realityinmind
They basically discredited themselves 1:20 into the TRAILER. Who do they want to watch this thing? I assume they want newbies to watch this thing. They could have made it at least a little bit interesting by discussing some history regarding some of the hard-to-find titles. And above all they should NOT have ever interviewed Billy Mitchell (King of Kong) and Todd Rogers (Dragster fiasco) --- what were they thinking??? Anyone who knows anything about video game world records knows that Billy Mitchell is a prolific cheater. And why in God's name is Todd Rogers in the last 15 seconds of the trailer talking about all the video game world records he cheated to obtain?? This is shameful. The makers of this documentary are clearly out of touch with anything NES past their own love of playing video games and collecting titles. The only people that will be interested in this documentary are video game newbies that haven't been watching YouTube for the past 10 years. Everything and anything you would want to watch and learn about in this documentary is available on YouTube without the pretentiousness and without having to stomach listening to the makers suck up to famous video game world record CHEATERS in the hopes of giving their documentary some form of legitimacy. They actually did more harm than good for themselves with this one.Seriously... Todd Rogers? This is ridiculous.
Mr-Fusion
"Nintendo Quest" had promise, but the execution is way off. The idea itself is cool: you've got 30 days to hunt down every last official NES title in existence (no online purchases). That means road trip, and already we're talking great movie, right? Game over, man.It's not that this is a bad movie, but it suffers from reality TV production methods and it doesn't give us all of the relevant information. We never know the budget for this quest or how the majority of these games cost. And the negotiating scenes are painfully drawn out. Why spend screen time listening to an awful speakerphone or listening to someone read aloud text messages when this could be better conveyed through a graphic? When all else fails, let the director insert himself into the thing and scream plot information.The odd thing of it is that it actually becomes a downer after awhile. Jay spends his time in one store after another, getting depressed over the price-gouging and cynicism that collecting can engender.There's good to be had, but it's primarily in the opening; an examination of the console's enduring longevity and appeal. That sequence gets into the gamer in all of us. If only the rest of it weren't so morose.4/10
nintendobulldog
At the start of the film you meet Jay and his best friend. Jay has loved Nintendo since a child and wants to travel across North America in hopes to collect all Nintendo cartridges produced for the system. The film has Jay's best friend as a narrator, explaining the quest and a little history of Nintendo and games (best part of film). The rest of the film follows jay slumping about retail stores, collectors and rummage sales trying to find and complete the collection. At no point in the movie does Jay seem happy about this quest or that he is enjoying himself. He picks up game after game with a little number tally of the games acumulated in the corner of the screen. He does not give any feedback what games are his favourite, why he has this passion or show any emotion when he does get a rare or good game. Half way threw the film the subject switches to Jay's fathers passing. He tells the audience how he is happy he is dead, and how he was a tyrant. The only explanation given for his father being such a awful individual was that he did not like Video games? It was really hard not to turn the film off after this point!After researching this film I found out it was a Kickstarter project which was donated around $40,000. Essentially people donated this money so a little spoiled brat could have a complete Nintendo collection and received a subpar movie with no passion or substance
koryco
*CONTAINS SPOILERS*To be brief, this documentary really tries to crack itself up to be some great adventure but in reality it's just a spoiled brat with a lot of money going "around the country" having uncomfortable encounters, pressuring retailers into giving him deals, complaining when they won't, and finally (and completely inappropriately) talking about hating his dad and being happy he died... REALLY. In the middle of the movie, for no obviously good reason, he talks about how he hates his dad, and then explains how happy he was when he died. It made me feel really uncomfortable watching. like, way more uncomfortable than I was prepared for in a documentary about NES games.That aside, he starts the show by saying he is going to attempt to get every retail NES game release in person without the use of the internet within 30-days. Well, spoiler, he doesn't. He gets close, but after the last day was up he just went ahead and bought them on ebay. Talk about an anti-climactic ending. The fans would have probably appreciated the film more if he'd extended the time frame to just go out and find them somewhere. Further, and this may be nitpicking too much, but he does say he's not going to used the internet in "any way," yet the whole time he's price matching shops against ebay.This movie also takes itself way to seriously, coming off extremely pretentious. Game collecting should be fun. Games are designed for the sole purpose of having fun (although this has changed in the modern era). Not once did I ever think that Jay was having fun. He treated every deal like he was negotiating with terrorists, he griped about a lot of prices, the movie just gets depressing at parts. This makes them seem like they're trying to accomplish something super important. Sorry folks, you're not landing on the moon, you're buying video games. Game collectors can be passionate, myself included, but if you're not enjoying yourself then why waste your time? why waste our time for that matter?My last gripe with this movie is that he encourages a kind of behavior that gives local businesses trouble. He wants to match everything with online prices, and he feels entitled to discounts because he's buying in bulk. As a former small business employee, I can not begin to tell you how annoying people like him are. Just because they're not walmart or best buy does not at all mean that you're entitled to thousands of discounts, the retailers have sticker prices for a reason, and most of the time those sticker prices are well researched to give the customer the best value. Small businesses have to offer low prices to stay competitive. And you really can't expect every price to be better than ebay. Ebay sellers aren't paying for employees, rent, electricity, etc. It costs money to run a business! I digress. However, Jay exhibits this kind of behavior a lot during the film, and it rubs me the wrong way. Looking for a diamond in the rough? They do go to some really neat local shops and display some very impressive personal collections. Plus, for those of us who don't particularly care to collect NES games, the movie does a really good job relaying the current state of the NES collectors game. You'll know what games are sought after, you get some history behind the really hard to find ones, and you'll feel like getting your own full NES set is not entirely impossible. That much, I think they did well on. However, pile all the other pointless, boring, and pretentious baggage on top of it and I hardly think anything about the movie can be seen as redemptive.
