I’m only 31, and I’m not sure that’s quite old enough to be ranting about kids these days, but I am conservative so it does seem like I might as well get an early start. Anyway…
Have you seen kids these days and their video games? Kids just don’t appreciate what a video game is really about. If they tried playing Donkey Kong, after a few minutes they’d say, “Now how do I get online to pwn some n00bs?” Back in my day, video games weren’t about pwning n00bs and there wasn’t a line to be on. Video games were just about demonstrating your individual skill and getting a high score so you could put your initials in as “ASS”.
And what’s with all the story in video games? Video games these days all need to have cut scenes and voice acting. What for? Back in my day, video games didn’t have stories. Why did Pac-Man need to eat all the dots on the screen? Because it was a video game and that was the objective, that’s why. If I wanted a story, I’d have a read a book. And I never did.
And what’s with all the sandbox games? So many games these days just let you wander around and do nothing in particular, and kids these days think that’s so cool. “Wow; I can just run around town doing whatever I want!” I already have a place I can wander around aimlessly, though: It’s called life. In a video game, I want set objectives and I want to get them done. If I wanted to wander around aimlessly for hours I’d go to Home Depot.
And finally, because of their video games, kids these days don’t value life anymore. They have their home consoles with Grand Theft Auto, and if they die they just wake up at the hospital and get back to things like nothing happened. But back in my day, we knew the value of life: Three lives for a quarter. That’s right: Lives used to cost money. And that made them precious. Kids these days don’t appreciate that.
Its worse than that. In pointless sandboxy games such as Little Big Planet, if you get stuck in your aimless wandering, you’re encouraged to suicide yourself to get out. How does that translate to real life? Look at Japan’s teen suicide rate, thats how. I wonder if thats how they convince muslims to strap on suicide vests. “You know, Hussein, you’re hopelessly stuck in a dead-end job. You should get a suicide vest and go down to the Infidel police station and start this level over!” What’s the cheat code for 72 virgins? ^^><ab start?
If kids these days had to invest a quarter in every game of Asteroids or Space Invaders (and spill a little bit of their beer into one of the buttons to un-stick it and make it work properly), they’d appreciate video games more. Back in the day, at 25-cents a game, the challenge to fight off the ominous “Game Over” was huge.
The best games ever written were Ping Pong and Atari Tank. I challenge ANYONE to beat me at Tank. Forget it. You can’t.
I saw some kids playing something called Angry Birds on their telephone. ON A TELEPHONE, for Pete’s sake!
Remember when you could make phone calls on a telephone? And the telephone was some big thing that was on the desk and Barbara Stanwyck could use to kill an intruder in a movie? Try that with a phone today.
In order for things to get fixed, we’re going to need to charge money to fire birds from slingshots into green pigs. Then, you wouldn’t see a bunch of kids with 3 stars on every screen in levels 1-5. Not that I know anything about that.
Yeah, kids these days have it easy with their “progressive” video games, where everyone needs to feel happy about themselves so it can’t be too hard. Back in the day, you could lose your 3 lives (and your quarter) in about 30 seconds, and then it was GAME OVER for you.
Even console games had the dreaded GAME OVER, and there was none of this “saving your progress” bullcrap. If you couldn’t reach the end of the game with your 3 lives (plus however many you earned from bonus points), you were just s.o.l. unless your friend came over and could get farther. Or if you found a cheat code.
I’m telling you, everything started to go downhill when we moved to 16-bit machines…
I’m old enough to remember when a quarter still got you five balls in pinball.
Darned inflation.
Back in my day, I used to play Missile Command all the time. If I could, I’d be playing it yet. I was so angry when that whippersnapper Carter cut my funding.
Rule of thumb on complaining about kids… If you’re ultra conservative, 25 years old, if you’re ultra liberal, never (you never grow up – you never get to complain).
Also, anyone remember that board hockey game with the twisting pull rods? Damn I rocked at that. Permanent neighborhood champion I was. King of the ice. See, I’m just fast with my hands, Cilla.
Didn’t have video games when I was little. We actually went OUTSIDE and played with plastic army men in the dirt. Then we’d terrorize frogs, snakes or any insects that we could find. Then when it was getting dark we’d go inside and eat supper. Didn’t wash my hands either.
Alot of crappy games try to make “sandbox” style games these days and suck at it or dont have the budget. Good sandbox games are made by
Bethesda
-Fallout 3
-Oblivion
Rockstar
-Gta 4
-Red Dead Redemption
Fallout 3 is one of the top games made in the past ten years.
