NES – Page 13 – Obsolete Gamer

Romstar was my first manufacturing job. I was half the tech department and later headed up the consumer division. Repair, beta testing, phone counselor, manual writing, I was there. Some previous work I did with a friend on an in-house hardware game system resulted in Magic Darts for the NES. I also helped ship, beta test since I had the only truck at the company (strange but true fact, the cabinet for Ninja Warriors was designed to fit the truck, an 88 Toyota short-bed.

The Music Hall

J.A. Laraque

Bionic Commando: 8-bit OST

Released in late 1988 by Capcom, Bionic Commando follows the adventures of Ladd Spencer, a super solider with a bionic arm that could fire a grappling gun allowing you to pull yourself up or swing from the ceiling. One of the funny things is he could not jump. I guess his arm was too heavy.

Editorials

J.A. Laraque

Games I have never beat: Faxanadu

Faxanadu came out in 1989 by publisher Hudson Soft, it is an RPG where you main goal is to defeat the Evil One. After being away from home for an untold amount of time you return to find your homeland pretty much abandoned. The Eleven King asks you to kill the Evil One because somehow that will lower unemployment and balance the budget.

Humor

Umar Khan

Bob-ombs: The Real Threat to America’s Safety?

Cute and cuddly. That’s what many think of when they see a Bob-omb. They don’t see the sin that drives them, the motives that turn the gears in their little mechanical bodies. Are we going to allow these “people” into our country? Are we going to allow America to swept away by these monsters?

Blog

J.A. Laraque

Commercial Wars: Best use of Mario Bros – Japanese edition

If you thought Birdo was weird before this commercial from Japan will not make things better. Honestly, they makes things worse. Funny thing is there is an ongoing debate as to whether Birdo is a guy who dresses like a girl or a girl. My question is do you really want to know the answer. Unfortunately, I don’t have the translation for what Birdo said, but man watching him, her, it push that egg out of its snout was just disturbing.

Blog

J.A. Laraque

Motivational Monday: Not so Superman

Lex Luthor has created a virtual Metropolis and trapped Superman’s friends in there and for some demented reason wants Superman to spend most of his time flying through rings with an unreasonable time limit. Perhaps this would be reasonable if the flight controls were good and it wasn’t over done, but on both counts they failed.

Company Representatives

J.A. Laraque

Vern Jensen: ActionSoft

I felt like everything I had done programming was unworthy compared to what I was seeing on the screen. And, once I got to play the game, the gameplay certainly matched the special effects. Super Metroid wins by a couple of points though, just because when I played it, I couldn’t put it down until I had finished it.

Editorials

J.A. Laraque

What is the best classic space shooter and why?

I can’t help but to re-iterate how significant the first accomplishment was. This was in the days before DirectX, before any abstraction layers, back when Men were Men & Women were Women & game programmers had to write universal binaries for what hardware MIGHT be running their code. That feat is the equivalent of walking into the UN Building and trying each language until you’re talking to everyone.

Notables Gamers

J.A. Laraque

JerseyJosh: Game Casa

Zelda was the first game that got me to think and prove I was the smartest. Beating that game was my greatest accomplishment until the first time I got to second base.

Company Representatives

J.A. Laraque

Patrick Rene Posthuma Linthorst: Phure Studios

Games like Zelda; A Link to the Past and Super Metroid would always make me doubt about Ocarina of Time being my all-time favorite game ever, since they’re really good games and come in as a close second and third, but Ocarina of Time is a game on a whole new level and which I’ve been waiting for for more than three years.

Editorials

Umar Khan

My Unparallel Loathing of Gaming Hipsters

Hipsters.The word alone makes me want to go on a punching jamboree at a local Starbucks. I’d like to point out my disliking for them in detail. Yes, reader, you will become more knowledgeable on who is a gaming hipster and may even come into the realization that you yourself or someone you hold dear to your hearts may even be one of these aberrations.

Company Representatives

J.A. Laraque

Lincoln Davis: NCsoft

Contra was the first game I was able to complete without dying once. Super Spreads rocks!

Blog

J.A. Laraque

Motivational Monday: Boss Battles

I get it, a lot of people are tired of the FF7 talk, but you have to give them credit for presenting the final Sephiroth fight in a grand manner. Sure, Final Fantasy has used angel themed bosses many times, but the mix of the long intro, the orchestra music and his presentation makes you feel like this is it. Unfortunately, with just a few items it is incredibly easy to not only beat Sephiroth, but to neutralize almost all of his attacks, but hey how about that cool music.

Blog Movies & T.V.

J.A. Laraque

Commercial Wars: Best use of a Rap

Finally and again the way they talk about the game toward the end, “Ya go Link ya, get some.” Is that not a line from every Ron Jeremy movie? I just think these children need more parental supervision and a kick in the ass.

Blog

J.A. Laraque

OGS: The NES Show

OGS is finally back with a brand new show! This show we tackled the NES from its beginnings, all the great games and accessories for it and much more. We were joined by our newest NES and SNES writer Luis and had OGS regulars Umar Khan and Edgar Median call in and share their experience with the Nintendo Entertainment System.

Company Representatives

J.A. Laraque

Josh Austin: D3Publisher of America

Metroid for the NES was the first gaming experience I had that affected me. At the time, all the games were colorful with bright music and lots of character. Metroid was a faceless hero isolated in a sci-fi alien world, to me there was nothing ever like this and it completely consumed me. I had to get that character through the world to complete her goal, it was a quest, and one that I couldn’t stop until I found every secret path and upgrade.

Hardware

J.A. Laraque

Five Treasured items from my Console Days

Let’s face it, if you weren’t using cheat codes you were missing out on the full gaming experience. The Game Genie changed the way we played console games allowing you to do all types of things with games you normally would have never had the ability too.