I guess this should have been posted at the end of last year, but I was dr- occupied.
I have to say that my favorite gaming moments of 2006 were not actually getting my hands on my very own Wiimote and Nunchuk or unearthing the hulking Xbox 360; in fact, it had nothing to do with actually playing a game.
No, my favorite gaming moments of 2006 were shooting, editing and polishing my Sony and Nintendo launch footage in late November. It was great because it was my first time actually getting a close-up look at launch events - seeing happy gamers pooled together, doing or about to get something they all loved with no ill will towards anyone else, was just a great feeling. Plus, it was also an up-close-and-personal way for me to witness the final moments of the Gamecube/Playstation 2/Xbox era - the "last gen".
These were the moments that made me feel like part of the industry. Sure, I'm still an outsider looking in; my current job doesn't follow this career path so far. I can't get many exclusive interviews (except for this and this) or early scoops on breaking stories (except for this one). I don't have the time to be a current-day review writer, and must resign to the fact that I'm limited to reviewing old games I've beaten and games that will take months to beat on my schedule such that they're not new anymore.
But for a few hours on the midnights straddling November 16th and 17th, and November 18th and 19th, I - and my friends who do the Trigames.NET podcast with me - felt like we were part of something - part of an industry - that we love, that is loved by many others like us.
Maybe these nights were testament to the sad fact that anyone with a digital camera, a half-decent website, a few friends and the ability to pretend like you know what you're talking about can get wannabe hacks like me press passes to a launch media event.
At the very same time, though, I prefer to think about how passion for something and the desire to know it inside and out, the right way, can drive you to succeed even if it's just a tiny success. In the grand scheme of things, these were videogame console launches. People line up, people buy machinery. Big whoop. But I'll say it again: to see people so happy, so intense, so passionate; to be able to interview these people who like what I like; to document the experiences so that you never forget those nights; these are the reasons why I got out of my chair on those nights and stayed up 'til butt-o'clock editing those videos.
It's cliche, but if you truly love something and want to make something out of it, spend every waking moment you can towards that. If I never end up in the game industry, I'll still have those two nights as part of the crowd to remember.
For the hell of it, here are my videos. I'm keeping it to links-only so that the post doesn't get too bloated to read:
Playstation 3 Launch: Part 1
Playstation 3 Launch: Part 2
Key moments:
1) Hearing someone say she was getting a PS3 for her boyfriend, and then - when doing my recap of their interview - saying that she, brave soul, was getting it for her girlfriend. She immediately corrected me with vigor. Pwnd.
2) Me muttering to myself: "That's Tim Surette. Just chillin' with Fat Man Scoop! ...Fat Man Scoop could eat TEN Tim Surettes."
3) Misspelling Tim Surette's name as "Tim Surrette" in the video.
4) Catching someone bribing a wrist-strap holder with $400, only to see him around the back entrance half an hour later with no PS3 in hand.
5) Meeting Tim Surette - not on video unfortunately - at the end of the night, shouting out, "Tim Surette, GAMESPOT!" and shaking his hand... and possibly scaring him away from ever coming back to New York City.
Wii Launch: Toys R Us, Times Square
Wii Launch: Nintendo World Store
Key moments:
1) Numerous instances of Ethan filming me filming Ethan filming me.
2) Getting press badges for the Wii launch. (This was the result of me learning from my mistake of NOT preparing enough for the PS3 launch :()
3) Meeting Ryan (Mac Donald), Ricardo, Tim and Vinnie (if you don't know, he operated the camera for them that night) from Gamespot... and then shouting out JodyR and DrFish62 (Brian) while being interviewed on On the Spot's live coverage.
4) Apologizing to and basically groveling in front of Tim for misspelling his name the night before on my blog and making sure he knew I fixed it, and possibly scaring him away from ever coming back to New York City even more.
5) Seeing Ethan and Tony - who hadn't preordered anything anywhere - get their consoles without waiting on line (press passes), while Al and myself waited on a 5 hour line at the Nintendo World Store the next day to retrieve OUR PREORDERED consoles.
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