Also Gespieltes Zarathustra
My God, it's full of franchises
So E3 is upon us. The armies of marketers rally to the corporate banners and scream their fearsome warcries. Wi-fi! Teraflops! Sequels! Market shares! By now you've probably seen images of the big three, including Sony's weird PS-a-rang. There is truly some impressive hardware in the making here, including a PS3 that can output to dual screen HDTVs. Who the hell has two HDTVs? I don't know, but I'm sure they can afford all three next gen consoles without having to look at the charge account.
But what's really amazing about all the new information coming down the pike is how much I don't give two shits. One shit, yes, I obviously give that, since I'm bothering to write on the topic. But two? No. I haven't had enough fiber.
Seriously, I can't get excited about gaming hardware anymore. Everyone has a technological fanboy apex, I think. My friend Nick's crested with the Super Nintendo. Mine lasted heartily into the PS2 era. Some people crapped out on the C64 or the 2600. And then there are Mac people, who are clearly iSane.
The point is, it's very hard for me to get worked up about specs, performance, or even actual graphics. We have evolved gaming entertainment to the point where graphics just don't really matter. If you want to express an artistic element, you don't have to parse thousands of concepts down into a few lines of code anymore. Ninjas can appear fully-formed from the mists of nightmares and interact directly with a man's jugular vein in sparkling crimson 3D. At some point an increased level of texture detail on the blood stain just doesn't add anything to the experience. Hell, Tenchu has some of the worst polygon clipping around, and it's still just a fun game to play.
So what do they have ready for the intial releases? More plumbers, more Madden's, and God help us, more Tekken. Tekken 6? At least Capcom had the decency to add words to each sequel (Super Final Street Fighter 2 EX Alpha Smurf Ultra Turbo, anyone?). Not everyone can make a Katamari Damacy, but why is anyone excited about all the same warmed-over crap? How many times can you make the same damn game? Oh, this time I can shoot the aliens with RED lasers? Awesome.
They are also making more Final Fantasies and Metal Gear games. Because kids don't read enough today, and we if we keep feeding them poorly-translated and awkwardly-written stuff like this, they may stop altogether.
Perhaps I am just becoming grouchy and old, with my red checkered bath robe and baseball bat, sitting on my front lawn yelling at the neighborhood kids as they run by with their PSPs. But I still play far more games than is healthy for my daily schedule. I bust up criminals in CoH. I tear around San Andreas in my stolen Infernus. You've seen me wax weird about the Sims. I keep an eye out for peripherals and accessories to improve my laptop, which is a monster gaming station. But I just don't think I'm going to plunk down anything this year on a console. Feh.
7 comments:
I think I'm were you are on this one. Graphics and hardware specs don't mean anything without good games to back them up.
Stef had a rule that I couldn't even THINK about getting a PS2 until I could name three games that I really wanted, that I honestly couldn't play on our first-gen PlayStation. Looking back, I think the winning triad was Ico, Jack and Daxter, and Kingdom Hearts.
I will most likely follow the same credo with the PS3. It looks great, and I will own it someday, but not until I've exhausted my gaming options on the hardware that I own.
I mean, we still have that unnamed action franchise 3D sequel that I worked on to look forward to, right?
It's much more difficult when you're a Nintendo Loyalist. I've always marched under the banner of Miyamoto-sama, but the Cube never packed the punch its predecessors had.
I remember the day one of my friends got an NES (complete with the gun and ROB, the stupid robot that never worked and was a dumb idea in the first place), and it turned the world of Creve Coeur upside down. Graphics on the same level as the Super Mario Bros./Excitebike combo stand-up at the local bowling alley, right in your own bedroom. For a seven-year-old, it was amazing. Sometimes I think the only reason I did so well in school all those years was my mom's promise to get me an NES (action set, with gun but sans ROB) if I kept my grades up.
By contrast, my brother and I bought ourselves the N64. It just wasn't the same experience.
8-bit Forever.
Did you ever actually try using ROB? It made that darn Gyromite game pretty darn tough.
It was a lot easier to give the second controller to your little brother and yell out "Red" or "Blue" when you needed him to open or close a gate. Then, when you were bored, you could send a bunch of ROB commands (transmitted to ROB through flashes on the screen) to try to give your brother a siezure or something.
Only tried ROB once at the aforementioned friend's house. He had his NES plugged into one of those old freaky projection monitors - you know, the red, green and blue lamps that were at the Ground Round near the sit-down Ms. Pac Man machine? He had one in his basement. BIG images. Fun to shoot ducks and outlaws as big as my fist.
Ah, the 8-bit era. But then came the Super NES, which I could never see as anything but underwhelming. Still, while some of my friends switched religions (from SNES to Sega Genesis), I remained loyal to Miyamoto-sama. Still, the images of a fast-moving blue hedgehog were certainly more exciting than a fat Italian plumber throwing turtle shells. But then there was Star Fox, and the balance of power shifted once more. At the end of these console wars, I was heading off to college and I had lost my lust for cyber superiority. Though I did beat my freshman year roommate Scott 16 straight times in battle mode at the original Mario Kart.
And so, weary from more than a decade of console wars, settled down with my N64 and played Star Fox 64 and Ocarina of Time over and over until I understood the zen of gaming. And I never needed another console. Oh, sure, playing at my friend's gamecube is fun every now and then, but its connotation as a participant in the console wars evokes covetousness, a negative emotion and path to the dark side. One would be playing Wind Waker and wonder what it would be like to also play Crimson Skies on the Xbox, and Xenosaga on the PS2, and soon, they're a Dark Lord of the Sith.
It's simple logic, really.
I had a Ninetendo Master System. My parents bought it with my inheritance shortly after my grandmother passed away. At the time I don't think I fully appreciated the ethical ramifications of that, but now whenever I think of ROB and his glassy automaton stare, I ponder the quandary of having gained entertainment and material joy in return for the death of a loved one.
"You wanted a Nintendo? Well, now you have one because Mor-Mor died. Enjoy."
Wow. That's kinda creepy.
I honestly don't remember how I convinced my father that we deserved a Nintendo system. We were at a Hamvention, and they were selling the ROB sets for $150. I calmly explained the position that our Atari 800 computer system was simply behind the times, and was able to list a series of new and exciting games that we could play with the new hardware. Either I had a very powerful set of Jedi mind powers at that age, or my dad was so happy to have our father-son-Hamvention bonding time that he caved. I haven't been able to move any objects with my thoughts since, so I'm guessing it's the latter.
The only thing I've understood about this entire conversation is "Also Gespieltes Zarathustra".
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