Sweet gaming memories: Motocross Maniacs on original Game Boy

The early 90's were a pretty sweet time to be into video-games. Things were evolving so fast after Sega joined in the home console wars that companies really had to try hard in order to earn the consumers money and it seemed like everyone was getting these machines for their homes. I don't remember exactly how or why I ended up with a Game Boy, but it was probably a Christmas gift since I didn't have much in the way of a job back then.

The Game Boy was a pretty eventful development in the video game industry because although it was not the first portable gaming unit, it was the first one that saw any sort of widespread release. It remains to this day, one of the best-selling consoles of all time, mobile or otherwise.

Motocross Maniacs had a lot in common with one of my favorite NES titles, Excitebike but it took this literally to another level.

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For the younger audience out there I want you to step into your time-machine and imagine being excited about playing a game on a two-button console that was in only black-and-white and was pixelated as hell. That was every single Game Boy game that ever existed. Imagine a Kindle but without the backlight option so it was necessary to play it in just the right light. If it was dark, forget about it... If it was too bright, also forget about it. It chewed through batteries and lithium wasn't something that existed. It was expensive and cumbersome and everyone loved it.

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Excitebike in the NES was a simple game but it was also highly addictive and just an extremely well-made game that had a lot of replay value. Motocross Maniacs (which I will refer to as "MM" henceforth) took that basic premise but made it completely insane by turning it almost into a Sonic the Hedgehog experience taking you on impossible vertical courses that were extremely fast and not something anyone would be likely to ever see in real life.

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MM took all the best stuff from Excitebike and turned up the heat in a ridiculous manner. This game was all about getting airborne and flying into the sky to unrealistic heights, shooting off a ton of nitro to reach speeds that would certainly kill an actual rider, and working your way to the finish line in a crazy fashion.

There was no realism in this game and honestly, we weren't looking for any. Since it also didn't have different lanes to travel in you would simply blaze by anyone that was in front of you with no danger of crashing into them. Sometimes these levels would have multiple ways to the end point and choosing the wrong one would result in you getting left behind. It didn't matter though because you were constantly flipping and doing loopty loops that were crazy and fast given the time period.

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This was the only game that I ever played on Game Boy that took advantage of the included "link cable" so that you could play multiplayer with a friend. You both just had to have Game Boys, the same game, and plenty of AA size batteries. This was the first time I recall playing a multiplayer game where both players had their own screen yet the game would start at the same time and you could see the other human player on your screen in real time. This seems so simplistic these days, but back then it was a very novel experience.

You could build your own tracks but mostly, the physics were so complicated behind track creation that most of the tracks that I ever built ended up being something that was damn near impossible for anyone to actually get through. The devs had to be very careful to put the ramps in the correct places otherwise the areas above wouldn't even be accessible at all.

Throughout the years I have grown distant towards most racing games that are released and the few motorcycle games I have tried to play have been real duds in my mind. Like a lot of things, as soon as they tried to make the games super realistic I kind of fell off with them because they got too complicated. Motocross Maniacs was simplistic, insane, and if replicated in real life would certainly result in multiple casualties. It was a pretty great time to be a portable gamer though, and we had a lot of fun with this game that not very many people even ever purchased even though it was a Konami release.

Did you play it? Let's talk about it in the comments!