(Image via The Cartridge Strikes Back)
The year was 1998. Google was being founded. Harry Potter and the Chamber of Secrets was being read. And @nepd was hustling people at Goldeneye on the Nintendo 64 in the dormitories at the University of Iowa.
I may have been born too early for the competitive gaming scene of Counterstrike, Smash Bros and Overwatch, but that doesn't mean that I wasn't able to cash in on my gaming skills.
Goldeneye, based on the James Bond movie of the same name, was one of the first FPS games to grace a gaming console. It featured a four-person split screen mode that was legendary at the time.
I had honed my skills against my friends - whom I allowed to use Oddjob, a character that was a more difficult target - during the summer months and was ready to unleash my prowess upon unsuspecting Iowa Hawkeye students who happened to venture onto the 3rd floor of Mayflower hall.
(Image via University of Iowa)
Luckily, my floor was inhabited by lots of cocky rich kids from rich Chicago Suburbs. Many of whom had friends that would come over for the weekend. These floormates and their friends were my literal meal ticket.
My suitemates would help act as matchmakers and roped scores of college kids into our room to play some Goldeneye. We played "One Shot, One Kill" mode with pistols on the level entitled "The Complex". We also occasionally played with proximity mines, but that was more for fun.
The trick was to rarely show how good you actually were. Don't win by 100 if you only need to win by 1. You can shear a sheep a hundred times, but you can only eat it once.
In true James Bond fashion, it is best to leave them shaken, not stirred.
On a good night I could rake in $100-200, losing some small bets before suddenly getting better and winning a bigger one. Some of these college students had more disposable cash than I do now. Eventually, they just wanted to say they had won, and we're willing to pay the price.
(Image via Cinema.com)
In total, I cleared nearly $4000 playing Goldeneye (and a little Mario Kart 64) that year, with the vast majority of it coming in the first couple months. Eventually I had trouble finding someone that would play me for money. With a few small scholarships, I was able to escape from my first year at University with no debt at all.
I don't play many video games anymore, but I do play my son in Star Wars Battlefront on occasion. I haven't had to hustle him... yet.
Did you enjoy video games from the late 1990's / 2000's? I'm looking forward to making some posts on Wave Race, Tekken Tag Tournament and NBA Jam.