10. Bomberman 1 (Two Player Co-op Mode)

Bomberman 1 had to be on this list because of the strong Co-op mode that was in it. While Bomberman 2 had the best battle mode, it didn’t have a co-op mode, which was a shame. Bomberman 1 though had an amazing Co-op mode where you would start off in a level invincible for the first 7 seconds or so. If you were loaded with items and bombs from previous levels, you could just ransack the level before being able to get hit by anybody. In a matter of seconds the whole screen is just one big explosion with you and player two are standing around with the melee coming to an end. This is serious fun, but is all predicated on the fact that neither you nor your partner lose your weapons by being killed or idiotically killing yourself. Why a 2 player Co-op mode wasn’t made for Bomberman 2 is beyond us.

9. Metal Warriors

Metal Warriors can be irritating if you’re really shit at it. If you’re good at it, then have at it. Have at your friend who ends up in a fucking shitty ass robot who can’t jump so has to stand in the corner getting his ass beat while you throw out massive projectiles into nowhere. This is the fun though of many of the battle mode levels; the fact that you can enter into all the different robot machines, and if you happen to get screwed and end up in the 20,000 pound beast, then you’re dead. Strategy then in Metal Warriors isn’t just being good with certain bots, but finding the right bot that fits your style of play. There is the Swordsman bot who is fairy versatile all around. The flying bot is fun because you can crop down unexpectedly into player 2’s bot without them being able to do anything about it. Much like Mario Kart, you want to perfect a certain bot, but if you don’t have access to it, it’s good to have a good supplementary bot.

8. Double Dragon 2

With only a few Co-op games making this list, a Double Dragon game had to make it, but which one? Double Dragon 1 certainly started the 2 player co-op series where you could whomp on each other instead of moving forward in the game. Double Dragon 2 had a charisma though that Double Dragon 1 didn’t have. The graphics were smoother, the music was memorable, and the storyline was somewhat sophisticated. On top of that you got a some new moves and weapons to work with. Being able to do that flying 360 kick with the sound of a hurricane representing it was fun as hell, especially when “accidentally” hitting player 2. Getting through the levels was a challenge. The jumps were difficult, the bosses were elusive (except for that Arnold Schwarzenegger boss) and you had to rely on your partner for much of the game. Being able to kick out those Bobo’s out of the airplane would require one player to knock him down and the other to knock him out just as he was being sucked out of the plane. Coop 2 player was rarely this fun.

7. Street Fighter 2

Of course Street Fighter 2 is on this list. With all the characters you could choose from, this game is limitless fun. You go into the game thinking “Okay, I’m going to try someone new” and choose the weak ass Dhalsim. Your friend rocks you with Ryu’s fireballs and signature uppercut. You’re pretty pissed at this point. It’s time to go with the character you know can destroy all; M. Bison. After this, it’s just a domination fest with you using Bison’s Signature electric move that flies through the other player as if he didn’t exist. After 10 seconds the match is over with the other player screaming how unfair it is that you’re using M.Bison. Well it’s just as unfair being able to sit in a fucking shooting out those fucking fireballs all day. Of course, when you get really good at certain characters you can neutralize these seemingly impenetrable moves, even with Dhalsim (to this day, I’ve never seen anyone choose Dhalsim at the arcade Street Fighter 2 Coin-Op machine). Loads of characters, loads of moves, tons of irritation until you’re able to figure out how to combat all the other characters moves, a perfect recipe for a great 2 player game.

6. New Super Mario Wii (Coin Battle)

Super Mario Wii made it’s dominating entrance into the video game market last year with an incredible battle mode. A race to collect coins and kill each other would make this hyperactive battle the best for the Wii thus far. The feeling of getting thrown off a ledge by player 2 is excruciating because you have to bubble your way back to him to get out, and of course he being the ass he is, will run away from you the whole damn time leaving you with no coins and himself with all the coins, including the big coins worth 10 a piece! It’s paramount that you don’t die in this game, but this is rather hard when playing a difficult level trying to collect as many coins as you can. A good strategy? Collect a couple coins, kill player 2 before he’s able to collect any and then kill yourself. You win 2-0!

5. Contra

Contra is the one and only Co-op 2 player game. When one thinks of Coop mode, it is Contra. Even without the code, the game is loads of fun with 2 players. The game doesn’t allow you to kill each other which is a good thing because there’s really no way of getting past the first half of the first level if you were able to. The levels are set up perfectly for 2 players. The first level has high ground and low ground to destroy all the enemies and the fortress levels make it necessary for both players to take out radars on each side of the screen. Where the 2 player mode can be tricky is in the waterfall level where if you go to far above, you can leave the other player behind to his doom which isn’t a good thing, because it’s not like you have a lot of lives to work with unless you use the code. The game is perfectly programmed with a perfect amount of enemies per level and bosses that would scare the shit out of you. The only problem was the lack of lives which Konami made sure to code up with the 30 live code. You always felt less of a man though having to use the code, but you really had no choice. They should have given you 10 lives to start off with.

4. Super Mario Double Dash

As was stated in previous articles, this game single handedly took up 75% of our college lives. A’s became B’s and then B’s became B-’s. A professor would wonder why my editing became so poor as a became a junior and senior in college. One reason, Super Mario Double Dash. There’s no way I could actually look over a paper when I heard roommates in the living room yelling at the top of their lungs in anger because they got blue shelled just as they were about to win the race. I had to be part of it. I knew I could beat all of them regardless of getting blue shelled because I would be so far ahead of those fuckers that nothing could stop me from finishing a race at the #1 spot. That this game almost had 2 friends of mine going to physically blows shows how important of a game it was. If you lost enough, some people felt they had to prove their worth by actually having a physical fight. Thankfully this was never me because I was always accepted as the Double Dash Master. All this is only an anecdotal story though. How long could one actually talk about the game itself?

3. Bomberman 2 (Battle Mode)

Bomberman 2 has the best bomber man levels and some really badass items that make it a better battle mode than Bomberman 1. In the tradition of Bomberman, you have to skillfully bomb your way around blocks to eventually bomb player 2, and not even player 2, but possibly player 3 and 4, or the computer players if you don’t have enough friends which is probably the case if you play Bomberman 2 on a regular basis. Loading up a bombs is the most fun someone can have in a 2 player battle mode. You can get 10 of these things and just lay them down around the whole screen watching everyone run to the corner to escape your abundance of bombs. This overzealous excitement can lead to killing yourself though if you’re not careful enough. The levels range from the Bomber man “purist” level, to levels where you can jump across vines and levels where you can transport yourself and bombs through tunnels to other parts of the screen. The bomber man series has always been creative, but found it’s most practical creativity in this perfect 2 player battle mode.

2. WWF Raw (SNES)

Where the hell did this one come from? Do yourself a favor. By a 3rd party SNES/NES and buy this game. At first you won’t understand why this is such an amazing 2 player game, but the more you play it, the more it ages like fine wine, especially when you’re drinking lots of alcohol. It’s all on the Royal Rumble mode to make this game so great.  The smallest moves will seem like the biggest accomplishments. Hip tossing a wrestler over the ropes gives you an unparalleled reward synaptic shot. Demolishing wrestlers with no energy in the middle of the ring will also do the same thing. The feeling of getting thrown against the ropes while player 2 is waiting right there to hip toss you over the ropes is incredibly depressing. The only shot you have is if you have enough energy to stop in your running tracks before the bastard is able to throw you over. The fun doesn’t just stop at the Royal Rumble in Raw though. The Survivor Series mode is also amazing because for some odd reason sometimes you don’t get to use all the wrestlers you picked because of bad programming, making you feel that you want to beat the bad programming with skill regardless of your handicap. Amazing drinking game. You can even let the rumble go on with the computer playing against itself and have bets on which wrestler will be the last man standing!

1. Super Mario Battle Mode (SNES)

This is the best 2 player game ever. For those who disagree, you don’t know what good 2 player battle modes are. This game is one screen, 5 different bad guys, and 2 different types of mushrooms that you can get to help you to your advantage, but yet can be played for hours because of how subtle the strategy is. You think you’ve mastered this game because it’s only played in one room. How about playing one of us at Old Wizard so we can whip your ass 50 times in a row to show you how much you need to improve. The element of winning by gaining coins (by killing the enemies on the screen) puts pressure on the other player to kill you before you’re able to gain the coins, which in turn puts pressure on you which often leads to you sacrificing your mushroomed Mario or Luigi to get that one coin. The pressure shifts back and forth like being part of the best football game in the world. You eventually learn prudence when you feel like you’re in the dumps being small while the other player is big and them having 2 coins. You know the game can tides can turn any moment. Just get that one mushroom or switch mushroom and you become the big bully! Seriously, timeless fun in every sense of the word ‘timeless’.

A while back we wrote an article about how 2D gaming is better than 3D gaming, which it clearly is. We here at OW have been getting increasingly frustrated with the lack or creativity and push towards realism in games. To address this issue we made some phone calls and told Nintendo that we would have to pull our support if they didn’t rectify this situation. Fearing what in the industry is called the “OW Sega affect”, Nintendo acted quickly and came out with what is easily the greatest game to be released in the 2000’s. So here it is, finally the OW review of the new Super Mario Brothers Wii. After getting back to OWHQ from our holiday vacation our email, snail mail, and fax machine were flooded with messages. Granted a lot of it was our usual fan mail and another good portion of it was our usual hate mail, but mixed in were questions asking; ” I think I like this new Mario game but wanted to know what you guys think?”, “Hi OW, love the site, should I like the new Mario game?”, or “Hi OW, hate the site, should I like the new Mario game?” So to answer the biggest question on the gaming industry’s mind right now, yes you should and can (we give permission) like the new Mario game.

The new Super Mario Brothers Wii is a incredibly creative and infinitely entertaining masterpiece of gaming. Sony and Microsoft should take note as we are losing patience with them. The plot is pretty standard, the princess gets kidnapped, a consistent problem in the mushroom kingdom, and the brothers go after her assisted by two toads. Right from the start the game is entertaining the maps are reminiscent of Mario 3 though the levels themselves are more like Mario World minus all the dinosaurs. Each level is super creative and it is obvious that significant amount of time was spent on level design. Even when the levels get super difficult, especially world 8 you can’t help but think wow this level is awesome, despite the fact that you just died a million times.

During your pursuit of the princess you have to defeat each Koopling twice per world, and Bowser jr. a few times on the airship. Each of these boss battles are far more creative than anything in Mario 3 or Mario World. The fist encounter is in the fortress and is usually a simplified version of the final battle. Some highlights are fighting Iggy in the last castle of the jungle world and Ludwig in cloud world. To augment Mario’s plumbing skills against this band of turtle creatures, a number of Power-ups are available. The standard mushroom, fire flower, and Yoshi return, but with them come some new ones, the ice flower, helicopter hat, mini mushroom, and penguin suit. Each power-up is unique, fun, and useful. The helicopter hat, our personal favorite, allows you to fly when you shake the remote, another creative aspect of the game. The ice flower can diffuse some fire and turns everything to blocks of ice which can then be thrown at other enemies or smashed to pieces. The most interesting use is to access secret areas by freezing certain enemies in just the right place or floating up through water jets. The penguin suit is a much more powerful frog suit from Mario 3. It gives you extreme swimming power, ice flower power, you can run and slide, and let’s be honest who doesn’t look good in a penguin suit? Finally the game designers seemed to add a challenge to the game with the mini mushroom, which isn’t exactly a power up, but does allow you to run on water and go into tiny pipes. Our only complaint is that you don’t see Yoshi enough throughout the game and you don’t get to keep him when you beat the level with him.

The fun begins when you play with multiple people, actually the more people you play with the more difficult the game becomes. Everyone gets in everyone’s way and death rates quickly mount. ZM and myself beat the game after a few days with considerable swearing, threats, and tons of laughs. Unlike the earlier Super Mario Brothers games, where even in two player mode you are basically just playing one player games, this time you are all in the level at the same time. What’s worse is that you get into each other’s way, can pick each other up, throw things at each other, kill each other, and generally make even the simplest level turn into absolute chaos. Yoshi also becomes more fun with multiple players as you can eat your friends and then spit them out where ever need be. Another version of the multiplayer game are the battles, the coin battles being the most fun in our opinion. Here all the chaos makes sense, you have to kill the other players and get the coins. We honestly spent hours playing this part of the game sometimes getting very few coins because most of our time was spent trying to murder each other.

Sadly had this game existed when we were children ZM and myself would have been the fat losers we described in out hardcore gamer list. OW has flexed it’s mighty arms and world is turning back towards fun 2D games instead of realistic wastes of graphics. The game derives it’s strength from it’s simplicity, the graphics are crisp and fun, and the game play is fully enjoyable. The only confusion is why two random toads come along for the adventure instead of one of the other cast of characters. The toads can become a little confusing in the multiplayer games with all the color changes and what not (especially when they both have afire flower or an ice flower). Some reviewers criticize the game because there isn’t an online way to play. To them we say “get real friends, you losers.” Half the fun is yelling at each other while you’re in the same room. If that’s your one complaint about the game you’re only complaining for the sake of complaining, and you probably have no real friends.

Nintendo need not fear, OW will continue it’s support for the time being, but our expectations have been raised. We hope Nintendo follows up with a new Zelda game on the Wii with the same format as Link to the Past (and why not make that a multiplayer game also). Sega on the other hand continues to be on our shit list and will still not be allowed to make a new system. For now they are denigrated to making games for their one time biggest competitors until we decide otherwise. As for the other game produces they should take note of the power we here at OW wield. With a single swipe of the OW sword companies fall, lives are changed, and fates are decided. We hope the age of realism in games is in it’s death throws. If not we might have to make some decisions, no longer will OW sit idly by while terrible games like Pokemon, Sonic the hedgehog, and Killzone 2 are made. Gaming industry you’ve been warned!

Our Rating:

5. Super Mario 2

The amount of unnecessary controversy surrounding Super Mario Brothers 2 is unprecedented. If you hear someone complaining about a Super Mario Brothers game it’s probably Mario 2 because its not like Mario 1 or 3, which are supposed to be the “authentic” Marios. Looking back, and playing through Super Mario All Stars though, Mario 2 comes as a treat, with its completely different game playing style and colourful imagery. You could choose between Mario, Luigi, princess, and Toad, giving you more options than Mario 1 and 3 (although Toad proves to be worthless). Each had their own special abilities. With the Princess, you could float across major parts of levels, which was a fun new addition to the Mario saga. There was also a variety of level-styles which was also welcome, as in some levels you were digging through a pyramid, and others, going into underground labyrinths to find keys to use elsewhere in the level. Some people have a problem that the game is a blatant rip of “Doki Doki Panic” for the Super Famicon (Japanese NES), but this in no way effects the playability and general enjoyment of the game. Gamers always need something to complain about, but for those who don’t care about the rip off and just play the game, they are in for a welcome surprise. The creators of this game had good taste in what to ape.

4. New Super Mario Wii

Super Mario Wii made it’s dominating entrance into the video game market this year with an incredible battle mode. A race to collect coins and kill each other would make this hyperactive battle the best for the Wii thus far. The feeling of getting thrown off a ledge by player 2 is excruciating because you have to bubble your way back to him to get out, and of course he being the ass he is, will run away from you the whole damn time leaving you with no coins and himself with all the coins, including the big coins worth 10 a piece! It’s paramount that you don’t die in this game, but this is rather hard when playing a difficult level trying to collect as many coins as you can. A good strategy? Collect a couple coins, kill player 2 before he’s able to collect any and then kill yourself. You win 2-0!

3. Super Mario World

Super Mario World is often over-looked as one of the best Mario games of all time. Usually people will tell you that Super Mario 1 or Super Mario 3 are the best Mario games ever. But go back and put in your “Super Mario All Stars and Super Mario World” cartridge into your SNES and you’ll probably find yourself playing this game more than any other. Why? Because its fun. In comparison to today’s games which focus on better graphics and more gore, this game focused on fun. And in this respect this game succeeded beyond measure. Tell me that you didn’t have fun bouncing around on the dolphins on top of the Vanilla Dome. Or riding around the winged platforms in the Forest of Illusion. Or eating monty moles with Yoshi. No, Super Mario World wasn’t a hard game (with the exception of Tubular in the Special World). But it was definitely a fun game. And in the end that’s really all that matters.

2. Super Mario Brothers 1

Super Mario Brothers 1 was the game that put video games on the map. Granted other video games existed before Super Mario brothers, but none stirred the hearts and control pads of the masses quite like this one. After all, who could resist Mario and Luigi? They were more than just a couple of brothers in the plumbing business, they were bad ass renegades who didn’t think twice about stomping mushroom traitors or kicking turtle soldier shell butt clear across mushroom kingdom if it meant saving Princess Toadstool. Speaking of the princess, she was smokin’ even though they hadn’t pixelated cleavage yet. This is a game that had it all, bizarre villains, midgets, hot princesses, and wanton fireball destruction. All in all, the original Super Mario Brothers was a fun game, but it also taught us some important life lessons: much like you can’t go back on a screen, you can’t go back in life. Once you make a choice you are stuck with it. Eat your vegetables and you’ll grow big and strong, always chase stars, no matter where they lead you, if you eat a flower you just end up spitting fire, and with a little manual labour you’ll find gold coins in the most unlikely places. Yes, this game was a true classic that created a whole generation of super gamers and maybe some renegade plumbers too.

1. Super Mario Brothers 3

Ask most people what their favorite Super Mario Brothers game is and more than likely they’ll tell you that its Super Mario Brothers 3, and with good reason. This game is packed with tons of power ups, from the almost useless frog suit, to my own personal favorite, the Tanooki Suit. The game is also packed with so many different types of levels, varying from desert worlds to ice worlds, that you’d think you were in the Star Wars galaxy traveling from Tatoonie to Hoth. But this variety of power ups and levels isn’t the only reason this game is loved by millions. Its the little things. Like a level where you get to ride around in a giant shoe and actually stomp on spinys (tell me you haven’t wanted to do that since you first saw them in SMB1). Or a the massive number of secrets in the game like the treasure ships and white mushroom huts. This game was truly epic from beginning to end, making it not only the best Mario game of all time, but perhaps the best VIDEO GAME of all time.

