Shed a Tear for This Classic Videogame Death Montage

[Tom Goldman]

Shed a Tear for This Classic Videogame Death Montage


Watching an 8-bit sprite's life blink out has never been so emotional.

While playing older games like Asteroids or Ghosts 'n Goblins, have you ever thought that your deaths actually had meaning? There's something about this old-school videogame death montage created by Boing Boing that makes it seem like they do.

The reason is partially the choice of music, which is a chiptune version of "Mad World" by Tears for Fears (though you might know the Gary Jules version from upbeat theme [http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ccWrbGEFgI8] were used, the video would likely have a different feeling.

Additionally, in the context presented here, all we see are deaths. There are no life counters. No restarts. Just pure, old-school, videogame death, and that that's it.

If videogame worlds were real, and the characters got only one life, the princess would be a slave for eternity. The universe would be destroyed by a never-ending flow of asteroids. Demons would be stuck behind those barriers in Gauntlet forever while nothing but another pile of bones littered the ground.

Thank god for extra lives.

Source: Boing Boing [http://www.boingboing.net/2011/03/25/classic-arcade-game-1.html]


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[Reed Spacer]

Should have used yakkety sax.

Or is that cliche?

 

[BENZOOKA]

The video needs more Amiga games.

 

[malestrithe]

Wow, I think I've played all the games on the list.

 

[Soviet Heavy]

The cobra man looked like he was molesting the dude with his rattle.

 

[Thaluikhain]

Started off reasonably well, but couldn't keep it going for more than 30 seconds of game deaths.

 

[Vampire cat]

Should have used yakkety sax.

Or is that cliche?

Rand this video and played yakkety sax in the background instead... Brilliant.

 

[Koeryn]

I'm kind of sad they didn't use anything from Raptor: Call of the Shadows. It had a pretty damned hardcore low health and death animation. Low health, and your jet started smoking and burning, and when you died, it went into a cutscene of your pilot trying to save the plane as it's coming apart around him, and then shows your pilot in the still burning wreckage. It was pretty hardcore. Still beats a lot of the death animations I've seen in a lot of more modern games.

Plus, it was a badass game all the way around. Great music.

Spoiler: 7 minutes of gameplay, death + game over at the end

 

[Bloodstain]

Should have used yakkety sax.

Or is that cliche?

I tried it, and it's awesome. Thank you.

 

[Jaker the Baker]

I'm kind of sad they didn't use anything from Raptor: Call of the Shadows. It had a pretty damned hardcore low health and death animation. Low health, and your jet started smoking and burning, and when you died, it went into a cutscene of your pilot trying to save the plane as it's coming apart around him, and then shows your pilot in the still burning wreckage. It was pretty hardcore. Still beats a lot of the death animations I've seen in a lot of more modern games.

Plus, it was a badass game all the way around. Great music.

Honestly, that wasn't nearly as intense as you made it sound XD
He wasn't trying to "save the plane". He just sat there haha

Agreed about the music though

 

[LiquidGrape]

Should have used yakkety sax.

Or is that cliche?

Would've been less clichéd than using Mad World.

Now, it's a perfectly nice song. But I don't ever want to hear it again.
Ever.

 

[Jaebird]

Thank god for extra lives.

With the advent of regenerating health in games, even that is dying out.

 

[Tsaba]

so many good memories and so many nights of raging when running out of lives.

 

[The Apothecarry]

Nostalgia just kicked in...WHERE DID I LEAVE DOOM?

 

[Eleima]

Thought it was a very nice montage, loved the tune they used. Of course, it helps that a lot of those games are familiar, and those deaths really evoke a sense of déjà vu...

 

[The_root_of_all_evil]

Jeux sans frontieres

Adolf builds a bonfire and Enrico plays with it.

Mesmerising, I think I've played (and can name) 90% of those games.

Of course, you can make it even better this way: [http://tubedubber.com/#gJ6APKIjFQY:Ie_R1H9L4eI:0:100:0:0:true]

 

[Waif]

Pretty good video, though I wonder if the entire point of it wasn't "games without frontiers". There are three parts at the end which I wonder whether or not is the crux of the whole video. That being said, I also wonder if there is actually a video game of Jeux Sans Frontieres. It's a pretty mellow song I think, pretty good for being so old, lol!