Gamingwise, Link's Awakening was the best of 1993, and I did play Doom quite a bit. In the arcades I was big into Mortal Kombat II.
Library Additions, 1993
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 On 06/16/2020 at 05:49 PM by KnightDriver See More From This User » |
Oh, '93. What was I doing then? I believe I was finishing college after dropping out in '90 (I'll always claim I'm class of '90). I was in a school musical that year called A Dream on Royal Street. It was a mash up of Madi Gra and Shakespeare's A Midsummer Night's Dream. I played Francis Flute and had to appear in drag to outrageous laughter. Then I had to sing a song. Ah, days when I was fearless on stage. I was also an understudy to a minor character in Shakespeare's Hamlet that summer. I took a ceramics class and was encouraged to continue. I didn't. I also won an award for a short story I wrote in creative writing class. I was encouraged to publish. I didn't. It seems I ignored all good advice that year. Story of my life. Here's some media I absorbed in '93.
TV:
Late night TV was a thing when I was growing up. First it was begging parents to stay up to watch Saturday Night Live in the 70s. Then it was staying up late in high school to watch David Letterman in the 80s. Well, I stopped watching late night TV for a time and then Conan hit, and I was back on. His youth, smarts and corny humor pulled me in. His band had Max Wienberg, the drummer for Bruce Springsteen, a local favorite (New Jersey actually). I watched on and off throughout the rest of the 90s.
However, I have little interest in rewatching the episodes for Conan, Andy and Max these days. What I like best now are the musical guests. I watched a bunch of them again and was knocked out by the Radiohead performance (https://youtu.be/yel1JYK3FS4). Here's a youtube channel with a lot of others: https://www.youtube.com/playlist?list=PLMb7_AT7MHExttK9vmjAGTZXXrlNNb7qM
FIlm:
I became aware of Wallace & Gromit with this, their second, short film The Wrong Trousers. I love animation, especially stop-motion animation and claymation. I became a fast fan of Aardman Animations and still watch whatever they do to this day.
Games:
This was a tough one because of NBA Jam and PGA Tour Golf II, both of which my friend Mark and I played a lot that year. But Doom was a landmark event. We linked up our Pentinum 75s, and we played our first multiplayer LAN matches. Oh man, that was fun.
Doom is still cranking on all cylindars to this day. I was luke warm on Doom III but everything else has been stellar. As a testament to this series staying power, I have Doom, Doom II, Doom 64 and Doom III all installed on my Xbox One. I've played Doom 2016, but I still need to play Doom Eternal. Only money is the reason.
Music:
It had to be Tool's debut, Undertow. I got into these guys later through their trippy videos but quickly became a fan of the music too. Dark, moody, angry, creepy, subversive. I really like the way they create atmosphere. I've been listening to how long they keep a particular musical idea before altering it. What determines the length of time to play something? What are the effects? I find listening to them makes me think about stuff like that.
Books:
This book's title sounds like it's against video gaming, and even a bit xenophobic, but it's more about the history of Nintendo up until that time and how they managed to corner the video game market. I really struggled to find a book from '93 I'd read or really wanted to read, but this seemed required reading for a video game fan. I'm going to check it out and learn something about Nintendo I didn't know.
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