Tag Archives: art

Wild Arms 3 Part 38 Interlude: Art Appreciation

Did you think we were taking a week off just because Janus died? Nope! Gotta post something on January 23, Odd Number Day. Even though half of all the numbers in this world are odd, why are odd numbers called ‘odd?’ Is it implicating that half of everything in this world is odd?

Previously on Wild Arms 3: Chapter 2 complete!


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And now that all the major players have made their appearances…

Back in the day, I always loved strategy guides. It wasn’t just about knowing what was happening/going to happen in a game, it was also about the fact that strategy guides (and their general gaming magazine cousins) were about the only place you could get “official” art of videogame characters outside of a manual. And this was huge when your protagonist was a 16 x 16 block of smeared pixels! Do you know how many different ways I tried to interpret Celes Chere back in 1994? There was Amano art of her with pants! Did her sprite have pants? Could I see them on my chiclet-sized television? A strategy guide might help!

Now, Wild Arms 3 was released in 2002, and that was well past the point that one needed a magnifying glass and guide to figure out what was going on. In fact, as has been noted before, Wild Arms 3 has some extremely detailed and expressive models. However, it never hurts to see what was “intended” by the art department, so let’s take a quick look at some official Wild Arms 3 art.

(Unlike the rest of the LP, click on any of the images in this post for a larger view)


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As was the style of the time, our first decent introduction to our team is available in the manual. I appreciate that everyone looks happy, and even Jet seems to be having a good time. Also of note…

  • Jet’s age is listed as ????, which is never not a red flag for “mysterious past”
  • Gallows is 6’ 3” and 220 lbs. He might be the most jacked mage in all of JRPG history
  • Clive is 5’ 8”, and his gun is nearly as tall as he is
  • Virginia and Jet are the exact same height. There is something about that that I find adorable


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And our villains get a page, too. While the Prophets are clearly implied to be evil, Janus seems to be described as almost heroic. Maybe aspirational? Regardless, he definitely comes off as the bad guy who eventually joins the heroes… But, as we all know now, that is not the fate for this JRPG Janus.

Maya is not mentioned in the manual at all, and that is a crime.


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Anywho, that’s it for good stuff in the WA3 manual. Just going to also note that I am not convinced that there are actual screenshots in this manual, but some kind of simulated, labor-intensive art going on. Speaking as someone who has spent the last year taking “real” pictures of Wild Arms 3, these examples do not look actually possible…

Beyond the manual, there was a Wild Arms 3 strategy guide, but I never bought it, because Wild Arms 3 came out at exactly the point in time that I was a poor college student that had to decide between purchasing strategy guides or buffalo wings for the week… And there wasn’t a free website called buffalowingfaqs.com.


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There was some free official art released on the Wild Arms website, though.


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I have had this nonsense saved as part of my pictures screen saver for the last two decades.


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I have always loved this piece…

FGC #466 Mario Paint

Wobbles!There will never be another game in my life like Mario Paint.

First of all, in the only instance of this ever happening, I can’t decide whether I should blame myself or Nintendo Power for my initial predicament in 1992. On one hand, there was the propaganda department of the almighty Nintendo correctly identifying that a gussied up Microsoft Paint with a random doodad controller accessory might not be the billion seller that is the usual anything with “Mario” in the title, and their decision to hype Mario Paint from here to the moon was, in retrospect, pretty inevitable. And, yes, as a young lad who was not even old enough to earn a paltry fee for lawn mowing, I eagerly devoured that marketing and demanded my parents purchase Mario Paint right now, I don’t care if it’s August, Dad, I need Mario Paint like the deserts of World 2 need the rain (or at least a less angry sun). Nintendo Power had worked its usual magic on Wee Goggle Bob, and it was kind of inevitable that I’d beg my parents for some sweet Mario Painting from Summer to Winter.

