All Things Virtual 6.0

Ah, yes. Time for another inane installment of my pointless ramblings and musings on the industry I so love. My days have been occupied with Animal Crossing and Final Fantasy XII and I simply can’t stop playing. Especially when it comes to the latter. I’m close to twenty hours in and I am positively in awe of the grand scope and sheer beauty of this game. You may have read the myriad posts on related boards placed by idiots that wouldn’t know criteria if it knocked up their sisters and gave them a swift kick in the testicles. Indeed, many such posts are derogatory and plain offensive towards the game in question. Let us dissect the vacuous arguments employed by these soppy wanna-be critics, shall we?

Argument A: Final Fantasy XII has no story

Oh really? Gosh! I wonder what the hell it is I have been following here while playing the game. Let me see. Seemingly Evil Empire, check. Increasingly convoluted plot, check. Characters with different back-stories, check. Deus Ex Machina? Don’t know, I’m still not far enough into the game. As it is, the game has a very mature story in comparison to any and all other Final Fantasies, the only other parallel there being the original Tactics on the PSOne. I can see how all the retards – yes, retards! – who wouldn’t know a decent plot if it shat on them would whine about not having the same old PG13 teen romance and angsty characters that have been a staple to the series for nearly a decade barring Final Fantasy IX. However, the claim that the game has no story couldn’t be farther from the truth. The story is great. It is nicely paced and very well written as far as I can surmise.

Argument B: The characters don’t have personality

Again, I question the mental capacity of any and all making such claims. So far I see distinctive character traits of the none-aesthetical persuasion that markedly draw each story player as a very real persona. Balthier is rogue-like character archetype of hedonistic nature that, nonetheless, fall prey to compassion and other influences beyond self-gain. Vaan is a naïve street urchin trying to find meaning for all he’s suffered as well as trying to sort out all the new information he’s been given; a brash and impulsive teen who’s gotten way in over his head and is simply trying to wade though it all unscathed. Even Fran, perhaps the most laconic of the characters, has a distinct personality evinced by her aloofness. It would seem everybody wants a jackass like Tidus instead of a more realistic character like Basch. Perhaps an A-hole like Squall is in order instead of witty Balthier. Or even an angst-ridden Cloud; I’m sure he’d function well in a mature context such as that conveyed by the story. Maybe people want more self-indulgent passages of flashbacks and drawn-out monologues. I don’t know. But I do know that anyone saying the characters are devoid of personality is probably devoid of any critical thinking him or herself.

Argument C: The battle system sucks/is too hard

I don’t understand how people can find so much fault with system that, honestly, is a vast improvement over the beaten-to-death random battle encounter. Sure, it is somewhat difficult, but not impossibly so. I’ve died a few times but it only enhances the experience to know that there is plenty of challenge left in the game. If you think the battles are hard now, you should get some old-school console RPG’s or any of the Shin Megami Tensei games. Suck on THAT for a while!

In any case, life has been pretty ok. Perhaps I will get my super lucky break soon… or not. On to the crap!


Launching Riots

So the launch of the Playstation 3 has come and gone and I’d surmise that about half, if not more, of the consoles have been acquired so as to be put on the auction block. With consoles bids reaching moderately ludicrous amounts such as four and five thousand dollars to those that have gone beyond preposterous and into the realm of impossibility such as one single console going for a little over thirty thousand dollars and another for eighty nine million. Whether the last two examples will actually have the winning bidder paying the impossible bids is really not that big an issue. In fact, I am quite sure said prices will not be what is actually paid given that the winner of both of these auctions happens to have no previous purchases or feedback in ebay. The point, however, is the sheer bastardizing of something us gamers hold dear. Sure, as the industry has grown so has the attention diverted towards poignant events such as the launch of a hot new console. Unfortunately this has made launch events fertile ground for opportunistic money-grubbers and no longer a joyous occasion for the truly hardcore to let their passion show. No longer is the ebay profiteering an oddity, it is now the norm. I’ll not go into a politically or ideologically charged tirade here, but I have to question the state of the population when squabbling and subcontracting are at the order of the day for people camping out in the hours prior to a console launch. Horror stories abound. The ugly side of humanity showing its face rather fleetingly but clearly nonetheless as people fight for the chance to score a quick buck by making a privileged purchase. It’s a dog-eat-dog world.


