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Monday, Sept. 15, 2003 - 1:41 p.m.

Nintendo thumb

It's like I'm back in elementary school. I feel like a bit of a kid again.

Then I remember that I'm 27 and I'm playing video games. I'm about 13 years removed from my regular video game playing days. OK, at least 10.

But I have "Nintendo thumb," or whatever you want to call it. My left thumb is sore from all the joystick maneuvering that went on this weekend. Honestly, it wasn't that much. I played on and off Saturday and Sunday, but never more than an hour or so at a time. But with these newfangled controllers, there's so much more to do.

OK, backtrack: I finally buckled and, armed with Mom's Target gift certificate which served to defray some of the cost, purchased an Xbox video game system and NCAA Football 2004 on Saturday morning. Since she was in Jersey City, Casey and I had continued to find pleasure in the old-school Nintendo and games like Dr. Mario and Tetris. But when it got tougher and tougher to get the games to work -- and when a backup game system was also a problem -- it became clear that the days of Super Mario Bros. were over.

I've been eyeing one of these suped-up systems since December, when I played with a friend's, but I knew I wouldn't get much use out of it in the summertime. I'm sure I'll still play it sparingly as long as there's nice fall weather and college games to watch. And I'll get little weekday use out of it, except when I manage an hour in the morning before work or late at night after Casey's gone to bed and all the shows are over. With the fall season beginning, I can't be missing TV to play football video games.

But this Xbox is something. I'm not used to the idea of a computer software company building a video game system, so the fact that I not only bought a video game system but also a DVD player and stereo is somewhat shocking. The instruction manual even described how I can put a CD into the console and upload the songs; I can then play the songs back without the CD in there. So, in other words, I can make my own mix soundtrack to play along with my video games. Or, as Casey and I both said, I can just put a CD in the stereo, which is in the same room.

And the controller is something to get used to. Good ol' Nintendo had the standard directional pad on the left, the Select and Start buttons in the middle, and the red B and A buttons on the right for game play. The Xbox controller, however, is bigger and heftier. Where you might have held the Nintendo controllers with four fingers underneath and just the two thumbs to use the controls, with these units you use your thumbs and forefingers, which have two buttons of their own tucked into the contours of the underside. Not only is there the left control pad, but also two mini joystick with notches at, basically, "north," "east," "south" and "west," which account for my sore thumb. The left joystick serves the same purpose as the familiar control pad, but the right joystick adds even more options. And then there are the buttons -- A, B, Y, X going counter-clockwise starting at 6 o'clock. Oh, and there's black and white buttons near the lettered ones that add still more options.

So let's review: four lettered buttons, two colored, two joysticks and a control pad, and two finger triggers on the underside. That's 10 different inputs, all without accounting for any combinations of two or more.

And while it's somewhat refreshing to not be able to dominate the game from the get-go, I'm finding myself a bit frustrated at my inability to succeed with any regularity. I guess I'm spoiled from 125-0 seasons in Baseball Stars and 18-1 championship campaigns in Tecmo Super Bowl.

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