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| Review by Clay N Ferno |
There were 678 Nintendo games releases for the Nintendo Entertainment System in North America.
This is the story of lifelong friends issuing a challenge to one another to collect them all in 30 days.
Jay Bartlett is a super-fan of Nintendo and Star Wars, already has most of these games but must start from scratch using his own money and no online purchases in a race against the clock.
Nintendo Quest is the documentation of that journey and the hero’s challenges along the way as real life and anxiety set in as stumbling blocks toward achieving the goal.
Jay Bartlett and friend Rob McCallum (writer/director) have been friends for 30 years.
To channel the thrill of the hunt and also to showcase some great Nintendo trivia and history, Rick started a Kickstarter under the name NES Club. Nintendo Quest is the successful product of a crowdfunded movie, at the very least. They incorporate some great original 8-bit graphics for titles as well as an 8-bit soundtrack to set the mood.
There is a short history segment about the history of Nintendo in the United States as well as interviews with championship Nintendo world record holders, musicians and other well known (to the NES community) collectors. Two digital meters run in the movie showing the progress of his hunt as well as the resources (money available) as an energy bar as Nintendo Quest progresses from Level 1 to Final Boss.
The challenge to our Star Wars and Foo Fighters-loving Jay Bartlett was to collect all 678 of the official retail-licensed NES games to completion including rare and hard to find games in just under 30 days.
A countdown of the top 20 most rare games are ticked off as we go, leaving the more common games to luck of the draw and first access. Completion is key, and no online purchases can be made.
Sidebar – to those that contributed to the Kickstarter campaign, the money wasn’t used to buy the games, that was only used for production of the film. Jay used all of his own money.
I did enjoy this movie at face value. As someone that grew up playing NES and testing new games by renting them at the local video store (kids, look that one up!) I had no idea there were over 670 games to try! Sure, some of them stunk, but wow, that’s a lot of games. One wonders if Jay played each game eventually or if he challenges himself to play some of the worst out there on occasion.
The friendship between Jay, Rob and their other road trip mates and camaraderie is cute and reminds me of the relationships I have with my friends to this day — I immediately identified with the team. Substitute comic books for video games and it would be like looking into a support system mirror for me.
First, some small critiques about the overall vibe of the documentary. The first time filmmakers’ take on the Morgan Spurlock challenge is fun but doesn’t have as much going on besides that.
Perhaps this should have been cut to an hour. While adhering to the actual guidelines of the film (no online purchases, using Jay’s own money) the first ‘scores’ were from friends of his in his hometown, racking up nearly 50 games in his own neighborhood for cheap! I’m not saying it’s cheating but it didn’t make for great storytelling.
Later in the movie there are trips to gaming stores and flea markets in the US (the filmmakers are from Canada). We see Jay haggle for the first time as he negotiates bulk purchases with notorious flea market table vendors. Since it is quantity he is after, spending too much on one game works against his budget. Most negotiations happen off screen but more ‘common’ games seem to go for $ .50—$1.50. His ultimate gets…Stadium Events and Little Samson can easily go for hundreds or thousands of dollars!
Stadium Events — a rare Power Pad (think Dance Dance Revolution) game sells Mint in Box for $77,000 in some cases and there may only be 10 cartridges on the market. Some negotiations with a vendor in Florida leaves Jay with a bad taste in his mouth for the amount he is willing to spend and this drama successfully carries itself out to whether Jay can achieve his goal by the end of the movie.
The more interesting interviews in Nintendo Quest are with video game maestros Patrick Scott Patterson (G4, Guinness World Record Holder) as well as Tommy Tallarico (Video Games Live) about the history of Nintendo and also the 8-Bit music created by the limitations of the technology.
Marc Ericksen, the artist responsible for a lot of video game box art gives us the origin of the Mega Man 2 art and the impact his art has on fans today.
In all, this was a fun look back at the Nintendo games of yesteryear and the passion that fans have for the classic system still to this day. We learn a ton about the personal life of Jay, who seems an interesting and passionate fan with some anxiety problems that maybe were helped out by forcing him to come out of his Koopa shell and confront the marketplace.
Now that Nintendo Quest is over, I’d love to see what the makers of the movie and Jay can come up with as another challenge, since we all have similar interests, I would watch another movie from the team.
