Super Mario Bros.

Oh yes, i remember being 6 years old and begging my mom to let me have a Nintendo. All my friends were talking about it at school, and I wanted one too! Imagine my surprise when the next Christmas rolled around, and I found an NES under the tree. It only had two games: Super Mario Bros. and Duck Hunt [ダックハント]. Yet that was enough for hours of entertainment.

You have to understand that at the time, we had no computer, because those were unaffordable (think thousands of 1990 dollars). and more for hobbyists than families. My parents weren't of the video game or arcade generation, so they didn't have an Atari or anything like that. The most I would get is a few quarters to play Pac-man when we ate at Pizza Hut. I did use computers at school, but they were ugly Apple computers with tiny monochrome screens, nothing like the beautiful color graphics of the Nintendo on a TV.

I remember the day, much later, when I figured out how to beat the game. I always had difficulty timing my jumps right... A few years later I got Super Mario Bros. 3 [スーパーマリオブラザーズ3], which I actually think is a much better game. it's more polished and detailed, and obviously the graphics are nicer. I wasn't much of a fan of Super Mario Bros. 2, which I never owned but I did have some friends that played it. The game I always wanted but couldn't get was Zelda II: The Adventure of Link [リンクの冒険], alas...

That concluded my console gaming experience for many years, until I went to a flea market in my teens and stocked up on old NES cartridges. I still owned my NES, so it was a nice trip down memory lane. In between that time, I discovered computers and began programming (including writing my own games), but I also played a variety of classic games for DOS and Windows. But Super Marios Bros is where I began, so it holds a special place for me.

Looking back at Super Mario Bros now, it seems so strange and even surreal. It's a wonderfully creative concept of great imaginations. Like so many old classics, you can't easily compare them with modern games, because they influence everything that comes later, and technology keeps improving.