But why did I give a damn? Sure, Nintendo Power is great at riling up preteens on the promise of new Ninja Turtles, but it’s not like I fell for every campaign that showed up in my mailbox. I couldn’t give less of a crap about Ken Griffey Jr., and Nintendo Power claimed he was the second coming of Bo Derek (which, I am to understand, is a good thing?). And, as exciting as a new, two-button controller ever sounded, it wasn’t like I needed that mouse for Gradius or other games like how the Game Genie instantly became my most preferred peripheral. And the general concept of Mario Paint? It wasn’t like I was dumb enough to believe Mario’s presence was suddenly going to make me a better artist.

Oh, wait. Never mind. That’s exactly what I believed

MAAAARIO PAINT HOORAHI’m an engineer from birth. My grandfather built cars back when that meant something. My other grandfather literally invented food additives we use today (editor’s note: I feel I should note that this is not actually a lucrative field, and I am not the heir to the immense fennel fortune), and later became a science teacher. Both of my grandmothers ran entire businesses despite receiving what appears to have been the worst education available. And my parents… well… I guess my mother is pretty good at charades. Point being that my heritage seems to be that I come from a long line of people that “figure things out”. And I used this skill from a young age to be a born and bred computer geek. If it had some “computer-y” component, I was good at it, despite the obvious handicap of being a child (and, reminder, all children are dumb as rocks). So, while I was terrible at drawing (a skill I had always hoped to possess innately, as practice is for nerds), clearly Mario would catapult me to artistic stardom. And there’s an animation feature! I always wanted to make my own cartoons, so not only would my new artistic skills generate the next Mona Lisa, I could also create the next Bugs Bunny while I was at it. Mario Paint wasn’t just a videogame (Dad!), it was a ladder to the lofty heights of unbridled artistic expression.

And I can assure you that I reminded my parents of this certainty at every available moment. I’m not convinced there ever was or ever could be a gift that I bugged my parents about more. I remember going to Sears for a live demo of Mario Paint, receiving a free hat, and wearing said hat constantly while begging like a hungry dog. I remember August, and a vacation that consisted primarily of stating how this Disney World is pretty okay, but have you heard of this new Mario Paint? I remember dragging my Mom to garage sales in the Fall, and hoping against all odds and reason that a pre-owned copy of Mario Paint would have found its way into the neighborhood wares. The concept of a videogame-based Halloween “treat” was introduced to my parents. A similar plan may have been hatched for Thanksgiving. Through it all, I was unable to obtain a Mario Paint, so it was all up to Christmas. Surely, by the jolliest of holidays, I would finally have the game that had led to an excruciating, ostensibly infinite four month wait.

And then I got Mario Paint for Christmas. Hooray! Happy ending!

… What? You expected some sort of horrible twist? Come on, this is the official Goggle Bob Christmas Special for the year. You want bad vibes, wait until Wankery Week.

And here’s some further good vibes: Mario Paint might be the most important videogame I ever owned.

Play it again, MarioLet’s get this out of the way right now: Mario Paint did not make me an amazing artist. Despite the fact that I can find all the secret exits in Super Mario World, somehow welding Mario to the experience did not instantly make me an expert in the rewarding field of properly utilizing the spraypaint tool. Nor did it allow me to create the astounding and inevitable Goggle Bob: The Animated Series, as the animation feature in Mario Paint is comically limited (nine frames of animation can barely animate Mickey Mouse’s tiny shorts). And, frankly, while the music composer section of Mario Paint has always been some kind of low-key remarkable, the fact that it didn’t use proper musical notation always bothered my “concert band”-based brain. My oft-stated reason for needing Mario Paint -that it would improve my own artistic prospects beyond anything a mundane set of markers could ever achieve- was clearly an unmitigated catastrophe. Hell, I would have been better off with those (lame) colored pencils and (boring) paper, as at least you can keep paper. Mario Paint only had one dedicated save slot! Any given masterpiece must be erased if you came up with something new.

