The Addiction Always Comes Back

It makes me itch. I think of it, I crave it. I dream of it, because I have to catch them all- Pokemon!

Yes, I’m a 17-year-old boy trying to hide the fact that I’m walking around and thinking; what Pokemon should I start my adventure with? Where will I find a moonstone?  How do you catch the Abra before teleporting away?

This isn’t what my girl friend wants to hear I’m thinking about when she asks me, “what are you thinking about?”

But after a weekend run to a local game shop with my girlfriend, who probably can beat me in some of the video games, the old game caught my eye- Pokemon Red for GameBoy color.  And my delight for the game resurfaced.

This game, sadly for me, was in front of my face more than any book when I was growing up. This was my breakthrough to gaming. It was the first game I could completely control. I knew everything about the 151 Pokemon as if they really were my own (friends). I knew their moves, their strengths, their weaknesses, and I played for hours upon hours.

The adventures of starting out in your hometown of Pallet Town then adventuring and capturing Pokemon in this world took me into the driver’s seat, becoming a training Pokemon master.  By choosing Squirtle, Charmander, or Bulbasaur the journey began.

After the game store  incident, the rush of excitement and nostalgia returned. I searched for my classic games to reconnect, yearning to start a new adventure as a Pokemon trainer. After a search through old baseball cards, miscellaneous boxes in the garage and turning my room a little more inside out, there was no luck of finding my beloved Pokemon Red game.

So now with a withdrawal from Pokemon for years, I go back to the game store with a bag full of old video games that have been collecting dust. This way I can trade them in and bring home something new to feed my addiction.

This addiction to video games is not rare for my generation, but for me, I get lost in the exaggerated plot lines and characters. With only one true love of video games, Pokemon, everything else falls short. This addiction comes from hours of watching the Pokemon series on Saturday mornings of my child hood and getting my hands on my own Pokemon.

So now, I find a used Pokemon Fire Red and a used Game Boy Micro to start my new quest to become a Pokemon master. With the last copy of the Pokemon Fire Red, this is a restored version of the classic Pokemon Red, I started my adventure all over again. I took that sigh of relief when I heard the noise that every truly addicted Pokemon kid knows, the intro fight song.

Knowing my addiction needed to be tamed, I put the Game Boy down for a day after playing for about a week straight. Then one night, I woke up from tossing, turning and sweating. I was having a dream that I beat the elite four.  Of course I got up.  I knew what I had to do.

By Juan Montes