10. Super Street Fighter 2

All those characters, all those moves, all those different areas to fight in. With all this diversity in game play, you could play this game for hours. Just when you thought that Dhalism was the character to choose because of his long reach, you realized that Ryu could easily penetrate this by throwing fireballs at him from a distance. When you thought you couldn’t beat your expert friend at the game, all you had to do was choose M.Bison and do his super move into your friend’s character back and forth forever. All these different techniques and all these different ways at stopping the techniques. This was only on 2 player mode. In 1 player mode you had to beat the game with all those characters. This game was endless fun and would solidify itself as the ultimate fighting series in fighting game history.

9. GoldenEye 007

007 was patently addicting. How ridiculously amazing the multiplayer action was made this one of the most re-playable games of all time. Almost every level was amazing to play in (except for the cavernous areas). Who could ever forget “The Facility”; the premiere 3D shooter level in all of gaming history? Play this with Rockets, Proxies, whatever you wanted, and this level would be amazing. The most fun a person can have playing this game is have 2 people secretly gang up on a 3rd person in the facility playing with proxy detonators. You throw them in every spot where a player can start and all that the player getting wrecked can do is press start and die. Controllers will be broken after this, possibly along with some jaws. This game can be played forever. It’s possibly the best 3D shooter ever made.

8. Doctor Mario

Tetris on Acid? Doctor Mario was a different approach to Tetris. The goal was to rid your screen of all the viruses. You did this by connecting the blocks with the appropriate colors coming down from your blocks. The way you laid the blocks down was vastly different from Tetris. Some sideways laying you would do in Doctror Mario, you would never do in Tetris. A great idea off the already great Tetris, Doctor Mario solidified itself as one of the better multiplayer games for the 8 and 16bit platforms.

7. Rampart

Rampart was a pure strategy game that would become endless fun upon learning how to actually play it. Don’t count on learning how to play it when playing the computer 1 on 1. The computer will destroy you with the first shots from their ships. Play against a friend and figure it out, then you will know the power in the replayability of this game. You choose your main castle and build around it to fortify the castle and the eventual cannons that go inside of it. Your opponent then smashes your walls to pieces. After this you’re in rebuilding mode taking pieces (much like Tetris) and putting them in place to envelop your castle and retain the points needed to win a match. Great game, great concept, this game can be played for hours.

6. Bomberman 1

Bomberman 1 was replayable in numerous ways. Firstly it had an amazing co-op 2 player mode where you had to destroy level upon level, boss upon boss. Not losing your weapons was key to winning at this game. Once you lost your weapons and had to start over from the level you were at with no weapons, it was deflating. Playing the battle mode was a joy too, but you had to start at level 1 difficulty or the computer would have it’s way with you. They would race around, trapping you in corners while you were just trying to find an extra bomb to lay down. Once mastered though, you could increase difficulty level and feel proud of the fact that you were challenging the well-programmed computer. Then it was just you and your human opponent fighting for Bomberman supremacy.

5. WWF Royal Rumble

WWF Royal Rumble was a great game. You could replay matches against opponents, have tag team matches and Royal Rumble it up against the computer and friends, and of course this game had Mr. Perfect in it, making it one of the most perfect games of all time. Believe it or not, this game isn’t just button smashing, but knowing when to eye gouge and to kick your opponent when he was down (as this would do a large amount of damage to him). The button smashing came in the grapples against the rope when you needed to throw them over the ropes. This game was classic, and not just because Mr. Perfect was in it, although that helped.

4. Metal Warriors

Metal Warriors is the ultimate Mutiplayer game for the sci-fi fan. Robots, rockets, different levels; this game was the sci-fi gamer fan’s dream. All the robots had different characteristics. Some would have agility but not a lot of strength. Others would barely be able to move because they were so slow but a couple shots of their weapon would destroy their opponent. The replayability factor came in the fact of trying to master all the different robots. Accordingly, you should be able to beat any robot that you choose regardless of how weak some may seem when you use them for the first time. To become the ultimate Metal Warrior player, you had to master all the robots. This made it one of the most re-playable games of all time.

3. Mario Kart Double Dash

As was stated in previous lists, Mario Kart Double Dash took up most of this author’s college life. It singlehandedly brought downmy GPA from a 3.8 to a 3.4. Papers were edited in haste as coming in a close first at the Mushroom Cup proved to be more important than letting your professor know that you weren’t lazy and actually spent time looking over your papers. Mario Kart excelled in replayability because not only could you have race battle, but the battle mode was even more addicting. All the levels were designed perfectly and the skill required to become good at the game kept growing the more each player played.   Much time had to have been put into this game for this to occur. Mario Kart Double Dash will always prove itself as the ultimate racing game.

2. Super Bomberman 2

With 4 players Super Bomberman 2 is the ultimate replayable game. You could go 7 hours straight without thinking of drink or food playing this game. Bombs, explosions, kicking the bombs into explosions right where your opponent is and then accidentally hitting the other opponent…man what a feeling. Sometimes you’ll start a battle mode and everyone’s already dead in 5 seconds and you ask yourself “What did I do”? but you’ll happily take the win. There are numerous battle areas, some great, some good, and some really really bad. Just avoid the really bad ones and this is one of the most fun multiplayer games of all time.

1. WWF Raw

WWF Raw is the most Re-Playable game of all time. It has many modes to play, but most importantly it has the Royal Rumble mode. The only thing missing from the game is that Mr. Perfect wasn’t included. Instead you have to deal with the utterly annoying and uncontrollable Luna Vacahon (weren’t Women supposed to be relegated to the managerial role in wrestling?). Besides this small shortcoming to the game though, you were in for endless hours of button smashing. Start drinking while playing this and you could go into the morning playing this game. You’ll be in your 12th beer and not notice that your button smashing abilities haven’t unraveled even though your hand muscles are strained to the limits. At the end of the match though, you’re literally breathing as if you ran a marathon because of how much energy you put into throwing opponents over the ropes. The satisfaction of having no energy left but enduring 6 more wrestlers to win a Royal Rumble is the one of the best that any human being can have. This satisfaction will always bring the player back to playing this incredible game.

In recent centuries the world has been racked with animal on animal violence. You need not look further than Animal Planet, Discovery Channel, and sometimes History Channel (check local listings). Every where we look some animal is killing another animal. But why? Is it for food? Are the creatures pre-programed to hate each other? Or has gang warfare spilled over into the animal kingdom? Only recently, since man has evolved hunting and tracking capabilities, has human on animal violence escalated. Some people, so called ’scientists’, have postulated that these behaviors are what allowed human beings to become the dominate species on our planet. A quick look out the window, if you live in an urban area at least, shows you that yes there are a lot of humans everywhere. But why has modern man chosen to still attack, kill, capture, and even eat animals? Is it because proteins obtained from meat and poultry are essential to a healthy diet? Is it because a number of domesticated species would no longer be able to survive on their own without human intervention? Or is it because of the destructive influence a certain video game has had on the populace?  As we have shown in previous articles, all violence in society can be blamed on video games, so it only make sense that animal cruelty must also be the fault of video games.

The game blamed for this recent surge in animal violence is, of course, Pokemon. In the game young children are encouraged to run away from home, live in remote areas, capture rare animals by forcing them to fight other rare animals, and then force them to live in small balls. A trip to a local pet store is all one needs to see the destructive influence Pokemon has had on the average pet owners. Small plastic balls are readily available for a number of different species. These balls force the animal to roam the house, walking in their own waste, attempting to free themselves before they are thrown at another animal and forced to fight it out for no reason what so ever. Small groups of children have been found wondering state parks attempting to capture animals and force them to fight each other. In a number of incidents the animals turned on their owners and mauled them. Not too long ago Michael Vick, and avid Pokemon fan, was arrested for running a dog fighting ring.

What is more disturbing is the far reaching nature of Pokemon. Because the advertising campaign was so wide spread and most people are so stupid, nearly everyone in the targeted age group was quickly swept up in the so called ‘pokemania’ leading to ‘poke-animal-abuse,’ ‘poke-black-market-trafficking,’ and eventually ‘poke-federal-prison.’ The U.S. Federal prison system is brimming with twelve year olds who played pokemon and then tried to buy a lion cub on the black market. Children could be seen jumping the protective barriers at zoo’s attempting to catch a rhino or battle a bear. Fighting fish sales jumped through the roof. Dog fighting, cat fighting, and in one disturbing case sheep fighting rings popped up with alarming numbers. Throughout the nineties and into the 2000’s local and federal agencies worked tirelessly to stop young kids from becoming wrapped up in the Poke-craze that put so many in jail. Similar to the DARE program, “Don’t catch any of them” campaigns were started. Though they had some impact little could be done to stop this violent trend.

Finally the poke-phenomenon has started to fade and so have the animal fighting rings. These strange events have shown us once again that video games cause more problems than the solve. If it weren’t for Pokemon most of the world would probably be vegetarian. With every new release of ‘different versions’ of Pokemon fears of violent resurgence worry the animal lover community.

