Jason Mewes loves to play games, which came in handy in the new eSports movie Noobz that explores the culture of professional gaming.
Actor Jason Mewes has been busy of late. He has a regular gig on AXS TV, he completed the just-released independent comedy Noobz and he’s working on a host of new Jay and Silent Bob projects with Kevin Smith, including a new video game. Gaming is the subject of his new DVD, Noobz, from director Blake Freeman.
Mewes plays Andy, an enthusiastic Play-n-Trade manager who heads to Hollywood to play Gears of War 3 on Xbox 360 with his three buddies in a national video game tournament. The actor explains how married life has impacted his own gaming in this exclusive interview.
What games did you play growing up?
Growing up I played a little Duck Hunt, Super Mario Bros., and then I moved on to ColecoVision. I had some Donkey Kong, Centipede, and all those good games. Then I got into Nintendo. One of my favorite games was Dino Crisis. Then I started playing PC games, which was Lord of the Rings: The Battle for Middle-Earth, which is one of my most favorite. A friend of mine and myself would play literally from 11:00 in the morning to midnight every day for about a month and a half; it was pretty bad. Now I play a lot of Call of Duty. I play LEGO Batman 2. I play LEGO Lord of the Rings. I’m into the LEGO games; the LEGO Harry Potter, LEGO Batman and LEGO Lord of the Rings.
Do you have a favorite video game memory from when you were younger?
I do feel like the first couple of weeks of playing that Lord of the Rings was kind of ideal. I had just got done working for two months shooting a movie, and then me and my buddy would sit in the house; we wouldn’t leave. We’d order pizza from Domino’s and we’d just sit in the house and play video games and online poker. This was before I was married. We used to have these girls come over and they would hang out and watch us play for some reason. It was a good memory for that short a period of time, and then I realized that it was two months in, I was never leaving the house, and I was pasty white; that wasn’t good.
What are your thoughts on how far gaming has come since Pac-Man and Duck Hunt?
It’s pretty crazy. I just recently saw they had a free demo of The Avengers on Kinect, which is so awesome. You can be The Hulk. If you’re running, he’ll run. If you throw a knee up, he’ll throw a knee up, and you can lunge. It’s just amazing what the Kinect and the PS3 camera does with shooting bow and arrows, boxing, bowling, and volleyball. It’s pretty amazing and crazy, from side-scrolling games, Pitfall, to 3D Tekken, Marvel vs Capcom and all that good stuff.
