Gather around kids. I’m going to tell you of story of Flatland.
The people of Flatland were simple two-dimensional sprites. Some prominent members of Flatland were named Mario, Donkey Kong, Link, Samus, and Kirby.
They were the leaders of this land. They traveled up, down, left, and right, to vanquish evil, entertain audiences and spark the imagination. They were loved and adored and respected by millions.
But sometimes, these heroes wondered - is this EVERYTHING we could ever be? Sometimes, they sensed that there was an entirely different dimension that fell outside of their perception… if only they could somehow… touch it, experience it, and travel through it. Perhaps they would have entirely new types of adventures, entertain entirely new types of people, and become truly immortal.
Then, one day, a dude named Fox discovered flatland and flew to it in his Arwing. Unlike the others, this fellow had experienced the 3rd dimension and told them a story of its incredible depth.
“I’ve done barrel rolls in my Arwing through space and traveled along something called a Z-Axis” said the fox. "My secret is to harness the special power of an artifact I found in Europe called the FX Chip. Unfortunately, I did not see any extras in my travels. One was gobbled up by a dinosaur and he started seeing the world in crayon form. And another one was installed on some stupid car with dumb eyes. Unfortunately, I do not know where we could get any others. "
The heroes listened on and started to sulk. “Mama-mia, if only we could have a means of accessing the 3rd dimension ourselves, we would be even more kick-ass” said Mario to his friends.
Then, suddenly, the Fox said “To hell with this, let’s ALL find a new means of being even more kick-ass. I hate how my ship flies so slow. I want true freedom in the 3rd dimension with you all.” And so, all of the best characters from flatland crammed themselves into Fox’s tiny Arwing and they took off into space.
While in space, the crew ran into Andross - a giant monkey head made of robot parts or something. Andross gobbled up the tiny ship and the crew was entirely consumed. While inside the monkey’s head, they found a giant processor that powered Andross. Together, they dislodged it, causing Andross to shut down.
With their new processor in hand, they flew to Japan where they were all born and spoke to a guy named Hiroshi Yamauchi who decided it was his goal to develop Andross’s processor into something better than anything ever experienced before - capable of harnessing three dimensional power to the max.
He contacted his friends at SGI, and Project Reality was born. Finally, the guys at SGI developed a plan to smash the processor to bits - 64 of them to be exact - and have them all working in tandem to create fully 3D worlds to explore for the heroes.
When they finished rearranging the 64 bits, the Nintendo 64 was born! And that is, more or less, how it happened, kids.
The people of flatland became 3-Dimensional and blew everyone’s minds with how kick-ass they were. When it first happened, Mario was on the news and needed to go see himself in the mirror because he couldn’t believe it:
“Mama-mia. I’m so kick-ass like this. Wahoooo!” said the plumber as he effortlessly did an insane backflip for the first time.
There he and his friends were, in their fully 3-Dimensional glory. It had finally happened. They could travel along the fabled Z-Axis naturally as if it were as simple as breathing air.
And in this thread, we will worship the technology that helped Mario and his friends to do it. The Nintendo 64:
