The start of my gaming life began with the Atari 2600 when I was three.  Actually, it was the Sears Video System but it was practically the same.  Anyways, when we got our Nintendo Entertainment System that’s where my first loyalty began.  I was hooked with this system and we would either buy or rent games throughout its lifespan.  Fast forward a few years and the Super Nintendo Entertainment System came out and I realized I was becoming a Nintendo fanboy.  I had seen what Sega was doing in the background and dismissed it as being inferior because it wasn’t Nintendo.  This doesn’t mean I wasn’t blind to them because I did get a Sega Game Gear for Christmas because it looked superior to the Nintendo GameBoy.  Again, fast forward a few years and I got a Nintendo 64 because, not only was it 64 bit compared to the 32 bit systems, but it was Nintendo!  

As time went on it started to become apparent that my choice was folly.  What we got on this system seemed to be inferior to what the other systems got.  Sure we got Super Mario 64, Legend of Zelda: Ocarina of Time, Goldeneye 007, and others but they seemed to pale in comparison to the Sony PlayStation games like Tomb Raider, Resident Evil, Metal Gear Solid, and such.  Later on in the life cycle I did get a PSone so I could finally play these games as well as a Sega Dreamcast.  But I made the mistake, again, a few years later and decided to get a Nintendo GameCube because it was Nintendo and surely they wouldn’t make the same mistake again…

It started out OK with the games being pretty good with Super Smash Bros.: Melee, Legend of Zelda: Wind Waker, etc. but it fell by the wayside super fucking quickly when the other systems were getting Metal Gear Solid 2, Grand Theft Auto 3, Halo, and other heavy hitters.  Not to mention those systems were embracing the future of online gaming while Nintendo was just dabbling with GBA connectivity.  I couldn’t take it anymore and decided to just put the GameCube up and get into the Sony PlayStation 2 and Microsoft Xbox ecosystem.  When the generation was coming to an end I had made a decision which would last two decades.

With the Microsoft Xbox 360 it just seemed like it was the system that had everything.  Its online ecosystem was booming.  The games were there and looked amazing.  The controller was the bomb.  The system was customizable.  It was just super hip and cool.  My friends and I played Halo 3, Gears of War, Forza, and the like and couldn’t be happier.  Even when the Sony PlayStation 3 and Nintendo Wii came out it felt like the days during the NES when those systems just couldn’t compare.  Even with the Red Ring of Death that plagued the generation, even two of my systems, it didn’t phase my devotion to the system and I became an Xbox fanboy.  I made my mind to keep on the bandwagon for the next system set to be released in 2013.

I felt the Microsoft Xbox One was a cool system too.  I loved the design of it.  How the controller looked.  The Kinect being included was whatever.  I was even on board with the TV implementation of it.  I was kind of sketchy about the always online connectivity but I didn’t think it was a big deal because I really was always connected and would love to share my games with my family.  I got one that December along with some games and kept the train going.  I was even going to buy a Sony PlayStation 4 the same day because I could but they were sold out.  I started buying my games digitally and built myself a super huge library.

Throughout the generation the writing was on the wall that the Xbox One was inferior compared to the PS4 in terms of hardware and software.  The games just weren’t coming to the Xbox so Microsoft tried to fix that with the release of the Microsoft Xbox One X being a powerhouse but I think the system was too little too late so they pivoted to their next system that I had to have, the Microsoft Xbox Series X.  Sony was on board and released their Sony PlayStation 5 at the same time in 2020.

I was happy with this system.  I loved everything about it and felt the PS5 was just a hideous beast and didn’t really care for what it had to offer.  Heck, the Xbox even had Game Pass which I had subscribed to up until 2026 to play all the new games and be happy.  Things just couldn’t go wrong for the system, right?

