I don't know what my problem is when it comes to actually finishing games. I can't tell if it's distraction to other things (school, work, something) or if I look at my collection of games and say, "Hmm, think I'll try this one out now." I think it's a mixture of both, so "forcing myself" to actually see them through to the very end - and then some, maybe - is probably the best thing I could do as a gamer.
I have a passive interest in investing. I have shares in a few stocks that my Grandma bought me when I was a baby, but I don't really keep up with them too much. I'd like to get into it, though, and learn some more on how these things work and how I could get in on it. Economics as its own study is pretty daunting, so in addition to those classic texts I'll probably poke around for a few "primers" on the subject. Also, I follow Paul Krugman (economist who teaches at Princeton and writes/blogs for The New York Times) on Twitter, and he's quite good about adapting some of the economic language for laymen such as myself. I think a couple of his books will end up on my birthday wishlist this year.
Well, neither comment was meant seriously. I don't like these kinds of character designs (and the one's in Dragon's Crown have hit a whole new level of grotesque) and I've taken the entire sexism in gaming conversation to heart pretty well. It exists throughout the culture, even in places many may not really see, and surely there are people who wish to deny or remain oblivious to it. But the more disturbing and even heart-breaking participants in the conversation have been men who fight the idea tooth and nail, or who actively antagonize females as if gaming were some kind of Old Boys Club.
I don't know how many times I've seen an attractive woman and thought, "She looks good, but she would like sooo much better if she had massive breasts, small waist, and legs that make her entire body look like a Thanksgiving turkey."
And you know what: why don't YOU pardon YOUR privilege!
Again, if the internet response is any telling sign, then maybe hands-on will be the future. I've read a few articles critiquing some of Microsoft's future strategies specifically--Penny Arcade Report was pretty tough on the Kinect Pizza Hut deal. This is something that must sound amazing to investors and share-holders, sure, in the way that having artists like Usher come out to kind of promote your console is a pretty big deal. But to the real target audience - us, consumers and discerning gamers - it comes across as so awkward almost to the point of parody.
There are at least two problems with doing prequels. The first is that, by doing so, you're potentially meddling with the chronology of the franchise (TIME PARADOX--okay, there, got that out of the way). We think of Star Wars probably most immediately for doing that, but growing up as a big Gundam fan, I've seen it happen there a bit, too. All of a sudden there's these people, factors, and/or story threads that, while maybe not groundbreaking or anything, add just enough to throw off the continuity of the chronologically future titles. Oddly, I think of MGS almost doing this in reverse; we get these support characters in MGS3 who are pretty cool and not necessarily that significant, but by MGS4 they're actually all THE WORST PEOPLE EVER AND THEY PAID FOR THEIR SINS WITH THEIR BLOOOOOOOD.
The other problem (as one Cracked.com article discussed) is that, by actually showing us the past, the creator sort of takes the mysticism and imagination of the character or story. Again, using Star Wars as a reference, Anakin is turned from a good-spirited-Jedi-turned-bad into...uh, a kid and then a really underwhelming protagonist. So far, I don't think MGS has done this, because Solid Snake's tale has pretty much been told, and I guess the whole continuity has by this point has been covered. MGS3 demonstrated that a Big Boss game could be amazingly done, and the other games starring him (from what I hear) haven't been too shabby, either.
At this point, MGS is sailing into those rough seas currently battering the Resident Evil franchise: games which exist only to sell the label.
More or less that, yeah. Plus I've heard and read for a couple of years now the criticism/argument that E3 may be kind of irrelevant by this point. Print media's declined, nobody seems intent on shying away from the speed and on-demand service from the internet, and so it's almost like the event's really lost its purpose or special appeal to the gaming crowd. The presentations are never really that special, or at least nothing that couldn't be done any other time of the year, and it seems like everyone (at least in the gamer and games journalism audience) walks away complaining about things more than being excited about them: do we really need another year of Microsoft basically saying, "To demonstrate our awesome software announcements, HERE'S SOME A-LIST MUSICAL ACT!"
Who knows--maybe within the next few years E3 will end up being more of a hands-on showcase of hardware and software for investors and reporters, rather than overly glitzy and hyped stage shows.
One of the things that made me cautious about the Wii U at the moment it was announced was the fact that it was coming out a little too early. It's come out too early to really be next-gen, but its design has only (arguably) put it on par with its current generation competitors; it's stuck in this odd "current-gen-and-a-half" limbo. Getting a little third-party investment hasn't been too bad--in addition to the few ports at launch and future cross-platform releases, they've locked in some impressive exclusives like ZombiU and Bayonetta 2 (the latter of which Nintendo's actually publishing themselves!).
I think Ninendo's biggest obstacle - and which they're apparently trying to make their focus at E3 - is trying to keep that third-party "hustle" going. I was a little skeptical of both the Wii and the DS because of their greatly unorthodox hardware designs, but both had very respectable investments (the Wii had a pretty decent launch selection). And mind you, the Wii wasn't exactly up to the hardware standards of its competitors either. The 3DS surely had a rough start, but it's picked up tremendously; there's been quite a bit of attention paid to it from outside developers, and future offerings are looking pretty good too.
I don't see Nintendo abandoning its own hardware--after all, they stuck by the Gamecube. But I'm curious if they really can break out of that vicious cycle of the "software ghetto"; no one's buying the system because there aren't games for it, and games aren't being made for it because no one's buying the system. I plan on getting a Wii U hopefully before the end of summer (at latest before the holiday season), but my fondness for Nintendo doesn't necessarily reflect consumer or developer confidence.
Wired.com writer Chris Kohler tweeted something the other day (not in these exact words, though) how this move might be a way for Nintendo to mitigate the poor performance of the Wii U when put on the stage of the PS4 and next-generation Microsoft console. Save some face and, really, why further the embarassment?
But at the same time, he did mention (again, in a more brief form) how Nintendo doesn't really need to use up that stage time when they've been using Nintendo Direct presentations for a while now. The awesome Miyamoto moments aside, Nintendo doing a presentation this year wouldn't showcase much more than what they've already posted online. I don't see it happening, but who knows--maybe they'll roll out another few big announcements on Nintendo Direct during or right before E3.
Some might look at it as a sign of struggling or of total defeat, but I think this slight bit of austerity may be the better move.
I don't think it's just a lack of initiative holding back the Vita. Keep in mind that Sony's fighting an uphill battle with the system: the handheld market's been Nintendo's turf for the past 20 years and the 3DS still struggles against the boom from mobile/smartphone games. It was a hard market to break into from the start and has only gotten more difficult; even in Japan, which is regarded as being big on portable gaming, the Vita's done pretty poorly.
The price of the system isn't exactly appealing, either; the aforementioned mobile gaming scene (which is dirt cheap) combined with a sluggish global economy doesn't speak well for a $300 system with a small/subpar software library.
As for Sony themselves, I'm never really sure what to think. No company invests so much in something (namely a piece of hardware) with the belief that it'll do poorly. However, their strategy with the system isn't clear and it almost seems as if they've lost interest in their own product. Having not owned a PSP, I didn't follow their strategies in regards to it too closely, but from a distance it looked like there was a pretty noticeable dropoff where Sony just stopped caring about it. I know piracy had become really rampant with the system (to the point where that was damn near the reason to own a PSP), and that combined with a lack of first-party support turned it into a kind of "software ghetto" pretty quickly.
E3's just around the corner, so Sony will surely have something to say about the Vita there (definitely software titles, maybe even another price cut and/or package deals). But considering their victory from the PS4 announcement in February, I think that says more about what their bread-and-butter really is.
