I was watching the Mario marathon at mariomarathon.com and came to a startling realization.
I bought my N64 in Portsmouth, VA in the fall of 1999. The 2 games I bought with it were The Legend of Zelda: Ocarina of Time and Super Mario 64. Both games are amazing, to say the least, but one of them started a trend that makes me question how hard core of a gamer I am. Starting with SM64, I have not beaten a console Mario game since Super Mario World on the SNES. The only SMB game I've beaten since the launch of SM64 has been New SMB on the DS. Upon the re-release of all of the early Mario games on the GBA, I've revisited them all and beaten them, but not on a console.
Here's my problem. When it comes to Mario games, I try to be a completionist. I want to collect every star in the game. Because of this, I have not gone on to battle Bowser in any of the games. I spent countless hours on SM64, Super Mario Sunshine, and Super Mario Galaxy, but haven't beaten any of them....

For some reason, I've felt a strange sense of deja vu since E3 regarding Nintendo's WiiU. I keep thinking Sega Saturn and Sega Dreamcast. Let's explore where this idea came from.
If the WiiU launches a full year ahead of the other major console makers, technologically, it's going to be a relic by the time the next Sony and Microsoft systems hit the street. As great as the Dreamcast was, it was dead in the water when the PS2 came out. Of course, Sega basically gave up on the system without a fight. Nintendo will not do that, but they also won't do something else that they're in dire need of: SWALLOWING THEIR PRIDE!!!!! They got the Wii wrong on so many avenues. No third party support, shelves of shovelware, no new IP, no recognizable online strategy, friend codes(?), etc. They need to stop trying to be so family friendly and the gentle grandfather of the game industry and just copy what Sony and Microsoft is doing. They should've gone traditional, hardcore system this generation....

Nintendo, take a cue from Sony and Microsoft and include some type of achievement system on the WiiU. I'll even give you a name for them, although you've already used them in the Mario & Luigi series. Badges! Let us earn badges.
I am not an achievement whore. I do not play games that I would not otherwise play just to increase my gamer score or trophy collection. I very rarely research what actions I need to take to earn achievements or trophies. The closest I've come to getting every achievement in a game was Assassin's Creed 2, where I got 47 out of 50 possible. I refused to go and collect all of the feathers.
Moral of the story, badges (like how I already adopted the name?) would help to extend game play. I would master all of the drivers in a Mario Kart title in order to get more badges. Readers, admit it, we all play either Toadstool or Yoshi and that's about it. Poor Wario, Donkey Kong, and Bowser! They never get picked because they're so slow.
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This post is going to devolve into a list that I want you guys to populate. The subject is simple:
What games have you had on your shelves collecting dust that are raved about in reviews and in blogs and are widely considered to be must-plays? Further, when you finally picked it up, you kicked yourself for having not played it sooner?
Recently, Portal 2 released to rave reviews. No one can shut up about how funny GLADOS was in the first one and how original and clever the game is. Well, I sent a tweet to Andy Reiner on the Game Informer staff and asked him if he thought it was necessary to play the first to enjoy the second. He responded with what could've been considered a tongue lashing (text lashing?). In all caps, he told me that I had to play the first for its greatness. I sat down with it on an overcast Sunday and didn't get off the couch until I beat it. The experience was fantastic. I went out and bought Portal 2 the next day and have been playing chunks...

So, I'll readily admit that I had huge expectations for Nintendo coming into this E3. I have no problem being called a Nintendo fan-boy, but I own every system dating back to the 16 bit era, so I'm not completely biased. That being said, I see failure with the WiiU. More than failure, I see G-I-M-M-I-C-K written all over the system. It's going to take some excessively creative game developers to do anything original with the new controller. I see it as a tremendous in-game inventory system or quick reference map system, but that's about it. Using it to play games without the TV set to the game's input is nice, but is it necessary? I can only speak for myself when I say that I have a TV specifically for gaming. If I'm playing on it, my wife uses the other TV. That option isn't available for everyone, but are you guys going to play HD games on a 6.2" screen or your 55" LED?
Sorry that this sounds so pessimistic. I want nothing more than Nintendo to fight tooth...

Here it goes:
The only press conference I watched live was Nintendo's. I have to say that the 3DS is going to be a huge success starting at the end of this year. I think that the lineup of first party titles they announced are going to push the system over the edge. I expect to see them very hard to find during the holiday season, and then a system redesign in the February-March time frame. Once they release 3DS 1.5, I expect to see a price drop in anticipation of the Vita hitting the streets. I think the price point of Vita is a clear shot across Nintendo's bow by Sony. There is no way that Sony will make any money on that system at a $249 price point. This strategy, similar to Microsoft's selling 360's at a loss to get a huge market share, may prove to make the Vita highly competitive with the 3DS. More importantly than price point is software. I feel let down with the PSP because, when killer software was released (God of War, Daxter, Metal Gear), the system really let...