souvenirs — Image: John Szczepaniak
After the success of my academic talk in Birmingham in May, Dr Victor Navarro Remesal invited me to give a guest lecture to his students at the TecnoCampus University in Mataró, Spain. The state of current games education threw up some surprising revelations, while nearby Barcelona offered curiosities for retro enthusiasts. Join me on a Quixotic quest to discover Iberian history.
The talk itself was on Tracing Forgotten Family Lineages Through Oral Histories. In other words, while it's fun to speculate on a connection between Aztec and Metroid, in the pursuit of reliable history we need developer interviews to confirm or deny such observations. So the creator of Alex Kidd revealing it was meant to be Dragon Ball, and the programmer of Star Wars admitting they copied Alex Kidd. Meaning in a strange way, Akira Toriyama actually influenced the Star Wars portfolio.
By working with interviews it allows us to understand context. History is usually presented as a linear dated list of events - which is correct, we need to know the order of things. But interviews with developers will reveal a complex web of influences beyond simple chronology. If any one image summarises the lecture, it's The Tower of Druaga slide. Statements from Shigeru Miyamoto, Hideo Kojima, and Yui Tanimura of From Software, all describe how their work contains the DNA of Masanobu Endou's 1984 arcade title.
There was a lot to cover, taking 72 minutes and using 81 slides. It was an intense info blast fuelled by enough adrenaline to kill a small horse. One attending professor said that usually a lecture might cover one or two topics, whereas mine felt like it covered 300 topics worthy of further investigation.
Afterwards was a Q&A with some insightful questions. This isn't part of the video, which is perhaps good - my answer to yakuza involvement admits that everyone I've spoken with asks for comments and names to be redacted, and... I maybe let slip an interviewee's identity.
Several aspects of the talk were on legal precedents, such as with Data East's Fighter's History and Sega's camera patent. Students then described their fears over Nintendo's excessive litigation, given they will literally sue you for anything these days. This cannot be overemphasised: the young, passionate, hopeful creators of tomorrow are afraid to explore their artistic urges in case Nintendo attacks them. Creativity is being stifled. One student asked: if she made a game with similarities to Tomodachi Life, would that result in lawsuits? I am not a lawyer, but I advised her to read up on historical precedents as a means of defence. Prior examples being The Sims and before that Little Computer People. We must not allow Nintendo to force our children to bend the knee to their insanity. If these two examples seem obvious, keep in mind the students were born around 2006, the same year I became staff writer on Retro Gamer magazine.
Outside the lecture room was the opportunity to explore the university and converse with likeminded academics who had a logical and open-minded grasp on things. It was reassuring knowing the students were in such good hands. At least at TecnoCampus - games history in academia is not standardised and, globally speaking, some campuses adopt questionable methodologies.
I was shown one of the games laboratories, with four TVs along the wall. One plan was to take various retro mini-consoles from each era and hook them up simultaneously so students could experience each generational leap in a sitting. Dr Navarro also expressed a desire to acquire a PVM CRT for legacy hardware, to showcase what old graphics were capable of. Naturally we discussed the recent PlayStation anniversary.
He explained the challenges of conveying to 18-year-olds the zeitgeist of the times. When they were born in 2006 the entire 32-bit era was already fully formed. Without guidance young people tend to think of generations as separate bubbles. To understand creativity it's important to realise that when the PlayStation launched in December 1994, the 16-bit generation was only just reaching its zenith for visual and gameplay sophistication; meanwhile 3D was experiencing a painful birth with developers unsure even how to control it. In fact 1994 is especially interesting, being a focal point for so much. The release of the 32-bit PlayStation in Japan coincided with the last 8-bit American NES game, Wario's Woods.