Except… that wasn’t completely true. Yes, Mario Paint had a paltry save battery for preserving Mario Paint projects, but it was outputting to a television. And, thanks to Nintendo Power and its Mario Paint strategy guide (how could I resist such a periodical?), I was informed that there was a way to configure your Super Nintendo so it output through a VCR. Thus, with the marvelous power of a VHS tape, I was able to record all of my creations! Hooray! Naturally, my dad and I had to learn how to actually configure this sort of cable setup in our actual home (and still leave everything working so we could tape Quantum Leap), so I picked up a crash course in how cabling works thanks to a desperate desire to record the movements of my modified mushroom sprites (and if you’re thinking “so you learned how to hook up a TV, big deal”, then I will remind you how many people in this country still can’t figure out how to make an HDMI cable produce Law & Order on a proper input channel). Screw itAnd, while Mario Paint never left my console for long, this new configuration allowed me to record other games, too. I was able to record the entirety of Final Fantasy 3! Chrono Trigger! I could review these amazing stories and experiences in a manner that didn’t involve having to deal with a monster encounter every seven steps! I could finally absorb my favorite scenes and moments at my own carefully controlled (with a rewind button) pace.

Yes, I’m saying that without Mario Paint, I never would have gained a greater appreciation for the minutia of particular videogames. Without Mario Paint in 1992, there would be no Gogglebob.com in 2019.

(And I’m also going to claim I invented the concept of a video Let’s Play when I discovered I could hook a microphone into the whole arrangement. But that’s neither here nor there.)

And I suppose Mario Paint helped this author through a few more post-1992 projects. Mario Paint may have been limited, but it was still centuries ahead of any animation or “digital” tools that were available through my public education. I wowed many a junior high teacher with “real” animations on VHS tapes for projects where the best rival students could offer was a dinky poster. Some other kid turned in a clay model of a hedgehog? Bitch, please, I got Sonic on my side, and I can marry Genesis gameplay to Super Nintendo-based fun facts. In retrospect, the lettering tools of Mario Paint allowed me to have Powerpoint presentations a solid decade before that program became the bane of every “working lunch” (It’s just a stupid meeting where we get pizza, Debra). And while we’re talking about future innovations, I never did gain that dexterity to actually freely “draw” something that isn’t just an indescribable blob of pixels, but the general skills of Mario Paint eventually did transfer to skills in Adobe Photoshop. Waluigi?There is a direct correlation between the little paint-fill man in Mario Paint, and the ability to properly magic select shapes in Photoshop, and I will hear no debate on this self-evident fact. And, even as a computer engineer, you would not believe how often I wind up having to use Photoshop (computers is websites, right?). So, yes, Mario Paint, a Christmas gift I received when I was barely even ten, is a straight line to how I earn my living a solid 25 years later.

It may not have resulted in exactly what I wanted, but, against all odds, Mario Paint is the most important Christmas gift I ever received.

So thanks for putting up with my nonsense, Mom and Dad.

And Merry Christmas, everybody. I hope all your gifts are Mario Paints.

