Tales from Counselor's Corner

These interviews and articles were originally published on MorningToast.com between 2007-2013 and have been republished here with only minor changes in dates and links.

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Anyone raised in the Nintendo Generation like myself remembers Nintendo Power magazine. We didn't know then that NP was just a propaganda magazine to push Nintendo games down our throats, but hey...we didn't care...we just loved Nintendo games! But Nintendo Power was more than just a preview for new games, it was the life line for players both on and off those glossy pages.

Getting help...one letter at a time

I didn't have a lot of Nintendo games growing up but the ones I did have I thought were the best...and some of them were really hard. Some were so difficult at the time that I needed a little help from The Man himself. So in time of I need I did what many kids back then did, I wrote a letter to Nintendo Power asking for some help.

All the letters Nintendo received asking for help were directed to the so-called "Game Play Counselors." These were the game experts. These the people that got paid to play games. These were the people I wanted to be. These were the people that were featured in the Counselor's Corner section of the magazine. Counselor's Corner was often the best part of the magazine as it was the section that had the obscure "hardcore" tips and tricks.

I don't have copies of my letters to Nintendo asking for help but I did save all the responses I got back from Nintendo. Back then it was really cool to get a letter in an official Nintendo envelope on official Nintendo letterhead. Scans of the letters I got are in the PDF below and cover a range of my favorites games including Batman, Solar Jetman, Ironsword, Metal Gear, and Golgo 13.

Interviews with Game Play Counselors

After I posted an article about those letters on my website, one of those counselor's reached out and I took the opportunity to ask him some questions about working at Nintendo during their heyday.

My first interview was with Kirk Starr and as luck would have it, that interview led to another and then another...in total 5 interviews with former GPCs...and it was wonderful to capture their stories. These guys were idols to 12-year-old me because they had the dream job. Of course, to over-40 me, I realize they were doing a job just like everyone else...but even then, they had a really cool job that few people can say they had.

My nostalgia will never die

This series stands at five interviews right now but you never know when another former GPC will fall out the sky and take us back in time once again. And if you're a former counselor and want to join the list, leave a comment on the Tales from Counselor's Corner Facebook page or even send an email to brian[at]morningtoast.com if it's easier.

I want to thank all the guys that took some time to answer my questions. It might seem silly to them that I even wanted to to interview them about their job from more than 30 years ago, but when I wrote those letters asking for help, my dream job was their job - playing video games. And even after I interviewed them, it still sounded like a job any person would love to have.