Robb Grimm was born in a poor rural state that southerners consider the north, northerners consider the south, and everyone basically agrees is crap.

After a boring and very low-income early life in the sticks, young Robb’s family moved on up to a small suburban neighborhood whose green, tended lawns and neat fence lines distracted the casual observer from the dysfunctional social hierarchy hidden underneath.

If towns could smile, this one did so through needle teeth and wide, baleful eyes.

Robb was ill-prepared for the veritable minefield of unspoken rules and invisible class divisions he encountered in his new town and immediately trampled on them all, not understanding what he had done to alienate every group of kids he met.

This was a stark contrast to his previous school, where he'd known his classmates since day one, and who had never really indicated Robb was somehow Different.

He had always assumed other kids were just your friends automatically, and getting to know them was only a temporary detour on the road to becoming total buds.

He was never told there were some kids you weren't allowed to talk to because you were either born too rich, or too poor, or because you sounded too funny when you talked.

The rich kids hated the poor kids, the poor kids hated the rich kids, but all kids could agree that Robb Grimm was weird and sucked, and he quickly became a welcome diversion from the usual preteen class warfare.

"There's something wrong with all of these fuckers," Robb announced to himself one day as he walked home after an ass bruising. He was pleased to know he probably wasn't the problem, and also to be trying out an important new Cuss Word.

His obsession with Game Tapes began in the early 1980’s, when he got his first Atari system and discovered the power of digital worlds like Ms. Pac-Man and Maze Craze. The universe he'd never quite grasped had at last birthed a thing he intuitively understood.

As the decade dragged itself toward the 1990's and their plush, colorful sweaters for men, he graduated to increasingly sophisticated game systems like ColecoVision and Sega Master System, and finally, the Nintendo Entertainment System. The pinnacle of at-home video gaming technology.

He really liked that one a lot.

Through the high tech wizardry of these new Tapes, young Robb was at last introduced to a world where the rules were clear and absolute, logical thinking was rewarded, punishments were predictable and avoidable, and tormentors could be whipped in the face until they exploded.

"Now I understand the allure of strength and dominion over others," young Robb felt more than thought as he watched Castlevania collapse after destroying a resurrected Dracula.

Fortunately, Robb was prescient and reasonably good-natured enough to recognize such feelings were best left trapped inside his brain, and the whippings of bad guys' asses best left to 8-bit Transylvanias.

All of that said, please enjoy your time here as Robb slowly builds his unique “retro game reviews as personal memoirs," body of work, an exciting new proposal in the world of creative non-fiction delivery.

As with all very important literary works, this project will take some time. Thank you for your understanding and patience as I hand craft each word for your considerations.

In the famous words of Frankenstein's Monster's coroner, "We will examine every secret nook and cranny of this strange young man and discover where he went so incredibly wrong."

Robb thanks you for your interest on this matter.

-Robb