What's not to love about Infamous?

No, really, I'm asking.

I know this might be a little dated, given that this game came out almost a year ago, but I've only just gotten to this game in my big stack of unplayed, well-reviewed titles.

I've played through a fair chunk of Infamous, probably logged 5-6 hours so far, and it is a solid sandbox action game. It moves along at a good pace, has a fairly interesting sci-fi storyline, and some pretty entertaining superpower mechanics. I've enjoyed what I've played so far, and as such I have eaten up every sidequest possible up to where I am in the game.

So, why don't I love it?

The closest analogy I can come up with is that playing Infamous, for me, has been like watching TV late at night. I am clearly finding some entertainment value in what I'm doing, because I sit there doing it...but I'm not sure what that value is.

The game is pretty well put together, top to bottom, but it's like it doesn't have a heart - I don't care about any of the characters, I don't care about the people I'm saving. The game appears to have a mechanic that the city's population celebrate my heroic deeds, apparently by having some schmuck run up to me, point at me in an exaggerated way and then run off, or by my friend Zeke popping on the radio to tell me people are putting up posters of me around the city. It's a nice aesthetic touch, but really, I don't care much about it. I'm more worried about increasing my completion percentage than I am about whether a random bystander accidentally gets hit by a flying car.

And what's with the guy playing the main character? I know we can't have Nolan North play the role of every hero, but it probably doesn't help that the main protagonist Cole seems about as charismatic as a broken blender, with a voice to match. Maybe that's where the disconnect lies? Cole doesn't seem too concerned about anything that's happening either, presumably because of the morality system - he's got to play neutral until you decide whether he's going to do what's right or what's easy.

I suppose this makes Infamous seem like a bad game. It's not. It's really not. It's got a lot going for it. At the end of the day, I'm going to keep playing because of the neat gameplay and to see / mess around with Cole's other powers, but I think what keeps this game from being truly great is the disconnect that I've described above. I don't really feel involved with Cole or any of the characters. I'm entertained, but not engaged. And that's too bad, because all the right elements are there for a great experience, but they don't quite seem to fit.

The Uncle Bill Conundrum

Over Christmas 2007, I spent a fair amount of time at Clair's, having spent my first semester at law school living apart from her. I decided to bring my Wii to her place, and hook it up in her den, where there was more room for waggle-related antics. I had picked up Super Mario Galaxy before coming home for Christmas, and Clair's parents, presumably advised by Clair herself, gave me the Resident Evil 4 Wii remake as a gift that year.

Every year, as is tradition at her house, her uncle Bill and aunt Ronnie fly up from California and stay with her family over the holidays. Most of Clair's family took a curious interest in what the Wii was all about, and some even played a round of Wii Sports or two. But it was Clair's uncle Bill who took the most interest in the Wii, and in Resident Evil 4 in particular.

A couple of days or so after Christmas, I had started my first playthrough, and Bill came downstairs to see what it was all about. It was like something out of a commercial - he was saying things like "look out for that guy!" or "can you break open that box?" and generally getting very excited. Much later that same evening (or more appropriately really early the next morning), Clair and I were about to settle in for a long winter's nap when a clatter arose from downstairs. I sprang from the bed to see who else could possibly be awake at 4 AM. I had a suspicion, and sure enough, when I peeked my head out of Clair's room, I heard the familiar gunshots and guttural groans of Resident Evil 4 emanating from downstairs.

Sure enough, it was Bill. He was hooked.

The next day he updated me on his progress, telling me he'd managed to find the president's daughter, killed some "big monster guy". I should note that his progress in the game at this point was far beyond anything I'd actually accomplished in my time spent with the game.

Bill and Ronnie headed back to California a few days later. The following Christmas (this time last year) when they returned for the holidays Bill proudly informed me that he had purchased his own Wii and a copy of Resident Evil 4, and that he'd completed it a number of times over.

Fast forward to this holiday season. I was surprised to learn that Clair's mom was getting a loan of a Wii from a friend of hers so she could set it up in the house for Bill. When I first visited Clair's after getting back into town, Bill was still elatedly discussing his numerous playthroughs and various collected secrets and additional game modes. My knowledge of Resident Evil 4 is pretty basic, so at first I wasn't sure if Bill was just trying to establish conversation with a topic to which he knew I could relate. Then, he mentioned having completed the Mercenaries mode, and I realized that the man really did adore this game!

Bill also told me how he was disappointed with the other Resident Evil games he had tried. I assume he was referring to Resident Evil: The Umbrella Chronicles, and perhaps more recently, The Darkside Chronices, because he didn't like how they "forced him in to go in one direction", when he prefered making his own choices. This is the huge and obvious difference between the two offerings and the game that Bill treasured so much, and I can certainly understand his lament, as much as I loved House of the Dead and its recent re-imagining on the Wii.

Which brings me to the title issue: what games could I recommend to Clair's uncle, given his sheer, almost boyish excitement for Resident Evil 4? The obvious solution would be to point him towards Resident Evil 5, and a PS3 or a 360, right?

Well, no. Because Bill has said he likes the idea of having the "gun" in his hand, and being in more physical control of the aiming, an effect possible only on the Wii, and not at all captured by wielding dual analog sticks. Which means that I'm left with the Wii's admittedly paltry supply of above average games, a class of which Resident Evil 4 is a member, but what else?

The remake of the original Resident Evil just came out for Wii under the Archives brand, but I was dismayed to discover that it is essentially just a bare-bones port of the GameCube remake, wonky control scheme and all. So that went out the window just as quick as I had thought of it.

I decided that given the relatively positive reviews of the Silent Hill remake, Shattered Memories, I'd rent it and see what he thought. While he was rather interested in sitting down with Clair and I as I struggled through some of the Nightmare sequences, he ultimated rated the game "five out of ten", because he preferred to be able to fight his enemies rather than run from them. Personally, as far in to that game as I am, I've been really liking it, despite some trial and error with the Nightmares, but that will be the topic of another blog.

I brought over my copies of The Legend of Zelda: Twilight Princess, and Trauma Centre: Second Opinion, two Wii launch titles, for Bill to try out, thinking them be good examples of mature Wii content. When he reported back to me, he told me that the "doctor game" wasn't really his cup of tea, that he couldn't get into it. He gave what he dubbed "the horse game" more of a fair shake, however. I was concerned that what I found to be a very slow initial section of the game would put him off, but when I asked him how far he'd gotten, I determined from what he told me that he'd managed to at least get to the game's main overworld. So, he clearly put in a fair effort. Ultimately, though, he still seemed disinterested - perhaps due to the slower nature of the totality of Twilight Princess; it certainly isn't non-stop action, after all.

