497 Words About: The Pagemaster for SNES
Spending time with my cousin Jacob in Houston meant reconnoitering road-side ditches and looking for snakes, exploring our uncle’s garage packed with rust and auto-parts, and of course playing videogames on his Super Nintendo and Nintendo 64. I remember Star Fox and WWE Wrestling being our usual staples, but I also vividly recall The Pagemaster. I say vividly because we never got past the first levels in the land of Horror.
That, and the game allowed me to throw eyeballs at enemies.
Not enough videogames let you throw eyeballs.
The PageMaster was a media tie-in for the film which was one of my favorites, and something of an obsession of mine. I was a 90s kid, and it was because of The PageMaster I wanted to be Christopher Lloyd when I grew up, or, specifically, I wanted to be his character Mr. Dewey. At least two and a half decades later I work at a library, have long hair, and own several sweater vests.
I loved libraries, I loved cartoons, and I loved videogames, and here was a PageMaster videogame. In short, I was hooked.
Though it’s painful to recognise that this game was, in hindsight, largely a commercial product.
The PageMaster for SNES was a 2D, side-scrolling, action, platformer videogame. The player controls the avatar of Richard Tyler, the paranoid 10 year-old played by Macaulay Culkin, who’s been sucked into the world of fiction and must find his way to the “EXIT” where he can return to the real world and check out three books (Fantasy, Horror, and Adventure) with his new library card. Richard can jump from platform to platform while he avoids various enemy npcs. One powerup can give him goop on his hands allowing him to climb ceilings to escape environmental dangers, and, of course, he can find bags full of eyeballs that he can lob at enemies.
Watching a quick playthrough of the game on Youtube I wasn’t shocked to see that the game was…not horrible. Age has taught me to guard myself against my own nostalgia and too many “great” videogames have been revealed upon replay that they were in fact “good” or “okay.” I can say comfortably that The PageMaster is a “good” videogame.
When I wrote a short essay about Battle for Middle Earth, it was mostly out of nostalgia, and, to be honest, this essay was likewise going to be indulgent nostalgia. But I do want to say something about a game that I spent several hours with.
Videogames have been, and continue to be driven by commercial enterprise, and even the most artistically inclined games from Mother 3 to Seasons are not immune from this mercantilist environment. Videogame-product-tie-ins have their place in the medium, and some even manage to be “good,” and sometimes “great” games in their own right.
The Pagemaster lingers in my memory because of its aesthetic choices, chiefly being those eyeballs, but there was still a game in there. And it was actually fun.
Joshua “Jammer” Smith
10.28.2024
Like what you’re reading? Buy me a coffee & support my Patreon. Please and thank you.