A giant old-school Nintendo game controller sits in front of a wide-screen T.V. Mario’s flat image bounces around, breaking wooden blocks with his 2-D head, stomping on the sickly mushroom creatures, thanks to teamwork. One person controls Mario’s direction as his partner pounds on the wooden jump button.

This system is gigantic, but rather dated compared to the rest of the systems at the Games and Music Experience (G.A.M.E.) convention in San Francisco’s Moscone Center, which lasted three days and displayed some of the newest games available.

As one moves towards the center of the event, away from the free massages Tylenol is sponsoring and away from the G4 gaming area where freshly pressed shirts are given away, the game controllers get complicated. Buttons are added and your thumb is required to manipulate the character’s vision.

The Urban gaming area is sectioned off by fake brick walls, covered with spray paint graffers left on Friday. Folks gather around to play rapper 50 Cent in his new Xbox game, 50 Cent: Bulletproof. Big guns, gruff talk, and throbbing muscles entice the player to run with 50’s homies, Young Buck and Lloyd Banks.

The hip-hop culture crosses over into videogames in other ways. Mark Ecko’s Getting’ Up allows the player to be a daring tagger, bombing bare walls and trains with intense graphics, helping to make the game enticing, and the near by paint fumes enhance the experience. Live muscle cars crookedly bounce to the side, sponsored by R&S Hydraulics. A green candy paint Chevy sits calmly with her hood propped open. Her insides are glistening gold and silver; beneath her hood is an airbrush painting of exotic women. Men gather around to appreciate the car.
There’s a constant line in the more interactive sites. Dance Dance Revolution 3: Ultramix for Xbox gets a lot of players, and giggles. People bounce around on the dance pad, which is controlled by your feet. The pro’s get snickered at because they jump around in a nervous type jig, until those smirking realize the person they’re watching is winning.

The G.A.M.E. girls can be identified by their roller-skates. One blue-wheeled girl tries out the Karaoke Machine and sings boldly along with Whitney Houston’s hit, The Greatest Love. The longest line, which is a tolerable 7, waits for the guitar. With the plastic instrument in hand, the player has to press the coordinating colored buttons to match the ones on the screen, DDR style. Some people seem to play better if they rock their heads to the beat as they eye the screen.

Life-sized coffins and tombstones line the Fantasy area. This is where the “you’re on a quest” games are featured, like in Sid Mier’s Civilization IV. The player has to follow a map in order to accomplish anything.

Xbox 360’s are played in living room styled booths along the wall of the expo. A “Mature” warning sign indicates that those over the age of 17 are welcomed to play. Black leather seats give comfort to those trying out the new Perfect Dark Zero on a Pioneer plasma wide-screen T.V. The screen is split up into to fours as a Terminator and Reservoir Dogs poster from violent movies line the living room scene.

In the Sports section, Xbox’s Blitz is played. The graphics are clean and there are suggestive shots up the animated cheerleader skirts. Melvin Boyd, 18, plays. He’s just killing time until local rapper Keak da Sneak performs in the live band area. “I just came to watch Keak,” Boyd says on his second day at the Gamespot Production event.

Even though the performers may have been enticing, most of the people who attended the G.A.M.E. expo came to play some videogames.