Entry 1: Snake's Revenge (NES)

Picked by random selection

Young Zeph was not a fan of the original Metal Gear on the NES. I loved action games, and I loved games with a good story, but you know what I didn't love? Forced stealth. Young Zeph did not have the patience to creep through buildings, dodging cameras and guard patrols while infiltrating a base to rescue captives and save the world. I gave it a few tries, but I got constantly frustrated by the feeling that if I was spotted, it was essentially game over, and so to this day I've never actually played completely through the original Metal Gear. So when Snake's Revenge, marketed as a sequel to Metal Gear, was released, you'd think I wouldn't be interested. Right? Yeah, no, for some reason, I still wanted to give it a shot.

Look at those covers. Look at how similar they are. This was clearly going to be more of the same.

So... I got Snake's Revenge. But something strange happened. I liked it, and I liked it a LOT. Even though the game started with more stealth requirements? I didn't mind. For the first few screens, upbeat action music played, flares shot up onto the screen to illuminate the area of the woods you were traversing, and it just felt so much more approachable, despite being such a similar premise to the first game. Many of the initial screens had you dealing with spotlights that moved in a predictable pattern, so finding a path through them was intuitive. Even better, in this game, when I was spotted, a wave of enemies would flood onto the screen - but only about 3-4 of them. Once I dispatched them it was back to sneaking. Was this less punishing than the original game? I don't know, objectively, but what matters is that to Young Zeph, it felt considerably more enjoyable and fair. A single mistake didn't lead to an irrecoverable state. And so I dedicated myself to beating this game. The biggest problem? This game, to me as a kid, was HARD. The game alternated between top-down sections focused on exploration, and side-scrolling portions focused on a combination of evasion and tactically advancing. The latter sections could be incredibly punishing if you were unprepared, however.

Snake's Revenge is split up into roughly seven sections (though you could make the case for up to eleven, depending on how you look at things). As a kid, I got quite good at the first two sections, but everything from section three onward was just incredibly hard for me. The third area of the game has you infiltrating a camp to locate and board an enemy train. Within this camp are several side-scrolling sections where you have to crawl through tunnels submerged in water. The first couple tunnels aren't too bad - they give you a feel for navigating through them with a limited air supply, and you're never in any real danger. But one especially long tunnel is guaranteed to completely drain your air supply, and your life thereafter, and unless you have enough health to get through this section... you can't proceed in the game. Young Zeph had a hard time having enough health to get through this, and so he finally resorted to his last resort of the time: Game Genie.

Game Genie was an unlicensed add on for game systems that let you input codes prior to booting the game - these codes would allow you to funadmentally alter how the game played. Having trouble getting through a section of a game? Give yourself infinite lives, or even better, infinite life! Can't afford a cool item in a shop? All the money in the world can be yours! Game Genie was a boon for Young Zeph, giving him the ability to experience games that he didn't whave the skills to complete without it. Side note: this is why I'm such a big fan of games having assist modes or otherwise-named aids to help people through games. No one should be unable to experience a game that they really want to just because their hand-eye coordination or anything else prevents them from being able to do so.

Thanks to Game Genie, I was able to proceed past the third area, and through the entire rest of the game! Who cared about health? I laughed in the face of enemy bullets, and delighted in luring as many enemy units as possible to swarm around me before detonating C4 to clear the room, leaving my invulnerable body unscratched. I strode through hallways in plain views of security cameras, laughing at the waves of reinforcements swarming my location. I destroyed Metal Gear and saved the world! ... And yet. I wanted to do it all myself, without the help of Game Genie. I wanted to feel like I'd EARNED the adoration of a nation. So I practiced. I replayed sections of the game over and over until I knew the enemy patterns and could get through them easily. I memorized the locations of the items, including the ever-useful healing rations. And then finally, one night... I did it. I conquered the underwater section that had given me so much trouble - relatively easily. I tore through the rest of the game. Bosses fell by my hand and I leaned forward in my chair in excitement. All I had left to do was guide a remote-controlled missile through a series of narrow passageways. I had plenty of time, but my nerves were getting to me. I took a turn a half second too soon and watched my missile explode harmlessly against a wall. I had plenty more, but it was frustrating; to vent this, I stomped my foot on the floor.

Almost anyone who owned a Nintendo can likely remember instances where they were playing a game and then it freaked out. The technology to hold the cartridge in place was relatively new, and the Nintendo was prone to losing contact with the cartridge pins if the system got knocked, jostled, or otherwise disturbed. Sometimes it would just create a slight visual glitch; sometimes the game would freeze, often accompanied by a hideous noise, and force you to reset. In this scenario, my Nintendo chose to do the latter. I stared at my system in horror for a full minute - long enough for my parents to yell at me to do something about the awful drone coming from the TV speaker. I had come so far, and worked so far, and lost everything.

But there was a good lesson to be learned there! It was truly about the journey, not the destination. I worked hard at learning the game and was able to overcome the hurdles that stood in my way. Even if I didn't finish the game, I knew I would have, and that I had conquered something that had stymied me for weeks. And in the end, wasn't that knowledge enough?

No. No, it was not. I immediately restarted the game, stayed up past my bedtime, and beat it for real. Damn, it felt good.

It always made me sad, as a kid, knowing that your friends died during the mission. War is hell.

Snake smiles after a completed mission. Time to retire... until Shadow Moses.