Nintendo Replayed: Jeopardy 25th Anniversary

[originally written for overtimecomedy.com on 2/5/08]


Nintendo Replayed: Will my old Nintendo games hold up when I play them as an adult?

My parents figured buying Nintendo games based on game shows would educate me instead of melting my brain like normal video games. Makes sense, except they also bought me Wheel of Fortune, which is based on a show that's like Mecca for idiots.

As a kid, I dedicated myself to memorizing every single Jeopardy question, leading to my encyclopedic knowledge of nothing. I can still enjoy this game today, but I wouldn't recommend it for the following reasons

1) As you scroll through the pre-designed contestant characters, they become white then mulatto then black as you cycle through the line-up. In the 80's, that was progressive. Now, it's way creepy.

2) The answers are unbelievably out-dated. Did you know West Germany is the world's third largest auto maker?

3) With a scant 3 buttons and no keyboard, you have to seek out each letter in the alphabet grid to spell out answers. It's no big deal when the answer is, say, "Yale," but you can hurt your hand trying to spell out "electromagnetism" in under 40 seconds.

I would recommend several of the computer Jeopardys out there, that can grow with time, don't have as offensive contestant characters, and you can use a damned keyboard.