Shall We Play a Game?

The only correct answer is "Love to". And you get bonus points if your voice was in the weird high-pitched scratchy tone from the movie.

Back in 1983, I saw a little movie about a nerdy guy named David L. who lived in the Seattle area and liked computer games.

The cast includes Dabney Coleman and Ally Sheedy, of course. John Spencer and Michael Madsen are credited, and IMDb says that William H. Macy has an uncredited role as a NORAD officer.

And it introduced me to Matthew Broderick, who went on to memorable roles in Ferris Beuller's Day Off, Project X (opposite Helen Hunt), Godzilla, and The Producers.


Tonight, as part of their "The End of the World as We Know It" (nice) series, SIFF is showing WarGames. It'll be good to see it again on a big screen, and presumably with other film/game/computer geeks.


All right, so maybe you're not able to make it to Seattle tonight, but you still want some voice synthesized game experience, and match three is your speed. You could check out WarGames: WOPR for Android - a game I didn't expect to like, but I found myself sticking with through the end. You play in the role of WOPR, which gives the various characters in the game chances to play against you, providing a little variety in opponents. Additionally, there are two different sets of pieces and several active and passive powerups that you can buy and upgrade, so the game changes as you go along, rewarding you for continued play, even if you're stuck on a single level.


I haven't yet seen WarGames: The Dead Code and I don't think War Games: At the End of the Day is at all connected. Somewhat tantalizingly, IMDb says that there's a 2014 WarGames movie - there's no real information on IMDb, but if you do a Google search, the snippet for the IMDb page lists Seth Gordon as the director. Curious.

Note to myself: I should try to see WG:TDC soon (this weekend? Over Christmas vacation?).

Note to the reader: if you like geeking out to this kind of '80s nostalgia, and you haven't read Ready Player One yet, you owe it to yourself. Fast reading. Sort of like if "Ender's Game" was written by Neal Stephenson. Or if "Reamde" was... well, it's a lot like "Reamde".

None of these links are paid. So click away!