Facilitating the need for knowledge is TecnoCampus' library, with an entire multi-shelf case dedicated to game books (there's also a section of board games). Publications were in Spanish and English (I was informed students were trilingual, also speaking Catalonian), and were a mix of retail and academic press. It's worth noting the unfortunate dichotomy between these two markets, since academic press books tend to be much higher priced and with limited distribution, even if they're likely to be of mainstream interest. The recently released Intellivision book by MIT Press for example contains over 150 interviews, but is $60 and ignored by the mainstream. Several discussions with Dr Navarro were on how this divide can be bridged, so that all this knowledge can be more easily accessed by those outside academia.
He also shared a required reading list for the students, including such papers as:
- From Chess to StarCraft: A Comparative Analysis of Traditional Games and Video Games
- The Agony and the Exidy: A History of Video Game Violence and the Legacy of Death Race
- The Foundation of Geemu: A Brief History of Early Japanese video games
- Inspecting Video Game Historiography Through Critical Lens: Etymology of the First-Person Shooter Genre
- Girly Game History on Paper The Casio Loopy, a Video Game Console for Women
- Reverse Engineering North Korea's Gaming Economy: Intellectual Property, Microtransactions, and Censorship
- Rumble/Control Toward a Critical History of Touch Feedback in Video Games
- Copied, Used, and Modified The Heterodox Circulations of Arcade Video Games through the Cheonggyecheon Electronics Market in 1990s Seoul
- “Emergent countries play, too!” The Zeebo console as a (partial) decolonial project
- Unexceptional Consoles
In addition, there are guest lectures, such as mine, and others including:
- Emmanoel Ferreira - Attack of the Clones: Cloning, Piracy and Transgression in Early Games in Brazil
- Bruno de Paula - (A bit of) History of Games in Brazil - Tectoy and Zeebo
- Akinori Nakamura & Hanna Wirman - The past and present of games in China & Women in eSports in HK
So while "studying games" might have a whimsical image to it, the students have a lot to take in and digest. The professors themselves are also constantly working, producing fresh research and papers. During my visit Dr Navarro and his colleague Dr Beatriz Pérez-Zapata were rushing to meet a deadline for a joint paper - the topic is likely to interest readers, though since it's being blind peer reviewed, the details can't be disclosed yet. One week to write 8000 words? Easy, said I! They both then lamented that academic writing requires certain rigid formalities which makes it more time consuming than an article.
Given that my talk explored how Lewis Carroll's Alice in Wonderland (1865) and Zilpha Keatley Snyder's The Green Sky Trilogy (1975) were adapted into games, I spoke at length with Dr Pérez-Zapata on the topic of literature adaptations. She had done extensive research on the topic, notably adaptations of Spanish literature into games, such as El Cid, Don Quijote, and The Abbey of Crime (for home computers in the 1980s). This culminated in a chapter in a book on European games history. Unfortunately her paper is not available online or in English (yet), but this topic is utterly engrossing because it showcases how amazing games are. Just think about it: linear words on a page being converted into visually engaging, open-ended, free-roaming, player-controlled adventures where you can explore, truly immersing yourself in an interactive experience based on beloved narratives.
Finally Doctors Navarro and Pérez-Zapata described their dream project to collect the oral histories of Spanish developers with the help of their students. Remember, back in the 1980s there was a thriving computer scene in the country. It's still formulating, but the idea is that students might help with the research, perhaps tracking down a local developer from the past, or chronicling their portfolio, with the professors then seeking ethical approval and conducting interviews. It's an urgent quest as our window to speak with these creators is vanishing - anyone who was 25 years old in 1984 is now 65. They said my own work had given them the idea - I hope they succeed in their endeavours.
After a tour of Mataró they both gave me a list of activities then put me on a train south.
Exploring Barcelona
A short train ride from Mataró takes one to Barcelona (keep an eye out for Tres Xemeneies, a filming location for the new Blade Runner 2099 series). There are of course the buildings of Gaudi to see, the Gothic Quarter to stroll, and an opportunity to eat more Spanish seafood than is medically advised. But what about games?