What about some of the other more highly reviewed Wii games that have come along since 2006? Looking at Metacritic's list of best reviewed Wii games the problem becomes very apparent: a very high number of the highest scoring games are decidedly not adult experiences, which is in keeping with the whole Wii sales pitch, of course. New Super Mario Bros., Super Mario Galaxy, Rock Band 2? These are not games meant for adults whose first console was a Wii. I can't really picture Bill rocking out to "Paperback Writer" in The Beatles: Rock Band.

When last I spoke to him, I suggested some of the Call of Duty games as my last resort, and as of time of writing, I'm wondering if he will actually take me up on trying one of them out. They are pretty action-oriented, but they might be too hardcore, too fast-paced compared to the relatively slower Resident Evil 4.

At the end of the day, is it that Bill has played the perfect game for his taste, and everything else will be a disappointment? Are there other people out there like Bill, who exist at the wrong end of Nintendo's target market spectrum: desiring a particular type of mature gaming experience, but with motion control? Could Nintendo potentially capitalize on an untapped market of middle-aged men seeking adventure thrills? It is likely that Bill is a gaming anomaly, but along with making me think about these questions, this story leaves me curious just how much the "generation that missed gaming" is missing out on today by dismissing more serious games without giving them a chance, and only playing Wii Sports, if anything at all.

MarquisMark's Top Ten Games of the Decade

Having discussed the top ten films and albums of the decade with some friends, I decided I'd put some thought into a list of my personal best games of the past decade. In my post-exam euphoria, I finally got them sorted. So, without further adieu...

The top three games on this list are all first person shooters. This is odd for me, as I generally don't enjoy first-person shooters. These three are rather unconventional, and more importantly, innovative in different ways.

1.) BioShock (2007) – This game restored my faith in first person shooters. Well, not really, but it was a solid first person shooter that restored my faith in videogame storytelling. Intelligent but action-packed, this game brought the question “are videogames art?” to everyone’s lips.

2.) Fallout 3 (2008) – This game is fucking massive, and ate up so much of my time. A giant post-nuclear world to explore, so many things to do, and I never get bored of slow motion head explosions.

3.) Portal (2007) – This game contains the best game mechanic of the year, and, though short, is a quirky, memorable experience that should be held up with BioShock as a standard for storytelling for games to come.

4.) Phoenix Wright: Ace Attorney (2005) - Hilarious dialogue, a solid set of stories, and probably the best game soundtrack in recent memory. The closest I'll ever be to being a real lawy-...oh, wait now...

5.) Tetris DS (2006) – Addictive as fuck. This is the pinnacle of portable gaming.

6.) NHL 10 (2009) – Every hockey game EA has released this console generation has led up to this. The franchise wins game-of-the-year awards like gangbusters, and deservedly.

7.) Rock Band (2007) – Potentially the best party game of all time. Harmonix got it right.

8.) Perfect Dark (2000) – There was so much content packed into this cartridge, and every scrap of it was worth enjoying. The multiplayer perfected what started with Goldeneye.

9.) Batman: Arkham Asylum (2009) – There was so much that could have gone wrong here, and instead, it’s the ultimate comic book game: combat, stealth, story, voice acting – all way above average.

10.) Braid (2008) – This game makes the list over some biggies because it’s the little independent title that could. A neat time-travel mechanic turning standard platforming on its head. Great little puzzler.

Honourable mentions:

- The Legend of Zelda: Majora’s Mask (2000)
- Grand Theft Auto: Vice City (2002)
- Mario Kart DS (2006)
- New Super Mario Bros. (2006)
- Wii Sports (2006)
- Castlevania: Portrait of Ruin (2006)
- Wii Sports (2006)
- Etrian Odyssey (2007)
- Uncharted: Drake’s Fortune (2007)
- Grand Theft Auto IV (2008)

(Note: I would have added Chrono Trigger DS as an honourable mention as well, but it is essentially a remake, which I decided to leave out.)

Spontaneous Devotion, or How I Learned To Stop Worrying and Love Chiptune

In my first year of law school, while searching for NES game soundtracks, I discovered chiptune music. Well, that's not technically accurate, but you'll see what I mean.

For those (two) of you reading this that might not know what it is, chiptune is a type of electronic music that is made using a computer or video game system's sound chip. If I were to play you a chiptune song right now, you would almost immediately think of the original 8-bit Nintendo, or Game Boy. This is because, out of necessity, all of the music in the games for those systems are indeed chiptune.

Flash back to almost 20 years ago. I knew that video game music had the potential to be really fucking good since I was six, plugging in the password (A5, B2, B4, C1, C3, C5, D4, D5, E2) to skip past all those damn hard bosses to the first stage of Dr. Wily's Castle in Mega Man II. The ensuing bleeps and beats that comprised that stage's music, quite honestly changed my life.

Yeah, okay, that sounds a little dramatic, but hear me out: it essentially was the first step towards me loving music as much as I do now.

The twin harmonies, the triplet bassline, the hard driving beat; all combined to form a theme invoking more heroic emotion than seemingly possible from an 8-bit system's sound processor. It floored the six year old geek kid in me, who, eventually, would grow up to form a teenaged obsession with Iron Maiden, a heavy metal band who, using guitars, bass and drums instead of pulse waves, triangle waves and noise channels, created that same intense, "epic" sound that I fell in love with in classic Mega Man level music. Twin guitar harmonies, of any sort really, still make me giggle (more inwardly than outwardly) with sonic glee.

Soon enough, I started having more than a casual relationship with music, and I was discovering new bands I loved left and right. Around the same time, I acquired the ability to pretty much download any song I wanted (courtesy of the internet), and put them on a mixed CD (courtesy of my ex-girlfriend's CD burner).

I remember I had made a mixed CD with System of a Down, Deep Purple, and some Pink Floyd on there, and I had put "Simon's Theme" from Super Castlevania IV at the end. Driving around by myself, I would have that organ theme full blast on my speakers, with my rearview mirrors shivering from the bassline. When I picked up friends, though, on came the Floyd, or some Weezer...something else, anyway. For a while, I was kind of embarassed that I really, really liked a lot of video game music, but Zelda, Castlevania, and of course Mega Man songs all started popping up in my mixed CD rotation. I guess I felt as if it was a guilty pleasure.

One day in late 2007, while searching for NES game soundtracks, I stumbled upon the 8bitpeoples website, and, if I recall correctly, the first artist I heard on the site was a young fellow going by the name Random (pictured above rocking his Game Boy), who had just released The Bad Joke EP earlier that summer. I listened to the first two tracks, "Sitge's Savepoint" and "Micawber's Moan", and jaw having dropped, I proceeded to immediately download the rest of Random's (unfortunately small) discography.

When I first listened to "Micawber's Moan", I got hit with that same sense of otherworldly auditory wonder I felt back in the early 90s playing that Dr. Wily's Castle stage for the first time. Obviously, part of it was me nostalgically linking the sounds I was hearing to the sound capabilities of the NES (technically the Game Boy) in a way that reminded me of being a kid sitting in front of a TV at my aunt's house, but there was something else.

