Abigail M. Schilling

So please listen to Heather:

Abigail spends so much time in my office at Collective HQ reading Jacob's TWoP recaps over my shoulder, postulating about Heidi and Spencer, analyzing Vulture's American Idol charts, discussing the writers' motivation for fucking up Jan's character in the fourth season of The Office, advising me on movie trailers, etcetera, that I often forget she is twenty-six years younger than me. Then one day, out of the blue clear sky, I'll be on the phone and she'll be in my office and I'll say something like, "This hold music sounds just like MOTAS." And she'll be like, "What's a MOTAS?" And I'll realize that in 2001 when I was playing an amazing Flash-based escape room game, Abigail was on a field trip with her first grade class at the petting zoo.

Yesterday I linked Schilbo to MOTAS. Within three hours I received frantic IMs, texts, and phone calls from her. "I can't power up the teleporter!" "What do I do with this flashlight?" "Eff!" "Double eff!"

In fact, she's trapped in a spaceship right now, playing pool. (Oh, sorry: she beat the game of pool. She's now trying to read a map.) And that's why she can't blog. So come closer, my children, and in her absence I will tell you a tale of the most important events of the last two decades.

1985 - Nintendo releases Super Mario Brothers for Nintendo Entertainment System

Eight worlds, four levels each. Dragons, canons, poison turtles, poison turtles with wings who can jump, poison turtles with wings who can fly, canons, venomous octopuses, fire and blood. Two men: Mario and Luigi. That sound you hear is Nintendo flying at mach awesome, breaking the video game barrier as it has never been broken before.

1988 - Nintendo releases Super Mario Brothers 2 for Nintendo Entertainment System

Same hymn book, different Gospel. In Mario 2, you could play as Mario, whose power was just being awesome; Luigi, whose power was jumping really high; the Princess, whose power was momentary flight; or Toad, whose power was throwing stuff a long way. By this time, Nintendo had its own magazine, Nintendo Power and you could get it at the Kroger for only $1.99.

1990 - Nintendo releases Super Mario Brothers 3 for Nintendo Entertainment System

It's like, hey, how awesome is Super Mario Brothers? Answer: so awesome. How about we, like, multiply that by 50 badrillion? Answer: okay. And that is Super Mario 3.

1991 - Nintendo releases Super Mario World for Super Nintendo

At the time, I was too young to really understand the concept of marketing, but I'm pretty sure Nintendo just issued a press release that said "Super Mario World is coming. You're welcome."

Nintendo released some more Marios for N64 and stuff, but whatever. This is what you missed if you are young. This is what is important. You can get all these games for Nintendo DS Lite, and you should. If you really want to count in the world, you just absolutely should.