If you visit the Arc de Triomf in Barcelona and walk under it, then cross the road, you will be in what's referred to as the Geek Triangle. Around these two blocks are all manner of stores for: manga, anime, comics, retro games, board games, figurines, model kits, Warhammer, snacks, and more! It's actually overwhelming, so if you visit only one place check out Dashu. They had a lot of Japanese retro games at surprisingly nice prices - you could find mint condition boxed Super Famicom games for as little as €20! There were also vinyl records of anime and game soundtracks, and a ton of other things - including an entire shelf dedicated to Lupin.
In the Gothic Quarter, I also discovered the Catalonian cultural tradition of Caganer - or "the pooper". In fact, there are entire stores dedicated to selling only these deviant little figurines, based on every conceivable character you can imagine, from politicians to those of classic videogames. I wonder if Nintendo has seen Mario's thousand-yard stare?
If you want historical museums with a retro game flavour, be sure to visit the Museu Frederic Marès. It mostly has sculptures, but if you head to the uppermost floor you'll find the "Entertainment Hall" which explores games of antiquity. Focusing on 19th and 20th century games, there's multiple examples of how society entertained itself.
There's a huge display of military miniatures for use in wargames, popular among young boys. These toys in conjunction with the very serious Kriegsspiel led to H.G. Wells writing the book Little Wars. A later reprint of which feature a foreword by the legendary Gary Gygax, stating:
Little Wars influenced my development of both the Chainmail miniatures rules and the Dungeons & Dragons fantasy roleplaying game. For example, it established the concept of a burst radius for cannon rounds, an idea that was translated into both the Chainmail catapult missile diameters and the areas of effect for Fireballs in D&D.
Of course D&D led to the RPG genre in video games, so to glimpse these wargame models is to witness the protozoic emergence of everything we know today, including Final Fantasy.
There's also a beautiful collection of immersive layered dioramas, as found in perspective boxes and paper peepshows. Whatever name you ascribe, they're basically something to look at, either directly or through eyepieces, showing an interesting scene. As pointed out by Professor José Zagal recently, this technology is a direct precursor to the Virtual Boy, which attempted to replicate that same layered diorama look. His hour-long talk on the subject is essential viewing if you're curious about the Virtual Boy and its historical precedents.
Furthermore, these layered dioramas are also strongly reminiscent of the parallax scrolling and Mode 7 style graphics found in 2D games. It's impossible to convey in static photos, but as you walk around in front of them the layers move very much as they might in 16-bit console or Super Scaler arcade games. It's uncanny to think that people were exploring the concepts of 3D, forced perspective, and pseudo-depth over a hundred years ago.
I also found a handheld example of Corinthian Bagatelle, which was the precursor to both pinball and pachinko. It's fascinating to consider how this one form of entertainment would evolve in two drastically different directions, in America and Japan, becoming a foundation of each country's respective entertainment industries. Pinball, of course, is a precursor to arcade games, and pachinko is entwined with Japanese culture. Glimpsing it through the glass, surrounded by an eclectic assortment of forgotten curios, there was the feeling of simple ideas proliferating in unpredictable ways. If you're upset by Konami's obsession with pachinko these days, gaze upon the Bagatelle and know that it began here!
Finally was the adjoining automata room, displaying a variety of miniature, mechanised little people. These were simple clockwork novelties for the wealthy over a century ago, and would perform a repeating action, usually alongside music. Which doesn't sound especially games related, until you consider that companies such as Nintendo started first in mechanical toys, before moving onto games.
The human ingenuity of the mechanics in these moving dolls is also the same that evolved into the mechanical games now displayed at the Dagashiya Game Museum - coiled springs, wires and joints, all moving to enthral viewers. Dr Navarro had also described his growing fascination with automata and electro-mechanical parlour games, since these are the primordial origins of arcade games. I would hope that anyone interested in retro games will have a passing curiosity for the antiquated amusements preceding them.
This incredible journey lasted just one week but contained so much. And with that I'd like to sign off for 2024 and wish all our readers a Merry Christmas and Happy New Year. Here's to a better 2025 for all.