Photo: Nintendo
Politicians always have difficult time trying to appeal to young voters, and their efforts to do so are routinely embarrassing. However, this latest effort by the Republican party to appeal to gamers may be the most awkward of all.
Recently, the GOP published an article on their official website discussing their efforts to “overhaul our nation’s broken tax code.” While providing a rundown of their plans would have been sufficient, the GOP in their infinite wisdom decided to compare it to The Legend of Zelda, and it all got a bit ‘Steve Buscemi in that GIF from 30 Rock.’
It all started with a now-deleted tweet, in which @HouseGOP wrote: “What do The Legend of Zelda and the American Tax Code have in common? More than you’d think.”
Screenshot: Twitter
Now there aren’t many comparisons I can think of that can be made between The Legend of Zelda series and the tax code, besides them both taking all of my money and featuring a central antagonist that is just a giant, orange man. But Donald Trump’s party seems to believe that the two are more comparable than we’d believe, posting an article attempting to outline the similarities between the game franchise and the US tax code, that fails to reveal any actual similarities whatsoever.
Photo: Nintendo
The article, which has since been removed from the GOP site after it was widely mocked on social media, began:
“The Legend of Zelda series is Nintendo’s best-selling video game franchise enjoyed by more than two generations of gamers. The action-adventure game was released in 1986, only one year after Nintendo’s founding in 1985.
And you know what else was released in 1986? Yeah, you do. The last major reform to the American tax code was signed into law in 1986.”
And there you have it. That is the lone comparison that can be made between The Legend of Zelda and the American tax code. Y’know what else was made in 1986? Jon Bon Jovi’s popular album Slippery When Wet. The title of this GOP article could have just as easily been ‘What do Bon Jovi and the American Tax Code have in common?’ and it would have had the same effect.
If that wasn’t cringe-inducing enough, the information included in the article isn’t even correct. The Legend of Zelda isn’t Nintendo’s “best-selling video game franchise,” because that honor belongs to Mario. It’s actually the fourth best-selling Nintendo series, behind Pokemon and the Wii series of games such as Wii Sports and Wii Fit. Then there’s the claim that Nintendo was founded in 1985, which is off by nearly a century; Nintendo was actually founded in 1889, with the company initially creating playing cards, before moving into the video game industry in 1980 with the Game & Watch handheld systems.
While this won’t be the last time that politicians try to get young voters on their side, hopefully this is the last time that the Republicans will attempt to roll out a Nintendo franchise to help their cause. You’d think that the opposition would have learned from Hillary Clinton’s mistake — people know when you don’t play video games. Stop pretending that you play video games.