Of Unrealistic Price Cuts

More like unrealistic expectations of what price cuts may take place in the near and not so near future. I am, of course, referring to the Playstation 3 once again. I, like hundreds of thousands of gamers, have decided to watch and observe as people struggle to get one of these over-hyped consoles, blowing up to $600 on a gaming system that may or may not be entirely functional – more likely not if the Japanese launch is any indication -. I have stated many times that I will likely wait for both better games to come out and for a significant price drop to occur. Thinking critically, however, I think that a price drop that might put the console within my price range won’t likely be happening any time soon. If one thinks about it logically a considerable cut wouldn’t be taking place within the first two years of the consoles life.
The facts are that SONY is losing somewhere around $200 to $300 with every Playstation 3 and that the electronics giant is bleeding money from countless sources. It seems that it is a big punch in the gut they are taking for them to drop the price on the console anytime before 2008. Sure, the competition’s product is considerably more affordable and with comparable capabilities offered, the fact is SONY is likely not going to make a significant cut unless they seriously lose market share.
My guess is that us price-conscious gamers will have to wait and see. Surely, if most gamers and the public in general decide to stand aside and watch, SONY may see itself cornered and in need of desperate measures. Perhaps, but it’s too soon to tell. My money is on the console failing to meet expectations half way down the road. After all, SONY has already proved to be not only overly confident and downright arrogant, but they have made it clear that they withhold information from consumers, such as with the backwards compatibility issue. Who’s to say?


In Closing

That about does it for this meager installment of my lackluster blog. With retarded imbeciles paying up to $500 for the Wii even though there should be another shipment coming in over next weekend, well, as they say: a fool is soon parted with his money.
Me, I’m happy ignoring the next-gen. Maybe Wii will get the vife playing but I won’t know until some time next year, perhaps.
Hmmm. Now, what the hell could I possibly want for my birthday? Really. I really can’t think of any material goods that I might be able to use – save for a million dollars… or ten – so, what do I really want? I want vacations. Time off. A nice getaway to somewhere sunny, where the air is brisk. Somewhere I can work out in the glory of the morning sun, then relax as I see fit for the rest of the day. That for at least a week, would be nothing short of pure joy to me.

All Things Virtual 5.0

The Life Lethargic

On this Samhain I am sitting at work on my office computer wondering about my future, near and far. I am contemplating my choices and see some that are becoming somewhat clearer with the unstoppable advance of time. I wonder at how my mind will always go off on tangents into the realms of my creative being, into fantasy and speculation both highly intellectual and banal. When all is but a rat race and life falls into meaningless cycles, what do we have to hold our hopes up? Life’s a-wasting. That is what I’ve told myself very often. The more I linger, the more I lose my chance at making anything meaningful out of my life’s endeavors. However, who’s to say that anything we do is meaningless, be it productive – within the accepted terms of society – or purely recreational, if one is thoroughly engrossed by the activity in question? Is it meaningless when one enjoys it, regardless of whether there is palpable fruit as a product of the engagement? Is it any less meaningful is the fruit of the activity is of the abstract realm, something strictly personal and solely subject to individual perception? Isn’t life one’s own to be used as one sees fit? Who is to say that one has wasted life if one does not feel that one has done so? Working is a waste of life just as much as sleeping is. Time spent with one’s family is wasted just the same as time alone watching television. Videogames are a waste of time. Sex is a waste of time. Reading is a waste of time. Learning is a waste of time. Time is but fodder for the cannons of death. It will be wasted, used, consumed in any manner or none at all. Everything we do may or may not be futile in the grand scheme of things. We may all be writing on water after all. In Aqua Scribis. So why not simply enjoy life in every way we can? Someone judges your actions; let them have their own opinions. They cannot hurt you. Wasted time? If you are fulfilled and satisfied then you have wasted nothing.
I now wait for Final Fantasy XII with eager lust. I fear I may not finish Final Fantasy V, which I decided to start playing last week for the fourth time in my life. Wherefore? I don’t rightly know. Nostalgia perhaps? I may very well play XII only on weekends while playing spurts of V whenever time allows during the regular week. Discipline!
Zelda is still a good month and a few days away. I doubt XII will be finished by the time it arrives at my humble abode in the bed of the earth, but I must try nonetheless.
Animal Crossing was gifted to me. Wild World, that is! My DS has not been the same since. “Responsiplay” is the term used in an article at www.1up.com. I couldn’t agree more. Still. I enjoy the piece of crap game. It feels a little too much like the rate race we live, but it gives it an innocent spin. Quite benign, it would seem. Soon I will be playing with Metroid Prime: Pinball. I have been yearning to play it for a while now and the recent price drop made it hard to avoid.
With the Wii only 18 days away I am firmly in control of my desires and am confident that I will be more than apt for the endurance test that is staving off the purchase of the new generation systems. PS3 is too easy to avoid. I mean, c’mon! It’s $600 dollars I won’t be spending on something I don’t have time to play. Xbox 360 is really pulling at my heartstrings with the nifty new titles coming out before year’s end, but I am strong in my resolve and am a brave undertaker of Herculean tasks such as these. Ask me again on December 2007.

