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Originally posted by Undertoad
It's true. I played Donkey Kong on the Intellivision, but I think in the 20 years since then, I've gotten more sophisticated in gaming taste.

(insert Charlie Brown-missing-the-football AAAAAAAAUUUUUGGGGH! here)

I'm not knocking the Intellivision, as it was my first system and remains my old-school console of choice. I'm knocking Donkey Kong for it, as Coleco intentionally botched the 2600 and Inty ports so as to make the ColecoVision look good by comparison.

(Note: Intellivision games seem to be all over the place these days. There are PC emulators, there was a commercial PC release, there's a standalone gadget that I saw at Kay-Bee, and there's an upcoming PS2 pack called "Intellivision Lives." One problem -- how the hell are they emulating the controller, which had a twelve-digit keypad, four independent fire buttons and a 16-position disc?

Analog joypads can handle the disc and improve upon it, and the fire buttons are easy, but the keypad is a sticking point. Games like Space Spartans and Treasure of Tarmin used every button on the keypad, and NFL Football had you typing in numeric formations and plays.)

The other thing that appeals to me, and seems not to appeal to any of you, are the sports games. I generally get the EA NHL series every other year, and FIFA, and occasionally Madden. I even liked the High Heat series OK even though I'm not a big baseball fan anymore.

My friend Rick is a chronic sports junkie; he's magnetically attracted to EA football, soccer, hockey and rugby games. I haven't caught the bug myself; I'll play them, but not fanatically, and have tried to sway him towards the Sega Sports lineup (N__2K* -> ESPN Sports), as they're getting better reviews these days.

I hate all fighting games and will not play any of them.

I like fighting games a lot more when I'm not paying for them (hello, MAME), and thus not blowing rolls of quarters trying to beat some twelve-year-old who's memorized a 65-hit dial-a-combo string that kills anyone who hasn't memorized its twelve-button-and-joystick-move-combo countermove.

I have a soft spot for SNK's Legion of Street Fighter Knockoffs and Endless NeoGeo Sequels.

I hate puzzles to death, as well as games that look like games but are actually puzzles. Some of the original FPSes had that feel; you were fighting bad guys or monsters, but half the time you were pushing on every section of wall to find the secret room. That kind of thing really annoys me.

This is why I wanted to throw Zelda: The Wind Waker through a window. Old school Zelda was all about running around and zapping bad guys with your magic sword, with an occasional wall to bomb; Wind Waker was all about exploration and problem-solving and collecting clues and dull fucking ocean travel in your anthropomorphic talking boat just to be able to find something to HIT, let alone to reach the boss and advance the storyline. (And even then I could've gotten more into it if the control scheme wasn't monumentally retarded.)

If I want puzzles, character development and deep dark secrets, I'll play an RPG.