Grand Tortilla Fore!
I went to Savannah about three weeks ago. We unpacked our bags across a uniquely shaped condo. It was built as if the equally sized rooms were stacked on each other, and then fell down. After some cooler-to-refrigerator unpacking, I unpacked the Dreamcast the PS2. The Dreamcast was a reserve unit, in case the city didn’t offer anything to me. My first priority was Kingdom Hearts, yet another replay of Snake Eater, and GT4 for the odd 15 to 30 minutes of various transition moments. Being away from a home for several days, I had to make sure I wouldn’t run out of options.
Concerning the city, I fell in love. That’s all that needs to be said. I didn’t find much time for any of the games. After being there for a couple of nights, I did have a burst of the ever constant insomnia. After everyone was asleep, I plugged in the PS2 and blew into the controllers input. Now, insomnia may not be the right word for issue. I was tired, but not drifting. My body ached from walking most of the day. Weariness would hit soon with a strong blow, but not yet. I had (the word had in this instance, does not mean “once owned”. Instead it means, I have this friend who doesn’t come around anymore. I’ve said before I’m a high contrast person, friends or enemies, so naturally it’s easy to go dead to me.) a buddy that used to tell me that he hated to go to sleep, because he may miss something, paraphrased of course. I understand and live by the same motto, although I’m much less orthodox. There’s always something that can be going. Those moments that make you, could be happening those times you’re lying in a bed. So I sorted through the three games and in perfect human nature, crippled my gaming priorities.
Kingdom Hearts. I’ve put about 14 minutes into the game so far. I’m no stranger to RPG’s. I’ve got at least 2 more hours of in game tutorials. I could see it already, and I didn’t like the possible outcome. The outcome of getting past a reasonable amount of the tutorials, coupled with actual application, only to come across cut scenes and general narrative that would guide me to the next objective. And then quit, right as I begin traveling towards the next objective, save and shut the system. Then you return to the game a week later, and you’re not sure where to go, or what you’re actually doing to further the story. Then you replay your couple of hours skipping elements of the game that you do remember, looking for one stray sentence to guide you to an objective. Clearly I needed more than a couple of hours to start the game.
Snake Eater. Now while I’m huge fan of the game, it’s one that doesn’t pander to casual replays. Moreover, I’ve decided to start a new save file, and kick up the difficulty. With that of course, I’m worried about the food that I collect rotting, and then ending up in a difficult situation later. With Kingdom Hearts I needed a large down payment of time in the present, Snake Eater asked for an investment of time in the future. You can play a little today, but you have to promise to play at least a little tomorrow too. There are ways around it, but I don’t work that way. Which is why I had to take down Supply Lines in San Andreas, even though it didn’t lead you to more objectives, it pushed a back story forward. If you can get at least a cut scene out of something, then in my mind it’s a must.
So I dropped the GT4 disc into the console, and sat down in a chair that looked like a tea cup, but interestingly enough, moved like a tea cup ride. Long story short, I played for 2 hours. The last hour was spent making my own statement in the game. Which is that expensive cars suck, and the people who drive them, should drive them off cliffs and land covering bridges exclusively. I have a rather big beef with the rich, and your first step to entering, or at least entertaining the bourgeois life style is buying a car. That way, when you pull into the mall, you don’t have to explain to the patrons that you’re better than them. You can just point to your car and show them. My statement was made by putting a red fin on the back of all my cars, and changing all my wheels to green. This made me feel a little bit better morally, as now all of my cars look like they were custom built by these fine citizens.
Here’s the reason I stopped, and I haven’t picked up the game since. Finally the meat, you’ve been digging through you’re pasta for. I’m attracted to the game because it allows me to create “my baby”. All your hard work would seem to lead you to specific car, that was made precisely for you and only you. After playing for about thirty minutes, I realized however, that unintentionally the game plays out like a linear story driven game. Only without a story. You buy a car, an then race it, and make some money, and then buy the fastest car available to enter the next race. And relatively, it’s the same car for everyone. You’re gonna have people like me that want to keep a couple cars around, that for whatever reason, define themselves, but there’s no reward for it. With all the pissing and moaning about the lack of online play, people obviously want to race one another. But it takes a lot of it away for me, to bring my Corvette (with red fins, and green wheels) to a server filled with other Corvettes. The ideal I’m looking for has been used countless times in mech games. These games have weapons that are, on a certain level, better than others. However you build your mech to suit your needs, by which weapons you can manipulate the best. As the games have progressed, gamers can fulfill their vanity needs by customizing the appearance. When I played, I was better with a heavy and slow mech, and I would play against people who chose different mechs to suit them. Some times I’d best them, and often they’d destroy me before I even picked them up on radar. When you add something like complete realistic simulation to a game, it does have to give off these traits I’m railing against. I can’t say I like them, but they have to be there. Just like the rich bastards. Customization is a great thing, and I hope to see more of it. But is it even customization when you follow a very directed path to achieve a rank “bestest”. (that's clearly the well illustrated "bestest jig".)
