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It is a known fact that when the names Mario, Sonic or Donkey Kong are uttered, there is unified involuntary smile slapped onto the faces of the 80’s and 90’s children across the globe. Of course, these time-consuming characters are still widely known today, through the form of immaculate graphics and 3D gameplay, yet, this does not quite capture the essence of the three protagonists, or in my eyes, heroes. The shoddy picture and broken gameplay, added character to each of the games respectively, bringing a form of realism that would only be found in actuality. There are obviously a few other honorable mentions of our youthful video game careers, the likes of; Link – forever trying to reach Zelda, Ken and Ryu — the overly aggressive teens and Ash — the irresponsibly parented child.
The reminiscing of these games can only be described in one word; classic. But what do we remember of the games the made the transition from control pad to television remote? The answer – probably not a lot.
The adaptation from video game to television is one that has been done many times, even when most will agree, it shouldn’t have been. As a whole, the sub-category of video game based television shows can be classed as terrible, although there are a few gems in the mix, it isn’t enough.
Mario has been the virtual poster boy for Nintendo from the beginning, leading sales across all platforms. However, the Nintendo name was inadvertently tarnished, with the launch of The Super Mario Bros Super Show. A live action series which saw, the famous Mario and Luigi on their daily escapades, battling Bowser and rescuing the pure Princess Peach. This was to crash and burn from the get go. The weak plot matched that of the games, which, as much fun as it was to play, is awful to build an entire show around. The subpar acting also brought down Nintendo’s stock, with no memorable actors or quotable lines from series. After the lack of success from the show, Nintendo, why did you go and make a movie?
Standing on the other side of the spectrum we have; Pokemon. Snowballing from the success of the video game, the anime was released to the western English-speaking audience in 1998, with the highly regarded reputation laid out by the game, much was expected from the show and it delivered. Following the in-game venture, the series pits Ash – a young Pokemon trainer – on his quest to collect all gym badges and catch all Pokemon – take note Mario, this is how you deliver a simple yet prospective concept. The success of the show was overwhelming, the people wanted more and they got more, sixteen years more.
While the animate creature niche was booming thanks to Pokemon, the creators of Digimon decided to quickly and subtly jump on the bandwagon. Developing a plot which was close to identical to Pokemon, they still managed to garner a moderately large fan base.
In spite of the anime success, my previous statement stands, this sub-genre is terrible. This reasoning for this stems purely from the live action series’. My thoughts, an animation should stay an animation, when bringing a game to the television screen, it must be able to bring the same level of enjoyment that one has while playing its game counterpart. A live action series cannot create this same level of enjoyment. A game allows you to escape reality, however when live actors along with a real set is used, it all becomes to actual, not allowing the viewer the escape that they so desire.
Jamal Asskoumi – Blogger and Video Game addict