In Gus Van Sant’s Drugstore Cowboy, Matt Dillon blames the “TV babies” for his demise, and while things have changed a bit from the drug-haze of Portland, OR during the 70s - certain media-inspired scapegoats have remained intact. As a forerunner of today’s oft maligned videogame babies, I would like to take a minute and say thank you to the folks that recognize the old-school console games for what they truly are: ART!!!
And while my person may not prove a convincing counter-argument to the dangerous logic that pervades our culture presently (namely that videogames inherently corrupt the individual who plays/witnesses them), I am happy to see that the American Museum of the Moving Image (AMMI) has given these beautiful boxes their due.
Additionally, I have discovered some cool sights and sounds of old arcades and magazine ads that may force all you videogame addicts of the Reagan 80s into a pixelated flashback … as an extra bonus - here is the original pong manual.
I have to thank Amy (from John Pearce’s Historic Preservation class) for linking to the AMMI site. Whether she knows it or not, she brought me down memory lane - while, at the same time, giving me access to the original console game roms that can be run on any computer with the right game emulator (now that is progress in my book!!!). Such connections certainly give at least one old school gaming junkie his fix.
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