Way back when, in the depths of the eight-bit revolution and the good old straight-eight Nintendo Entertainment System, back when Mario was still a plumber and not a merchandising icon, I remember playing a little game called Lode Runner.  It was a strange little title, a kind of strange puzzle / platform action hybrid in which you ran around a maze, trying to lay hands on piles of gold while being pursued by robots who would have preferred it if you were dead.

You were unable to jump, and instead were given a blaster gun that didn’t work on your enemies, but rather on the floor to your immediate left or right.  I didn’t have a whole lot of fun with it, but maybe that’s because at the time I was like eight.

Now here’s the part that really got me.  Recently–like within the last couple days–I found a copy of Lode Runner on Xbox Live Arcade, for twelve hundred Microsoft points.  And except for the updated graphics, there’s virtually nothing that distinguishes it from my memories of the original.  And oddly, I STILL didn’t have a lot of fun with this.  Fully twenty years of growth and maturity still couldn’t make this canard be fun.

So if you’re looking for an almost completely intact copy of Lode Runner with a little bit of a graphics upgrade, then head on over to Xbox Live Arcade.  And if you’re not, then don’t worry–you’re not missing anything.