RPG Double Standards

For many years there have been two main camps within the fans of the Role Playing genre on consoles: Final Fantasy Lovers (FFL’s) and Final Fantasy Haters (FFH’s). FFL’s hold the series dear and close to heart, usually taking the bad along with the good and focusing on the latter when judging the games in the franchise. FFH’s condemn the series for a just about any little thing.
I believe that the majority of RPG fans that criticize FF for not changing enough from game to game and banking on trite clichés story-wise are mainly hypocrites. Every time I read a post on a forum by some kid – sometimes people my age or older… possibly idiots – saying FF is clichéd but touting Dragon Warrior/Quest for its story and character I feel like I want to punch the little tea-bagger in the teeth. First of all, one cannot possibly deride a game because of a certain something and then praise another that espouses the same exact factor as the greater of the two. Anybody else that comes out with shite like “Tales is better story-wise than any FF” should shoot themselves in the hand. Or maybe in the head, given the ample use their brains are evidently getting. Truth be told, the only RPG series I have played on consoles recently that doesn’t draw as heavily as any of the major franchises in the genre is Shin Megami Tensei. No clichés there, I assure you, save maybe those already done by earlier games in the series, which never actually came out in America. Face it, punks: The genre is ridden with trite ideas and little innovation on the majority of fronts. Bite it!

PSP: Particularly Stupid and (possibly) Pointless

I should start investing heavily in the stock market. I certainly predicted the current state of Sony’s PSP a good while before it came out so maybe I really should look into it. Clairvoyance fantasies aside, I find it a logical development that interest in the PSP waned given the poor support from game companies and the meager releases on the portable system. As it is, I currently see no title worth getting the system for. The one release I was looking forward to, Final Fantasy VII: Before Crisis, is looking less and less enticing in the wake of the PS2’s mediocre Dirge of Cerberus. Sure, the system can play MP3 on the go, but so does my iPod. Video on the go? Once again, iPod already does it and better. Sony’s main focus should have been the gaming department and they have sorely failed to make the PSP a must-own portable gaming system. It is a pity, really, because there is potential there. Unfortunately this potential has been hitherto squandered in paltry ports and reissues of PSOne games that, save for Valkyrie Profile: Lenneth, bear no consequence at all. Even the aforementioned port is only a cult title and hasn’t exactly lifted the system from the veritable quagmire it has stumbled into. Perhaps the PS3 will revive the ailing portable when their version of Nintendo’s failed connectivity gimmick hits the market, but I find it very unlikely.

Wilted Clover

I still don’t really know how to take it. First Oddworld Inhabitants pulls out of the biz – although recent reports hint at them making a comeback – and now Capcom deliberately closes down their most capable and creative studio. Capcom has gone on at length to assure that creative and original material will still be coming from them as the majority of the team has been redistributed among the different teams and studios under the publisher and developer’s name but only time will tell. I hope this is not the end of the wild ideas that made this passing generation so much more enjoyable courtesy of Viewtiful Joe and Okami. Let the homebrew rise up and take advantage of the advent of digital distribution. The geniuses of tomorrow’s game design will surely find their niche here.

Hot Boy-on-Boy Action

What is it with all the controversy caused by two prepubescent male videogame characters engaged in a kiss? What? Is it not as innocuous as a boy and a girl kissing or two girls kissing? What’s with the sudden moral double standards? Some say they have found it immoral. Others say it’s anti-natural. I say it’s just a kiss and nothing more. Who cares if two individuals of the same gender perform the above-mentioned smoochery? I certainly don’t! So much for tolerance and acceptance, I say. Bully is fun, kissing or no kissing.

In Closing

We draw near the year’s end and the high profile titles are already here, some still looming on the horizon. Me? I’m more worried about freakin’ Tom Nook’s turnip prices. The bastard has done nothing but lower the price since I bought my first freakin’ batch. We’ll see about that you rank bastard! He just wants me as a slave! I know it! I still owe him my latest house remodeling and hence he likely just wants me to break my own back trying to pay off the loan. Damn you, Nook. You shall rue the day I set foot in your town!

Write, Bitches!