I listened to other artists on the 8bitpeoples site, but for some reason none of the tracks by other artists really captured my attention and enthusiasm the way songs like "Black Mist" and "Searching for Atlantis" did. When I played Random's songs for others (namely, anyone who entered my room in residence for the next two weeks), I really don't think they got it. I guess they just heard video game music, and for their intents and purposes, I guess that's what it was.

I think it was the nostalgia hook that got me listening to Random, but what keeps me listening, and what I kept repeating to anyone listening to the songs with me, is this: Random is an awesome composer. There is an intensity to these songs, and there's certainly a high amount of danceability, too. But there are shovelfuls of intensely dance-y chiptunes to be found online, and only a couple artists have really caught my attention with great hooks, great harmonies, and great depth.

This realization, I think, is what has allowed me to shed the "guilty" from the pleasure of listening to chiptune, be it "Bloody Tears" from Castlevania II: Simon's Quest, or "Spontaneous Devotion" by Random: well crafted music, no matter what its source, is worth listening to, and sharing.

These days, along with listening to Random (and desperately hoping that the guy puts out another full fledged release as soon as possible), I've been listening to Trash80 and more recently Sabrepulse. A lot of this stuff is straight up electronic dance music, and while there's nothing wrong with that, every now and then I'll listen to old NES soundtracks (particularly Mega Man II, III and IV) every now and then for a true retro music experience.

Of course, there's also bands like Minibosses and The Advantage who play chiptune music with rock guitars, or bands like Anamanaguchi who bridge the gap between chiptune and full on rock in an undeniably catchy way. But they don't invoke the same sorts of emotion in me that straight up chiptune does. I don't think I've quite explained myself on that point, the best I can tell you, really, is just to listen for yourself.

In the end, now I don't mind when people know I listen to chiptune, be it game soundtracks or original composers. It's funny, actually; sometimes I miss the days when games didn't have full orchestrated soundtracks. There are exceptions to this rule, of course ("Drake's Theme" from Uncharted: Drake's Fortune being a recent example), but generally I don't find today's game soundtracks to be memorable as those on the classic NES and SNES.

Am I saying "they just don't make 'em like they used to..."? I guess I am.

Maybe I'm just getting old.

(Note: I can't remember where that picture came from - I just Google Image searched it. It's not mine, and if it's yours, let me know so I can credit you.)

Early Impressions: Demon's Souls

When I first played Atlus' Etrian Odyssey, I was full aware going in that the game was meant for purists, for hardcore RPG lovers, for the fiends craving a challenge. It was simple, but difficult, and I liked it for that (as you may have read in an earlier review).

Fastforward to last night (read: really early this morning): I finally cracked open Demon's Souls.

What in the merciful fuck is going on in this game?

I got through the tutorial session okay, in a bit of a blurry haze. At the end, a big burly brute of a beast one-hit killed me. I assumed that was part of the experience, and that it could not be avoided. I know that being dead and a spirit is part of the gameplay, and I, well, I'm not sure, but I think I might still be dead now.

I've just played through the same section of a castle about two dozen times, getting eight to twelve feet further each time. Okay, it's hard, yeah, alright.

But I don't so much feel challenged as I do mentally challenged. I don't know where I supposed to be going, what I'm supposed to be doing (collecting souls, ostensibly?) or how I'm supposed to accomplish anything. All I've been doing is leaving bloodstains everywhere, and getting my ass handed to me by every enemy I encounter.

I wonder, is this the madness that is supposed to ensue when you lose your soul? Being an aimless wanderer trying to fight his way back to some semblance of purpose? A cursory flip through the instruction manual was no help. I can't sell items? Okay. How do I save? I don't know! What the fuck do half these items do? Beats me!

I might not be an expert, but I'd like to think I'm pretty learned in the realm of RPGs. Here's hoping that I will slowly figure out what the fuck is going on in this game and enjoy it on the same terms as everyone else. Because I can only play through the same area another dozen or so more times before I get fed up.

Early Impressions: New Super Mario Bros. Wii

I've spent the last couple of hours trying to hammer out a closing statement for a mock criminal trial tomorrow evening, in which I am acting as defence counsel. This weekend, I bought a suit to wear at that exercise, the Blu-ray edition Watchmen: The Complete Story that I intend to watch for post-trial celebratory relaxation, and New Super Mario Bros. Wii.

I finished World 1 this evening before hunkering down behind my laptop to start crafting legal arguments. I remarked to my friend who was watching, "Alright, World 2, here comes the desert!" and, sure enough, I was greated by the golden brown sands of a pretty standard Mario desert overworld map.

This sort of predictability is alright by me.

New Super Mario Bros. Wii is the sequel to the 2006 DS game that returned Nintendo's well known (and perhaps overworked) plumber mascot to his two dimensional roots. This time, the focus is on a Mario platformer first - simultaneous co-op multiplayer, for up to four players. I was a little dubious at first, until I remembered these games always include exemplary level design coupled with that retro-quirk sense of humour that Mario and company provide.

Right off the bat, it somehow felt more natural to be playing this sort of game on a console rather than a portable system, with the Wii Remote in its sideways, NES-controller guise. Brought me right back to those days of marvelling at the original Super Mario Bros. Well, not really, but we'll get to that.

I played through a few levels on my own, and then noted to my delight that adding a second player (killerclair, of course) was as easy as pausing the game and having Clair grab a remote and hit a button. Having her exit the game when she wanted to get back to work was just as easy. Drop-in, and drop-out. Beauty.

One of the things that hit home for me early on was the rather clever integration of a controller-shake as, essentially, an extra button. It worked well and felt natural; I guess if anyone is going to get waggle right, it would be Nintendo first-party developers.

I always instinctively shudder when I read about new Mario costumes. Having grown up with Frog and Raccoon Mario, I feel that, for a game that's supposed to capture what I loved about these games as a kid, Penguin Mario or Bee Mario or whatever-animal Mario seem silly and foolish. I guess the "newness" of the games keeps me from going back to 1990 in my mind.

But, that's okay. Because New Super Mario Bros. Wii seems to contain everything that was good about Super Mario Bros. 3 or Super Mario World or even Yoshi's Island to an extent (I giggled a bit to myself when Yoshi appeared for the first time and I could do his little leg-kicking mid-air boost).

It's a combination of the old-school jumping, running, and princess-saving premise with just enough tweaks and new, fun elements to keep things hopping.

Propeller-Hat Mario wasn't so bad, I guess! Onto World 2!

Struggling To Move Forward.

Demon's Souls still sits, unplayed, on the top of a stack of PS3 games into which I have yet to delve.

