Pokemon: White.

One of my best friends got married back in June and I was honored to be his best man.  I'd never done that before.  It was neat.  Anyway, I guess it's traditional to buy your party gifts.  So my friend decided to buy me Pokemon: White. 

Kind of an unusual choice for a 24 year old man, huh? 

You know what makes it worse?  It was my idea.

It's been a very long time since I've played a Pokemon game.  I think I bought Gold, but by that time, I was sort of over the whole system.  Let's be honest: the mechanics of a Pokemon game have never really changed.  After playing the heck out of the Blue version, I guess I just didn't see the point of playing the same game, but with unfamiliar creatures.

That's completely opposite from why I wanted the latest installment in the series.  In fact, I actually wanted to play this because it was the same, but different.  (I hate being such a typical consumer...)  I wanted to re-experience what I felt as an 11 year old first introducing Pokemon to my friends. 

The more I think about it - because the more I play it, the more I think about it - I realize that it really is just the nostalgia.  I mean, don't get me wrong, the central mechanic of the Pokemon games is fun.  It's like distilling RPGs down to an abundance of options when building out a party.

But that's it.  They're terribly grind-heavy.  The story is awful.  (Especially in White.  It's truly, terribly awful.)  The music is repetitive and, outside of maybe the classic battle theme and gym theme, is utterly uninspiring.  The characters are... non existent.  So what brings me back?

Ultimately, at my core, I'm an explorer.  In the original games, the thing that kept me playing was, "I wonder what pokemon are in the next area?  I wonder when my party will evolve?  I wonder what the next gym leader will be like?"  It's the desire to figure out what's next that kept me playing.  As a matter of fact, when I beat the Elite Four (or whatever they were called), I pretty much stopped playing.  I had discovered everything I was going to discover and had no desire to "catch em all," despite the log line.

And now, as I'm playing a new Pokemon game, I find that the same thing pulls me forward.  A childlike desire to see what's next.  To be a part of discovering how things work.  I've anxiously trained up my Roggenrola into a Boldore (suspiciously like my Blue-version rocky friends, Geodude and Graveller...) just to see what comes next.  It was a delight when, all of a sudden, my Tepig evolved into a Pignite.  I have no idea what the next city on my journey is called, but I'm sure it will be filled with cheesy character lessons and, most importantly, new pokemon to discover and figure out.

Pokemon: White really is the same, just different.  Same formula.  Same battles (mostly).  Same gameplay.  And that's what I love about it. 

The last death-knell of childhood.

Kind of a dramatic title, eh?

I saw Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows Part 2 tonight.  (In the cheap seats, on film, and not in 3D, I might add.)  Toward the magnificently climactic ending, it struck me just how much of my adolescence was spent with that series.

I remember the first time I saw a Harry Potter book.  I had just turned twelve.  We had just moved to Ann Arbor, Michigan from Hackettstown, New Jersey.  We were in the Borders downtown (the one that just closed...) and I saw "Harry Potter and the Sorcerer's Stone."

Now, I'm a big nerd.  It was worse when I was a kid.  Anything with wizards or sorcerers or spells or anything had to be awesome, so I asked for it for Christmas.  From the opening page, I was hooked.  I identified with the feeling of being an outsider.  I, like Harry, longed to be special, to be different.  Like so many young nerds, I was just waiting for the day that my X-gene became active or some blue aliens from a distant planet made me an intergalactic cop.  A half-giant riding a motorcycle telling me I was a wizard sounded just as good. 

I quickly read all three of the books of the time, struggling with how to pronounce Hermione, hating Draco Malfoy, and getting inspired by the themes of courage, self-sacrifice, and dependence on a close circle of friends.  As I grew up, so too, did Harry Potter.  The decidedly darker turn of Order of the Phoenix resonated with my deeper adolescent desire to struggle against something oppressive and evil.  The higher stakes only increased the emotional engagement that I had with the characters.

I'm not ashamed to admit that I spent most of the last third of Deathly Hallows with a lump in my throat.  I had spent almost ten years with these characters.  And now, as the last Harry Potter movie has been released, it's been twelve years.  So, in many ways, watching those last credits roll to the top of the screen was like watching the last bit of my adolescence and childhood go away.  Sure, there will always be a new Zelda release to bring me back.  I'll stay involved in youth ministry and always have ridiculous fun with middle school boys.  But Harry Potter will remain a mainstay of my memories of growing up.