I’ve spent a good part of today thinking about what must be my first music/art software package. Mario Paint came out in 1992 for the Super Nintendo at a time when all manner of strange hardware accessories were being developed for the system such as bazookas! Mario Paint was bundled in a huge box with a mouse and mouse mat (I think the mat was the part that did the motion detection!) which, on a Woolworths shelf, looked like amazing value for money.
For an 8 bit cartridge system it packed in masses of features including an illustration application. I was reminded by the Wikipedia entry about its ability to string a series of stills together into an animation in which the only way to play them back was on the SNES through your TV set, BUT…. the manual actually showed you how to record these animations onto VHS so you can play your 3 second pixelated stick men and to your mates when they come around and they can laugh at what actually took 14 hours to make (the story of my life, actually). A Mr Brian Millband has a whole blog full of his animations.
Of course all animations could be brought to life with music composed in the Mario Paint Composer. Although you are limited to crotchets, a completely arbitrary tempo slider and a choice of 3/4 and 4/4 time signatures, youtube is littered with hundreds of people who have managed to score hits like Take On Me, Sweet Child O Mine and my personal favourites In Da Club by 50 Cent and Chun-Li’s stage music in Street Fighter II. The sound palette has some wonderful sounds from traditional horns and drums to a Yoshi squeal and a baby sound which I failed to notice at the time, but when pitched down to its lowest note sounds slightly orgasm-esque!? This section of the package is now available for free download here on PC and Mac which means my week is now ruined!
Finally, after a hard day of being creative, it was time to play the built in coffee break game called Gnat Attack! I challenge someone to tell me a more frustrating yet utterly addictive game. Imagine a cross between the button smashing at 10000 mph of Track and Field meets Operation, the board game in which you had to pull crap out of some geezer’s body with with a pair of tweezers. Just watching this video bought back the same sick feeling I used to get back then after a 3 hour Gnat Attack session. GRRR!!!… bluurgh!
Anyway, Mario bloody Paint. A strange idea for a game but a sign of things to come I guess. Very nice memories nonetheless.
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