It is extremely frustrating, and it mirrors my inability to write lately. I have so many games I want to play, so many things I want to talk about, so many ideas for directions for the blog. And yet, school and life keep getting in the way of a good solid gaming session, and a good blogging session.

Not only that, when I do get a free moment, it ususally ends up getting usurped by NHL 10, which I've played to an obscene degree (it is as good as I'd hoped it would be). Or, my new obsession, Strat-o-Matic Hockey. We won't go there.

Oh, and I did manage to finish Uncharted, the most cinematic game I've ever played. "Drake's Theme" really drove that feeling home every time I fired up the game. Sorta excited for Uncharted 2, but again, this requires me to dig myself out from under that giant pile of unplayed games.

With exams looming in a month's time (less, actually), I fear I won't have as much of an opportunity to write as I'd like. I do have a mini-reviews thing that's in the draft stages, however, it's just a matter of me sitting down to properly finish the reviews, or in some cases, the games I'm reviewing.

It is not a lack of things, but a glut, that has prevented a move forward.

This weekend I am going to try and post some mini-reviews, and maybe, maybe, some impressions.

In the meantime, I've been playing Castlevania: Dawn of Sorrows. I had a game in progress, but then, as is my custom, I got distracted by something else and forgot about it. In the tradition of many other gamers of my ilk, I decided to restart from scratch. I dabbled in the GBA's Circle of the Moon, and I straight out gobbled up Dawn of Sorrow's sequel, Portrait of Ruin, but something about the Metroidvania style that's become so prevalent in the series lately rubs me the wrong way, especially considering Super Castlevania IV is my choice for best game in the franchise.

Dawn of Sorrow is a really solid platformer, with some neat concepts thrown in (and it's nice to have a break from the "Charlotte! Jonathan! Charlotte! Jonathan!" back and forth character switching gimmick from Portrait of Ruin). The touch-screen "draw the seal" mechanic is a bit difficult to do on the fly in a game where you're primarily using the directional pad and buttons.

There's something to be said for games that encourage some free-roaming exploration, but I find more often than not I get frustrated because I can't remember the places I need to go back to once I find the item I needed to access them. Maybe I'm overly nostalgic, but I'd really like a throwback, no-frills, level-based Castlevania game. Every other fucking game is getting a retro-remake! I guess Castlevania: The Adventure ReBirth could be that game, but I don't have high hopes, given that the original Castlevania: The Adventure was a boring and rather awful Game Boy game.

Note to Konami: Let whichever Belmont is in charge this time around flick his whip in eight directions again! Why would you introduce such an enjoyable, heralded mechanic, only to remove it in every (as far as I know) subsequent game?

Alright, Demon's Souls tonight, dammit. Tonight!

Lamenting the Boss Battle

I just finished Batman: Arkham Asylum a little while ago, and after a couple of gloriously immersive weeks as the Dark Knight, gliding around thugs like a black-suited ballerina while simultaneously demolishing their brain-cases... I'm left rather disappointed.

The game gets almost everything right - the story, the atmosphere, the combat, the stealth, the voice acting, the flow and pace of action. And yet, the final boss fight, which should have been the culmination of Batman's long, arduous night at Arkham? A huge disappointment. Even the first "boss" of the game was more enjoyable.

At this point I'm going to begin discussing some of the details of this game's final boss sequence. So, uh, from here on, SPOILER ALERT, okay? Fair warning? Good.

At the end of Arkham Asylum, the Joker has managed to get his hands on a compound called "Titan", a more advanced version of "Venom" - a powerful steroid-like drug that transforms users into hulking, strength-enhanced brute version of themselves. The Joker, with Batman bearing down on him, unleashes a dose into his own jaw, and essentially becomes a giant Joker-monster, who just happens to be the final boss. This seemed like the obvious direction for the game's plot, but it was not the lack of surprise at this outcome that disappointed me. It was the fight itself.

Taking place in a small, makeshift Joker arena (ostensibly constructed while Batman was stopping the rest of the rogue's gallery on the loose at Arkham), Titan-Joker leaps up on a platform and addresses Gotham City in the spotlight of a news helicopter, while 8-10 thugs come at you. Once you've dispatched them all, you use powered up Bat-Claw to haul Joker down from his "stage" and then give him a one-two punch in the jaw. He comes at you for a second with giant claws, and then jumps back up to his platform. What then? You repeat the process, with a couple more advanced guards (with knives and tasers) thrown into the mix. Three shots to the jaw and the Clown Prince of Crime goes through the floor and, incapacitated, is picked up by the cops. Cue credits.

What a (ahem) joke! After some pretty awesome set pieces with Killer Croc and Scarecrow, you barely even fight the Joker directly! I understand the use of the guards to make things a little interesting; it worked to comparatively better effect during the Poison Ivy fight. But that's the only real challenge of the fight - if you are stumped at how to strike at Joker directly, the game instructs you to use the Bat-Claw to pull him down. Dodging Joker's attacks is a breeze, and he doesn't put up a fight at all when you first topple him from his platform.

END SPOILERS!

This is just another example in a trend of final boss battles that are anti-climactic and rather uninspired. Off the top of my head, BioShock's final boss was a similar sort of "repeat-the-pattern" fight with a supercharged main villain (keeping that one unspoiled - if you haven't played BioShock, do not delay any longer). This isn't quite a new trope, either; if I'm recalling correctly, all of the Bowser fights, including the very last, in Super Mario 64 require you to grab Bowser's tail and throw him into little spike-bombs lining the sides of his giant platform. This happens three, maybe four times in the game. Ooooh, the last Bowser is rainbow coloured. Innovative!

There are exceptions to this rule, however. Sometimes boss battles can set your heart racing and adrenaline pumping. A very early, but fond memory I have from my gaming past was when I fought and defeated Ganon in The Legend of Zelda: A Link to the Past. I remember the giant hole in the roof of the Dark World Hyrule Castle - I remember falling into it, and my little pulse starting to pound in my neck as I read through Ganon's menacing rhetoric about destroying me and making the Triforce his own personal plaything. Ganon threw all kinds of tricks at me, that required more than just hacking and slashing: agility, quick thinking, and skill.

Standard RPG final bosses are usually just nothing more than a drawn out combat sequence with a giant monster, world-destroying demon, or something of that ilk. I don't really consider that to be problematic, because that's exactly what's expected in that style of game. While it may be repetative, it is forgivably so, because it is usually the challenge of the RPG final boss that separates it from the usual enemies or mini-bosses. One notable exception would be Giygas in EarthBound, which is actually one of the weirdest and most innovative boss fights in gaming history. While the battle mechanic is the same as in every other enemy or boss fight in the game, the presentation, and the way you must defeat him is unique and definitely in keeping with the quirky yet powerful storyline.

