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Editorials   The Console Cold War
- By Nathaniel Walker [Associate Editor]

A war of ideas is raging, and the battle lines are drawn through every living room in the industrialized world. As videogames finally begin to emerge from the shadowland of gimmick and into the spotlight of art, it seems to many that the good side is losing that war. Why is it that those things which are finest about videogames are the things which are also the most vulnerable, particularly now that our medium has finally arrived? That is a difficult question to answer for many reasons--not the least of which is the fact that the question itself is barely formed.

So before we worry about how we got here, let’s figure out exactly where we are. Nintendo’s new slogan says it all: The Nintendo Difference. We aren’t playing with power any more, folks--we are now looking for something different. Different from what? From the generic, from the mundane, from the mediocre, from the mainstream, and (most importantly) from the things people have come to expect. The fact that Nintendo is trying to carve itself a larger piece of the videogame market by calling attention to its differences, to the things that set it apart, proves what most of us have suspected for a long time now: Nintendo is, sadly enough, on the defensive. The new slogan has Nintendo focusing outward on the competition as they strive to define themselves, not focusing inward and bringing notice to what they see. They want us to see them not for what they are, but what they are not. Playstation is “the norm”. Nintendo is something else. This is not the approach taken by a winning team.

But why is Nintendo not the winning team? Is it because their games suck? Is it because the company is childish and simplistic? Is it because they have incompetent marketers? Is it because the GameCube doesn’t play those wondrous and miraculous little Dee-Vee-Dees? Of course not. We haven’t found ourselves in a “Hot War”, where console features and games and general quality go head-to-head and the winner takes all. This is a Console Cold War, a war of ideas. Features matter not, game quality obviously doesn’t amount to squat, and marketing dollars don’t carry nearly as much weight in the videogame industry as they do in other entertainment sectors (although, I admit the X-Box may be the herald we should hark on that). Two different ideologies are at play here, folks, and in the end this will prove both the making and the breaking of the videogame universe as we know it.

Videogames are an art medium. If there were any questions about this before the release of Ocarina of Time, that game single-handedly answered them all. I won’t go into the great “What is art? Can one truly define art?” conundrum, but I will say this: videogames carry with them both “form” and “content”. There is aesthetic beauty, and there are moments which carry with them deep meaning. Such a large number of non-gamers have a hard time seeing this because videogames are essentially brand new. Keep in mind that photography--both still and moving--was considered gimmicky by the utilitarian masses back when it first broke the surface of the artistic world. In twenty years maximum, videogame design will be recognized as an art form by the mainstream. And here we are: this is the source of our Console Cold War. It is at this point--the place where videogames branch away from the nursery school toy and extend out into the world of human expression--that we find the market, the fans, the media, and the future divided by separate ambitions in the videogame world. One of our console competitors has (in my opinion, unknowingly) embraced the evolved creation of videogames as an art. Two others have been left swimming in the kiddie pool. Unfortunately, this puts our artistic player at a distinct disadvantage--for the kiddie pool is where most of the kiddies are bobbing around. As everyone knows, a business needs a buyer. Unless more gamers are willing to jump into the deep end of the console pool, floaties or no, our lone electronic pioneer may begin to sink. That pioneer is obviously Nintendo.

Sony and Microsoft are catering to the masses--they are the McDonald’s and the Taco Bell of the videogame world. The popularity they have achieved is a direct result of their approach to the market: flashy packages, fashionable images, references to the dark pleasures of unsuccessful adulthood…these are the things that make children turn and look. Any yahoo with half a cylinder pumping can see that Tomb Raider was not one-tenth the game that Mario 64 was (and still is). Any graduate from the University of Roll-On Deodorant can see that The Legend of Zelda has more to offer than a game in which you solicit prostitutes and then beat your money out of them. Due to this stark contrast, many gamers haved accused Nintendo of being a child’s company. They fail to see the irony of their argument. They, like many before them, fail to realize that blood and big breasts does not make the adult world what it is. Sony and Microsoft are keying in on that tendency of our world, to pursue that which is new and oh-so-sparkly but simultaneously easy to digest and instantly gratifying. Ultimately, this strategem will backfire--for as the kids in the kiddie pool get bored (as children always do), these two companies will find that the monotonous cravings they have nurtured will cause their fans to continually search for a different if not somewhat improved monotone. Playstation 3 must come soon, and then numbers 4 and 5 and so on and so forth, until the shine wears off and the lack of gameplay depth finally jolts the kids out of their stupor, and awakens that need within them to find something more. But instead of pursuing more (which is difficult) they will most likely pursue other (which is easy). A new kiddie pool—no deeper than the first, but now in a nice shade of very adult Brimstone Red and capable of playing 12 Dee-Vee-Dees in a row without manual switching. Pity, when the teething bastards could have had real depth if they were only willing to risk death and dismemberment by holding their breath, enduring a few ignorant jeers, and diving into the ocean that is today’s Nintendo.

I am no elitist. I do not believe that the great consumer masses are irreversibly stupid and that most people are incapable of depth. I believe we all have potential, and that every one of us fights the same fight--do we stretch ourselves and enjoy something truly great, or do we settle for microwave dinners and Sitcom #456223? Almost all of us can claim victories, and all of us must admit our share of defeats. But here we are, in the dawning light of humanity’s newest art form, a new endeavor with unlimited possibilities and an already amazing history! It seems a shame that the one company that has enough of a handle on things to say “we are making a videogame console for videogames” is the company struggling the hardest to earn respect. I hope that Nintendo will not join the ominous ranks of Van Gogh, Kafka, and the like. I hope that they have not suddenly found themselves before their time. But it is, I dread, quite possible.

And so the Console Cold War rages on. Will the quality of the Nintendo GameCube’s games beat out the pop shine of Playstation 2? Will it be able to surface in the sea of advertising drool Microsoft has squeezed from its billion-dollar media mutt? Will widespread recognition of videogames as an art form save Nintendo’s art from annihilation by the competition’s toys? Nobody knows. But the true question is: what do YOU have in your living room? Do you have a Multi-Magnificent HomeSelf Entertainment Castle Water-Purifying Device, spewing forth disembodied intestines and Mario-ripoffs with mammary glands (the likes of which only a TRUE adult could stomach, much less enjoy, right?)…or do you have a videogame console? Choose well. There will always be garbage to ignore, folks. Finding the gems to treasure can prove much more difficult. This time around, those gems won’t be coming packaged in a Playfaxmachine, or an X-Trash Compactor. They will come in powerful little purple and black Cubes. If you love videogames, for whatever reason, now is the time to go swimming. And just so you know--from the outside, that kiddie pool is starting to look a little yellow.