DVD Review: Classic Game Room: "The Rise And Fall Of The Internet's Greatest Video Game Review Show"



Before there was YouTube, there was Classic Game Room.

Nowadays, the Internet is clogged with off-beat, low-budget videos the pontificate on every topic known to man. But in the latter part of the 20th century, video on the Internet was a rarer animal. Classic Game Room: The Rise and Fall of the Internet's Greatest Video Game Review Show, is a tongue-in-cheek documentary that revisits this not so long ago era, chronicling the story of one early web video series that met its unfortunate end when the dot com bubble burst.

Early on in the documentary, narrator Mark Bussler describes The Game Room, the videogame review show he co-hosted with film school buddy David Crosson, as "two nerds making fools of ourselves online." And it's an apt description. The two 23-year-olds are more concerned with creating parodies and poking fun at the gameplay, graphics, and even concepts behind the games rather than giving them a GamePro-style analysis. One needs only to look at their review of X-Men: The Videogame, in which Bussler and Crosson become their alter-egos, "The Lush" and "Pottymouth" and team up to attack the evil Magneto. Crosson curses like a sailor until his enemy submits. Bussler's superpower? The ability to throw empty beer bottles at people. At least until he runs out of bottles.

The doc takes us through some of the duo's most notable shows. A review of Duck Hunt becomes a look at Nintendo's "unreleased version," called "People Hunt." A review of "Alien" for Atari turns into a Real World parody. While some of their reviews can skew towards the blue end of the comedy spectrum-- a review of the Sega Dreamcast game, "Seaman," leads to the predictable bodily fluid double entendres-- Bussler and Crosson's odd sense of humor makes them endearing characters. You're watching two kids having fun.

Additional commentary by Bussler (Crosson is mysteriously absent) does its best to put the show in context and describe what happened behind the scenes. Interspersed throughout, and overused, is some strange, seemingly random stock footage (including an unfortunately-timed video of a bridge collapsing).

While a classic video game novice will learn very little about the games these two review, video game aficionados will certainly be able to identify with Bussler and Crosson's misadventures in videogaming.

In October 2000, unable to secure advertisers (Nintendo dropped out after a not-so-positive review of Perfect Dark), the show, along with the Internet site that featured it went under. Bussler went on to become a documentary filmmaker, and one of his first projects was Classic Game Room. Sure, the film makes The Game Room out to be a bigger part of Internet history than it was, but that simply reflects the love its creators had for their creation. Today's YouTubers take note.

"Had we kept going, I think we would have been more popular than Seinfeld," Bussler deadpans in the epilogue.

After a beat, though, he admits, "No, we wouldn't."

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Mets Fan Catches Record Homer

Barry Bonds did it. #756*. And for ten minutes, on his home field in San Francisco, he was celebrated as a hero. I admit, it was emotional to watch him pay tribute to his godfather, Willie Mays, his predecessor Hank Aaron, the fans, his family, and finally, with his surprisingly soft voice cracking and eyes brimming with tears, his late father.

Then of course, we all went back to talking about steroids.

Did steroids account for Barry Bonds' superhuman power surge, at a stage in his career when he should have been DHing for a last place American League club? All signs point to yes. But as CBS's Gregg Doyel points out, baseball's records were meant to be held by people such as Bonds. Pete Rose, a banned-from-baseball gambling addict, holds the seemingly untouchable record for career hits. Ty Cobb, a well-known racist and cripple-beater, holds the seemingly untouchable record for highest career batting average. These are characters beloved by their hometown fans, but held in less esteem by the rest of the baseball world.

They love Barry in San Francisco. And he was lucky to break the record there. There was nothing to ruin his hero moment. Hank Aaron, who many people speculated would snub Bonds, issued a taped statement of congratulations. Mike Bacsik, the pitcher who lobbed Bonds the record-breaking meatball, asked him for a signed bat. Outside the friendly confines of AT&T, baseball fans may have booed, but Bonds couldn't hear them.

But while the criticism of Bonds is more than justified, #756* may have been a great thing for baseball. In a year when we've witnessed Craig Biggio's 3000th hit, A-Rod's 500th homerun, Tom Glavine's 300th win, and Bobby Cox's 132nd ejection, casual baseball fans have never been more aware of baseball's cherished milestones. Bonds's record takes Aaron's untouchable 755 and suddenly makes it a number begging to be beaten. As Aaron himself implied in his recorded statement-- Bonds's feat isn't that he jacked 756 homeruns... it's that with one swing of the bat, he's inspired thousands of baseball players to come try to beat him.

"My hope today, as it was on that April evening in 1974, is that the achievement of this record will inspire others to chase their own dreams." -Hank Aaron

And try they will. The next homerun king, whether it's A-Rod, Albert Pujols, or a bionic Sammy Sosa-bot, is coming. And the baseball world will be looking forward to the day when the homerun record will once again be held by someone who upheld the purity of the game. And when that day comes, the celebration will be that much sweeter. And the cheers with ring throughout the country, not just on the shores of McCovey Cove.

So let's not bash Barry Bonds, let's thank him. Every hero's quest needs a villian to vanquish. Barry's made the pursuit of baseball's holy grail that much more holy. The homerun chase is no longer about beating a number, it's about beating a man. And that's more exciting in my book.

And the baseball that breaks that record will be worth soooo much more.

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P.S. It Wasn't The Steroids... It Was The Mechanical Arm

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