Here is why I am talking about loyalty.  2025 was the year Microsoft decided the Xbox consoles and the brand was basically pointless.  At the start of the year they decided that they should put some of the Xbox games on the PS5.  It was only going to be 4 games so we shouldn’t worry, the Xbox was the main focus!  Then they announced even MORE games were coming to the PS5, like Gear of War, and would run EVEN BETTER on that system!  Then they cancelled a bunch of games we’ve been looking forward to for the last few years, like Perfect Dark, and told us to kick rocks.  Granted, these games were troubled, but still!  They then announced that Halo, the main reason why people stuck with Xbox, was going to PS5 as well.  So what’s the point?  Lastly, Game Pass, what seemed to be the only reason why to stick with an Xbox going forward with its low price point and access to a large library of games was being broken up into even more tiers and the price was DOUBLING.  So, not only were you getting less games but you were now meant to pay MORE for those games.  Fuck this!  The day after it was announced in October 2025 the price would increase, I went and bought all the components and built myself a PC to last me quite a while.

Microsoft effectively nuked any goodwill they had amassed over 20 fucking years of brand loyalty by sure corporate greed.  What was a system I had loved was, essentially, thrown to the curb and told it wasn’t good enough.  I still love the system because of how well it was made and how it functions but I can no longer follow Microsoft to the ends of the earth.  They’ve made their bed and decided to squeeze all the money they can out of their dying brand and the loyalists to which, in the end, they will probably tell them to fuck off once all is said and done.

They’ve made mentions of how the next system is going to be and how it will be a premium experience.  But who fucking cares?  Microsoft has shown they don’t know which direction they want to go and why should anyone follow them.  Of course we’re held by the balls because of our large digital library they have behind their walled garden but I no longer trust them to even carry that forward without some dumb caveats.

Microsoft of loyalty can fuck right off.

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Fast forward to 2005 when I had just bought an Xbox and bought Battlefield 2: Modern Combat for it.  Luckily for me it came with a 2 week trial of Xbox Live.  I had no intention of playing online but my friend convinced me to give it a try.  Playing that brought me back to how much I liked the game.  I enjoyed it so much that when I got my Xbox 360 a year later, I bought the game there to play it with a new bunch of people on a more modern system.  It was also on this system I played Battlefield 1943 as well as did a really stupid thing with Battlefield 3.  During this time there were also the Bad Company games I tried as well as Vietnam but I didn’t take to them.

In 2011 I had just built a new computer and thought what better way to check it out than with Battlefield 3.  I also just got an SSD to see how quick it would load on that which was a complete night and day.  I also decided to get the game for the Xbox 360 as well because I wanted the maximum amount of people to play with.  I also hoped some of my friends would get it too [which they didn’t].  Unfortunately, I didn’t play as much as I wanted to because by this time, we were into the thick of Call of Duty mania.  Black Ops was also taking up more of my time and I really loved the way it played.  It was quite a different change going back to Battlefield with how different they played.  

Now the year is 2013 and I was in line to get either the PlayStation 4 or the Xbox One.  I got myself an Xbox One as well as Battlefield 4 and playing this game on this new system was unlike anything I’d ever seen.   Seeing the world collapse as certain objectives in the game happened was amazing.  This was the one my brother and I got really into.  I kind of stopped playing Call of Duty at this time and was strictly a Battlefield player and I couldn’t wait until the next one popped up.  

Battlefield 1 was announced next in 2016 which took the game back to World War 1 and from all I saw it looked like a completely different departure.  Again, my brother and I were totally excited for it and were super happy how well it turned out.  Having the change in setting as well as the new weapons and type of map changing events made it super cool.  Again, we couldn’t wait, luckily Battlefield was right around the corner set to be released in 2018.

Battlefield V really seemed to have been it for me.  I played the game a bit but didn’t really care for it.  My brother and I tried it but everything just seemed off about it.  The gun play seemed like it was trying to mimic Call of Duty again and the emphasis on making defenses.  It wasn’t what I was looking for in a Battlefield game.  Also, the World War II setting was still kind of played out at this time.   I may have also been bored of first-person shooters because I really didn’t give two shits about Call of Duty as well.  

