Back in the habit
Well, it feels good to be back at my apartment. It really does, being on my own again.
Anyways, like the title says, I'm back to buying games.
Yesterday, while running errands, I picked up a 2nd Sixaxis. Jake and I started a new Resistance campaign on hard co-op. It's so awesome playing 2 players.
I also picked up Incredible Hulk: Ultimate Destruction, Gun, and Tetris Worlds, at Blockbuster using their Buy2Get1Free deal and a gift card.
That, and I'll still waiting for a package from Wal*Mart with Killzone and Pursuit Force, along with a nice looking UMD case. And someone else is sending me a bunch of PSP games and moves, so that'll be nice.
I'm really loving the PS3 the more I use it. Everything just works on it. Hell, my Wii's frozen about 4 times now. My faith in Nintendo is a fraction of what it used to be. They release few epic games and expect their users to ignore everything else, insulting the competition and having a joke of a 3rd-party lineup. This is coming from a guy with a Yoshi quilt and Mario bedsheets. Nintendo needs to rebuild itself as a company. Sure, I'm excited for Super Mario Galaxy, but in the long run, I'd rather play a Jak 4 or Burnout 5. Why? It's because they come out faster and have oomph to it. Look at the GameCube. I love driving and action/adventure titles. What's there to play on it? Super Mario Sunshine I got when it came out. But it was realllllly repetitive in level design except for the hallmark fun of the title which everyone points out. Yes, I have RE4, Dead to Rights, and nearly ever other shooter or action game on the Cube, but it pales to the PS2.
In one generation, Sony released 11 games with Sly, Jak and Ratchet, their new mascots of choice. 11 MAIN games. (Yes, I consider Jak X a main game.) What did Nintendo release? Super Mario Sunshine, Mario Kart: Double Dash and what else? Wario World? That was a super short game and boring. Their titles just don't seem to have a big presence anymore outside of a big super Zelda or Metroid release and then we wait and wait and wait. Well, I got sick of waiting. Purchasing a PS2 was the best choice I ever made. Ratchet and Jak made me remember why I played video games. It wasn't about waiting for another game featuring Mario thrown at me. It was about returning to a familiar world to once again conquer the bad guy. THAT is what sequels are about, not re-using art assets in lieu of spending time developing new properties.
When I loved Nintendo, I was hyped for every major Mario release. My first game was Super Mario Bros. Our pediatrician recommended video games to improve my hand-eye coordination. Then came Super Mario Bros. 2 which I played the shit out of. And then came Super Mario Bros. 3 followed closely by Super Mario World and a few years later Yoshi's Island. I was on a fucking roll. Seriously, they just kept releasing awesome platformers. Super Mario 64 was so big, I loved it and still managed to beat it multiple times. But something changed.
Banjo-Kazooie came out later and made me think. Sure, I loved Donkey Kong Country, passing on the later titles for being too long and too derivative. But, up until B-K, nothing had even come close to topping Nintendo's own games. It was unusual for me. I always considered 2nd and 3rd parties to be inferior stopgaps betweens 1st party releases. showed me that other companies can do games better. It had a story and more to do than Super Mario 64. I mean, it felt like a real adventure, rather than just simply jumping into paintings. In one game, it developed characters better than the entire history of the Mushroom Kingdom. The final boss battle clinched, it too. Jinjonator vs. another Bowser? It's not even close.
Since then, Nintendo's offerings have dwindled and I just kept denying it. Sure, I'll keep supporting them, but I look at the die-hards today and wonder when they'll come to the realization that I did. It sure took me a while. I just wished I had listened sooner. I knew it long ago. Why else did my brother and I still ask for a Genesis, Playstation, Game Gear and the rest as they got released? We wanted more games and Nintendo never provided enough. They spout rhetoric about "quality over quantity" and then consider 8 releases a year spanning ALL GENRES to be enough to keep us quiet.
Well, I won't be anymore. I was fucking ripped off waiting for Super Mario 64-2 and disappointed by Yoshi's Story. I don't even want to think of the years between the Mario sequels now. I'll probably pick up New Super Mario Bros. eventually, but it just feels so wrong now. It's like NSMB was an apology from Nintendo for forgetting what video games were and instead just side-storying and porting all their previous games for the last 7 years. Anybody understand my feelings?