For the record, I know that word “fin” is the wrong word for the item I’m noting, but it was for the best, as it was edited down from “that shit that kids put on their trunks to get into car clubs.”
Love,
-tim
Concerning the city, I fell in love. That’s all that needs to be said. I didn’t find much time for any of the games. After being there for a couple of nights, I did have a burst of the ever constant insomnia. After everyone was asleep, I plugged in the PS2 and blew into the controllers input. Now, insomnia may not be the right word for issue. I was tired, but not drifting. My body ached from walking most of the day. Weariness would hit soon with a strong blow, but not yet. I had (the word had in this instance, does not mean “once owned”. Instead it means, I have this friend who doesn’t come around anymore. I’ve said before I’m a high contrast person, friends or enemies, so naturally it’s easy to go dead to me.) a buddy that used to tell me that he hated to go to sleep, because he may miss something, paraphrased of course. I understand and live by the same motto, although I’m much less orthodox. There’s always something that can be going. Those moments that make you, could be happening those times you’re lying in a bed. So I sorted through the three games and in perfect human nature, crippled my gaming priorities.
Kingdom Hearts. I’ve put about 14 minutes into the game so far. I’m no stranger to RPG’s. I’ve got at least 2 more hours of in game tutorials. I could see it already, and I didn’t like the possible outcome. The outcome of getting past a reasonable amount of the tutorials, coupled with actual application, only to come across cut scenes and general narrative that would guide me to the next objective. And then quit, right as I begin traveling towards the next objective, save and shut the system. Then you return to the game a week later, and you’re not sure where to go, or what you’re actually doing to further the story. Then you replay your couple of hours skipping elements of the game that you do remember, looking for one stray sentence to guide you to an objective. Clearly I needed more than a couple of hours to start the game.
Snake Eater. Now while I’m huge fan of the game, it’s one that doesn’t pander to casual replays. Moreover, I’ve decided to start a new save file, and kick up the difficulty. With that of course, I’m worried about the food that I collect rotting, and then ending up in a difficult situation later. With Kingdom Hearts I needed a large down payment of time in the present, Snake Eater asked for an investment of time in the future. You can play a little today, but you have to promise to play at least a little tomorrow too. There are ways around it, but I don’t work that way. Which is why I had to take down Supply Lines in San Andreas, even though it didn’t lead you to more objectives, it pushed a back story forward. If you can get at least a cut scene out of something, then in my mind it’s a must.
So I dropped the GT4 disc into the console, and sat down in a chair that looked like a tea cup, but interestingly enough, moved like a tea cup ride. Long story short, I played for 2 hours. The last hour was spent making my own statement in the game. Which is that expensive cars suck, and the people who drive them, should drive them off cliffs and land covering bridges exclusively. I have a rather big beef with the rich, and your first step to entering, or at least entertaining the bourgeois life style is buying a car. That way, when you pull into the mall, you don’t have to explain to the patrons that you’re better than them. You can just point to your car and show them. My statement was made by putting a red fin on the back of all my cars, and changing all my wheels to green. This made me feel a little bit better morally, as now all of my cars look like they were custom built by these fine citizens.
Here’s the reason I stopped, and I haven’t picked up the game since. Finally the meat, you’ve been digging through you’re pasta for. I’m attracted to the game because it allows me to create “my baby”. All your hard work would seem to lead you to specific car, that was made precisely for you and only you. After playing for about thirty minutes, I realized however, that unintentionally the game plays out like a linear story driven game. Only without a story. You buy a car, an then race it, and make some money, and then buy the fastest car available to enter the next race. And relatively, it’s the same car for everyone. You’re gonna have people like me that want to keep a couple cars around, that for whatever reason, define themselves, but there’s no reward for it. With all the pissing and moaning about the lack of online play, people obviously want to race one another. But it takes a lot of it away for me, to bring my Corvette (with red fins, and green wheels) to a server filled with other Corvettes. The ideal I’m looking for has been used countless times in mech games. These games have weapons that are, on a certain level, better than others. However you build your mech to suit your needs, by which weapons you can manipulate the best. As the games have progressed, gamers can fulfill their vanity needs by customizing the appearance. When I played, I was better with a heavy and slow mech, and I would play against people who chose different mechs to suit them. Some times I’d best them, and often they’d destroy me before I even picked them up on radar. When you add something like complete realistic simulation to a game, it does have to give off these traits I’m railing against. I can’t say I like them, but they have to be there. Just like the rich bastards. Customization is a great thing, and I hope to see more of it. But is it even customization when you follow a very directed path to achieve a rank “bestest”. (that's clearly the well illustrated "bestest jig".)
For the record, I know that word “fin” is the wrong word for the item I’m noting, but it was for the best, as it was edited down from “that shit that kids put on their trunks to get into car clubs.”
Love,
-tim
posted by idlehours at 12:29 PM
1 Comments:
My new favorite entry.
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