I fell out of love with the Battlefield franchise at this point.  Seeing them trying to chase the battle royale didn’t work out for them.  The monetization of the game was just something that rubbed me the wrong way.  What they did on the gameplay as well as the massive changes they made for Battlefield 2042 just pushed me away hardcore.  Also, what EA did to the Battlefront franchise was enough to make me not want to play anymore of their games.  Fortunately, it seems like EA heard all of this and decided to show the world Battlefield 6 which was going to release in 2025 and, from what I saw, I couldn’t be more excited!

If you’re still reading this post, you’re probably wondering where I’m going with this.  Why am I just reiterating a Battlefield Life with no real point.  Maybe I’m just reminiscing so that way, in 20 years, I know exactly what was going on in my life for the previous 20 years.  Maybe I just want to tell you how I feel the future of Battlefield is going to finally be alright after years of it stagnating.  Who knows but you should probably read on.

A beta released for all platforms to try in mid-August 2025, and I finally got my hands on it.  Everything felt like it should.  The gameplay.  The environments.  The sounds.  The hecticness.  The anxiety inducing matches.  The Battlefield Moments.  They were all there!  I couldn’t be more excited!  I told my brother who was also on board.  I was going to play a modern Battlefield game on a new generation, Xbox Series X, and the anticipation was building and building!  Up until September 29, 2025.

So, this is why I’m writing it.  I was so excited for this game, and I had preordered it [which I don’t do anymore] and I had even done the Premium edition because I felt they finally deserved it.  On this day it was reported that EA announced they were going to be acquired by a consortium of venture capitalists PIF, Silver Lake, and Affinity Partners for $55 billion in a leveraged buyout.  Normally I don’t care if companies get bought or sold but when I saw this, I had a crisis of conscience.  I could not condone with my own money this sale to people who I feel was responsible for some of the worst atrocities committed in the modern day.  After some thinking, I cancelled my preorders and vowed to never touch the game.

Even though it’s only been a month, and I have really been tempted by the game based on the videos I’ve seen since, I still cannot support them because of this.  It really breaks my heart not just because it’s a game I was looking forward to but because of how long the Battlefield series has been in my life.  From a teenager away from home to a middle-aged man with a home of his own.  Now, because of the ever-creeping monster that is corporate greed and a “fuck your feelings” movement, Battlefield is dead to me and will probably never be resuscitated.  Thank you, Electronic Arts.  Thank you so much for killing something that I love but I guess that’s why you went to PIF, Silver Lake, and Affinity Partners cause it’s what they’re best at.  

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Today the cover of Madden 10 was released with two athletes on it, Troy Polamalu and Larry Fitzgerald, who were both stars in the last Super Bowl. NCAA Football 10 was also released with my fellow Texas Tech Alum, Michael Crabtree, for the Xbox 360 version so this made me even more giddy. These games have never really bothered me with their releases annually since that’s how sports roll. What really bothers me are the legions of so-called “gamers” who say that these are garbage just because of, what they say are, minor graphical updates, roster updates and other negligible additions that shouldn’t warrant a full purchase. People: STFU! First of all, these games are done in record time, 10 months, in which entirely new contracts need to be made, animations redone, scouting reports and others that most development studios wouldn’t be able to do if they had years [take a look at Gran Turismo 5 for an example]. Also, these games are the very epitome of what a gaming is all about. You have patterns, multiple “endings”, competitive play, single play, lasting appeal, strategy and more that should be enough to keep other enthusiasts happy. Granted they do use plenty of canned animation and use most of last years engine, but that’s for practical use. Developing a game engine would just be outrageous and a resource hog if they did it every single year, for every single one of their yearly franchise.

