I’ve complained/discussed time management a lot on this website…sometimes constructively, sometimes just complaining or venting, but I’ve always said something.
Now it seems I can’t even find the time to complain about my lack of time….that is sort of sad. I can definitely say where my time is going though:
1) I have a roommate and I spend some amount of time shooting the shit with him by default. I used to spend that time in my apartment talking to myself….which would often end up on the website.
2) There is now a Playstation 2 always readily accessible. For those of you who didn’t know me during my years as a video game god…man did I waste/enjoy hours and hours and hours and hours of gaming bliss.
Many of you remember well the days of NHL 94. But there were also other games. Please forgive me for not naming them all….there wouldn’t ever be time to cover them…ever. I’ll tell you about two though, since I know you’re all interested 😉
1) Baseball Super Stars: This was a game for the first Nintendo console where the more you played the more skills you could give you players. Every game has that feature now….but that was the first game I ever remember that could remember what you did last time and save your player’s statuses.
I spent endless time (probably hundreds of hours) powering up my players but I never remember playing a real game against another person. Hundreds of hours, and never really played a game. That is the absolute height of waste and pleasure.
2) Civilization: This was the very first version played on my dad’s first laptop, a Pentium 150. You started with one villager and built a farm, then a village, then a city, then an army, then you crushed all of your enemies…..that is the part I really liked.
You went from wooden tools all the way to inventing space travel…which is how you won the game, not when you made peace with your fellow man, but when you built a space ship to get away from them before they destroyed you. Not a very inspiring story, but it was awful fun.
I remember one night I had been playing it for hours and hours, and then everyone went to bed and I kept playing…..then I remember still playing and all of the sudden the sun was coming up and I snuck off to bed because it was time for dad to wake up to go to work. I remember feeling embarrassed.
I thought it funny and pathetic. I had been playing for over 12 hours straight….sitting in that one spot hunched over that little computer watching stick figures crawl around the screen. I’m out of my mind.
I remember during the days of NHL 94 in college when I lived at Sloan Street this guy I lived with (Ryan Peitch) couldn’t beat me at hockey and he got so frustrated with it that he quit playing the game and started playing NBA Live 95. He played it for weeks…a whole season against the computer and one day I came home from skipping class and mentioned that I used to play a similar game with Josh in High School when it was called Lakers vs. Celtics.
He laughed it off and said he would crush me, so I agreed to play. I actually thought he would win. I hadn’t played in years. I remember watching him out of the corner of my eye…..he was getting angry….really angry, like when you’re so mad you’re trying to hide that you’re mad so as to keep your cool. He quietly lost and put the game away…forever.
The reason I remember it so well is that I think it damaged our friendship. I don’t think he liked me so well after that. In fact, if I were to ever see him again…..I think I would ask him about it.
Anyone know where Peaches is these days? I’m sorry Peaches…..I didn’t mean to beat you at NBA Live 95!!! It was all luck. I’m sure you would’ve won in a rematch.
So to make a long story short, Josh keeps asking me to buy an XBOX and I’ve always put him off because I knew if I bought it I would play all the time…I was right. I’d throw that freaking Playstation out the window if I could.
Josh, care to tell a story about Techmo Bowl?
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Tecmo Bowl! What a game! It actually had 4 plays you could choose from. If the defense picked the same play that you tried to run, you were toast. (Except pass 3 with San Francisco.) Anyway, one day we’re over at our girlfriends house, and we ask her little brother what games he had for the nintendo and he says with a wide smile “Tecmo Bowl!” (I typed out a lot more and realized you probably don’t care about the details so I’ll make the story short.) We told him San Fran was the best team, but he said he was unbeatable with the Giants and L.T. so we said we’d play him. We were San Francisco and Elliott played offense and I played defense. Needless to say, Elliott picked pass 3 everytime just to show the little kid how little he knew about the game and I proceeded to guess what play he’d choose about 95% of the time. I think the final score was somewhere in the neighborhood of 56-0……. at the half…… before he turned it off and ran to his room crying. We were cold hearted bastards back in those days.
Side note, I saw Peaches Sunday in Charlotte at the Final Round of the Wachovia Championships. He was with his wife.. Beth.. I think her name is. He looked the same, sounded the same. Said he lived in Huntersville which is just north of Charlotte and has a 4 week old. Strange thing too, because I was telling Dave about the time we went up to his Gigantic house in college on the way there. Late.
I remember techmo bowl as well, but the stories I remember…or try to remember were in college….making a drinking game out of it. But it seems to me you could pick between 3 running plays and 3 pass plays. Or was that the Super Nintendo version…..who knows.
My memories revolve around.. Sacked..Drink!
Interception…Drink! 1st down…Drink!Touchdown…Drink! Pass Play…Drink! etc. etc.
You’re thinking of the 2nd installment of the game. I think it was called Tecmo Super Bowl or something like that. It was upgraded to include a massive amount of data that allowed you to choose between a whopping 8 plays.
Yeah, I remember the countless hours of sega hockey. Walking into your room, empty boxes of dominos pizza filling every cornor. And yes, you and Sally engaged in battle. I’m man enough now to admit that I couln’t even contend in the same class of play as you two.
Fucking Roenick. Or Modano, or Jagar. Bastards, every one of them.
But Techmo, go back further. Freaking Tandy Computers you loaded the game with a freakin cassette. I can’t remember the game, but it was a bunch of yes no questions that lead you into some block like jungle displayed on the screen.
God how I loved Pitfall for Atari. I thought that was the greatest game in the world.
And what about the gameroom that use to be located next to Pizza Inn right there on 123. I can remember walking from jr high after school all the way there. Tempest. What a great game. Dig dug. Loved it. The first Star Wars game.
Damn, I think there’s a little tear in my eye as I type.
Later
Swirl
Josh, I remember that too…how odd out of all the Nintendo games there were, he picked the one we were arguably best at. His name was Jay Steele right?
It really is a pity there wasn’t professional video game players when we were young like there are now. I’m positive we’d be in the hall-of-fame.
Jason,
I remember the gameroom next to Pizza Inn. That’s crazy you mention that. I used to go up there and ride skateboards with Tyler Gambrell….remember him? Isn’t he dead or something. I think I remember that.
I played Karate Champ up there for hours and hours and hours. It all seemed so fun and limitless when everything was a quarter. Now games cost 2 bucks. Fuck that. I can buy a beer for that much.