Back in the days, Nintendo made sports games. During the 16-bit days, Ken Griffey Jr was to them what Joe Montana was the Sega, that is an athlete that was perfectly marketable for a video game. Ken Griffey Jr’s Winning Run, named after the final play of Game 5 of the 1995 American League Wild Card playoffs (where Griffey scored from first base to win the game in the 11th inning), is the sequel to 1994’s Kenny Griffey jr presents Major League Baseball. Developed by Rare, it has received a major graphical overhaul. It was one of the first sports games to feature computer rendered graphics, similar to Donkey Kong Country and Killer Instinct. As a result, it was one of the finest looking sports games of its day. The stadiums looked so awesome, and the players were well animated. The game features 28 MLB teams (including the unlockable Arizona Diamondbacks and Tampa Bay Devil Rays, who had just been named around the time of this game’s development), but as there is no player’s association license, the only real player in the game is Ken Griffey, although many of the players have pun names that allude to real-life players, Fire Pro Wrestling style. You can play in exhibition mode, franchise, MLB Challenge Mode, and All Star Mode. It’s probably not likely that this game will be available on virtual console, so your best chance is to seek out the cartridge. If you can find it, definitely get it, as Winning Run is one of the best sports games of the 16-bit era.

Video Games are murder simulators. This was declared by recently disbarred attorney Jack Thompson. He then came up with a proposal that could be considered no less than genius: create a game in which the player plays as the vengeful father of a kid who was killed by another kid who played video games. The father then goes on a rampage, killing the head of the software company who created the game, then expanding his rampage to killing as many of the people involved in the games industry as possible. If such a game was made, Mr, Thompson promised that he would donate $10,000 to the charity of the choice of Paul Eibeler, the head of Take-Two Interactive. A group of programmers (consisting of 3 alcoholics and a foreign exchange student) dubbed themselves “Thompsonsoft” and created I’m O.K, a tongue-in-cheek ‘murder simulator’. However,Thompson went back on his word to make a donation claiming that his proposal was a joke, and web comic artists Penny Arcade made the donation themselves. Although it’s not a game so much as political satire, I’m O.K is fun in its own right. Taking inspiration from the 8 and 16 bit days of gaming, I’m O.K is a 2D action platformer. Taking control of Osaki Kim, the father of a kid who was killed by a gamer, you take your revenge on the game industry using several weapons. Starting off by killing the head of fictional gaming company “Take-This”, he then takes his revenge on the entire gaming industry, from the lawyers at “Blank Stare” to an arcade, O.K makes his move to E3 2006, where the heads of the gaming industry will gather. In between levels, you take part in a gallery shooting bonus stage where you go into retail shops killing gamers and earning more money to buy more weapons. The game is gory and hilarious, and it is available for download over at http://www.imok.gzwn.net/.