Nostalgia

Lately Nintendo has exhibited a lot of marketing genius. First, they created the Wii, a gaming system which bucks the trend of all of their competition. It doesn't have awesome graphics and increasingly complicated games. It's simple, fun, and appeals to a much broader audience including people who've never played video games before. This is clearly evidenced by the fact that my mother-in-law is now addicted to Wii Bowling.

Then, they came out with Wii Fit. Instead of going to the gym you can now work out with your family on your Wii. Now you can play video games and get exercise at the same time. WhoDaThunkIt?

Just recently Nintendo introduced the Virtual Console for the Wii. Now, you can give your Wii your Credit Card Number and buy "points" that you can use to buy and download old Nintendo games to your console. It's awesome! I spent $5 (500 Wii Points) yesterday to download the original Super Mario Brothers...in my opinion the best video game ever created.

I remember one Christmas Eve many, many moons ago when I first played Super Mario Brothers. We went to the house of some friends, Rudy and Mary Guttierez, for Christmas eve 1987- I think. They had a Nintendo Entertainment System. I think it was pretty new. Us kids were completely enthralled and I remember we spent HOURS playing it.

It's amazing to watch my own kids experience the same delight playing the same game which is very cheesy looking compared to the other games out today:



They had a blast playing this thing. Also, Anna and I had a lot of fun playing this too. We were both suprised at how many things we remembered, like where the 1-Ups (Extra Guys) are located on level 1-1 and 1-2. We remembered how to get to the warp zones on level 1-2 and 4-2. It took a little digging but we were also able to figure out how to get to the coin heavens in level 2-1 and 4-2. We had a blast playing Super Mario Brothers.

And then we downloaded Tetris Party, which combines classic Tetris with some new Tetris games, including the ability to play Tetris on the Wii Fit balance board. You want a work-out? Try playing tetris where you have to move your body to make the pieces move. Anyhoo, Anna pretty much whipped me in Tetris. I put up a really good fight, but finally about 1:00 AM she turned to me and said, "Joe, I don't think you're going to beat me."