With that defense, I’ll move into the real topic: being an asshole. Gamers are known for this because we don’t like noobs invading in our territory. It’s offensive to us to think that people who only play Diner Dash or Bejeweled are in the same circle [of Hell?] as Street Fighter 2 EPIC players. A notable example of being an asshole is this recent VGCats comic. Just because you don’t agree with another person’s gaming habits [even if they are Bejeweled] does not mean that you [who likes Excitebots] is any different than them. We’re all part of the social pecking order of gamers that play these things just to have fun. Most of us may have spent eternities trying to pull off a 300 hit combo in Marvel Vs Capcom 2 or figure out WTF was going on in E.T. for the Atari, but does that make us any different from those who try to get the highest score in Bejeweled by analyzing the surroundings to figure out the perfect pattern to chain our combos? I don’t think so. These games may be contrary to our tastes, but to them, Gears of War is just as ridiculous.

This may seem kind of like I’m being a hypocrite since I’ve been plenty outspoken against other people’s tastes, but I’m not saying they’re retarded for liking or not liking a game, I’m saying people should give the shit they rag on a try. Super Smash Bros.: Melee is an example of a family friendly game that has LOADS of hidden exploitation that quickly threw it into competitive gaming so who’s to say that Diner Dash or Peggle couldn’t have the same. These quick games are the natural successors to what we had as a kid with coin-operated games that were only to hold our attention for minutes at a time. Yet, like most douche bags out there, think these nostalgic games, such as Pac-Man, are the best things ever.

Just because we were here first does not make us any better than people who followed. At one point or another we’re all noobs and had to get good at our hobby in order to enjoy it so it should be courteous that these games that new gamers are enjoying should be applauded for bringing more people to our medium, even if those people tend to be douche bags, at least when they do graduate to “traditional games” we can fucking snipe their head off from 100 yards out while jumping off some stairs.

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First off are the visuals. Everyone is saying how technically impressive this is for a Wii game, which is true, but shouldn’t be seen as a good thing. Yes, the Wii is the weakest of the three consoles and doesn’t have TRUE HD capabilities, but every time I hear/read that The Conduit is gorgeous, I throw up a little inside my mouth each time. The people mostly saying this are the Wii-only crowd who claim that this is on par with current Xbox 360 and PS3 games. !!! Have they not seen what Killzone 2 can pump out or Call of Duty 4 was able to do, at 60 frames per second nonetheless…at ridiculous resoultion?! To even compare the two, I feel, is an insult on an extreme level. From screen grabs of The Conduit, I see no sense of realism in this game. There’s buildings with clean floors and pristine walls rather than ones that look either destroyed or used as in K2 or CoD4. Hell, even Halo 2 had buildings that were at least partially used, not to mention Resident Evil 4. Again, I’m just going off of screens here and not complaining on fluidity or effects since streaming videos aren’t exactly the best thing to judge off of.

Next are the praises at how “original” this game is. Seriously? Terrorists, viral outbreaks, alien invasion, mutated people? This has all been done before plenty of times so there really is nothing original about it. I’m not saying that the other games were original, because they weren’t, but at least Gears of War or Killzone put you on different worlds rather than using Earth again. I’m just pissed because the same people that say it’s original are the ones who call Gears an Unreal knockoff or how Killzone uses the generic space marine figure. I guess having former Secret Service agent, Michael Ford, will be the next great character next to Mario and Solid Snake. Bullshit!

Controls are something that I could probably rally behind. I loved the controls in Metroid Prime 3: Corruption and with some few tweaks, which this game is offering thanks to customizable controls, would be the ideal shooter. Unfortunately with the good always comes the bad. The Wii and I never got along when it came to controls over long periods of time. Pointing at the screen [or resting my hand on my lap WHILE pointing at the screen] was easy at first but, over time, my hand would get tired of having to keep it in that position and would start to shake due to the strain. Mind you this isn’t after 5 hours of rigorous gaming but more along the lines of an hour or so. When a game requires you to be accurate with your reticule, shaking is a no no. This isn’t the Wii’s or the game’s fault, but something that would force me to consider the options. Unless they allow Classic Control support, but I highly doubt it.

