Hey, Brett Mandel Made A New Game

Brett Mandel, the Will Wright of tax reform, has released yet another video game. The Philadelphia Forward guy who sends out all those emails previously released a game where you drop tax reform proposals on City Council members’ heads. (Anvils would be better, but I can deal for now.)

Now comes a game where you fight the Philly Tax Monster, which has such memorable quotes as “I hit you with High Taxes” and “Say bye to jobs and neighbors.” Oh, it’s like Final Fantasy VII the dialog is so well-done.

Philly Tax Monster

‘Punch-Out!’ Has An Apocrypha

Now that I’ve realized that it’s the drugs, stupid, I’ve decided to pander to the base a bit. And what’s funnier to stoners than unintentionally hilarious Wikipedia articles? Well, unintentionally hilarious Wikipedia articles about Punch-Out!!.

Here’s what I learned:

• “The Electronic Arts game, Fight Night: Round 2 for the Nintendo GameCube identifies this character as ‘Little Mac’, but his appearance and naming in Fight Night is not considered canonical due to the third-party nature of the product. [I didn't know Punch-Out!! had a canon. —dmac]
• Doc also utilizes his almost magical healing powers brought about by pushing ’select’ one time per fight. [I already knew this, of course.—dmac]
• “However [Von] Kaiser can still attack with his flurry of left and right uppercuts, but with any skill at all his celebration will be short lived.”

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Charlie Manuel loves him some ‘Punch Out!’

There’s nothing like a conversation about old-school video games to get everyone excited. Mention Tecmo Super Bowl in a group of 20-to-30 year old guys and you’ll get bombarded for an hour with stories of QB Eagles, ridiculously long punts and braggadocio about 106-0 wins and 14 safeties in a game.

Tecmo may be the gold standard of Nintendo sports games, but one that wasn’t far behind was Mike Tyson’s Punch Out! (You must spell this game’s title with the exclamation point.) The plot of the game is this: You’re a 10-year-old (or so) named Little Mac and you fight guys three times your size, culminating in the final fight against Mike Tyson.

And yesterday, as the Phillies were photographed for the upcoming game MLB ‘07 — MLB ‘06 is due out next week — Charlie Manuel shared his fondness for the 1980s classic:

Most, too young for the Atari revolution, first played a version of the ricochet game “Breakout” on a personal computer before graduating to the wonders of Nintendo staples “Super Mario Brothers,” “Donkey Kong” and “Mike Tyson’s Punch-Out.”

“You got to fight Bald Bull,” recalled manager Charlie Manuel, a “Pacman” fan who, at 62, owns a “Tetris” game.

Yep. You got to fight Bald Bull. (Twice.) Go get ‘em, Fightins!

Phillies have video games on their minds [DN]