10. Mac Fans

Macintosh computers are the popular kids of the computing industry. They are shiny, pretty, never get sick, and all generally look the same. For those with the money and with little computing ability they are great computers. The average Mac fan on the other hand is quite the opposite. They are the arm chair liberals, dirty stinking hippies, you know the type. The white kid with dreads, the hippie girl with a trust fund, your average coffee shop customer who loves to type in public over the latest latte flavor. These people are so annoying and only bought their computer because it fits into their pre-determined self image. When asked why they love to recite the TV commercials; “Oh they are so intuitive” or the ever popular “They never get viruses.” There are plenty of reasons to use a Macintosh; the proprietary hardware and software guarantees, better integration between the two, faster graphic computing ability, and simple one version OS to name a few. But that’s not why these annoying people buy them, they just love their pretty little shiny thing and love to tell people about their self righteous purchase.

9. Star Trek Fans

Star Trek is a great show, it has good plot lines based on intelligent problem solving, and it also has terrible fans. They are the bullies of the nerd world. They have their own conventions, their own languages, and they don’t like anybody else liking the thing that they love. In fact when the show Babylon 5 came out Star Trek fans were so incensed that someone would create another science fiction series that they began to attack the creator of the series. In one such event a virus was sent to him disguised as his a drawing from his toddler son. The virus destroyed his hard drive and left behind a Easter Egg claiming “Star Trek Rules”.  When Next Generation came out fans were also angered that someone other than Kirk was allowed to command the Enterprise. Star Trek fans live behind this ‘how dare you’ attitude that prevents anyone from doing anything that changes the status quo of the Star Trek universe. If they had it their way the only series ever would have been the original one, the only captain ever would have been Kirk, and nobody who doesn’t already speak Klingon would be allowed to watch the show. In fact most of the show would be in Klingon. Once again the fans of the show ruin the show. The only revenge us normals have on them is the new movie which was geniusly directed by JJ Abrams. I almost jumped out of my seat when watching Vulcan explode. No revenge could be sweater on the obsessive Star Trek fan then making the thing that they love a popular summer block buster. I mean who would have ever expected that Spock and Uhura would have a secret romance brewing. Yes the Star Trek fan is a terrible person but now that Star Trek is hip and Vulcan is destroyed perhaps their days will be numbered.

8. Heavy Metal Fans

Heavy metal fans are a lot like hardcore gamers. In fact if you drew a Venn diagram of hardcore gamers and heavy metal fans they would intersect quite a bit. Where some people drowned their sorrows in their parent’s basement by playing video games, some go out to heavy metal shows, dressed in the stereotypical all black, and mosh or headbang. When you think about moshing, its just a bunch of guys rubbing on each other, which, if you think about it, is kind of gay. Just like the hardcore gamer there are very few girls at these events, as most girls don’t like heavy metal. This further frustrates the heavy metal fan and leads to further violence amongst them. The heavy metal fan also likes to claim that they are railing against the life of the common man, the average, or the normal people. They do this by dressing exactly the same, wearing the same color, growing their hair long, and doing whatever they can to become indistinguishable from the next fan. This little contradiction never cross the heavy metal fan’s mind. Sadly, we here at OW love a number of heavy metal bands and have been to a number of heavy metal shows. Oddly enough we dressed in our typical jeans and a t-shirt where the most unique people at the show. One time I had to go straight from work which had me where a white polo. For those who don’t know white is the only color that can physically harm the heavy metal fan. Anyway I got a lot of bad looks at that show.

7. Pokemon Fans

Anyone worth their salt knows that these games were just one gigantic marketing campaign aimed at loosening the wallets of parents with young kids. We here at OW love Nintendo, but these ‘games’ are so stupid even we can’t support them. Each game is exactly the same and named after a different color, mineral, or gem. What’s worse is that the kids who loved Pokemon when they were young have now grown up and the brainwashing hasn’t worn off with time. They still swear up and down that these games are the greatest things ever and some even dare to refer to them as RPG’s. None of them have the ability to see that somewhere in Japan a marketing team came up with the most brilliant sales pitch ever. “Gotta catch em’ all.” And believe me they did. The caught all the games, all the action figures, all the playing cards, the t-shirts, the shoes, and just about anything else they could get their grubby, brainwashed hands on. None of them realize that each game is the exact same thing, that the cartoons, action figures, stuffed animals, and playing card game were all released at the same time. None of them realize that the simple catch phrases, bright colors, repetitive plot lines, and simple stories where only aimed at furthering their addiction. Nope they are all so stupid, so brainwashed, and so young they can’t see beyond the perfectly aimed marketing that they still, to this day think that pokemon was just a good game.

6. Dave Matthews Fans

Have you ever been to a Frat party? How do you feel about Birkenstocks? Backwards hats with curved brims? Greek letters? Chugging terrible beer? Keg stands? If the answer to each of these questions is resoundingly positive, then you may be  fan of the Dave Matthews Band. What is more interesting is that DMB is actually a talented band, with a  world renowned drummer, bassist, and saxophone player. Oh they also have this gigantic dude that plays violin. I don’t know if he is any good, and I don’t want to be the guy who tells him otherwise. In any case we here at OW generally like this band but boy do we hate the fans. They are either insanely obsessed or drunks looking for a party. Or sometimes both. We have even heard of DMB fans who will only listen to DMB because they claim nothing else is even worth it. Further research has even shown that there is an on going feud between DMB fans and Blink 182 fans. Why is completely beyond us. Going to a DMB show is like watching every jock, frat boy, and sorority slut get so hammered they forget they were even at the show. But don’t worry they have pictures on facebook to prove they were there.

5. Star Wars Fans

Some people worship God, others Allah, and others the dark lord himself. Star Wars fans, on the other hand, worship only George Lucas and accept everything he does as infallible perfection. The only movie that Lucas hasn’t ruined is his first original creation American Graffiti. And believe me if he could find a market for greaser action figures, the stores would already be packed. No Star Wars was ruined with twice for us at OW, first with the stupid remakes that added all sorts of crazy computer graphics in the background, and secondly with the prequels. We here at OW haven’t been able to watch anything Star Wars since viewing those tragedies. Yet the average Star Wars fan doesn’t see anything wrong with anything George Lucas does, in fact, they lap it up. ‘Hey look, he added Boba Fett into the scene even though he doesn’t need to be there and it really doesn’t make sense that he is there.’ Not only do Star Wars fans love these terrible creations, they will also buy anything with the Star Wars logo on it.  This includes; action figures, t-shirts, cups, costumes, shoes, curtains, underwear, soda cans, comic books, novels, pens, shoe laces, posters, fire places, pillows, dehumidifiers, carpets, coffee tables, no I’m not just naming things I see in my living room, and the list goes on and on and on and on. The worst thing about Star Wars fans is that they are the ones that ruined the thing they claim to love. Because they never held Lucas up to any type of scrutiny he has been able to roam free doing anything he wants ruining people’s childhoods and making money hand over fist while he does it. Star Wars fans are the mindless sycophants of the science fiction world and they have ruined the creation that they hold so dear.

4. Hulk Fans

In the world of comic books, there is no one more annoying fan than the Hulk fanboy.  Don’t get me wrong, there’s nothing wrong with Hulk.  He’s a great character within his somewhat narrow boundaries, and when written properly he serves as a brilliant bridge into explorations of how the mind works and how we determine our basic humanity.  The problem is the fans who want to make Hulk into something he’s not.  No, he couldn’t really beat Superman, and that isn’t a bad thing.  He has so much more going for him than the Man of Steel as a character, though.   Unfortunately his full potential is never realized, as most writers use him as a big monster, going on mindless rampages until the real heroes take him down.   This is the reason most Hulk fans are about as dumb as he is.  The worst Hulk writing tries to bring him down to that level: just a big angry strong brick, with no complexity or torment, basically just a walking power set ready to smash anything in his way.   Hulk fans believe he can defeat anyone if he gets angry enough, I have even seen a thread on a forum where someone actually posted that the Hulk can return from being erased from reality by punching back into reality. I recall another Hulk fans even saying that the Hulk could defeat Galactus if he gets angry enough!  It is the biased stupidity of Hulk fans that I hate.  Its really the fact that both the Hulk and the Hulk’s fans think he’s unbeatable even though that is clearly not the case.  I don’t even mind delusional people as long as they aren’t trying to cram their delusions down my throat, and Hulk fans are notorious for this.

3. WoW Fans

I’m really not sure what I could say about World of Warcraft fans that South Park hasn’t already. They love this game as much as… say a crack head would love crack. They live, eat, and breath this game, and then inside the game they live eat and breath. In the real world the are generally disgusting slobs, far from the actors portraying them in the commercials. Are we to truly believe that playing World of Warcraft will make us as cool as William Shatner or that Shatner, with a very busy acting schedule would have time to play this game. When you hear about someone who started playing this game the inevitable reaction is “Oh, that sucks” as the realization sets in that you will never see that person again. When you hear of someone quitting the inevitable reactions is “Really! I’m glad to hear he’s getting his life back in order.” At a recent staff meeting, after the customary feats of strength and tale telling, we decided that  OW is going to open the first ever WoW rehabilitation center. All of the chairs will be extra big, the couches will have extra springs, and there will be no junk food, no TV, and certainly no internet access. We’ve decided that we can cure you in about six weeks at the nominal fee of $1000/week plus the cost of food. We may like to make fun of these people but were also happy to fix them…for a fee.

2. Phish Fans

What’s the difference between a  DMB fan and a Phish fan? Drug use. Your average DMB fan drinks a lot of beer, smokes some weed, and depending on how rich and white they are, do a little coke. Your average Phish fan is on everything from LSD to Heroin almost all the time. Where the DMB fan wears clean pressed button up shirts, the Phish fan might change cloths once or twice a year and generally walks around smelling like patchouli oil. Which, by the way, barely covers up the constant weed smell, since they smoke pot like cigarettes. Much like the DMB fan they are obsessed with all things Phish. OW has even heard stories about fans doing Heroin because lead singer Trey Anastasio was doing it. The difference being they were dirt poor, couldn’t afford it, and generally don’t have jobs. Much like the DMB fan, we here at OW enjoy most of Phish’s albums but, once again, there fans are terrible people who try to pretend it’s still the seventies. If it wasn’t for this band the tie dye industry would have disappeared years ago. Yet despite OW’s best efforts people still buy these terrible t-shirts.

1. Sega Fans

Sega fans can be summed up in one simple word: delusional. Let’s look at the facts; Sega has only had one successful system, it’s most famous character is an obvious copy of Mario, and has gone out of business at least once. They were so bad at making video games systems they had to quit. Despite this Sega fans still think that this is a good company. They still think that Sega is better than any other system. This obviously makes no sense, since, at the time there are no Sega systems. They failed. In order to save the company from complete destruction they had to start making games for their arch-enemy Nintendo. Sega has been reduced to a mere video game production company. Still the average Sega fans worship the failed company. This is equivalent to supporting the failed the candidate, following the loser of the war, or living in the burned out house. None of this makes sense. The average Sega fan however refuses to recognize that they worship a fallen hero. We here at OW have made it our mission to save these people from their own stupidity however, to date, we haven’t been able to recover any of them. This may because they are just too far gone, their minds warped, there bodies weak and frail, and their sanity completely lost. Still we refuse to give up. Eventually they will realize that even their own leader doesn’t own a Sega system and the halls of Sega fan HQ are hollowed. Eventually the light that is OW will bring these lost souls home where they can find whatever gaming system they so choose, as long as it’s still in business.

10. You beat World 8-1 in Super Mario 3 without using a P-wing or a Cloud
This level is the reason they made the P-Wing and the Cloud. If you have a P-Wing, this is the time to use it. There’s no better level to fly over than this one. If you don’t have a P-Wing, use a Cloud. And if you don’t have a Cloud, good luck. You’re probably going to end up smashing a bunch of controllers before you beat this level. Not only are there hard jumps, Piranha Plants, and Bullet Bills in this level, but there’s even a Boo Buddy! Apparently this level wasn’t hard enough with the standard over world enemies, so the game designers decided that it was necessary to put a random ghost in the level as well. Can someone tell me WTF a ghost is doing in this level? Besides the randomly placed Ghost, you have to make it over two almost impossible jumps in this level. The first is the pit you have to jump over with a Red Paratroopa flying in it, and two cannons on the other side. Almost immediately after getting past that jump on your tenth try, you’re faced with yet another leap of faith as you have to jump on a music box to cross another wide chasm. If you can beat this game without a P-wing you’ve probably spent as much time as we have playing Super Mario 3.

9. You Beat Street Fighter 2 with Zangief
Street Fighter was a great game. The amount of time Sage and I have spent playing this game is enormous. All those characters to beat the game with and all the two player action that could be had in this game made for one of the best fighting games in history. Play the game with Zangief though, and the player was in for one of the most difficult fighting games of all time. Zangief was slow, had no shooting power and excelled in no area except for basic power, which was useless in a game with fighters as diverse as Ryu and M.Bison. Congratulate yourself if you conquered Street Fighter with Zangief. It’s something even the most adroit players can’t accomplish.

8. You Beat Bubble Bobble By Yourself

The only reason anyone has ever beaten Bubble Bobble is because you get infinite continues.  Nobody could beat this game otherwise. Even with infinite continues few people could beat this game by themselves. This game is very easy to learn how to play, and you might not even get killed for a few levels. And then pretty soon you die and it hits you like a ton of bricks.  And you keep dying.  A lot. Remember how you once had a score of 300,000? Well, those days are gone. Each time you start over the score resets. There will come a point for everyone when they hit the challenge wall, and it will be a lot sooner than you’d expect from a game that has over 100 levels’ worth of play. I think for me it was around level 20.  It will probably be even sooner if you’re playing by yourself. The difficulty curve is way too steep for this game.  And if you do make it to level 100, you have to get past Super Drunk.  To wake him up you need to drink the potions at the top of the screen. The potion makes you spit lightning bubbles (60 will take out Super Drunk). If you have no friends, Passing Super Drunk will not give you the happy ending (This is evident after several hours of eye-glazing solo-play. You beat that sh*t and get a screen saying “This Is Not The Happy Ending). Let’s recap: If you’re going to get to the final stage of Super Drunk, you had best be drinking the sh*t that makes you spit hot lightning straight from the bottle. If you drink alone, you might pass Super Drunk, but it will not be a happy ending. There are some important life lessons for you here, kids, I suggest you heed them wisely.

7. You got to Friday in Paperboy

Being a paperboy might be easy in real life, but in the video game world its one of the hardest jobs out there.  One would think that being a professional spy or maybe a hit man would be one of the harder jobs out there.  But compare how easy 007 is to Paperboy and you’ll see just how wrong you are.  Anyone who tells you that they love this game has no idea why they love it. Maybe they liked getting knocked down after the 3^rd house on the left by movers moving glass that they cannot get up on the curb for the life of them. Maybe they liked spending days and days of game play just to get to the end of the first day with the shitty bonus level that somehow turned from a street into a skateboard park with poorly designed skateboard ramps in the vein of the poor designs of Skate or Die. I have no idea why anyone would like a game this difficult. If getting by Monday was difficult, just trying getting by Tuesday and Wednesday. These were each about 10 times more difficult than Monday exponentially. Paperboy was a tiringly difficult game. Any game that you had trouble getting by the first level on had no business being recognized as a great game. Some gamers will try to convince you they got to Wednesday and even Friday, but you can be sure that most of these people are liars. Something about the cover of this game screams “simplicity”, but that has nothing to do with the fact that its extremely difficult to get half way down the street in the first level with the neighborhood elements being thrown at you. If anyone disputes these claims, they can send us their own personal video of playing paperboy and getting to Friday.

6. You beat the first level of Ghosts n’ Goblins

Some games start out easy and then gradually get harder.  In other games the first level is nearly impossible to beat.  There is no game that exemplifies this upshot from sheer difficulty like Ghosts ‘n Goblins. 1/8th through the first level you’re surrounded by mounds and mounds of enemies. As you’re walking as your character, you’re basically surrounded by a force field of enemies coming at you from every possible angle. Okay, maybe if you had a lot of energy or someone decent armor, you could take the level one onslaught of nefarious enemies. As you walk, you see you do have armor, looks like pretty strong armor, until a weak ass looking bird swoops down, barely hits you, and your armor comes flying off. Not even faux-Halloween armor is this poor. I’m pretty sure that if a bird touched a plastic armor suit that you wore for Halloween, it wouldn’t come flying off. As your worthless armor comes flying off, you’re left with an almost-naked character who is left with nothing on except underwear. Q: Who wears nothing under armor? Am I inept to mid-evil tradition or is there something completely untenable about someone wearing nothing under armor? You’re basically left naked running around in the wild with a force field of petulant enemy’s surrounding you at every second. This stultifying game play leads you to give up after 1 to 2 minutes making you feel like shit and making you retire to much more germane games with more sane difficulty levels. If you were one of the few people who made it to level two, consider yourself to be one of the elite in the gaming world.

5. You’ve landed on the aircraft carrier in Top Gun once

Ever try landing on the aircraft carry in Top Gun for the NES?  When landing your plane on an aircraft carrier, you are given terse directions from your “command screen” which you follow. If you follow the directions 100% perfectly, you will have about a 5% chance of landing the plane. I have personally seen the plane landed once. I remember that eventful day. I was at a friend’s house and four of us were watching my friends’ father trying to overcome this insuperable task. The first time we saw it land, we had a party. I remember looking over at one of my friends who may have been crying out of joy, that the annoyingly impossible task could be circumvented. The excitement lasted until the end of the next level where we all knew it couldn’t happen again, and it didn’t.  The dogfights are easy and the missiles given to you in the fights are smartly efficient enough to create a moderate difficult level in the sky. The rest of the game is easy, but try landing on the aircraft carrier and you are thrown into one of the most difficult moments in video game history. It’s one of the greater accomplishments in life itself.

4. You beat Mike Tyson in Mike Tyson’s Punch Out!

Mike Tyson’s Punchout was actually moderately difficult to play through. Certainly, fighters such as Glass Joe and Don Flamingo were no challenge for little Mac. As one became good at this game, one could beat the likes of Mr. Sandman and Super Macho man easily and with a little practice. It was the last boss in Mike Tyson though that we witness one of the most difficult moments in video game history. One was amazed by how one small uppercut by Tyson could take Little Mac to the ground gasping for breath as Doc smiled on. Could a  final boss really be this hard? Where was the gradual increase in difficulty level that could get you ready for this domination? Certainly, it wasn’t Super Macho Man regardless of how powerful his Tornado punches were. It wasn’t Don Flamenco part two who had the stamina of 10 men. Nothing could get you prepared for having to dodge oddly timed uppercuts by the Bronx basher. Timing down Tyson’s uppercuts was beyond challenging. The gamer had better hope he had a game genie where one punch to an opponent could knock them down, or infinite stamina so that Tyson’s punch no longer had any impact. Take away the cheats, and one had to time all the uppercuts perfectly which was unbearably difficult.  Tyson could be beat with hours and hours of practice. Still, Mike Tyson is one of the most noticeable signifiers for “Difficult Boss” in video game history. Every gamer is struck with fear in having to battle an opponent who could spell game over for you in 1 hit.