Basically what I’m saying is that, although The Conduit is shaping up to probably be a great game, the people who say that it is original, a technical powerhouse and will show another reason why the Wii caters to core-gamers need to shut the fuck up.

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When I first started up Resident Evil 5 I was rather disappointed that, from the get go, I was unable to select Sheva [my new video game crush] to play as. Instead I had to pick stinky Chris Redfield and be unhappy. Luckily that changed when I did co-op, beat the game and unlocked her for my consumption at any time I wanted. This got me reflecting about every time the option is available to chose an avatar in a game, I either create a girl or pick the girl character [if possible.] Is something wrong with me? Does this make me any less of a gamer? WTFUX!?

For the most part I feel that this isn’t anything to frown upon since I’m still playing the game as it was intended to be played, except now I have some virtual eye candy flashing her shit! There have been plenty of studies that analyze all this data to show that people don’t go the Neo route and, instead, make a visually appealing image rather than look like their boring selves. When I make my womens, I don’t even make them as my ideal girl [though I may hint at her in the name ;)], I just make her as something I wouldn’t mind seeing walk around for hundreds of hours and not get annoyed. Being a different sex in game does grant rewards besides visual stimulation though…

Sheva, for instance, says some pretty lame one-liners throughout the game that wouldn’t be the same if they came from a male character. Her accent also makes it all the more lovely too. These quips about tankers being huge, herbs, and being notified about the same tanker being the the only visible object in an ocean make my day. Enough about my Sheva-Crush. The real joy of choosing a girl is that seeing this little fragile being kick a sack-wearing, chainsaw-wielding freak’s ass is always a satisfying moment. Knowing that my little feminine level 80 Prot. Paladin takes a fuckload of time to kill breaks through all the stereotypes that movies have created. People say that Scarlet O’Hara or Mulan are strong female roles, but did either one of them tank Cyanigosa or destroy Albert Wesker? No. Warding off hunger? Saving a dynasty? Stabbing the Witch King in the face? Shit, video game females call that a Tuesday.

Choosing to either make or a be a female in game does not mean that I secretly want to be a girl, it just feels more rewarding to me. Being a 25 year old male [that means I’m a man…right?] I feel that, being something I’m not in a world with no consequences, is always the way to go. The reason why I pick girls is that I love boobs. Analysis over.

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His first argument is of the user interface that is in all consoles [handheld and home] that he finds to be distracting and does not contribute at all to the gaming world. This, I find, to be complete nonsense as, with the Xbox 360 and PS3 have shown, these always running interfaces keep gamers in contact with all their friends at all times when the system is on. No more having to hop on AIM or call your compadres to see if they want to play games only to wait for them to call you back and find them in a lobby. You can just invite them to the party you’re in and invite them to play the same game you are. Granted this is just on the Xbox 360 as the PS3’s interface still needs some tweaking till it gets it down but compared to the archaic methods that the Wii uses, it is a godsend to have these features at your fingertips. His other dilemma about this is that it takes time to boot up the OS and then hop into a game which is false. The only systems that do this are the Nintendo ones whereas the others allow the option to start the game upon turning on the console, granted the game is IN the console in the first place.

Next he goes on to complain about the abundance of buttons on modern day controllers and how games were much easier to control way back when. There’s a simple answer to why this is so: games have become sophisticated now. Games have graduated from the times when two plays were acceptable for football and when all you needed was a jump and shoot button. With the advent of 3-D gaming, you needed to be able to control the camera [or rely on AI to position it for you :(], you needed buttons assigned to all your new moves and, above all, you needed the ability to just handle the complexity of the newer generations. Games like Pac-man work fine with no buttons and a directional control scheme, but that’s because it was from a developer standpoint and not a hardware standpoint. Console back then had NUMEROUS buttons which were mostly in the form of number pads and were usually tethered to the system, not to mention an abundance of consoles made a uniformed control scheme idea commit suicide. More than likely the use of just directions was met from an economic standpoint on the developer’s end of not having to program for multiple consoles. Games back then didn’t always just use those two buttons though. You always had maps of holding left then pressing B to activate some feature the could have been made easier if two more buttons were added. Limiting buttons is just limiting the possibilities of designers to be more frugal. When that happens, you get the monstrosity that was Metal Gear Solid: Twin Snake’s control scheme.