It is unfortunate that truly great final boss battles are rare, even in games that are better than the average. While it's not enough to completely ruin a game (both BioShock and Arkham Asylum are arguably modern classics), it's enough to leave a bit of a sour taste in the mouth when your last bit of input at the end of a great experience is a repetitive or boring anti-climax.

The ideal boss battle, as I see it, satisfies most or all of the following conditions: 1.) you know you're at the end of the game and that everything that's come before has led you to this point; 2.) your heart begins to race as a result of the setting, atmosphere, music, and/or challenge of the fight; 3.) it requires the use of most of or all of the skills you've learned throughout the experience, or enough that it's not cumbersome; and 4.) it is notably different than anything you've faced up to that point in one or more ways.

These criteria might seem a little vague, especially the second and fourth, but I think that they all lend themselves to a more satisfying conclusion to an action/adventure game than what I'm used to seeing. I'm sure the process is more complicated than I'm aware of, in terms of keeping the game balanced, fun, etc. That said, though, I don't think I'm alone when I say that the concept of a "final boss" needs a bit of an overhaul.

What do you think? What are some of your own personal favourite boss battles? What made them stand out?

Etrian Nights (and Days, and Nights Again)

I missed the boat on a lot of early role playing games. I am aware of the existence of The Bard's Tale, Ultima and Wizardry, and that when they are namedropped, it means that we're in the realm of the "old school". Thinking back, while I did play a fair bit Final Fantasy III (read: VI) on my Super Nintendo, the only classic RPG I ever really managed to get all the way through was Chrono Trigger. Oh, I guess it should be noted that I also finished a handful of Pokémon games, as well.

When Atlus touted Etrian Odyssey as being a challenging throwback to the hardcore role playing experience, I was curious. A mapmaking interface? A deep labyrinth filled with secret passages, treasure and monsters? Highly customizable character skill development? The promise of a truly traditional dungeon crawler intrigued me not as a veteran of the genre, but as a relative newcomer. Given that my gaming habits usually tend to lack an attention span, this game really had no business taking residence in my DS any longer than, say, Big Brain Academy.

And yet, it's the handheld game I've played the most obsessively since I spent long, marathon sessions warring online with Tetris DS. Now, those sleepless nights consist of me telling Etrian Odyssey that it's time for me to go to bed, and it responding by grabbing me by my collar and slamming me right back into the labyrinth before I even know what's going on.

It might be the game's simplicity that draws me back every time. There is very little in terms of a plot; in a nutshell, the Yggdrasil Labyrinth sits just outside the town of Etria, drawing explorers from all around who endeavour to discover its secrets. You create a party of adventurers from a number of different classes, and set out into the labyrinth, just to see just how deep it goes. That's all there is to it. The focus is on exploration and discovery, which is supported by the game's "gimmick", for lack of a better term: the mapmaking feature.

When you enter the labyrinth for the first time, the DS' lower screen displays a blank grid that represents your map. As you traverse the many floors of Yggdrasil, you use the stylus to outline the rooms and hallways you are exploring. The mapping system includes symbols that you drag and drop into the grid that represent staircases, doorways, treasure boxes, and other events. The system is designed to harken back to the "old school" games I mentioned earlier, where players would often sit down with a pencil and grid paper and hand draw maps of the dungeons they were exploring. Combining this concept with the new school tech of the DS' touch screen was a fantastic move on Atlus' part.

The reason why I hesitate to call the mapmaking feature a "gimmick" is because the game doesn't just become an exercise in map completion. The dungeon crawling itself does not reinvent the genre, and the combat is nothing new: random encounters, first person perspective, turn based, menu driven. What propelled me to keep descending to the next floor, however, was the unique combination of deep customization and simplicity found in the levelling system. As your character gains a level, you gain one skill point to use towards acquiring and increasing the power of new attack moves, magic spells, healing powers, etc. There are a plethora of different skills, with each skill set differing from class to class. You can focus on one skill, or spread everything out evenly: deciding the path you want to take with each of your party members' skills is part of the fun of levelling up, and having just one skill point each level per character makes it a manageable task.

As the game only has one hub town, new items and weapons are uncovered through the items acquired from monsters, as well as from "item points" which allow characters, possessing the appropriate skill, to mine or forage for items. When these items are sold at the local shop, they eventually unlock new weapons and other useful items. This allows for a very natural progression of equipment upgrade, parallelling your level of descent into Yggdrasil.

The acquisition of items, along with types of monsters, are tracked in the city's main hall. The monsters are standard dungeon crawling fare - bugs, bats, and other animals - that obviously increase in difficulty as you progress. The wrench that Etrian Odyssey throws at you comes in the form of FOEs. FOE apparently stands for Foedus Obrepit Errabundus, which means "the vile, wandering one sneaks up". This is more than fitting nomenclature, as FOEs lurk around the labyrinth, and will often start to chase you if you get close. They are much stronger than the standard dungeon monster, and will trounce you if you stumble into a fight with one unprepared. They will appear on your map when they get close (or if you cast the appropriate spell), and this is fortunate as you will spend a lot of your time trying to avoid them. This creates quite a bit of suspense, especially when encountering a boss FOE for the first time. Sporadically, the game will use text boxes to narrate some interesting non-combat events that break up the level-grinding. The use of intense descriptive language, along with frantic musical cues often create a tense atmosphere that is quite impressive given the bare bones nature of the presentation.

As of this morning, I have attempted to beat what appears to be the game's final boss FOE a handful of times, with my party being routinely slaughtered each time. This has not left me frustrated so much as challenged. I feel like my party may need to gain a few more levels before they are able to withstand the boss' torrent of attacks, but I look forward to meeting the task head on.

The game's provided me a solid 50 hours or more of gameplay, perhaps more than a habitual dungeon traveller would need to reach the end of their own "odyssey". Despite the release of other top-tier titles such as Grand Theft Auto: Chinatown Wars, I've constantly come back to Etrian Odyssey for an RPG experience that I guess I missed out on in my youth. As the story is minimal, even after extended breaks from the game I could slip right back into Etria without feeling like I've missed a beat. With that said, it will not summon the same addiction as it did for me in everyone, as simpler, more mainstream games like Tetris DS can. This is a game meant for the hardcore, and is unapologetically so. If you liked what you've read here: deep customization and cartography elements in a difficult but rewardingly long dungeon crawling adventure, then by all means go check it out.

On a personal note, I'm equal parts anxious and afraid to crack the seal on Etrian Odyssey II. If it's as much an improvement as the reviews seem to suggest, then I'm in for some more sleepless nights (and rough mornings).

MarquisMark's "Week of Geek"

With work finished for the summer, I effectively have a three week vacation to spend doing as I very well please. I promised myself that I would dive into this blog headfirst, and so begins what I have dubbed my "Week of Geek". I plan to play an obscene amount of games that have been piling up and collecting dust, compile a few reviews, do a classic game review or two, and just generally comment on a few things that I've been dying to get off my chest and/or brain.

