STACK #180 Oct 2019

GAMES FEATURE

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The PlayStation One was the main era that cemented me as a gamer

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STACK ROVING REPORTER

here, but I’m just going to have to go with Final Fantasy VII, cliché

“The PlayStation One was the main era that cemented

best sellers at

me as a gamer. Those 3D graphics blew me away at the time – go back and look at the old Ridge Racer though, it’s hard to look at. But it was revolutionary at the time.” Nowadays he’s switched teams, favouring team Xbox. “I’m definitely more of an Xbox gamer, it’s my home console that I go to most. I do have everything though – you’ve got to have everything!” Still, his all-time favourite is a PlayStation classic. “You’re putting me on the spot

that it is.” Hey, some things are

clichés for a reason! Spencer’s most prized collectible started life on another console though, SEGA’s magnificent Dreamcast. “A prized possession of mine is my limited edition, premium Shenmue Ryo Hazuki statue from First 4 Figures. It looks beautiful on my shelf.” Currently, Spencer is hitting Gears 5 , although he’s also hit a bit of a snag. “I’ve mainly been playing the arcade multiplayer mode. But my co-op buddy sliced his finger open doing the dishes, so I have to wait for him to recover!” While Cyberpunk 2077 is getting “a lot of buzz” in West Lakes, the one Spencer’s waiting for most is Ori and the Will of the Wisps . So, he’s big on platformers then? “I’m a bit of everything really, like RPG, platformers, shooters – kind of a jack of all trades pretty much. But I definitely love my platformers.”

Date ending: 29/09/19

SHOP TALK

1 borderlands 3 (PS4/xbo/pc) 2 nba 2K20 (PS4/xbo/switch) 3 fifa 20 (PS4/xbo/SWITCH) 4 The legend of zelda: Link’s Awakening (switch) 5 spyro trilogy reignited (switch) 6 gears 5 (xbo) 7 control (PS4/xbo) 8 MARIO KART 8 DELUXE (SWITCH) 9 Marvel’s spider-man (PS4) 10 The legend of zelda: breath of the wild (SWITCH) Mega Drive just 11 months later – who can forget being forced to think of the band Genesis every time they entered the blood code ABACABB? Games Released In October Forgger (1981) Mortal Kombat (1992) Grand Theft Auto (1997) Manhunt (2003) The Witcher (2007) Assassin’s Creed III (2012)

W hen you’re shopping for games, it’s good to know that you’re dealing with somebody who’s into them too. Spencer Bodzioch, the games coordinator at JB Hi-Fi West Lakes, certainly fits the bill. When we asked him whether he’d consider himself a gamer, he was enthusiastic. “Oh absolutely, yeah! Otherwise I probably would have moved to another department by now. Having a massive interest and passion for games is what’s kept me in the games coordinator role for so long.” He’s been working for JB for more than ten years now, starting as a games advisor, but soon graduating to the coordinator role. “I’ve been a games coordinator for nine years – where does the time go?!” So, what sparked Spencer’s passion for gaming? 1988: The greatest action flick ever, Die Hard , was unleashed, and the world discovered the Stock, Aitken andWaterman- powered joys of Never Gonna Give You Up before Rick- rolling was ever a thing. Some Australians celebrated 200 years of English settlement, while the Iran/Iraq war finally ended – some 1.5 million casualties later. Meanwhile, in Japan, a black box of goodness was unleashed in October – the now legendary SEGA Mega Drive (or “Genesis” in the USA). Offering everything from what were then considered near-as-dammit arcade conversions to deep RPG adventuring for those with less OCTOBER

Spencer Bodzioch, your link to JB Hi-FiWest Lakes, SA

A little slice of gaming history…

however, that two key Mega Drive titles arrived,

in the whacked-out forms of funky aliens Toe Jam & Earl , and with the wholly different type of whacked that brawler Streets of Rage entailed. While it ruled the Mega Drive fighting game roost, October 1992 saw a wholly new style of brawler hit the arcades. Featuring digitised versions of real fighters, it offered a level of realism – and gore – never before experienced. While parents the world over went full Helen Lovejoy, gamers let Mortal Kombat machines swallow more coins than they’d probably care to recall, but it was all in the name of “fatality”… Luckily, MK hit

twitchy fingers, we’d have to wait an interminably-long 23 months for it to hit our shores. By this time, its original launch game, a conversion of the curiously titled Altered Beast , was old hat, but we had the advantage of a much greater library of games at launch. These included Ghouls ‘n Ghosts , Super Hang-On , blocky puzzler Columns, and vertical shmup time-suck Truxton . It was a year after its Australian launch,

3.04 milion units of Call of Duty 4: Modern Warfare in the last three months of 2007

1.1 billion in revenue generated from Call of Duty games in 2018

18 years since the first Ghost Recon title released

106 Nintendo titles that Charles Martinet has voiced

256 colours used in Wolfenstein 3D

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OCTOBER 2019

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