Playstation owner friends enjoying their copies of Final Fantasy VII, Legend of Dragoon, and Chrono Trigger while I ran like a dwarf child with a lock of hair in Quest 64. The quality of the games dropped dramatically from SNES to standard. N64 and I soon lost all faith in Nintendo.

Since Nintendo had taken a nosedive when it came to having cool and complex games, I was able to save my money and refrain from buying Nintendo’s next system, Dolphin, (cough) sorry, the GameCube, which belonged to Sears’ home appliances section. . While I was happy with my PS2, the only games I wanted to play on the GameCube were the Zelda games. Although I never had a GameCube, I kept up to date on all consoles and there was always a quality that the GameCube lacked and that Xbox and PS2 had; It’s hard to explain, but it seemed like the GameCube games were created as an afterthought or to follow the success of another game on a different console. Games like Metal Gear Solid: Twin Snakes and Final Fantasy: Crystal Chronicles were named after famous franchises, but did little to promote the depth of the game and character development.

When the Wii came out, I was tired of giving Nintendo the benefit of the doubt. The graphics were comparable to the Dreamcast and the motion detection capabilities did not appear ready to be marketed at the consumer level. And games, games still didn’t have the same impact as SNES. Why does Nintendo insist on turning its back on the people who made it the way it is today? I don’t even consider the Wii to be a game console, with games like Cooking Mama and Wii Fit, it has created a unique niche that caters for older folks and Girl Scouts. But there is nothing I can do about the drastic turn that Nintendo has put on its core demographic, except comfort myself knowing that while people are getting “Wiitis” in the form of carpal tunnel, I am performing a masterpiece like Metal Gear Solid. 4. o Elder Scrolls: Oblivion.