Nerd Shit

An attempt to write about something happier for a change. (Non Music)

One of the things that I’ve let slip over the last few years in interviews and writings has been my history with gaming, specifically retro gaming, which now I guess goes back to the PS3 era, which I was only briefly a part of until my house was robbed (twice!) and my Xbox 360 was amongst the things they left with.

I honestly was fairly nonplussed at that, at the time I was heavily into both drugs and World of Warcraft, which was basically my (very unhealthy) life for quite some time. I hadn’t really delved too deeply into the 360, honestly. I think I had a few games that I never even cracked and only really remember playing a bit of “Halo 3” and that first Dragon Age game. I generally was unimpressed, though it’d probably be different now.

Before the drugs and WoW addiction? Up to the PS2/Xbox era I was all in. I’d been playing video games since the NES was released, at my neighbor’s house, until I got one of my own. From then on, it was a way for me to escape what rapidly became a fairly sad and isolated life, alongside reading and (eventually) music. This isolation changed when my family moved from Pittsburgh to New Jersey. The whole “fresh start” thing. I moved sometime in 1992, on the day that Alice in Chains released “Dirt” and was immersing myself in the SNES. I’d had a Genesis for a few years, purchased through the power of being a paperboy and is the cornerstone for a lot of what I would grow to love about games, but the SNES was a siren’s song. I used to dogsit for a family on my street when they would go away and they had both an incredibly hot mom and an SNES which I would sneak away to play until my mother caught up and let me know just how fucked up it was. Good thing she never found out that I was trying to also find proof of a neighborhood rumor of a sex tape. I think I was an early adopter of being a piece of shit, also as a way to escape just how bad the reality of things at home and school were.

(We’ll get into this one sooner than later.)

Aside from the SNES, moving to the Jersey shore opened up a new community for me, hidden inside the arcades on the boardwalk. Possibly the most locally well known arcade in Ocean City was Jilly’s, which I guess still exists, and this was around the time “Street Fighter 2” was driving kids into the arcades in droves. I wasn’t much of a stranger to humiliation in my life (not much has changed) but there’s still a sting when you remember putting your quarter up, waiting in line for twenty minutes, and the one kid who had memorized every character’s moves pushed your shit in for two minutes until it was time to put up another quarter and head to the back of the line. This ushered in the era of the fighters, with “Mortal Kombat” not far behind. The first time I tried “Mortal Kombat” was in a rest stop on the way back from my father’s funeral (ok, I lied in the subtitle about this being “happier”) where I found a machine unoccupied and gave it a shot. I think I played as Sub Zero but I don’t remember because this memory (while being over thirty years ago) was tarnished by some guy who came out of nowhere, before I had even gotten through half of one round, saddled up and knocked the shit out of me. But that brief taste was enough. I would eventually skip school a few times to head to the arcades. I would spend time at Jilly’s up until the late 90s when I got a summer job elsewhere and arcade culture had started to morph from fighters and shooters to fucking dance games, something I never even entertained the idea of trying.

I guess I didn’t want to look foolish in public. I also used to wear spiked gauntlets out on the town so it wasn’t like I had anything approaching true self awareness in that arena.

Back in the time before I had bills and responsibilities I was able to be selective at where I worked, which landed me (concurrently, for awhile) at record stores and video game shops. My first job in the gaming world (loosely used) was at Electronics Boutique. For whatever reason, the mall near me had two of them-an upstairs and downstairs which never the twain shall meet. I worked upstairs. It was an incredible job, that I took very seriously, with a great crew of employees who made the whole thing seem less like work and more like a place to bullshit with people about something we all enjoyed for eight hours a day. This was during the time malls were still packed and the companies with stores inside them were “generous” (especially when compared to the retail hellscape of today) which meant a lot of freebies and the ability to borrow games. Like all good things, it eventually soured when the entire team besides myself and the assistant manager left. I stayed on and was close to the PS2 launch when my mother died. The district manager, who never replaced our actual manager in store, told me that he “had an aunt who could die anytime” he needed to get out of work. He used to also buy female employees lingerie. I hope he’s fucking dead.

A few years later I landed at Gamestop, around the halfway point of the PS2/Xbox lifespan and just before everything in an employee’s life revolved around pre-orders, used sales over new, and getting people to sign up for a fucking membership-three things that have helped to lead to the decline of in-person retail over the last twenty years that companies still seem to think are good ideas. Again, a fucking terrific job with a great group of people that went to shit when somehow every employee besides myself and the manager were caught stealing and all let go. My manager left shortly after and was replaced with a mulleted man who drove a shitty sports car and, I’m almost positive, had a coke habit. I was made assistant manager by attrition. No pay raise but increased responsibilities. Probably not the best idea since I’d learned how everyone else got caught taking games home.

Eventually my girlfriend brought home ‘World of Warcraft” and that became my life for several years as I slid into worsening mental health, drug abuse and financial ruin due to the stock collapse in 2008. My suicide attempt was even…er..attempted while playing. While I can (and will) look back on my time with WoW (at least the vanilla and first two expansions) as some of the best escapist moments of my life, it’s a shocker that I made it out of it.

Years went by, probably a decade, until I played anything again when the NES Classice was released. Since then I’ve picked up the SNES and the Genesis minis, modded them and gone back in time to play some of my favorites while also trying out games I’d never played. But, as of writing, it’s probably been five years since I picked up a game, either due to work or fatherhood (both) but I still spend a lot of time thinking about them, trying to watch Youtube channels related to the niche and talking to people about them. Which brings us here.

Every so often I want to write about these experiences (or other, non-music nostalgia interests) which I’ll always tag “non music” so those whose boats this doesn’t float can skip it. But, for those of you who do-welcome.

Finally, per usual, we’re still in financial trouble with my inability to work and the double whammy of replacing an HVAC and paying back mortgage. If you can donate (or share) our GoFundme it would truly help. I know it’s like a broken record at this point, but unfortunately I have no way of knowing when this will change.

GOFUNDME LINK

Venmo: Blackhouseindustries