I'm going to start by promoting the hell out of EA Canada's NHL franchise, because despite winning Sports Game of the Year awards out the wazoo over the last few years it seems to disappear beneath the current of other games, especially the behemoth that is Madden.

Hopefully tomorrow I'll be posting an equally celebratory review of Etrian Odyssey, a niche RPG that, similarly to NHL 09 and its elder cousins, seems to be getting overlooked.

By the time the week's out, there should be a wealth of posts on various different topics and games. I'll see if I can get Clair in the act, but unfortunately for her, she's still working full-time for another few weeks.

On with the show!

Score One For The North?

Just in time for its latest incarnation, I feel I have no choice but to sing the praises of what I think might be the greatest sports video game franchise of all time. Created by Electronic Arts, this series has seen many iterations since it was brought to consoles in the early 90s, home and handheld versions alike, endeavouring to bring the action of a nation's favourite sport to life, electronically.

No, it's not Madden.

EA Canada has turned the NHL franchise into a rather impressive hockey simulation in the last three or four years, on the current generation consoles (minus the Wii / handhelds). The latest entry in the series, NHL 10, is scheduled for release on September 15th in North America, and if the blog entries and video updates on their site are any indication, it is another labour of love for David Littman and his team at EA Vancouver.

The revolution for the NHL series began in late 2006, with the advent of the "Skill Stick" in NHL 07. Players used to hitting the face buttons to pass, shoot and deke had to unlearn what they had learned, as stick movement was mapped to the second analog stick. Now, pushing up on the stick fires off a wristshot; pulling back winds up for a slapshot, and pushing left or right stickhandles the puck in the respective direction.

Despite a bit of a learning curve, especially for those used to the earlier games' button setup, the Skill Stick was an intuitive way to control the game, and with a solid base on which to build, each successive game in the franchise has tweaked and added to the basic gameplay.

My experience with NHL 07 and 08 was a positive, if limited one. Learning how to take advantage of the Skill Stick took some frustrating time, being a veteran of the older SNES versions of the game. A friend and I would start a season as a mutually agreed upon team, and we'd happily spend two or three hour sessions thrashing, or being thrashed by the CPU. What made the experience worth repeating, aside from the new controls, was the level of realism found in-game. Gary Thorne and Bill Clement calling the action, the "ding" as a puck wired at the net ricochets off the crossbar, the home crowd chanting their beloved goalie's nickname after a flurry of scintillating saves while the opposing squad tries to set back up on the powerplay...

Great sound, realistic AI, solid gameplay; these things weren't new to the franchise, but combined with the controls and the next-gen graphics - at the risk of sounding trite - they made the game feel as close to real hockey as you could get.

It's not uncommon to hear the complaint that EA releases the same sports games year after year, with only minor tweaks and roster updates. Then, given the previous instalments of the game, what makes NHL 09 stand out as one of my picks for the best game of last year?

More than just a culmination of the other things EA Canada has done right with the series, NHL 09 contains two new, rather expansive new game modes, "Be a Pro", where you take a created player from the minor leagues of the AHL to the big time; and its online counterpart, the EASHL - where you take that same created player online in 6 vs. 6 league games. I barely scratched the surface of these two modes, because the reason for my addiction to the game was simple ranked matches. My friend and I became, and still are, slaves to the leaderboard - we've got almost 700 matches under our collective Ottawa Senators banner. I've got more time logged in the different NHL 09 modes than any other game from last year, or even this year. By far.

What makes online play in NHL 09 so obsessive is a combination of everything I just mentioned, magnified by one key factor - human competition. No longer are we playing against a computer opponent and worrying about being outmatched by algorithms. Every game is different. I know that this is what makes online play obsessive in general, but there was something about NHL 09 that made the learning curve we had to battle early on more compelling than your standard FPS: learning how to play against a wide variety of real life hockey strategies, setting up our own plays, and learning how to combat the cursed "glitch goals" - unstoppable shots that beat computer-controlled goaltenders far more than they are intended. Yes, the online component was available in earlier years, but the gameplay tweaks, while minor, numbered in the hundreds, and the "Defensive Skill Stick" balanced the field (er, ice) to allow for more back and forth play, instead of just a series of amazing offensive maneuvers. There's just so much depth, challenge, and most importantly, realism, even for single online exhibition matches.

The NHL series is Canada's Madden, but I never hear about it, aside from a cursory sardonic news post on some gaming blogs. It's likely because hockey is a Canadian game, and doesn't quite hold the same interest that football does down in the States. It's a shame though, because it's as least as good as the Madden games, and it has the critical response to prove it. Metacritic rates NHL 08 and 09 better than its football contemporaries, and has umpteen Sports Game of the Year awards. What's more, the review scores are going up every year.

Does it take the enjoyment of playing (or watching, more appropriately) a particular sport to appreciate a video game of that same sport? Given that I hate playing golf, and sleep while trying to watch golf, but for some reason love golf games? I'm guessing the answer is "not necessarily". So, I guess the best I can do is be an advocate where great reviews and awards have failed - hop on board with NHL 10. It's shaping to be a continuation of a great series which continues to improve with every season.

Audience, purpose, onward.

We've been sitting on this blog now for a few weeks, with its handful of entries. Clair and I have basically foregone any real work on it for summer related activites, along with our mutual playthrough of Majora's Mask, for the Vintage Game Club, as I mentioned previously. I suspect that once the fall hits, we'll try to update a couple times a week. We'll have a HD camcorder to post some little video reviews and things, maybe once weekly, although with law and art student schedules, that will remain to be seen.

Clair and I had a discussion about the point and audience of this blog, and more particularly, whether our friends would have any interest in what we're talking about. At some point, I'm going to start linking to this blog, whether it be in forum signatures, or on my Facebook profile, or elsewhere. But, for whose benefit, aside from my own?

For the great majority of the non-gaming population, particularly those in an older generation than mine, video games are toys, a perspective that is personified in my mother. I do have fond memories of her manipulating a controller violently while playing Super Mario Bros. on my old NES, but generally, she is rather disdainful of my hobby. She often asks how, and why I can spend so much money on what she feels are essentially children's playthings. While I know most of my peers do not share that viewpoint, I fear that most people, upon hearing that I've decided to devote a portion of my time to a blog about video games, would just consider me immature, or maybe just foolish.

How then, to justify that I want to write, at least somewhat intellectually, about games? Do I even need to justify it? It's pretty clear to me that video games are just as important a medium as television, film, or music; artistically, culturally, or otherwise. As someone who's got more than a casual interest in games, then, I guess I feel compelled to babble on about that interest, but also, to maybe dig deeper than mere "this is fun, I like the graphics" in terms of what I want to say about them. I want to take this concept seriously. I'm pretty sure Clair does, too.

