Gaming off the Beaten Path

We have decided to rid the world of your worthless civilization. Prepare for WAR! I have said it before, but I think it bears repeating every so often: I'm not entirely objective about my game reviews. While I absolutely focus on the quality of the games I play, I won't hide the fact that sometimes, I just like certain games for reasons beyond what I can explain. Maybe it's a specific gameplay loop, or story beat, or even nostalgia, but some games just have that "greater than the sum of their parts" feeling. That is especially true of my 10s games, many of which I have deep seated relationships with. I myself categorize these games a lot of ways, but I definitely have, at leas in my head, a ranking on how much nostalgia or other intangible factors impacts these titles. And I have no shame in admiting that Civilization II is more influenced by those factors than any other game on that list. It might be the one I get the most pushback on when I talk to people, I g...

May the way of the hero lead to the Triforce For the last few years, I've talked a lot about games that I don't believe get the credit they deserve. Titles where the narrative surrounding them is different than what it should be. That can be tough to do in the internet age, where online discourse is often missing context or deeper understanding of the game being discussed. However, that isn't always the case. Sometimes, that narrative surrounding a game is absolutely spot on. There are a lot of games I cover where I feel the need to tell you how great they are. Like, if I don't tell everyone how great they are, no one else will. The Legend of Zelda: A Link to the Past is not one of those games. One need not search too long on the internet, or even dig too deeply into older gaming media, to see how revered this game is. It's not just that ALTTP receives endless, effusive praise, it's that it rarely if ever seems to have any negativity surrounding it. Even the peo...

  "The American Prevailing" is a cliche that only happens in your Hollywood movies. Oh Mr. Kennedy, you entertain me. To show my appreciation, I will help you awaken from your world of cliches." Of all my 10s games, I think Resident Evil 4 may be the one I feel the weirdest about. I know, I know, how could I feel any level weird about Resident Evil 4, one of the most sacred of sacred cows of gaming history. This is one of those games that people will straight up rail you for disliking, as if it's some sort of personal attack. I guess that's starting to change a little bit, it's become a victim of being so popular that people start to hate it just for being so. That always seems to happen in the gaming industry, though that is a different discussion for a different day. Besides, it's not really why I've always had a sort of weird relationship with RE 4. I'm not the first person to say this and I'm certainly not going to last, but it just didn...

  There's nothing special about being courageous in times of need The golden era of RPGs was in full swing in 1999, at least I would say it was. The PlayStation had officially pulled away from the pack and had become a haven for the genre, the Saturn had come to be appreciated by fans for its lesser-known RPGs and the Nintendo 64....had Ogre Battle and Quest? Of course, that also meant that some of these games started to feel a little bit formulaic. That's not necessarily a bad thing, if it ain't broke don't fix it, but it's always nice to see some level of innovation. Honestly, I think the best games tend to find a middle ground, they have just enough new stuff to feel fresh but they don't throw out mechanics that have proven to be enjoyable. As great as RPGs were in this era, I feel like 1999 to 2000 was when a lot of games started feeling similar. A lot of them were still awesome, but they just sort of felt like they were doing more of the same. I felt that w...

When I came to this world, I did not even know the meaning of humanity's power, so how could I believe? But you changed all that, Hiro. You showed me the power of your inner strength and made me believe. After almost five years of blogging, I've determined that the late 90's and early 00's are my favorite era in gaming. Let's say from 1996 to about 2004. There's an entire post's worth of reasons as to why, but the most important of such reasons is a simple one: RPGs were mainstream. Nowadays, I would consider a grand total of one RPG franchise to be mainstream: Final Fantasy, and even that franchise is not as popular as it once was. I guess Pokemon is about as mainstream as it gets, but it's kind of it's own thing with a much different feel than the kind of RPGs I'm talking about.  Persona, Tails, Trails and even Dragon Quest are comparatively "mainstream" amongst RPGS fans, but they are still relatively obscure when considering the gam...

I struggled for a long time with surviving. And, no matter what, you keep finding something to fight for. Another week, another timely post. I have yet to "The Last of Us" on HBO, but I have heard nothing but effusive praise. What little bits I have seen look pretty great and seem to jive with what I've heard in reviews. One of the biggest positives I've heard? It actually follows the plot of the game. Oh My! A show about a video game that actually follows said video game? Who would have ever thought that would work? Doesn't everyone know video games don't work as TV shows and you have to completely change the plot and characters to make them fit? Did they learn nothing from the smashing success of Resident Evil? Look, not every video game plot is going to work as a full-on television show. You would have to venture pretty far from the plot of, say, Tetris to create a good or even workable program (that's an extreme example, but you get the point). But tha...