Let My Games Go!

Often I surf blog-style news sites, and these sites rely on people posting and commenting on articles as if they have some say in the matters addressed in the article. The truth is, unless it's a small site that doesn't generate a lot of traffic, they don't. A site like Kotaku cares for little but click-revenue. Developers and publishers care even less about what these people think. That is another matter entirely.

It is not uncommon to run into someone badmouthing a game and the legions of fans ganging-up on him in the game's defence. What is uncommon is someone who has become disenchanted with a series because it's sequels were bad or gameplay became stale. See - Devil May Cry 4.

I write, as is common for me, in response to the fear someone had of the future of the God of War (I shudder every time I hear the word) -franchise-.

It's a completely valid opinion, especially in light of the fact that publishers just won't let a product die. This was supposed to be the "end" of a "trilogy". I quote these words in the same manner that Sony quoted them in press releases. So it should come as no surprise that "trilogy" referred only to then end of the narrative arc as it pertained to Kratos' quest to kill Zeus, and not the end of the series. This becomes a problem in games with strong, defined narrative. Publishers don't have the guts, and as far as I'm concerned, the decency, to end a game properly. God of War 3 for example, is full of ret-con and tacked-on cliffhangers just for the sake of luring people into the next game in the series. You know what would be great? Make your games so good that people want to play the next one without the need of a cliffhanger. Final Fantasy does that with every incarnation of the game. It rides it's name and it's name alone. Each game is unique (relatively speaking) and barely, if ever, references a previous game in the series. It's also a problem for the developers. Sure, it's great for a dev to make a bunch of great games, but it's not so great to make the same game over and over again. It would be nice to see Bungie or Infinity Ward make something else but an FPS, but look at that, they're both making another game in a franchise that has been done to death. Another tell-tale sign that the series needs to end is that the combat in God of War, is virtually unchanged in each game. Sure, there are some timing tweaks and a few new moves are added. But by the time you start playing on "Very Hard", combat boils down to what is most efficient. That being square, square, triangle, and spamming grab moves (especially in God of War 3). Bottom line. Yeah, we all love God of War (well, some of us don't), but that's not a reason to keep making them over and over again with the same character. You need to change it up a bit. Take the Megaman games for instance. Boring old franchise until, whoops, look at that, Megaman : Zero. You make Zero the main character, change the combat up 100% and put a bunch of shout-outs to the old games and the series and you've got another winner.

New-ish Project

I'm going to be working on a sort of new-ish personal project based on Norse mythology. The goal is to create a cohesive, unified, functional world, as opposed to the mess that it typically appears to be.

Switching-Out

Long-time-no-post:

It's been about forever since I've posted, but this time I'm keeping it brief.

I've traded-in my PS3 in favour of a 360. Some would consider this a downgrade, and certainly the 360 has it's flaws, but to put it bluntly, online play on the PS3 is garbage (except for Killzone 2, that actually works really well). Never once had I met a single person worth talking to for more than a minute. For the most part, the vocal crowd on PS3 spew the same trash that those on the 360 do.

The only difference is in the quality of the online experience, and the 360 trumps the PS3, no contest.

On that note, I mute everybody on every online game I play. Trust me, nobody is worth talking to online in almost any game.