Come to think of it, it’s just about the only good game made in the past ten years.
I want to go play my SNES now.
BTW Fallout “New Vegas” comes out in a few weeks.
Um, anyone remember listening to “The Lone Ranger” on the radio?
Back then lives cost $.25
To liberals today, the life of a fetus is cheaper than that.
Hey Enemy I remember listening to the Lone Ranger on the radio and a whole lot of other stuff as well. I also remember when Mad Magazine was a ten cent comic book and I remember when I had a full head of hair.
Dig Dug Roxxxx!!! I still play it today.
I resented video games for supplanting pinball. Funny thing is, as a pre-pubescent, pinball machines were illegal here in NYC. They had become a source of teenage (and older) gambling. Then for some reason they came back in the mid-70s. I thought it had something to do with the release of “Tommy” (the bizarre Ken Russell film version of The Who’s rock opera, youngsters), but it was probably just another revenue source for a broke Big Apple.
Half of me wants to say, “When I was a boy, if we wanted a video game, we had to play with the Etch-a-Sketch and Wooly Willy.
The other half of me laughs at how “Death Race 2000” (a black and white look down game in which you chased tiny skeletons with a tiny car) was pulled because it was deemed “too violent.”
Then there’s the other other half of me that misses Gorf, Battlezone and Spy Hunter. Yup, there was no saving games in Gorf. It simply insulted you, “Ha ha ha, you lose Space Caaaadet.” And you were done.
Hehe, I still use ASS as a name or my save game slot whenever it is available. In RPG games I can’t resit using Butt or Ass in my character’s name. In Rock Band My first band name starts with Bung since the game told me Butt and Ass were not allowed in an online profile.
Hide and go seek still rules as the ultimate game.
Frank, that IS old enough to be ranting about “kids these days”.
But, “HEY, you nOObs, get off my lawn!!” or
“If that ball comes over my fence again, I’m pwning it!”
aren’t sentences you’ll use, because they are all online, and not on anyone’s lawn.
Except maybe the armed ones who are ready to play Grand Theft Auto in your car.
I AM the Pinball Wizard that the song was named after. I would like totally destroy any and all comers…except on a video pinball game…that is teh gay!
I used to get a whole 10-15 seconds of fun out of a quarter playing defender.
Hide and seek was my game of choice. Problem is, no one ever came looking for me. I was a pwned n00b before those were words.
Just Cause 2 is a pretty good sandbox game if you like trashing banana republics.
Godzilla games are fun because you choose to trash San Francisco. Take that, you slimey hippie. Stomp on Pelosi.
Basil, never underestimate a phone. My daughter held off a home invader with a phone handset. Beat the snot out of him and gave him a concussion. She came out okay, he had head damage and a broken leg. And all that was BEFORE she got to my gun locker.You can kick butt with a phone. True story.
I still have a working Magnavox Odyssey console with games. My 6 year old Grandson loves to play that.
You whippersnappers make me laugh.
In your day, you could beat video games. “Ooohh, I beat that lizard thing and got the fairy princess”.
Fairy.
In my day they just got harder and harder until you couldn’t beat them and you couldn’t “save” them, you started at the beginning.
Talk about building character.
Played the entire Space Invaders on the Atari 2800 with my (at that time) sane sister till it cycled the score back to ZERO
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Played Quartat til it cycled back to the beginning with just changes in color on the enemies… pastel was too damn fruity for me and ended it there
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God Mod ‘d thru DOOM 1 / 2 and I still loved the hell out of it~ loved the novels too since they actually explained what was actually going on!
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Played Dragon Warrior to the end without finding Every Single Stupid little thing in it and loved it big time. Got screwed in two because that final “dungeon” blew~
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Back in the day I played FFVII three times over since it was.. well. FUN
Metal Gear Solid was simply awesome and never got better in its later incarnations
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Perhaps growing up sucked the fun out of me, since I’ve never found a game to love any longer. Sure; I’ve completed other games since then, but it just isn’t the same anymore. I feel no satisfaction in finishing anything. The journey might be fun to a slight degree, but it is utterly forgotten once I’ve traded it in. So truly I believe it’s a generational view I’m seeing here from the postings. You all remember the “good old days” and wonder what the hell is going on with the new field of gaming and the young’ins dorking around with it in their PARENT BOUGHT i-whatevers cells or RRoD / Lone Orange Power LED light of DEATH consoles (LOPLD..not as sexy as the former).
Face the ugly wrinkled truth: We who morn the past – Are the Past!
Do Solitare, Freecell, Minefield and Bubblet count as ‘video games’?