FGC #466 Mario Paint

  • System: Super Nintendo Entertainment System. There was actually a later version for the 64DD, but, unfortunately, that system is just an urban myth that originated in odd issues of Nintendo Power.
  • Number of players: Technically one, but you can fill an entire movie theatre with people that will watch your recorded Mario Paint masterpieces.
  • I hate this thingIsn’t there a game in here somewhere? Oh yeah, there’s Gnat Attack, a game supposedly meant to increase your mouse dexterity. However, all I learned from Gnat Attack is that sentient, disembodied hands scream in a singularly horrifying manner when stung by bees. The more you know!
  • Just play the gig, man: The music of Mario Paint is permanently glued to my very soul. I hum the “loading” theme when I’m trying to remember something. And, sometimes, all I’m trying to remember is the sound a piggy makes.
  • Favorite Tool: I am terrible at free-hand expression, but the teeny tiny pixels of the stamp creation area are exactly my speed. And I can add a set of sunglasses to a Super Mushroom really easily! I am killing it at this creativity thing.
  • Tell us about the Mario Paint Nintendo Power strategy guide: Okay, yes, it does sound like the stupidest thing in the world. But! Back in the pre-internet days (or at least pre-56K modem days), this was about the only way to get Mario Paint… templates? Ideas? This was a big book of fun starting points for using easy-to-follow stamps to create your own Marginally Original Character Samus or Marginally Original Character Link. What I’m saying here is that the Mario Paint strategy guide was the secret genesis of every sprite comic, and, for that reason, we should burn every last copy.
  • Hey, didn’t Homestar Runner get his start from his creators using Mario Paint? Shouldn’t you have been able to produce something equally timeless? No. Shut-up.
  • NOW LOADINGDid you know? Using the “Load” command when first booting up a new, physical copy of Mario Paint will load a piece of art that actually appears on the back of the Mario Paint box. I’m not certain why anyone would ever think to do that, but, hey, it’s good to see that lil’ car.
  • Would I play again: In a way, I never stopped playing Mario Paint. However, in a more accurate way… No. I love this game, and it made more of an impact on my life than I care to admit, but it’s not exactly accessible. I’ll just have to be happy with Undo Dog finally earning a supporting role in Mario Maker.

What’s next? It’s the end of the year, so it’s time for our annual retrospective. Who will win the coveted Goggle Bob Game of the Year award? It’s Kingdom Hearts. Wait, ^&%#, I just gave it away! Dammit! But, uh… there will be other awards? I guess? Uh, please look forward to it.

Seriously!

FGC #423 Super Smash Bros.

Please join special guest artist Pooch and myself in examining the deadly sins of the Smash Bros.

Lust, Sin of Donkey Kong

This is where it all started for the Nintendo empire: an ape that really, really wants to sling a random woman over his shoulder and carry her Arceus-knows-where. But there is little question what Donkey Kong is going to do when he gets there! He’s a big, naked ape, and she’s a beauty worthy of a Jump Man’s gaze… we already know what happens if you fail to climb that construction site. Donkey Kong Juniors don’t just pop out of eggs! Sure, one could claim this is all borrowed imagery from King Kong, but King Kong didn’t just stand next to Fay Wray beating his chest and smiling all day.

Of course, this interpretation is primarily based on DK’s maiden voyage, and not his later games. You know, the titles where he tries to save his bananas from being devoured by toothy crocodiles. Come to think of it, Freud might have a thing or two to say about that. And that’s even before you get to the part about him banging his bongos

Gluttony, Sin of Yoshi

Yoshi must consume.

He? She? It. It is an eating machine from the absolute moment it is hatched. Give or take a flutter jump, it seems the only way a Yoshi burns excess calories is by producing hollow, projectile eggs. Everything else is ingested, and the difference between delicious fruit and a screaming koopa troopa means nothing to this unrelenting lizard. All is sustenance to Yoshi, all must be consumed, and that never stops from cradle to an inevitably oversized grave. There’s a reason a certain plumber recently seems to leave his “noble” steed at a stage’s goal post; if a Yoshi were to traverse the entire Mushroom Kingdom, the nation would become nothing more than a reptile’s pizza topping.

Envy, Sin of Kirby

Yoshi is an animal. Kirby is unappeasable desire.

Kirby started as yet another 2-D platforming hero at a time when such a mascot character was produced roughly every seventeen seconds. However, Kirby was very different from his brethren, as he had amazing skills right from the moment he awakened. Projectiles? Just a matter of sucking in literally anything that is readily available, including plain air. Extra health? Pep bottles and Maxim Tomatoes grow on trees. Even flight, the most coveted of all platformer powerups? Well, ya don’t need any raccoon tails for this cream puff.

But it wasn’t enough for Kirby. Kirby needed more.

As of Kirby’s Adventure, Kirby gained the ability to copy the skills and powers of his opponents. Later adventures granted Kirby the talent to use multiple skills at once, combine them, or even convert his stolen skills into living assistants. Whom… he could devour again later. Why would he do that? Because Kirby can only have so many abilities at one time, and what is this ability compared to that ability right over there. Who cares if that power is attached to an ally?