I'm aware that we're a little late to the blog party, but I'm looking forward to being able to actually articulate what I think about when it comes to games. Maybe even to a (small) audience. That audience will likely not include most of the people I know, because a lot of my friends aren't really gamers, as I am. I would like to think that what we write here could potentially appeal to even the most casual of gamer, but the reality is anyone who devotes this much time to thinking about video games is far from casual.

I guess the bottom line is this: the possibility of legitimate and intelligent discourse about games in any aspect is what has got me excited about this blog, and determined to make it worth reading.

In any case, with an introduction and a statement of purpose out of the way, I can focus next week on actually outputting some of the (actually game-related!) ideas I've had for posts. Stay tuned.

Forced forward, or back?

And here we are, a month later and only introductory entries to show for it. That's some good bloggin', boys.

I've had ideas percolating on actual worthwhile topics to discuss in here, and once I get those ideas down in structured, word-sentence-paragraph form, they will be posted.

I finish up work two weeks from tomorrow, at that point I've promised myself I'd spend at least a week gaming, and writing about games, and reading the blogs of some folks I've been following on Twitter, and who have been posting in Michael Abbott's Vintage Game Club's foray into The Legend of Zelda: Majora's Mask.

I've been playing through Majora's Mask along with the Club, and it's struck me that there's a certain type of game that can merit these sorts of playthrough - and it's those that have a worthwhile narrative. This might seem obvious, I guess, at first glance: no one can critically analyze a game like Pac-Man, or even Super Mario Bros. in this sort of way. I would argue that the original Zelda for the NES might be the cornerstone for the mature gaming experience.

In my mind, I put both the original Super Mario Bros. and The Legend of Zelda side by side as the quintessential starting points for my generation of gaming. The key difference between both games is the direction in which the gameplay propels you. In Super Mario Bros., you can only go forward, never back. For a wide-eyed, innocent child, it was easy to know where to go to find the Princess (the next castle); it was the getting there that was the challenge. Meanwhile, in The Legend of Zelda, you had no choice but to retrace your steps, constantly, in order to find the next task of your quest to rescue the princess. The challenge was figuring out what the heck you were supposed to do next. I remember as a seven year old, renting the original gold cartridge with my cousin, and being completely baffled. It was quite complicated, and for my inexperienced, platformer-trained mind, I got frustrated and annoyed with it, and ultimately tossed it aside.

Now, as an adult gamer, while I can still appreciate the appeal of a platformer ('Splosion Man has recently caught both my attention, as well as Clair's), newer games in the Zelda oeuvre have opened themselves up to me, along with other more complex and interesting narrative games. Just before the release of Twilight Princess, I replayed the original Zelda, and completed it, albeit with some aid from a few online sources. While it certainly lacks a more complete story than say, A Link to the Past, even, I had more of an interest in navigating the world of Hyrule, killing its baddies and solving its puzzles.

The Legend of Zelda set the tone for more complex games to follow, not only in its own franchise, but in others. As the series progressed, more focus was given to epic storylines and character development. While as a child, I enjoyed the hack 'n' slash adventure gameplay of A Link to the Past and Link's Awakening, as an adult replaying Majora's Mask, I can now fully appreciate its depth and darkness of story and character. As I grew older, more mature games started to come to my attention, like Final Fantasy VI (or III as I played it on the Super Nintendo), and Chrono Trigger.

I'm not saying that RPGs of that nature, or other mature narrative games couldn't exist without Zelda. What I am saying is that before The Legend of Zelda, I can't really think of a console game that put forward more than that a very simple gameplay concept; eating pellets, jumping from level to level, or driving on an infinite highway. If there is, it simply did not have the impact that Zelda had, and still has (take Okami for a recent example) on video games. From that comparatively primitive 8-bit beginning, we now have games that can be discussed and debated over in a similar sort of way as novels or films. This appeals to the undying child in me that revels in a late night spent fighting through dungeons, and as an adult gamer, who revels in the a-ha! moments of narrative and thematic discovery.

If only I had the time now that I had as a child to sit down and actually finish some of the epic quests I've been starting. Oh, the responsibilities of adulthood.

- MarquisMark

To begin: where I'm from.

While Clair seems to have taken a scattershot approach to her introduction, I decided that I would begin on a more particular topic: my growth as a gamer. From my humble NES kid childhood to my avid gamer present, here's how I got to where I am today, from 5 to 25, from behind a controller.

I got my first console, a Nintendo, for Christmas when I was 5. I remember playing Mario/Duck Hunt that Christmas Day, then having my parents spring a gift on me later that night, under the guise of Santa having accidentally “dropped it behind the TV”. That gift was Super Mario Bros. 3.

I was a Nintendo kid. I had Nintendo bed sheets. I had a Super Mario Bros. backpack. I forget which year, but I know I’ve had a Mario birthday cake. I had a stack of about 10 games, and every Friday I would get McDonald’s and I’d go to the local video store to rent a game. I remember renting Mega Man 2 and having a bugger of a time with it – I couldn’t beat any bosses, but the fact that I had eight different levels to try instead of having to play level the same one over and over again kept me content. I remember renting Mike Tyson’s Punch Out and being forced to rematch King Hippo over and over again because I didn’t know to punch him in the godforsaken mouth.

I had a subscription to Nintendo Power for what must have been four or five years. I remember many a summer day playing outside, waiting (impatiently) to run and check the mail to see if the new issue had come. I loved re-reading old issues, learning about games I would never play, getting excited for new games and new systems, and finding out new secrets about my favourite games.

Eventually, I got a Super Nintendo, and I was a full-fledged gamer – I received games for every special occasion that presented the opportunity to receive games as a gift. The parents gave me a Game Boy for Christmas one year, after I borrowed my cousins and broke it. I finished A Link to the Past and I remember how my little heart pounded when I was fighting Ganon. Probably the same way it pounded when I was trying to finish Super Mario Kart on 150 cc: I used to play my own music and mute the sound, and you can imagine the absurdity of watching an intense young boy manipulating a controller furiously to the Chipmunks’ version of “You Keep Me Hanging On”.

My mom grew less and less amused as time went on, though. She’s always seen video games as children’s toys, and here I was growing into adolescence and all of a sudden I wanted a Nintendo 64. I was jealous when my friends got one for Christmas and I did not. I thought that that was it for me and console games, at least until I had my own income. At this point I had a good computer, and so I was downloading shareware games like Doom and WarCraft II to tide me over. At least a computer had other uses that merited me having one – it didn’t quite seem like a toy to my mother.

