As a collector of video games – as well as a reviewer of them – in my 40’s, I’ve seen a lot of genres come and go, get a new lease of life, get revisited, outmoded, souped-up, etc. and the one genre that burns me to the core most of all, seemingly swept aside by technological issues and the passage of time – is the lightgun genre.
Whether you were introduced to the genre through Duck Hunt on the NES, Point Blank on the PS1, House of the Dead on the Dreamcast, or Silent Scope, LA Machineguns, Time Crisis, or Beastbusters in the arcade, the chances are that you have some pretty strong memories bouncing around your noggin that involve that most shooty-shootiest of gaming genres (I also just remembered the Toejam and Earl Menacer game! What a multi-cart that was!), and they are fading away into the most distant past, as CRT TVs become harder and harder to get.
Quite frankly, unless you are a collector of video games and accessories from a bygone era, the most recent recollections that you’ll have would be of fiddling about with the incredibly tediously thin cable that came with the Nintendo Wii sensor as you tried to get it balanced on top of your TV without knocking it off, yanking the cord out of the delicate sensor, or just strangling yourself to death out of sheer frustration – which often seemed the most practical option.