And “must have it all” is such an integral part of Kirby that it followed him to Smash Bros. It has shadowed him straight through the series, and, as of Super Smash Bros. Ultimate, Kirby is capable of gaining nearly 75 different abilities from every last fighter.

But, of all those abilities, Kirby can only use one at a time…

And Luigi is standing right over there…

Is he even using that fireball? I bet Kirby could use it better…

Greed, Sin of Link

Link is often portrayed as a simple boy who claims the sword of a hero, heroically challenges a malevolent despot, and eventually saves an entire kingdom from an awful, certainly pork-scented fate. Link has gone by many names, but often earns a title such as “Hero of Time” or “Hero of the Wilds”.

He also earns literally more rupees than he can carry.

And enough food to feed the kingdom.

And treasure from literally every tomb, crypt, well, dungeon, and castle for miles.

And, in the end, the entire royal family owes him a debt.

And then he reclaims a magical wishing triangle that will gratefully grant him anything he wants.

And to think, he was already looking greedy when he decided he needed two hookshots

Sloth, Sin of Pikachu

Now we shall consult the Pokedex, Book of Oak, Chapter 25:

25:1 When several of these Pokémon gather, their electricity could build and cause lightning storms. … 25:8 This intelligent Pokémon roasts hard Berries with electricity to make them tender enough to eat. .. 25:11 It stores electricity in the electric sacs on its cheeks. When it releases pent-up energy in a burst, the electric power is equal to a lightning bolt.

So, to summarize, Pikachu is smart, generates electricity, can summon lightning storms, and can readily expel the power of a lightning bolt. Assuming a lightning bolt’s one billion joules of energy can be properly converted and utilized, that’s enough juice to power a lightbulb for six months. Assuming Pikachu only has a charge that powerful once day (and can’t be infinitely restored in seconds at a local Pokémon Center), a single one of those shock rats could power a city with approximately one minute’s worth of effort a day.

But what does Pikachu do?

Well, let’s just say that the coming energy shortage and associated apocalypse isn’t bothering the yellow mouse one iota. Pikachu has a party hat, and he’s going to use it, dammit.

Pride, Sin of Fox McCloud

James McCloud lost his life to the betrayal of Pigma Dengar, and failed to stop Andross, a mad scientist that sought to conquer the entire Lylat System. Fox McCloud thus inherited a gigantic starship, and the massive debt incurred by the production of such a craft. Fox, strapped for cash and perhaps anxious for a little vengeance, decided to fight back against Andross’s forces, and gathered the Star Fox team to save the galaxy.

And he did!

By himself!

Yes, Fox McCloud may have flown with Peppy, Falco, and Slippy, but who was the one that saved their Arwing’s asses every time they got into a scrape? Fox even piloted an experimental submarine just to show some random marine biology who’s boss. And did the whole team battle the giant floating brain of Andross? Nope. Just Fox. So is it any wonder that when Dinosaur Planet was threatened eight years later, Fox was alone in a rotting ship with a rusted out robot? Of course not. Why would Fox ever ask for help? He saved the damn universe! All by himself!

Team Star Fox has reassembled on occasion, but history has proven it will always be undone by the pride of Fox McCloud. Yes, he’s an ace pilot, but what is the cost of being “the best”? Fox could never maintain a permanent relationship with his closest friends. Fox could never maintain a real relationship with the princess that once left her planet for him. If ROB wasn’t bolted to the Great Fox, Fox would be completely alone in the very universe he saved.

No friends, no items, just Fox, alone, at his final destination.

