When it comes to Nintendo, I am a fan of your old school, Mario-esque adventure games; so last October when my roommate blessed our double with the original 8 bit NES, I quickly attached myself to Super Mario Bros. 3, Ducktales, and Metroid. (Metroid, alas, is only there to taunt me because it does not actually work. Several friends and I have employed all the childhood tricks we can recall for restoring a Nintendo cartridge to life but Metroid is dead to the world.)
I avoided the game Contra because from the cover, it looked as if it was just a combat game. It lay dormant for several weeks until discovered by a friend (who is now my current roommate). I returned from class one day to find Suzanne frantically pushing away at the control pads and realized that Contra was not at all like Mortal Kombat, as I had suspected, but was more along the lines of a Mario game (although the happy little plumber never actually toted a machine gun). It's a linear adventure whereby two brothers are battling a military host and destroying alien bosses. And more importantly for this column, Suzanne is the master of Contra.
The first time she discovered this abandoned cartridge, she beat the game within the hour. However, she is only able to beat the game by utilizing some trick which secures the player thirty lives. She mastered Contra when she was about nine years old, and to this day, the intricacies of the game are engraved on her memory. And yet, she does not tire of Contra because she has a goal - to beat the game using only a single life. This is an important point so I'm going to make it again - she wants to beat Contra without dying.
With that understood, I would now like to explain the Contra Complex. This can be best explained by illustrating how Suzanne plays this game. She starts off splendidly - artfully avoiding machine gun fire and leaping over lasers while destroying her enemy targets. I would venture to say that she is in a Contra-nirvana. Then, her concentration relaxes and the unthinkable happens: a life is lost. All hell breaks loose.
I'll be sitting at my desk dashing off a blitz or memorizing slides for art history when I hear from the common room an explosion of oaths and threats upon the existence of the NES. Against my better judgment, I usually go and join Suzanne to observe the subsequent bloodbath. For here lies the Contra Complex - after Suzanne loses her first life, she proceeds to quickly lose another dozen. Once the chance at perfection has been destroyed, her frustration mounts to such a level that it mars her playing abilities.
For several months now, I have been witnessing this spectacle - playing really well, making one mistake, and then playing badly - but it is only this past week that I have realized the Contra Complex extends beyond Contra and Suzanne. I realized this while playing racquetball over the weekend. My opponent and I were evenly matched but every time my friend fudged a shot, she got so angry with herself that she played the next few points more poorly than she should have. During our second game, as she swung her racquet around in an arc of rage, I realized that I was witnessing the Contra Complex. Several good shots, one lousy shot, and then an instant succumbing to defeat.
Now the pop psychologist in me is curious to discover how the Contra Complex applies to various personalities and venues of life. I know for certain it pertains to my academics. Take last term, for example. I was doing really well in my three courses and then around mid-term, I got a fabulous 60 on a CS4 homework assignment. I was not very excited by this, especially since I had actually made a noble effort at the problems. So what did I do? Double my efforts for the class I was struggling in? Nah, that would have been the sensible thing. Instead, I gave up on CS4 and decided to just shoot for passing so I could get the TAS and devoted my energy to my psych and history classes, which I was still doing well in. Little did I know, this was a manifestation of the Contra Complex - good grades, one little 60, and suddenly I give up doing the work for the class.
In sum, the Contra Complex is the spawn of Satan. It is the mindset whereby failure distresses us so greatly as to affect future performance. Watch for it, and if we ever meet, share your stories with me so maybe I can write a pop psych book after I graduate and make lots of money. In the meantime, I shall be seeking intervention for Suzanne - even if I gave up on CS4, there is still hope for her beating Contra with only a single life.