3. You beat Contra without the code

Contra contained the most conspicuous cheat code in gaming history and for good reason. We won’t go into the code because we know its already inculcated into every gamer’s brain beyond any doubt. Why is this code so well known though? Could it be that Contra was so hard that it became a staple for anyone who even attempted to start their journey in the game? This is precisely the reason why any code becomes imprinted on the human genome. It’s to bad too, because Contra is actually one of the finer moments in early gaming history when one knew they could waste 30 lives on a level. Take away this ability though, and you were doomed to the first level, maybe the second if your practiced it for over two months. Once you were in the second level you were pretty much lost to the electric shocks and countless enemies throwing bombs at you. The game after the second level just starts getting good too. The third level as the waterfall level in the game has one of the most perfectly abject bosses in gaming history. The gamer who thought he was good enough not to use the code would never be able to experience this boss, instead, throwing his controller to the wall in the event of being hit by the guns coming out of the ground in the first level. Contra today is known as a great game because it has become accepted that to play it in any casual fashion requires the code. The gamer does not feel remorse at having to play Contra with a cheat because he knows everyone else has to and that there is no one on earth who can possibly come close to beating the game without the code. One wonders if the creators of Contra ever knew how hard it would be to conquer the game without the code.

2. You’ve beaten Super Mario the Lost Levels

This game is near impossible. If you can beat this game you are beyond great. We here at OW have all beaten this game and we are all great. There isn’t anything easy about any part of it. Except the beginning when you press start after that it’s all work. This game is unlike modern games which are all easy. That’s right, all modern games are easy. And stupid. This game however is hard for the sake of hard. You truly have to become a master of every aspect of Lost Levels. You have to wear your controller down until it becomes ergonomic through erosion, not ergonomic by design. You have to live eat and breath Lost Levels until the very end and only then will you be a master of video games. Nay only a few have completed this quest, but they shall live on in the halls of eternity. Where they shall eat not but the finest meals, drink not but the finest wines, and sleep on not but the finest linens. Actually nobody will really care and it won’t really affect your life in any way at all. Trust us we have a religion based on us now.

1. You Beat the Turbo Tunnel Level in Battletoads on Your First Try

10. Has to be either a first person shooter, or third person shooter

This is obviously the most hardcore way to play a game. If you can’t be it in real life why not pretend on your parent’s TV? The shooter allows one to pretend they are walking down the street and killing everything that you see. Which is often the dream of the hardcore gamer. And what’s better than pretending to see through your own eyes while killing, well imagine pretending being a handsome soldier, a handsome car thief, a handsome warrior, or some other type of handsome person that you aren’t in real life. You never see the main character in any of these hardcore games as a fat slob who gets winded when running, has terrible acne problems, needs a wardrobe that doesn’t include t-shirts with stupid sayings, lives in his parents basement, and has never touched a real girl. No the hardcore game is everything the hardcore gamer wishes he was, everything he rails against, and everything that makes him cry at night. The first and third person shooter embodies this idea in the fullest capacity of this theory. Here is a place where they can act out all of their fantasies in a way that not only rewards them but also releases all their pent up virgin aggression.

9. Has to be rated M

Hardcore games are almost always rated “M” for mature.  The Hardcore gamer only likes video games that are excessively violent so that casual gamers, like older people or little kids, either don’t play them, or aren’t allowed to play them.  It also makes them feel more “hardcore” because they are playing games with excessive gore.  Games like Killzone 2 are marketed to overweight hardcore gamers who enjoy these overly violent games because they help them take out the frustrations they have with the real world by blowing up people in the virtual video game world. This is because the hardcore gamer’s real life is constantly beset by setback after setback.  So these excessively violent games are a form of stress relief for these downtrodden social outcasts.

8. Discourage innovation

If a hardcore game is anything, it’s not original. Why bother? The best way to make a sale is to just update the graphics, change the story slightly, make it WW2, or if it’s already WW2 make it the future where robots have taken over the world (or are at least giving their best effort), and if it’s already the future make it the ancient past, where you have to battle giants of some sort. Then add in some new weapons, change the color of the armor, or make the main character shave his head. Of course, if his head is already shaved then grow his hair out. Now if in the first game he was a part of a team, then in the second one he should be by himself trying to find his team who were captured. Also if you have a tank in the first game then you will obviously have a super tank in the second game. Now if the game was originally in the future the sequel has to be in the past. If the game is the first in the series then you have to take all the good things from the most recently popular games, add them together, subtract the year it was released and add that many guns or swords, then, finally make sure the game isn’t too different so as to not upset the gamers your trying to sell the games to.

7. Must have spent over $1,000,000 on marketing

Millions of dollars goes into hyping up each new hardcore game to epic proportions.  The game developers buy up ad space on sites like IGN and Gamespot, who will then review these games and give them either “five stars” or a “ten out of ten” and will eventually call each one the “game of the year” at some point.  The goal is to make the impressionable hardcore gamer feel like he has to own and beat the game before any of his online buddies do.  This way he will already be a master of the game before they even buy it, and when they play against each other online he will be able to easily dominate them, thus making the hardcore gamer feel like he has accomplished something in his otherwise meaningless existence.

6. Your health must auto-regenerate as soon as you take cover

We all like being better at things than other people.  We always have.  And the one thing that the hardcore gamer thinks he is better at than other people is video games.  But are they really better at video games than normal people, or do they just spend a lot more time playing them?  Hardcore gamers like their video games to be long and involved, but not necessarily hard.  They like the games they play to take 20+ hours to beat so that casual gamers who actually have lives outside of video games will never be able to beat them.  And yet at the same time the hardcore gamer wants to be able to beat these games himself, so they can’t be too hard, just really long.  Let’s face it, dying isn’t fun.  These games have to be easy enough so that the hardcore can win and thus feel better about himself.   One way to make video games easier is to have your health meter automatically regenerate whenever you take cover.  This makes the game take longer, while at the same time making it easier.  In Contra you didn’t have a health meter.  One shot and you were dead.  That’s why the hardcore gamer usually prefers modern games over the classics.

5. Should have some sort of multiplayer mode where 12 year olds can talk in l33t speak

All hardcore games have an online multiplayer mode.  This is where hardcore gamers get most of their social interaction.  To deal with that fact that they are social outcasts, hardcore gamers have invented their own language. In one of the most childish reactions a group of people could have, they further force their own isolation by creating a useless and annoying language. Leet speak allows groups of “hardcore gamers” to bash on their most hated enemy, the casual gamer, without the casual gamer even knowing its happening. This is important, as the average casual gamer is far more physically fit and could easily beat the living hell out of a hardcore gamer, should they be found out. Leet speak further makes the hardcore gamer feel special. Every waking second reminds the hardcore gamer that they are in fact gigantic wastes of life, but at least there is one thing that the average person can’t figure out. I mean who could possibly crack the complex code that is leet speak? I mean replacing vowels with numbers, I don’t get it, but then again I’m not a “hardcore gamer.”

4. Must appeal to 12 year olds. (lots of guns and boobies)

The average age of your typical hardcore gamer is 35, we have done vast amounts of research and this is the number that our monkey comes up with time and time again. The average living quarters of your hardcore gamer is 33% parent’s basement, 33% parents attic, and 33% above parents garage. Again our fact checking kittens have run these numbers repeatedly and no variation has been seen. What’s more interesting is that our psychological research team has found out that the average maturity level of your hardcore gamer is roughly 12. Therefore a game which would appeal to the hardcore gamer must appeal to a 12 year old. What do 12 year olds think about, well mainly boobies. Therefore the easy marketing tactic is to place lots of scantily clad women into hardcore games to attract as many hardcore gamers as possible. We here at OW find it interesting that despite all the hardcore gamer’s ranting about how un-intelligent your average person is the average hardcore gamer is generally attracted to the same things. The same basic human principles motivate them, however, they are so socially retarded they are unable to act on them. Hence video games based on violence and mayhem. Your average 12 year old loves running around building forts, smashing stuff, and generally getting into mischief. The average hardcore gamer is a 12 year old trapped in a giant sweaty body with little social interaction and lots of video games. Therefore a game deemed hardcore must have lots of things that a 12 year old would love.

3. Can not have any colors other than brown, green, gray, red, and black

“Hardcore” games almost always evoke brooding aesthetics not only in theme but in appearance. You don’t even know where you’re going in some levels in these games, but at least you’re comforted in knowing that you have a big gun to randomly shoot in the dark at enemies that you can barely see. It helps to have a mode on your TV that brightens up your screen. It also helps to have glasses on when playing these games. If you don’t have either, expect to walk around these games like you were a blind person. Cashing in on the conditioned spookiness of the dark never came so easy for video game makers as it does in the modern hardcore game.

2. 80% of the budget should go toward the graphics, give the rest to marketing.

