Elf Needs Food Badly by Michele Christopher
This column was named after a video game. Gauntlet, obviously. But why? Why not Zelda or Zaxxon or Defender?
I used to play Street Fighter. There, you size up your opponent and take advantage of his weaknesses. You learn how to hurt with the most impact, how to cause the most damage with the least amount of moves, how to look for mistakes and pounce on those moments, going in for the kill when your opponent is vulnerable and weak. I like playing Gauntlet. It’s not the most difficult game in the world to play, and it’s not even always exciting. But there’s something about getting to the next level. Killing all those ghosts and monsters and getting the food and treasure and finally reaching your goal. And then starting over. Looking at your game partner and saying, you’re hungry. I’ll get these monsters while you go over there and get that food. And then a few minutes later, your partner looking over at you and saying, you’re about to die, let me cover for you while you get that potion. He’s got the stronger magic. I’m pretty fast. Together, we can put those two things together to get where we have to go. Get there alive. You have to know what you’re doing. You have to pay attention to each other. You have to watch where you are going and take note of what’s around you and keep a constant eye on how your partner is doing. In Street Fighter, I was a button masher. Just moved around and banged the buttons hoping for the best. All I really wanted was to not die. To fake my way through the round just enough to get out alive. I didn’t want to stand over my opponent’s body and raise my fists in triumph; I just wanted to be the one to not die. But when your opponent is incredibly skilled at the game and you’re not, it gets tricky. He knows every fighting combination. He knows every trick and cheat. He knows how to kick you at the same time he’s punching you at the same time he’s spinning around and delivering an elbow to your gut. He takes pleasure in exploiting your weaknesses and tells you over and over during the game just how lame you are at it. Having played Street Fighter way too long, it was a relief to play Gauntlet. I like having a partner instead of an opponent. I like having a set goal in mind and figuring out how to get there right instead of just blindly hitting buttons. I like sharing strengths and picking up the other player where he has a weakness and having him do the same for me. It’s like Valkyrie and Elf together make one formidable foe. We can work our way through anything because neither one of us is interested in crushing the other, only our common enemies. We realize when we press ‘start’ that this isn’t going to work if we don’t make this a 50/50 effort. I got your back if you got mine. I’ll come to your rescue. I’ll help you out of tight corners. I’ll do whatever I can to keep you alive because without you, I am not going to make it out of here. Well, maybe I can. But I don’t want to. Michele beats metaphors to death for a hobby. The Gauntlet also appears on Tuesdays. |
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Comments
you guys need to read between the lines on this one
Posted by: the turtle | October 22, 2006 1:16 AM
gotcha. I think most of us would rather play gauntlet than street fighter, at least for the long haul.
Posted by: pril | October 22, 2006 2:21 PM
Gauntlet was tons of fun growing up, especially as a D&D geek. Cooperative games were cool because you could basically role-play while you played them without feeling too silly.
I also liked Double Dragon for vaguely similar reasons, except then at the end you have to kill your partner, which was odd.
And then there was this strange game I played a few times. It had some plot involving corrupt cops and thugs, but if you ignored the plot completely (which I did) then you get the experience of you and your friend walking through a city beating the hell out of everyone you see. Used to make jokes like "get that accountant, man! Damn accountants!" (a lot of the enemies just looked like normal people)
Kids these days only have Grand Theft Auto. They don't know what they're missing.
Posted by: Kory | October 22, 2006 5:37 PM
I learned how to do the Hadoken when I was 7. That knowledge has carried me through EVERY FIGHTING GAME EVER so far.
Posted by: Tim | October 22, 2006 7:47 PM