In regards to the older consoles being able to run forever, I will point to the NES as your bastion of absurdity. This console is the very epitome of all that can go wrong with older systems. For starters the choice of going to a front loading drive meant that when a user inserted a game they ALWAYS bent the pins that read the data and, after time, caused these pins to wear out extremely fast. This, coupled with cheap parts, made the NES unplayable. I remember having a trick of piggybacking two carts, blowing into the system and pressing Reset some odd times to finally get the game to work, only for it to fuck up in the middle of it. My family took really good care of their new investment but when it comes to cost effective measures and piracy control methods that shit on the consumers there’s little you can do. Cartridges being built like tanks is completely true but they do have a cyanide capsule embedded within them called “Battery Backup.” The games still worked great, as long as they were clean, but over time the batteries would just wear out causing years of game data to be erased. Nothing you can do about keeping them somewhere else off of the system as memory cards/paks/HDDs were some long ways off.

I will concede defeat about load times and their effect on the industry. Things are being done to decrease these times such as installing to hard drives, network distribution and others. Over the span of a console generation they usually dissipate as developers become streamline the data process of the console.

Firmware updates to the console sector of gaming is a welcomed edition, in my eyes, and is the next logical step for network gaming. He argues that they should have gotten it right in the first place and how they’re time consuming and frequent. I have news for you buddy, these updates happening regular are keeping your investment running and getting rid of those load times you bitch about. Getting hardware right the first time, no matter how many engineers you have on your payroll, just isn’t going to happen. In the old days you had hardware revisions that, if you were stuck with your first gen hardware, meant you were left in the snow and not cared about. Microsoft has shown that everyone is part of their plan regardless if you bought a console the first day as you have constant support from them with new interfaces, hardware tweaks [through software] and all around bug fixes that would, otherwise, cause you to hang yourself. They’re frequency is good because it shows that they’re still finding things that can better optimize the system and help keep it from becoming a homebrew playground like the now defunct Dreamcast or how the original Xbox was.

I feel the same about patching games as I do patching hardware. It enhances the experience for us more so than it does them. When a company is able to patch their games you have examples such as Burnout Paradise or Call of Duty: World at War. When they don’t, you get Guitar Hero 3 [for Wii] having mono sound and gamers having to ship in their game to get one with stereo. I’m really adamant about patching in games because I know plenty of games that could have been improved with a patch but didn’t because of the policy from the company that they do not patch [SMASH BROS. BRAWL!!! >:(] These patches allow the developer/publisher to provide more content either free or as DLC which has had it’s share of ups and downs. People seem to forget that these are businesses and want our money all the time to survive. Even if it’s shit that should have been included on the disc, like alt. costumes for Street Fighter 4, no one is putting a gun to my head and forcing me to buy them. We do the same thing with movies in buying the same movie twice because one has updated features and commentary. Would you rather buy a $60 game once and MAYBE purchase some DLC for it…or buy it twice to get those things you want on the disc. Choose wisely.

To settle the score, the writer states that he’s not all that into the “bells and whistles” of the new consoles. This is just the exact opposite of how I feel since I’m glad that when I plop $300 on a system I’m getting more out of it than playing games on it sometimes, I get to watch movies, talk to friends, listen to music, stream though my files,…watch porn…, and play games. Consoles in the early times weren’t over complex not because they were trying to keep things simple or they wanted to get grandma to play, it’s because they just weren’t able to. When you have the ability to do something and don’t, is that a smart move? It’d be like walking from GLOBAL WARMING instead of running.

