When Rock Star Games began re-releasing classic video game titles like Max Payne and Grand Theft Auto 3, among others, for the iPad, I actually felt my age. Here were a few of the most popular video games of the past decade and to me they were brand new. God forbid I admit that I’ve never played Halo before and lose all geek credibility that I’d previously earned through running like a girl and having every Nerf Herder album on my iPod. What can I say, I’m a child of the 8- and 16-bit video game era.
Thankfully, as I was Googling “Rygar walkthrough” yesterday, I came across a site that helps an aging hipster geek like me embrace his roots: Title Scream has cataloged a ton of classic title screen shots from some of the greatest Nintendo and Sega games of the 80s and 90s and turned them into GIFs that — I’m not gonna lie — had me immediately looking for cheap Super Nintendos on eBay. (Side note: Old Super Nintendos are not nearly as expensive as they should be. They’re priceless artifacts, people!)
As I began gathering some of Title Scream’s grabs – and there are a ton – it was like I was whisked away to my childhood living room, with my favorite NES games spread out on the floor, as me and the neighborhood kids traded them like Visine bottles at Coachella. Only this time I’m not trading The Legend of Zelda for Hudson Hawk. Some mistakes stay with us for a lifetime.