The more realistic and dark the graphics in a game are, the more likely it is that it will appeal to the hardcore gamer.  To the hardcore gamer, games with graphics that are too cartoonish (like most of the games on the Nintendo Wii, for example) will appeal to the casual gamer crowd, and so no matter how much fun these might be games to play, a true hardcore gamer would never admit to enjoying them.  So when designing a game for hardcore gamers, companies like Valve and Guerilla Games spend as much money as they can on making the graphics look as realistic as possible, with minimal effort put into the actual gameplay itself.  As we saw earlier, the rest of the budget for these games goes to the excessive marketing in order to hype them up to epic proportions so that the hardcore gamer feels like if he doesn’t buy the game and beat it before all of his friends do, he’ll lose all of the respect of the hardcore gaming community.

1. Everyone on N4G likes it

If you need to know the status quo in the gaming world where do you go? N4G. Here you can talk about Kill Zone 2, Kill Zone 2, or how much better Kill Zone 2 is than Kill Zone 1. This is the website where everyone goes to be different by completely agreeing with each other on all the major gaming issues. Can’t get a girlfriend, live in your parents basement, kind of smell bad, have acne problems? Then go to N4G. Sure there may be some argument as to the degree hardcore, but if a game is recognized as good by the crew over at N4G then you know it’s hardcore. How does a population of people who claim difference should be celebrated, that the popular people are all just clones of each other, that girls only like the same jerk, stand out? Well they go to N4G and agree on everything. And what happens when something different actual does come along? Well they shun it. They won’t let it sit at their lunch table and they call it mean names. In a sense they do what all the bullies at school do to them. You see the hardcore gamer is only skin deep; granted the skin is greasy, red and blotchy, and very pale. The hardcore gamer just wants to fit in, therefore they all like to agree with each other.

30. Ninjis

The Ninjis made their first appearance in Super Mario 2. It was assumed that they were minions of Wart, subsequent games, however, taught us two lessons; first the Ninjis would work for Bowser, which means must have been some sort of mercenaries, and second that they had some strange ability to cross between the dream world and the real world. That makes them more powerful than Freddy Krueger in my book. I would also imagine that they had tons of training, the title “Ninji” was most likely not given out to anybody. You probably had to be shaped like a star previously as well. I think it would be difficult to have to mold yourself into one afterwards. An office poll shows that these guys have the same coolness that Boba Fett had before Lucas ruined Star Wars. They are just rare enough that it give them a mystique of awesome. Thank God Lucas doesn’t run Nintendo.

29. Shy Guys

The shy guys are an odd bunch. They also made their first appearance in Mario 2 as agents of Wart, though like the ninjis they apparently were able to leave Subcon as they appeared in subsequent games. Much like the koopa troopas they came in a variety of colors and abilities. Some would walk off cliffs to their death, while others had the good sense to turn around. They never seemed all that shy as they would head right toward which ever character you would happen to be playing at the time. Like most of the enemies in Subcon they were easily dealt with and could be used as a weapon against each other. A rather humiliating experience I would imagine.

28. Piranha Plant

You have to give Bowser credit for these nasty little plants. Both of us here at OW have owned a Venus fly trap at one point or another and we all have similar stories of failure. No matter what you did they always died. Bowser on the other hand had one growing in practically every pipe in the entire game. We don’t know what he did, but I would love to find out. They also came in a couple of different flavors; the timid green ones, the fearless red ones, fire breathing versions, some that walked and spit spiked balls, some that jumped, and some that flew. Mario had to think twice before jumping down a pipe because most likely a hungry piranha plant was waiting for him.

27. Boss Bass

Boss Bass was found in Mario 3 in the third water world. He was annoying not just because he could eat you alive, but because every time you killed him, he came back. This eternal recurrence ability made him one of the more powerful enemies in all of Mario 3. Shells and fireballs could destroy him, but he would be back in a second waiting for a platform to lower so he could eat you alive. Spending entire levels trying to avoid this bastard proved to be one of the most controller-breaking moments in Mario 3. Give me the whistle. I don’t want to have to face this fish over and over.

26. Triclyde

Triclyde was a boss in Mario 2, and one of the most difficult at that. He was much more difficult than Wart who could be beaten with mere vegetables. This three headed snake inhabited Mario’s land of dreams, spewing the most powerful fireballs in the game at him. If you knew how to skip levels by finding warp zones you wouldn’t have to face him. If you didn’t though, you would be facing a boss as difficult as Ridely from Metroid. Triclyde was the most nefarious looking boss in all of Mario 2, and for good reason when experiencing how hard he was.

25. Ludwig Von Koopa

The eldest of the Koopa kids, Ludwig von Koopa was the king of Pipe World in Mario 3. One wonders why he had a different last name than the other Kooplings, but no matter, he was one of the most difficult final bosses to face on the conspicuous airships at the end of each level. He was quick, and he threw out his wand smoke rings faster than most other Kooplings and just looked freaking mad. A little known fact about Ludwig was that he was also a composer. What kind of music did Ludwig compose? With his first name you could probably infer that he tried to make classical pieces like Beethoven, but we never hear. Maybe he created the whole soundtrack of Mario 3. Maybe this was his greatest legacy.

24. Rocky Wrench

This devious demon was first introduced to the gaming population in Super Mario Brother 3. These characters are some seriously sneaky bad guys, with an orange furry coat and black shells, and sporting the ability to burrow inside objects and pop up when ready to attack. Their primary target being Mario or Luigi, these menacing little maniacs armed themselves with an unlimited supply of shiny heavyweight wrenches. Tossing them through the air, the wrench would keep an impeccable straight line towards Mario’s face, disobeying all laws of gravity and air resistance. Not only were these wrenches shiny and sneaky, they were doubled up and spinning at a high velocity, for an extra hard hit. Found in the wooden airships or tanks, these mole-like enemies would pop up, lid still balancing on their head, throw their evil wrenches and pop back into their hole quite quickly. Jumping on these enemies’ heads the split second before they burrowed back down to safety is an especially fulfilling action. Watching them fall down below the airship or tank off the screen is just icing on the cake.

23. Boomerang Brothers

Its obvious that these guys are Australian. Nobody can handle a boomerang like the Aussies. It also means that they are the descendants of criminals the British government not only wanted removed from society, but actually did remove from the country. That being said these dudes must be bad ass. We first met them in Super Mario 3 when Bowser must have conscripted Aussie turtles to supplement his otherwise vast army. Sadly they weren’t all that tough. They used boomerangs that were comically too big and also too slow. I would have used small fast ones, that way Mario wouldn’t see what’s coming. Then again the Aussies aren’t know for being the smartest bunch, let alone the Aussie turtles.

22. Mouser

What needs to be said about a larger than life mouse with a bomb fetish who feels the need to wear gloves, glasses, and boots, but no undergarments? This lovable bomb throwing rodent was introduced to the public in Super Mario 2 as a Stage Boss standing in the way of Mario as he attempts take Subcon by storm. While his attempt to blow Mario to bits usually ended with Mouser being blasted by his own bombs, his grasp on our memory still emains intact. Mouser was also a regular on the Super Mario Brothers Super Show acting as King Koopa’s second in command. The show gave him a bit more personality, having him speak with a German accent and plaingy dress up with the Koopa Klan, depending on which “Mushroom Kingdom World” they happened to be in. So to all you fans of Crazy Naked German Bombers, this is the character for you!

21. Buzzy Beetle

Buzzy Beetle. The name is synonymous with “fire-proof”. Every gamer knows that the only difference between Buzzy Beetle and a regular Koopa Troopa is that Buzzy can’t be taken out by fireballs. One wonders what the logic was behind making beetles impervious to fireballs, while turtles and mushroom men weren’t. Granted its not like these guys really look like any beetles I’ve ever seen anyway, but they sure were tough once you got them spinning.

10. Super Punch Out! (SNES)

The progenitor to “Super Punch Out” was of course, “Mike Tyson’s Punch-out” for the NES which is one of the better games of all time in its own regard. But for all that the original offered, the Super NES version doubled in enjoyment adding more ingenious characters and circuits than the former. The playability increased more too with the controls responding seamlessly to your hand movements. All the fighters were endowed with iridescent colors and personality up the wazoo. Mad Clown was the most evil of evil clowns you have ever encountered in or outside any video game. Super Macho Man was the goofiest of bodybuilders you could ever encounter showing off his muscles at any chance he could get. Masked Muscle was so fun to look at that you actually enjoyed having to fight the nefarious Mexican heavyweight. While the personality and design of the characters were expedient for making all ages enjoy this game, it was the final boss in “Nick Bruiser” that appropriately scared the player into reconsidering the bout as Bruiser slowly walks to the middle of the ring to fight you. You hear each stomp as his boots traverse the canvass to meet Mac face to face. More additions to Super Punch Out include a time trial mode where you attempt to beat the best in the world by knocking down your opponents in record time, some fighters in 10 seconds or less like the infamous “Gabby Jay” who reminded the player of the weakness of Glass Joe. All these qualities combined to make Super Punch Out a slightly more enjoyable game than the original, and if we creating our top 100 list with this first and foremost in mind (enjoyment factor), than Super Punch Out must edge out the original, even if the original firstly brought in the great idea.

