Not to be out done, as a representative of PALGN, I took it upon myself to emulate these fine gentlemen on my recent ski trip to New Zealand (to the most reasonable extent). Standing at 1935 meters above seas level at its highest peak, The Remarkables ski resort provides 220 ha of snow powder goodness and the scene for our gaming try out.
The Remarkables Ski Resort
I don’t own a DS but the GBA SP, a slightly frailer unit was the subject of this trial and The Legend of Zelda: The Minish Cap was the lucky game. Poor weather predicted, so I was quite relieved when the sun was shining upon our arrival that day. With the winds down and some of the members of my group were eager to some skiing under the belt while conditions were good, I played along, with my GBA and point-and-click digicam safely stowed in the recess of my thick jacket pocket. Handily enough at the top of one of the ski-lifts (roughly 1500m), a bench was provided. No, not for bored gamers but for snowboarders wishing to attach all their clips and when the professional photographers got tired or had pictures to take.
Take a seat and play
So what’s it like playing a GBA on top of a mountain. Well, it’s damn cold. Initially I tried playing without gloves, but then my knuckles got really stiff and painful from the howling mountain winds. When I put the gloves back on, the clicky nature of the GBA SP buttons proved to be quite comfortable. Even under the thick gloves. Precision wasn’t too much of a problem either. Controlling Link was just as easy at the top as it was at the bottom.
You can really make hay in the sunshine, as you have no need for the backlight. When the sun’s out, the quality of the GBA screen shines. Even under light cloud cover, you’d be fine. However, once the snowstorm started, not even the backlight is enough. Sure enough, this is obvious but at least you have an excellent view and on a nice day, an excellent environment to play to. The Boktai games would do really well up there.
A fine day for gaming
While my activities were hardly crowd drawing, it seemed that there was a bit of a frustrated log-jam of snow boarders at the top of the lift. The only viable conclusions that I came up with were:
1. They were a group having a lesson.
2. They fell at the top of the lift and there happened to a large number of poor snowboarders.
3. They were disgusted with my association with Tingle, who I had met during my play session.
I guess if I really wanted to draw a crowd, I could have sat there and played naked, though a bare backside on a frozen surface does not have a desirable result.
Obviously inspired from by tuning into the frequency of my loose brainwaves, the vacationers were treated to the rare site of a naked snowboarder whooshed past us as I finished my session and was making my way down the mountain.
No! He's not here
It was fun to experiment on top of the mountain and a GBA or DS might be handy on a mountain expedition, especially if you’re going to have long rest periods. Nintendo really know how to make a device portable, in the most literal sense possible. I guess the next place to go is the bottom of the sea… But if you really want something to do during your lunch break on a ski trip, consider taking that break in the ski lodge.
Checking out the views
Sure enough, the thing that makes it worth it is the view of the surrounding area. It really makes you realise how much more there is to life and it’s extremely satisfying when you look up and just realise how far you can see. Though when the weather’s down, the ski lodge can provide some nice views as well.
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