Anyways, like the title says, I'm back to buying games.
Yesterday, while running errands, I picked up a 2nd Sixaxis. Jake and I started a new Resistance campaign on hard co-op. It's so awesome playing 2 players.
I also picked up Incredible Hulk: Ultimate Destruction, Gun, and Tetris Worlds, at Blockbuster using their Buy2Get1Free deal and a gift card.
That, and I'll still waiting for a package from Wal*Mart with Killzone and Pursuit Force, along with a nice looking UMD case. And someone else is sending me a bunch of PSP games and moves, so that'll be nice.
I'm really loving the PS3 the more I use it. Everything just works on it. Hell, my Wii's frozen about 4 times now. My faith in Nintendo is a fraction of what it used to be. They release few epic games and expect their users to ignore everything else, insulting the competition and having a joke of a 3rd-party lineup. This is coming from a guy with a Yoshi quilt and Mario bedsheets. Nintendo needs to rebuild itself as a company. Sure, I'm excited for Super Mario Galaxy, but in the long run, I'd rather play a Jak 4 or Burnout 5. Why? It's because they come out faster and have oomph to it. Look at the GameCube. I love driving and action/adventure titles. What's there to play on it? Super Mario Sunshine I got when it came out. But it was realllllly repetitive in level design except for the hallmark fun of the title which everyone points out. Yes, I have RE4, Dead to Rights, and nearly ever other shooter or action game on the Cube, but it pales to the PS2.
In one generation, Sony released 11 games with Sly, Jak and Ratchet, their new mascots of choice. 11 MAIN games. (Yes, I consider Jak X a main game.) What did Nintendo release? Super Mario Sunshine, Mario Kart: Double Dash and what else? Wario World? That was a super short game and boring. Their titles just don't seem to have a big presence anymore outside of a big super Zelda or Metroid release and then we wait and wait and wait. Well, I got sick of waiting. Purchasing a PS2 was the best choice I ever made. Ratchet and Jak made me remember why I played video games. It wasn't about waiting for another game featuring Mario thrown at me. It was about returning to a familiar world to once again conquer the bad guy. THAT is what sequels are about, not re-using art assets in lieu of spending time developing new properties.
When I loved Nintendo, I was hyped for every major Mario release. My first game was Super Mario Bros. Our pediatrician recommended video games to improve my hand-eye coordination. Then came Super Mario Bros. 2 which I played the shit out of. And then came Super Mario Bros. 3 followed closely by Super Mario World and a few years later Yoshi's Island. I was on a fucking roll. Seriously, they just kept releasing awesome platformers. Super Mario 64 was so big, I loved it and still managed to beat it multiple times. But something changed.
Banjo-Kazooie came out later and made me think. Sure, I loved Donkey Kong Country, passing on the later titles for being too long and too derivative. But, up until B-K, nothing had even come close to topping Nintendo's own games. It was unusual for me. I always considered 2nd and 3rd parties to be inferior stopgaps betweens 1st party releases. showed me that other companies can do games better. It had a story and more to do than Super Mario 64. I mean, it felt like a real adventure, rather than just simply jumping into paintings. In one game, it developed characters better than the entire history of the Mushroom Kingdom. The final boss battle clinched, it too. Jinjonator vs. another Bowser? It's not even close.
Since then, Nintendo's offerings have dwindled and I just kept denying it. Sure, I'll keep supporting them, but I look at the die-hards today and wonder when they'll come to the realization that I did. It sure took me a while. I just wished I had listened sooner. I knew it long ago. Why else did my brother and I still ask for a Genesis, Playstation, Game Gear and the rest as they got released? We wanted more games and Nintendo never provided enough. They spout rhetoric about "quality over quantity" and then consider 8 releases a year spanning ALL GENRES to be enough to keep us quiet.
Well, I won't be anymore. I was fucking ripped off waiting for Super Mario 64-2 and disappointed by Yoshi's Story. I don't even want to think of the years between the Mario sequels now. I'll probably pick up New Super Mario Bros. eventually, but it just feels so wrong now. It's like NSMB was an apology from Nintendo for forgetting what video games were and instead just side-storying and porting all their previous games for the last 7 years. Anybody understand my feelings?
Comments