One day when I was eight I came home a very excited little boy. I had just seen a dinosaur. Several actually. And a live Egyptian mummy. Not an 'alive' Egyptian mummy of course, that would have been terrifying. But a live Egyptian mummy in a glass display case.
I'd been on a school trip to the Natural History Museum and had had a fantastic time. Nothing was going to beat the time I had just had.
I was saying as much to my family as I rounded the corner into the lounge, when I noticed my brother wasn't paying attention to a word I was saying. He was transfixed with the TV screen and was jolting and gesturing with a small black box in his hands. A black wire protruding from the box rippled as he moved and was connected to a much larger black box positioned across the room by the TV.
I took this all in carefully and realised that somehow, for some reason, my brother was controlling a Sega Master System. It couldn't have been our Sega Master System of course, we didn't have one. We must have borrowed it. On loan through some sort of scheme. Right?
Right Mum and Dad?
I looked over at Mum and Dad, still hanging on the unfinished details of my dinosaur and mummy story, and I pointed toward the bizarre situation unfolding around my brother.
My Dad beamed. He offered an explanation, but I didn't hear it. I didn't hear anything but the plinky plonky sfx of Alex Kidd In Miracle World turning over and over. I didn't hear anything but the sound of my brother protesting as I ripped him free of the equipment, pushed him to the ground and sat in his spot.
To hell with the dinosaurs! Screw the mummy! An infinite portal of virtual mummies and dinosaurs just opened up in front of me and I didn't have to merely look at them behind glass. I could throw axes at them, destroy them, and walk within several pixels of them before falling over and flashing in wild transparency.
This easily beat the time I had just had.
Today's THREEHUNDREDANDSIXTEEFIVE challenge T-shirt has been donated by the team at Pixel Pixels, a haven for gamers looking to dress in tees designed to dig up console nostalgia. On the front of the garment is the reverse spelling of the Sega logo presented in the recognised typeface and printed in a sparkly blue veneer. 'Ages' perhaps represents the ethos of early 80's gaming as vital progression in the commercialisation of the culture. It could also represent how long it took to complete the average video game in those days which actually was bloody ages (back then there was no means to save your progress, the game cartridges would occasionally freeze right at a critical boss fight, or your brother would throw toys at you causing you to waste precious lives).
This Pixel Pixels T-shirt, featuring their logo on the back, has done wonders to evoke long lost childhood memories and has drawn my attention for the first time to the fact that 'Sega' is simply 'Ages' backwards.
HOW MENTAL IS THAT!?
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