So, I puttered around on my computer until about four months later on my birthday when a well-placed lie about a math test grade permitted my parents to think enough of me to get me an N64 for me for my birthday in 1997. I eventually ‘fessed up, of course. And I didn’t know about the N64 until after I’d lied. I actually felt really bad about lying, afterwards. But my ill-gotten system came with the relatively new Mario Kart 64, so it was hard to feel guilty for too long.

I re-experienced the heart-pounding exhilaration of a Zelda game with Ocarina of Time – probably the only time I’ve ever delayed playing a game because I didn’t want it to end. I tore the shit out of the palm of my hand trying to win mini-games in Mario Party. I spent long hours playing NHL 99 tournaments with my friends at sleepovers. I chuckled heartily at the movie parodies in Conker’s Bad Fur Day. I rented games every weekend, just like before, until the lifespan of the N64 ended, and so did my time as a gamer, at least for a while.

And then, I didn’t get a GameCube, I remained ignorant of the PlayStation, and I don’t think Microsoft had even entered the gaming ring. If they did, it wasn’t really on my radar. I spent my early university years chasing girls instead of coins. I still played a few games on a newer computer we got for the house in 2003, a little GTA: Vice City, a little Return to Castle Wolfenstein, a little Morrowind. But most of my computer time was actually spent on MSN talking to friends or trying to impress potential lovers, and downloading obscene amounts of new music, as I finally had my own CD burner.

My old Game Boy finally just stopped working, and I convinced my mom to get me a Game Boy Advance by telling her it could play my old Game Boy games. While it wasn’t a console, per se, it let me get into Pokémon (for better or worse). I also had a small addiction to Mario Golf on the GBA – it was a surprisingly fun game, for what it was.

I played an Xbox for the first time at my friend Tracey’s. I remember playing Splinter Cell and Knights of the Old Republic on there, and I remember her trying to get my attention away from it to do other things. In fact, while I was in university, most of my gaming experiences took place at other people’s houses. My friend Grant had a GameCube, some of my other friends had a PlayStation 2. I played casually, but not often.

Time passed and eventually I ended up with a girlfriend that owned a GameCube, and, as a first in my life, I moved in with her. This allowed me to have permanent access to some games that I didn’t get a chance to play through when the GameCube was new – particularly Super Mario Sunshine (which I eventually finished) and The Legend of Zelda – The Wind Waker (which I never really did get very far into). I started buying my own games for it, and then she bought a DS, which entranced me.

I’d seen a friend of mine play a DS the year before, with its two screens and its touch pad, and I was intrigued. I played some of the mini-games from Mario 64 DS, and I enjoyed them, but figured I’d never own one, as I was well out of gaming territory by that time. Now, all of a sudden, here was one that I could play every day, if I wanted to. Eventually, my then-girlfriend gave me one for my birthday, along with Tetris DS, and that was it – that started me back down the road towards gaming again. I played Tetris obsessively, mainly online, and there was no stopping me. I would be up until 5 a.m. playing, as I did with Harvest Moon 64 years earlier.

Eventually our DSes became DS Lites, we got ourselves a puppy, and all of a sudden news of the Wii was reaching us. Motion controls? Old games available for download? A new Zelda game as a launch title? We were beyond psyched. I don’t think I’d ever been so anxious for a game system since I wanted a NES for Christmas when I was five years old. Yeah, seriously.

I was a kid again. I could hardly sleep the night before the Wii’s launch. We had one pre-ordered at Entertainment Centre (the only local official Nintendo dealer) and we woke up at the crack of dawn to get it. It hasn’t been replicated since, but I remember the awe I felt messing around with the Wii on that first day, playing around with Miis and Wii Sports. I had high expectations for the Wii – and it’s not really certain whether they were met, two and a half years later, but I remember how much my first time playing Wii Sports Tennis was like my first time ever playing Nintendo at my cousin’s house, when I couldn’t have been older than four years old. It boggled the mind.

When that relationship ended (she took the dog, so I got the Wii), I moved back home, and treated myself to an Xbox 360 out of the money I would have had to put towards rent. By this point, the internet had become a big part of my re-emerging obsession with video games, and reading blogs like Kotaku had me wondering how the other sides of the console war were living. With Guitar Hero II being released for the 360 within the next month, and my obsession with that game growing daily, it became something of a no-brainer.

Since then, I’ve also purchased a PS3, so what started as a childhood passion has come full circle to become, well, an adult passion, I guess. I’m a part of a generation that sees video games as more than just kid’s toys; they’re a viable medium of entertainment just the same as music and film. That being the case, though, I still get reproving looks from my mother when she looks at my growing collection of games. Ultimately, I know that I’m not the only adult who grew up playing games and still takes gaming seriously today.

Look, let me go back in there and face the peril: A Start.

I am unaware (see: confused) of how to begin such an endeavor (see: beginning this video game blog) so I will just jump right in there. Hello…everyone. Welcome to our video game blog. Ahem. Are you comfortable? Yes… indeed.

This idea came to my boyfriend Mark (MarquisMark) and myself after skimming through sites like Kotaku, The Brainy Gamer and Sexy Videogameland and thinking: “we also have thoughts… let us project them”.

We play games (or we like to think we play games) somewhat intellectually. We discuss and critique, debate and review between ourselves, and now, of course, for those who read this little blog. We look at everything from the merit and importance of story to how bitchingly thrilling it is to blow things up (see: heads, via Fallout 3). Basically we play all kinds of games, all across the board, and want to discuss them here. This blog will include our thoughts and reviews in form of videos, audio clips, pictures and text. If that sounds like it’s your cup of tea, you should stick around.

And now some little bits about me -

Games I am currently playing and have very recently finished:

I just finished playing Phoenix Wright: Ace Attorney - Justice for All on the DS. I am also about to finish Chrono Trigger (I literally just beat Lavos and the game is on pause waiting for me to return), this being an all time favorite it’s my sixth time or so finishing it. I am currently playing Fallout 3 for the second time. I finished it first on the PS3, however this is before DLC was announced for PS3. So I acquired a copy for XBOX 360 and am now working my way across the wastes again. I have been playing Left 4 Dead and have been stalled in my play through of Oblivion. I believe my next game to tackle after I get a dent in Fallout is Portal and Bioshock, both games I have watched to completion, just not being the one behind the controller.

My favorite system of all time: SNES

My favorite games of all time:

Tetris (no “obviously you’re a girl” comments please)
Super Mario World
Starcraft
Chrono Trigger

What I’ll be writing about:

At the moment I am fairly Fallout obsessed, so I assume some of my first posts will be regarding aspects of the game that really stand out to me, as well as taking a look into some of, in my opinion, the more brilliant side quests, and their integrity. Other than that I’ll post my thoughts on any games I’m playing/replaying and perhaps do some reviews of old favorites.

If you have any comments, recommendations or questions feel free to get in touch with me. I’m really friendly, and am pretty much an open book.

Stay electric,
-clair