Once the most revered videogame star in Silicon Valley, Jumpman is now a washed up 8-bit videogame actor, who can often be seen auditioning for bit parts or voice over work. But life wasn't always so hard for Jumpman. Back in the 80's, he was the king of 8-bit. You walk into any retail store and you were bound to find Jumpman's likeness on a variety of products such as watches, t-shirts, coffee mugs and toilet paper. Jumpman was popular. He dated all the women from Peekaboo Poker and when he wasn't working Jumpman could often be found in the hot tub with all the Bubble Bath Babes.

So when Nintendo announced that up-and-coming game designer Miyamoto was holding auditions for the lead role in a psychadelic platform game, all the top videogame analysts and Hollywood insiders figured Jumpman was a shoe-in for the role. And as expected, the final audition in fact came down to Jumpman and an unknown portly plumber in overalls. Nintendo announced the finals would be held on location in the Mushroom Kingdom in two weeks. A map to the set would be sent to Jumpman's agent the night before the audition.

With time to kill and a fresh merchandising royalty check burning a hole in his pixelated pocket, Jumpman did what every wealthy young videogame actor did in the 80's. He partied with Corey Haim and Ralph Machio like it was 1999. Red and blue potions were chugged. Mushrooms were munched. Love was shared. The binge ended the morning before the final audition with Jumpman waking up next to Revenge of Custer's Revenge fame. While Revenge was considered a hotty during the Atari age, time was not kind to her 2-bit figure.

Jumpman high tailed it to the closest warp zone, and headed over to his talent agency to pick up the map to the Mushroom Kingdom. To his surprise no one answered the door. Jumpman opened up his briefcase, pulled out his high tech 9-pound cellular phone and dialed his agent's number. No answer....no answer....no answer.....

With Jumpman missing the audition, Nintendo cast the portly plumber as the lead for Miyamoto's Super Mario Brothers. Jumpman Jumpman's life quickly unraveled. His brother, Hopman Jumpman was killed in a horrific marshmallow incident. The next two years then saw Jumpman involved in numerous lawsuits and scandals. When the dust had settled, Jumpman had lost everything.

Left with nothing but a wristwatch to his name, Jumpman moved to Blok-jima and lived as a recluse amongst the Bloknauts. For years, Pixel poked and prodded Jumpman to exact his revenge on the gods of 8-bit by character assassinating Mario. Jumpman, for the most part, ignored Pixel, which was hard to do as Pixel was Jumpman's only friend. Then one crisp autumn day in 1996, there was a knock on the door. It was Disk-kun. Seeing as they were both 1980's gaming icons that had been disgraced by Nintendo, Jumpman and Disk-kun immediately bonded.

Pixel became jealous of this relationship. With Jumpman's malleable mind distracted by endless rounds of VS Excitebike on the Famicom Disk System, Jumpman began to ignore Pixel. But without Jumpman to manipulate, Pixel's goal of world domination would fail. Something had to be done.

Like a gremlin, Pixel hacked his way into Disk-kun's Disk System and severed the belt. While Disk-kun's endless banter about the Mario Brothers was tolerable while gaming, without VS Excitebike Jumpman quickly tired of Disk-kun's stories. So when Disk-kun inquired as to the meaning of Disk Error Message #29, Jumpman told him that it was a sign that Disk-kun should return to Japan.

Pixel quickly filled the void created by the departure of Disk-kun, and again seeded Jumpman's brain with thoughts of character assassination. Target? Mario Mario. While Jumpman had always been able to resist Pixel's influence, after five years of hearing from Disk-kun about why Mario was the greatest videogame actor ever, Jumpman quickly became consumed with the impulse for revenge. Only one question remained, not "should he?" but "how should he?"

To be continued......be sure to check out part 2.