Wrath, Sin of Samus Aran

Samus Aran is murder incarnate. She has committed genocide at least once, and, in the event said genocide doesn’t take, she gets the call to commit some good ol’ fashioned clone genocide. She has also eliminated fellow bounty hunters that were infected by phazon, and took no time waiting to see if a vaccine for such a condition was even possible. Oh, and there’s the little matter of how she was duplicated by her prey twice, and both times the “evil twin” was exactly as destructive as OG Samus. The “Dark” Samuses were just pointed in an inconvenient direction…

And then there’s the matter of Ridley. Ridley is a space pirate that has committed his share of sins, up to and including killing (and maybe devouring) Samus’s parents. Obviously, he should be punished for such an act. In retribution, should he be killed? That’s a question for the philosophers. But should he be killed over and over, at least four times, by the same person? That seems a bit excessive. And then cloned, reborn as an infant, and forced to desperately survive on the same space station as the hunter that killed him in the first place? That’s not a punishment, that’s a horror movie. And Samus is the pure, unstoppable vision of wrath they put on the poster.

Mario… who… uh…

Um… Mario is pretty alright. Hrm. Guess not everybody is a bad smash brother…

FGC #423 Super Smash Bros.

  • Here come the brosSystem: We’re technically just profiling the original N64 release here… so that one. It was the N64! This might be the most important Nintendo franchise to come out of that system. Or the only franchise to start on that system…
  • Number of players: Super Smash Bros. completely justifies all four N64 controller ports. Mario Kart and Goldeneye are pretenders to the throne.
  • Special Thanks/Credit: Once again, the venerable Pooch is responsible for the art of this article. All of it! Except the screenshots! Duh! Hit Pooch up for some commissioned art when you have a chance. Mention this article and get a resounding, “What? Really?”
  • Speaking of Art: Check out that box art.

    Poor lighting

    Link looks so confused!

  • Maybe actually talk about the game for a second: It is rather amazing how much of “Smash Bros.” was right here at the beginning. They might not be distinct modes, but the start of things like Smash Run or Endless Smash is obvious in the single player campaign, and every bit of the presentation seems like a prototype for the eventual celebration of gaming that Smash Bros. would become. Even the intro seems overtly cinematic… for an N64 game, at least.
  • Favorite Character: It’s Samus Aran. It’s always Samus Aran.
  • Follow your Dreams: According to an interview from 2008 (Brawl time) Sakurai initially just wanted to make a new, four-player fighting game with original characters (apparently it would be called… Dragon King? Isn’t that already a JRPG?). Unfortunately, he knew that new fighting games had a rough time attracting an audience, so he “borrowed” a few Nintendo heavies to put together a demo. Nintendo didn’t approve the project (or the characters being tossed into smash world) until a demo featuring Mario, Samus, Donkey Kong, and Star Fox was presented. And the rest is videogame history.
  • FINISHCome to think of it…: That means “out of his Arwing Star Fox” was created for the demo, and Sakurai didn’t go for an already more established 2-D character (like Yoshi). Of course, it’s not like he was going to throw Ness in there, and Kirby wasn’t exactly meant for polygons…
  • Ridley is too big: Ridley appears in the background of the Zebes stage. With his appearance in the opening of Melee, and his status as a boss in Brawl and 4, it’s pretty clear that his turn as a starring character in Ultimate was an inevitability.
  • Did you know? According to the credits and my ears, the Pokémon of this title all use the original 4Kids English voices. That is why Jigglypuff sounds so… right.
  • Would I play again: That’s a good question! It’s weird how Super Smash Bros. feels simultaneously like every other Smash title, and also its own thing. Each character seems to have at least one overpowered move (thank you, Pikachu lightning), and the balance is completely insane as a result. Why play with this old, broken man when there’s a better boy right there on the Switch? On the other hand, the nostalgia here is strong, and it’s always fun to PK Lightning smash a piranha plant. So hard to decide!

What’s next? Random ROB has chosen… Brain Dead 13 for the Playstation! From famous franchises to… not so much. Please look forward to it!

Poor petey

FGC #347 Space Invaders

Here they come, here come space invadersStreet Fighter 2 defined the fighting game. Grand Theft Auto 3 defined the sandbox game. Doom defined the FPS. Super Mario Bros. defined the platformer. Pac-Man defined the videogame mascot. And Space Invaders? Space Invaders established the very core of videogames.

