Fun Blast from the Past article I found on Karma Running

https://brooklynrail.org/2007/10/local/ninja-playground

Found this while googling some stuff. Has an interesting look back into the history of Ninja Gaiden's community.

So, this "The Brooklin Rail" online magazine seems to focus on many cultural themes. It's kinda interesting that in 2007 they interviewed Bigalski about playin NG competitively. From what I know, in America has always been a more passionate approach to videogames than here in Europe, and this article, even if not very competent, seems to show it.

Did you ever watch that american movie, in which there's that autist child with great skills at any videogames? I think it was sponsored by Nintendo because it only featured Nintendo games. It was from the early 90's I think. You coudn't see anything similar in Europe, I think. There was a significant arcade culture in America, at that times. And there are also other examples of that.

That photo with Bigalski and Iberian is epic

I think it has to do with culture and marketing as well. Videogames were a rarity for me when growing up. There were no arcades in my country and only one or two classmates had a (S)NES. Finding them was rare too, only a few shops had them. It wasn't until much later that I started to see those around. Delayed releases also didn't help, we got some games months if not years after Japanese and American releases, this lasted even until the Wii era where Japan got Super Smash Bros. Brawl nearly 15 months before Europe and Metroid Prime 3: Corruption launched around 6 months later in Europe compared to America as I recall. 

And I think I know the movie you're talking about. Is it The Wizard? I remember AVGN doing a skit on it a long time ago. Pretty funny! 

For me videogames growing up was VideoPower, a short tv-show about videogames. It was really bad but it had heart and it was my only peak into gaming at large. Later-on there were a few magazines. I remember reading CompuKids as a youngster (around age 9) and a Dragon Ball Magazine that was just a collection of images of seasons of the show we wouldn't get to see for nearly 10 years haha. I remember seeing Broly in them and thinking "why the hell does this guy have green hair, and why does Goku have yellow hair"? It wasn't until 2001 that I fondly recall GameQuest magazine coming out, the first real sponsored gaming magazine that had interviews, reviews etc.

What about you?

The movie was The Wizard, yes, I didn't remember the american title. I remember it was kind of a sad movie though... nowadays most movies have to be happy and positive, back in the days I remember a lot of american movies being malinconic. But they were great movies with a strange atmosphere. I think some of them have signed us and contributed crafting our personality.

Btw, where I live, we had arcades and videogames in the 80's. My dad, for christmas, bought a Commodore 64. Later on I discovered the arcades, where I played many games. Super Mario (which was available in a cab for some strange reasons...) Street Fighter, Altered Beast, After Burner (with the original cab) and many others. Then I've had NES and SNES. In the 90's I found an arcade near my place which had ALL the Neo Geo games, all the 2D beat em ups like Art of Fighting 1&2, FatalFury Special, Samurai Shodown 1&2, a couple of other stuff. Then, my cousin gifted me with his PS1, and then I bought a PS2. Then I also played on many emulators. Now I have Xbox 360, PS3 and PS4.