Nostalgia

When I think back to my younger years and video games I smile at the good times that were had playing on a console or the Commodore 64. Younger generations don't understand how far games came from the days of Pong to the Kinect in such a short time frame. Back then game developers were constantly bringing new ideas to the marketplace and gamers rejoiced at that.

One of the best games of the late 90s was Goldeneye for the Nintendo 64. While most games based on movies are a complete waste of time, Goldeneye was a rare exception that exceeded the expectations of everyone. A satisfying first person shooter, this was arguably one of the greatest games for that platform. The hours spent on multiplayer alone was worth the price. It wasn't complex, but it was challenging as well as fun.

So this Christmas I used one of my gift cards to purchase Goldeney 007 for the Wii. It follows the storyline of the film, but updated a bit for today's technology. It uses Daniel Craig as the star British secret agent and he even lends his voice to the game. Surprisingly the dialogue is less banal than the movie.

The game is similar to the old title we know and love, but hardly the same. Still it brought back some nostalgia to the hours I spent attempting to beat the original Goldeneye on every difficulty. The latest version is terribly simple though. Gone are the days of getting body armor and carefully moving around every corner to take down an opponent, because you're health well quickly regenerate when you hide in cover, similar to the Call of Duty games. If you die in a level you won't have to restart it, just simply re spawn at your last checkpoint. It took me just a short amount of time beating the whole game on agent and sadly I'm not sure if I unlocked anything. In the original you had two unlockable levels, but I haven't seen any here.

While the graphics are improved and the style is better what was most notably missing were the friends piled on the couch, numerous bottles of beer, and the smack talk.

"James Bond is quite serious about his drinks and clothing and cigarettes and food and all that sort of thing. There is nothing wry or amused about James Bond." - Ken Follett