There are a lot of great video game historians on Twitter, and they manage to unearth some amazing artifacts in 280 characters or less. Video Game Canon’s newest column, Bite-Sized Game History, will aim to collect some of the best stuff I find in my timeline.
This time on Best-Sized Game History… Pong takes flight, Mother 3‘s hype train leaves the station, and Nintendo’s battle with ROM hosting sites is yet another blow to game preservation.
You can find a lot of dedicated video game historians on Twitter, and in 280 characters or less, they always manage to unearth some amazing artifacts. Bite-Sized Game History aims to collect some of the best stuff I find on the social media platform.
If you get seated next to a frequent flyers on a plane nowadays, they’ll be all too happy to tell you that the in-flight experience ain’t what it used to be. Flying was considered a special occasion back in the jetsetting 70s. People dressed up, they’d say. The food was fancy and the atmosphere was luxurious.
After seeing this vintage ad touting Continental Airlines’s cocktail tables for Pong, I’m beginning to agree with them:
1975: Continental Airlines may have been the first commercial airliner to bring a video game into the skies. In April of 1975 Continental Airlines installed PONG cabinets in its DC-10 coach cabins. You could also have a drink at the pub and watch old Flash Gordon serials. pic.twitter.com/CgrvSc2SnX
— John Andersen (@JohnAndersen21) August 11, 2018
EarthBound (AKA Mother 2) was a huge hit for Nintendo and one of the best games to come out of the Super NES era. Naturally, the consolemaker began work on a sequel, and development quickly moved from the 16-bit console to the Nintendo 64’s fabled 64DD add-on. After the disc drive failed to catch on with fans, Mother 3 disappeared until it was resurrected on the Game Boy Advance nearly a decade later.
The RPG still has yet to make its way to the US, but this early article/advertisement from its 64DD days was recently unearthed:
“Mother 3 Times” – from Dengeki Nintendo 64 Magazine (September, 1997). pic.twitter.com/ykojtdVjty
— VideoGameArt&Tidbits (@VGArtAndTidbits) August 12, 2018
Many English-speaking players have been able to experience Mother 3 thanks to the distribution of ROM files on the Internet, though Nintendo has never been a fan of this (admittedly illegal) practice, and they spent this week trying to shut down some of the online community’s biggest ROM distributors. While they’re entirely within their rights to do so, many games are only playable thanks to ROMs, and game historian Frank Cifaldi replied to Nintendo’s action with a thread detailing how this could hurt game preservation efforts:
ROM sites shutting down only feels as big as it does because of the completely abysmal job the video game industry has done keeping its games available. There is no alternative BUT piracy for like 99% of video game history.
— Frank Cifaldi (@frankcifaldi) August 8, 2018
Hope you enjoyed this edition of Bite-Sized Game History. And be sure to follow me on Twitter for more bite-sized history lessons.