9. Illusion of Gaia

From the title screen, you hear a Wagnerian sweeping crescendo signifying an aggrandized adventure ahead. On top of that, you see a picture of the world from outer space. Yes, Illusion of Gaia was a game of world significance. You traveled the world seeking out myths that have been discovered throughout time in the real world, from Mayan culture to Chinese culture, in an investigation to the whereabouts of your journeymen father who was lost at the Tower of Babel. The story along the way is invigorating and often romantic with multiple people falling in love. You’re even cast out at sea for a prolonged period of a time with a princess who becomes stricken by the grandiose nature of the sea, where she stops becoming nagging and starts eating the fish you catch for her. Illusion of Gaia as an RPG is much more like “Zelda: Link to the Past” than a Final Fantasy three. There is no traditional experience build up and turn-taking battles, instead the protagonist “Will”, will gain experience by beating all the enemies in a room and will do so in real time fashion, something much preferred for adventure game players than the former style. Throughout the adventure, you have the option of changing into different warriors like “Friedman” and “Shadow” who you need to use to get past specific areas in the game. The towns are filled with a varied cast of interesting people who all are informed by their indigenous cultural “memes” that help you with information to pass on to new areas, and give you a sense of a Romanized world-view, that you will remember past completing this game. Illusion of Gaia is often overlooked within the great games in RPG history. This is a mistake as the story line and game play are absolutely superlative.

8. Super Mario World

Super Mario World was one of the first games developed for the SNES, and showed off all the new advantages of a 16 bit system. Bosses would fly at your screen taking up the whole screen, 3D imagery stood out from the world map showing much more depth in graphic technology at the time, and worlds were larger with more memory in the cartridges for the new system. Super Mario World utilized all these extras in the jump from 8 Bit to 16 bit. Super Mario World for SNES was mostly like Mario 3 for Nintendo, except there were even more hidden areas to uncover and much more radiant looking enemies to contend with. This game had a style and entertainment value of its own distinguished from previous Mario’s. Yoshi was a great new addition, as you could ride him around and gulp enemies Tony Robins style, along with spewing out fireballs in a quicker fashion than Mario ever could. Also conspicuous in this game was the stereo imaging of the sounds and the music utilized by the new 16 bit technology that made a drastic effect of the mono-auditory technology of the 8 bit NES. Bowser was bigger and better than ever with a massive helicopter shooting projectiles at Mario from all angles. In the end, Super Mario World was another great Mario game with the additions of the new systems technology. The importance of all new Mario games on new Nintendo systems though was that none of the greatness of the original Mario was ever lost, for all the spice and progression of technology. Nintendo understands that what first and foremost makes a good game is creativity and imagination.

7. Super Mario Kart

Mario Kart for the SNES made the Nintendo market even more massive then it had already become. Being able to take all your favorite characters from old school Mario and using them on intricate race tracks proved to be one of the more enjoyable moments for the SNES. Most people picked Mario to race with because he wasn’t weak in any category specifically. Using Bowser though was for only the best racers. His weight would make it hard to accelerate, but if you could avoid obstacles his acceleration speed was the best. The music was also a strong point in Mario Kart. This soundtrack would be sought after like the best SNES RPG’s. The Mario Kart legacy would first start with this SNES game.

6. Secret of Mana

Secret of Mana is without a doubt one of the top 5 RPG’s ever created and easily in the top 10 games ever created. It was a Squaresoft RPG for SNES, meaning it was going to be one of the greatest games ever created with the kind of thought put into it that a great philosopher would put into his magnum opus. Great RPG’s have the character of reading fiction, but having absolute real-time interaction with the book your reading. Playing this game is on par with reading “the lion the witch and the wardrobe” for the first time. Right away, from the cover of the game, you could tell that this game was going to be incandescent and massive in breadth. Three heroes overlooking a massive tree in the middle of a massive forest served as the game cover. The largeness of the theme would be equaled by the actual game itself that was huge, but never ever boring. The big advantage that Secret of Mana has over other RPG’s is the multi-player action that was never found in RPG’s afterwards. You could play this game with two other people and take it on habitually with them, after school, and even on Friday nights when everyone else was gearing up for banal pseudo social hour time. It’s unbelievable to think that no other RPG afterwards utilized this power, and understood that there are groups of people who want to go on massive RPG adventures together. For some reason, the RPG theme is understood as primarily single-player. This is a mistake by the creators of these games that “Mana” cashed in on. Every single tune in this game is memorable, which makes you wonder why every single tune in new games are never memorable. Every single land in this game is filled with beautiful, distinctive themes, which makes you wonder why RPG’s on new systems, with all the new technology involved, pale in comparison to the impact of this 16 bit installment. There’s a little saying that goes “It’s not the Arrow, it’s the Indian”. This may be the best example of that maxim in gaming history. One could write about this game forever, but it’s not to be understood by what others write about it…

5. Donkey Kong Country

Rare took the Donkey Kong brand name and transformed it into one of the strongest adventure games for the 16 bit medium. In DKC, you had the freedom to move back and forth between levels and play multifarious side games. Meeting your family along the way proved to be a creative and imaginative leap for the Donkey Kong. Getting to talk to DK’s cranky grandfather or his cool surfin’ buddy gave the DK brand name pizzazz and nuanced not seen in any adventure game before, let along the Donkey Kong series. DKC was also a big leap in terms of graphics. Rare took traditional 16-bit graphics and made them into the most innovative graphics for the 16-bit era. Donkey Kong looked as colorful and animated as ever throwing barrels and pouncing on chompers. Rare took an already successful series and made it even more successful, an accolade which is recognized in our top 5 video game developers of all time.

4. Super Metroid

The only bad thing about Super Metroid for the SNES are the hand cramps you will get from playing it so much. In Super Metroid, the successor to Metroid for Nintendo and Gameboy, we see Samus back on Zebes fighting old enemies from her prior outing; Craid and Ridely are back, not to mention the plethora of new space pirates trying to get a lock of Samus’s flowing hair. The suspense of this game has been unmatched by any other. As you are about to fight Craid, the music in the room before changes to the somberness of a Beethoven Sonata, and you come across a previous journeyman being eaten up by space insects. This type of engagement with the player is often lost in the “high-tech” musings of current video game makers. Between the valence of the soundtrack and the emotional ending where “you-know-who” comes to save you, you are in for a one of the most amazing video game experiences of your life. When playing this game for the first time, know that you will never be able to play ii for the first time again…

3. Final Fantasy 3
Final Fantasy 3, yes 3, is one of the greatest RPGs ever made. We here at OW refuse to adopt the Japanese numbering order. If anything Japan should have to re-write their numbering to fit the order of release here. You see OW bleeds red white and blue. And as any true American knows we are the greatest country ever, if you don’t think so we’ll invade you and force our culture on you. Japan should truly decide whether the numbering they use is worth it or not. We’ve invaded bigger countries for less. Anyway I digress. This game is awesome, it’s one of the first games where the bad guy actually wins and it has an incredibly interesting plot. You can all but pull yourself away when you have to return to the real world.

2. Chrono Trigger

The theme music for 600.AD is perhaps the most recognized RPG theme in RPG history. Hit up Youtube now and you will find variegated renditions, from the simple piano mimicry, to obscure oboe afflatuses. This is just the music though…There’s also the game…made by “Sqauresoft”, which means it’s impossible that it wasn’t a great game. The theme of Chrono Trigger was arguably the best, most thought out idea for any RPG ever made. Taking advantage of the idea of the chronology of actual world history, you were to adventure across every span of the world’s totality, even to the “end of time” which gave you goose bumps knowing you were on the brink of timelessness. The creators of this game must have been reading Hegel before and during the development in this game, as creating a game with the theme of personally following out the logic of history, was surely an ode to Hegel’s essential philosophical insights. Philosophy aside, this game was effulgent and munificent in its delivery. The entire game, you think that the last boss is Magus, until you beat him and realize that he becomes one of the members of your party. Its here you realize how much time you spent playing this game, and how much more time you will have to spend to get at the real ending. Like all great RPG’s, this game had a series of fake endings, where you could play the game 15 hours and get a bad ending with the world being destroyed, to be completely unsatisfied in your “accomplishment” up to that point. The realization that you have more times to explore with their own massive story lines in these lands led to a feeling of grandiosity, the hallmark of all square soft games. Chrono Trigger is up there with Final Fantasy 3 and Secret of Mana as some of the best accomplishments in gaming history. It’s with this knowledge that one then wants to understand what was going on in the minds of the creators of these games. To make games like this required inspiration and muse not needed in modern game making that merely requires “sex appeal”. Video games did have a golden age. Chrono Trigger represents that golden age…

1. Legend of Zelda: A Link to the Past

The Legend of Zelda a Link to the Past is the perfect game. Its got the unlikely hero, the pretty princess, and the evil villain and his countless minions. As well as a great story, parallel universes, side-plots and quests, a place called Death Mountain, was one of the first games that would change the character when you got new weapons/armour, a boomerang, a better boomerang, chickens, a mysterious forest, a sword in the stone, a triforce, a secret society of underwater mermen, running, fighting, jumping, puzzles, more princesses, monsters, mayhem, graveyards, secret passages, bombs, better bombs, running shoes, magical wands, a tranquil town, you can catch butterflies, fairy babes, a simple map/with tons to explore, and on and on…

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