Super Smash Bros.

I spent many of my college hours playing a video game released when I was in the 5th grade, because we are all destined to go backwards, yes? This was a time of staring ahead – or at least pretending, while we glanced nervously, side to side, to make sure we were doing it correctly. And yet part of us all wanted to go back, to cling to, or even claw at, simplicity.

Isn’t that what you wanted?

There are few times in life for reinvention, especially of the self. After 5th grade – middle school – is one, and high school another. None are as important as college, though. And Super Smash Bros., I believe, shows us the self, fantastically realized.

So many college friends were Samus: attainable exoticism. Each person was convinced – of time, and of place. And of how and where and why. World affairs laid out at 2:13 AM with burritos and sheer lucidity. How many facts are clear when you can reach across your room to the other side; how much you know when a 20-minute stroll pushes your boundaries. You could believe you were out there, among the stars, your interventions intergalactic; but one day, you strip down to the underneath, and you’re just a person – in an expensive spacesuit.

Many more were Captain Falcon. A shame I spent my freedom chained by boisterous Captains. You already know the type. Wanted to go out? Captain is already out. Wanted to get a bite to eat? Captain is already eating. Wanted to take a weekend trip? Captain is already in the car. Yet the race into which you entered was never yours. It was the Captain’s. This hurt, of course, and his punch – “LET’S GET DRUNK!” – and his kick – “OH, SHIT! OH, SHIT!” – are aches now only in that you cannot forget what you lost, chasing the Captain.

Perhaps you knew a few Links or Marios. You probably knew a few pretenders. In college – or since – I’ve met so few. Who’s really likely to show up – each and every time – with a pizza? Who’s willing to look after your intoxicated friends, slop after slop? Who has the consistency of throw, of aim, to arc the fireball just right, and to twist the boomerang just so? I used to dream myself a Mario, or a wayward Link; now, I’m sure of only my uncertainty.

Like me, you may have, ironically, adapted yourself to as many Kirbys as possible. Perhaps you fashioned yourself as one, over time. The hat: a perfect metaphor realized. To move from class to that internship to that party to that apartment to that bed to that art show to that law library and back to that class. You wore them all. Your environment, ever mutable, mattered so little; you were there, twirling – smiling – and you knew what to wear. But you’ll never forget: Kirby just sucks.

College prompted experimentation, and it’s likely that you ended up around a Pikachu or Jigglypuff. They dared the ledge – and likely leapt. There is no onomatopoeia adequate for a Pikachu, for a Pikachu’s definition of success is self-electrocution. And, if the smoke cleared, there was Jigglypuff – melody misplaced, eyes closed, humming to the wrong Phish DVD. You spent plenty of time around those who were accustomed to being possessed; the revelry of their freedom was destructive and beautiful and unforgettable. But – Captain’s Orders – this was not your freedom.

College was this collage, an amalgam of fear and desire, and I made all of it make sense in the most practical, childlike way I knew. But I never grew fully comfortable with college, or with Super Smash Bros. And it’s only now that I know why.

Before brawling, everybody saw who I chose to be.