Space Invaders is not the first videogame. In fact, according to interviews with Space Invaders’ creator, Tomohiro Nishikado, SI started in the same place as a number of other games of yesterday and today: it was a complete rip off. And it wasn’t even a very good idea for a rip off! Anybody here ever play Breakout? It’s that one game where you control a paddle (horizontal line), and you bounce a ball off bricks. It’s basically one-player pong with a slightly destructive objective. But one neat thing about Breakout is the whole “physics simulation” is has going on. You have to negotiate your paddle around the screen to effectively bat that ball back and maybe hit it just right so your next “catch” isn’t completely impossible. If you could completely control the ball, there would be no game here, it would just be, what, point and shoot? Where’s the fun in that?

So, naturally, that’s the game Tomohiro Nishikado decided to make. Never let it be said a bad idea can’t change the world.

Let’s imagine what it had to be like to create Space Invaders (with a little input from various interviews with the man himself). First, you want to make breakout, but you can “control the ball”. Okay, that sounds fun and all, but it would be boring as hell after all of five seconds. So let’s make the “bricks” move! You can control the ball now, but you can’t control the opponents, so that all important bit of randomness has been introduced. Now what are we shooting at? Bricks are fairly slow, so let’s grab something more mobile. We’re already shooting, so how about a war environment? No, that will never work, as apparently it was difficult to properly animate tanks and planes back in the day (wow, where would modern gaming be if we never advanced that technology?). So, partially inspired by that one movie about that farm kid, Nishikado decided to rip off another film: War of the Worlds. Those iconic Space Invaders? They’re supposed represent the vaguely aquatic tentacled aliens of the H. G. Wells Martians. Go ahead and look at the Space Invaders lineup right now.

The colors, duke

We’ve got squid kids on the top, octopi on the bottom, and those iconic dudes in the middle are supposed to be crabs. So, in an effort to file the serial numbers off an already established game, Nishikado managed to create the prequel to Splatoon history.

But we haven’t hit masterpiece yet. On its own, with what was just described, Space Invaders would likely have been a well-liked but inconsequential arcade title. You’d slide in your quarter, bump off a few cosmic horrors, and then head off to hunt a wooly mammoth or whatever the heck people did for fun in the 70’s. Forty years later, some cynical blogger would find the title on Taito Legends, play it for three seconds, and then compare it to a game where Tarzan becomes a pirate. But, no, that isn’t what’s happening in our universe. In this timeline, Nishikado added one important thing: music.

Beep BoopOkay, “music” might be a bit generous here. I don’t see John Williams scoring “Theme from Space Invaders” for his orchestra anytime soon. But Space Invaders does have a theme, and it was the first game of its kind to do such a thing. Ever play Pong? Just beeps and boops. The previously mentioned Breakout? Same deal. Space Invaders added sound beyond “sound effects”, and… Can we call this the music of the invaders? Like, maybe this is their battle cry, and it sounds remotely melodic to our human ears? Whatever the case, the invaders are coming, and they’re coming faster, and their music is speeding up with ‘em. That’s right, Space Invaders didn’t just offer the first bits of videogame music, it introduced dynamic videogame music.

And when that music was released into the wild, when the arcades started hosting Space Invaders, that’s when videogames were truly born.

It’s also the exact moment talking about videogames became bullshit.

Do videogames influence people? Can a videogame change a person’s thinking? These questions have been kicking around the videogame blogosphere since well before the word “blog” even existed. Sometimes the questions are posed in relation to “elevating” gaming to a higher level, sometimes it’s a rhetorical posed because “the devil made me do it” can now be pinned on murder simulators. But you know what everyone tends to ignore? That there was a freaking scientific study performed on the human heart and whether or not it is impacted by lil’ ol’ Space Invaders. “Cardiac and Metabolic Responses to ‘Space Invaders’: An Instance of Metabolically-Exaggerated Cardiac Adjustment?” from September of ’83. That’s right, before many of you readers were even born, there was a study that, spoilers, confirmed that Space Invaders had a measurable impact on a heartbeat. Let me say that again for anyone that missed the premise: a videogame can literally control your heart.

GETTING STRESSEDOn one hand, that seems like a gigantic duh. Theme from Space Invaders gradually gains tempo as the titular invaders pick up speed, so, come on, of course your heart rate is going to rise. The earth is threatened, the invaders are getting closer and closer, and you’re our only hope. It’s a stressful situation! On the other hand, can you think of anything more insidious than a soulless computer game controlling your very heart? You need that organ to live! And let’s consider what is supposed to get your heart a-pitter-pattering. Exercise? Sure. A pop quiz? Indubitably. The very thought of your first love? Absolutely. But a videogame? Your heart is racing because of some gradually advancing seafood? Ugh. We don’t live in Bladerunner, chummer, this is an inconsequential, low-tech waste of a quarter. Why is it getting to you? This game is nothing.

But, even if it took years for people to admit it, we all know that isn’t true. There’s a reason your heart is racing. There’s a reason you care. You’re a triangle trying to destroy oblong rectangles, but it means something. You are repelling Space Goddamn Invaders. You are enjoying the game, but your heart is racing because, on even the most basic level, you understand that this is something more. It’s not Breakout, Star Wars, or War of the Worlds bootlegging, it’s an experience, and, for as long as your quarter lasts, it is everything.

What is happening here?And that’s videogames. That’s every Mushroom Kingdom, Hyrule, or Liberty City. It’s every time you’ve cheered at the death of Sephiroth, and it’s every time you cried at the sacrifice of the twins (I didn’t know they were going to get better. Shut-up). It’s every time your heart raced because this level is almost finished, it’s so close to complete… Dammit, now I have to do it all over again. It’s every note when you’ve sung the battle theme from any given Persona in the shower. It’s every time you’ve scored that final platinum trophy or 101% achievement. It’s all right there in your heart, in every single beat, and that stupid organ doesn’t know the difference between your first kiss and conquering a bullet hell.

And it all started with Space Invaders.

Space Invaders is videogames.

FGC #347 Space Invaders

  • System: Every.
  • Number of players: Let the world consider it a single player game, but there are two player options available. And competing for the top score is undoubtedly global (or at least as global as your local arcade allows).
  • What’s in a name: Yes, they are invaders from space. But they are constantly encroaching on your home base. In other words, they are invading your space.
  • Favorite Alien: I prefer the squid kids on the very top row. Also, side note, I absolutely cannot ever nail that damn UFO.
  • Best Version? I don’t know, but it ain’t Space Invaders ’95, which somehow managed to make panty shots an integral part of the Space Invaders experience.

    Shake it

    Weaponized fanservice strikes again!

  • Leaderboards: The top score is 9,990. If you’re wondering why it isn’t the more impressive 9,999, it’s because there is not a single target in this game that provides less than ten points. Artificial score inflation started early, kids.
  • Goggle Bob Fact: While Space Invaders has invaded (ha!) my collection in a number of different compilations, I don’t technically own “just Space Invaders” in any physical form other than the original Atari release. And I inherited that one from my grandfather. I’ve never actually bought a physical copy of the game of games! The shame!
  • Did you know? Oh yeah, so you (or a version of you with computer experience) could probably code a fresh copy of Space Invaders out of about six if/then statements and friggen Basic. But! Back in the day, our modern resources were not available, and Tomohiro Nishikado had to build his own software and hardware to birth Space Invaders. This, I believe, officially makes the man a hero.
  • Would I play again: Yes. Duh. It’s Space Invaders.

What’s next? Random ROB has chosen… Anarchy Reigns for the Playstation 3! Anarchy in the USA! Or maybe some post-apocalyptic version of it! Please look forward to it!

When did you get back?