Ignorance to what the new machines have to offer isn’t something that should be applauded when one decides to keep things simple, but should be seen as hindering the evolution of the industry. In the end it is up to the developers to deliver us rich and engrossing games [and from evil?] but when they can’t deliver us because of limitations in hardware from a back end standpoint, the only ones to blame are the same fuckers who are still stuck in the “simpler times in gaming.”

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The reason why I choose the novice setting, even on games I’ve been playing for decades, is because I really just want to complete the game in it’s entirety, take it for it’s narrative [if it has one] and not be burdened with lame shit that I know happens on the harder settings. Games like Metal Gear Solid or God of War have great exposition that tell what Snake or Kratos are striving for and when that narrative happens over and OVER and OVER[!!!!] again because I get shot while jumping over a crevice to my death, which causes me to see the same cutscene upteen times, it tends to become annoying. Sure I can learn how to play the game better and not suck OR I could just stick to the novice route while learning how to play the game, get my narrative crack and be happy. I’ll go with option B.

Now we have the main reason why I FUCKING HATE the harder settings and it has shown itself plenty of times during my run through Gears of War 2 on the Insane difficulty: cheapness. While I appreciate the game for ramping up the difficulty, I feel they shouldn’t do it at the expense of making a shot to the fucking face mean as much as a spitball to a steel wall. If I score a headshot on ANY difficulty with ANY gun it should mean instant death to the enemy. To make it harder for the player to just keep popping them in the noggin, program the AI better to try to better conceal their head as much as possible which would cause it to be more rewarding for me, the gamer, when I do score one. Next comes how much the player gets weaker while the enemies get stronger. In Gears, I spend about 50 rounds per each enemy while two or three shots of their guns cause my body to turn to pizza. In higher difficulties I would much rather prefer many more enemies flanking me with the same type of damage percentage done to them and me rather than have each enemy be as buff as a fucking Brumak. It just seems like a cop out on the programmers of making the game actually be a rewarding and strategic experience on Insane rather than annoying like Halo 3’s “Legendary” mode.

I’m bitching because of how many times, when playing on co-op, we have to pull a trial and error tactic to see where troika placement is to better our strategy. It may be impossible to give the AI uber intellegence that makes it a formidable opponent, but I can always dream I guess…or play online deathmatch :3

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While going through blogs, forums and the official Capcom site, I’ve noticed tiers starting to pop up on who is top, middle and low tier and, sadly while reading the comments, I’m noticing many people crying foul whenever someone says that their going to main Ken. The comments turn to insults as usual on forums, but now it’s personal as Ken has always been the character I turn to. Ever since SFII I’ve always picked him due to his melee attacks over projectiles and the extreme awesomeness of his Shinryu-ken that made itself so prominent in the Alpha and VS series of games. To hear people call this character cheap is the same thing that happened in another one of my beloved fighting games, Smash Bros, when people called Fox cheap for being too fast and having the Shine ability which reflected projectiles. I’ve come to accept that people will always call the person they lose to a “cheating pile of shit” but just because a person is overpowered doesn’t mean that anyone who plays them is a n00b who should learn how to play with a real character. To all my gaming brethren: get the fuck over it!

I don’t quite understand how people can call it cheating or being cheap when this is how Ken has always been since the designers started separating him from Ryu in Champion Edition. It seems like most people think that SF should be all about defense, no offense and a fuckload of Hadoukens being spammed out the ass but in this series, minus a few exceptions, this isn’t the case. As seen with many characters like Guile, Chun-Li and others, a close and personal assault can surely spell victory against a person who normally mains a projectile fighter like Ryu or Sagat. A similar case is in World of Warcraft between a mage and a warrior. The mage is deadly at distances but a three legged kitten up close whereas the inverse is said with a warrior, yet people don’t start bitching that the game is unbalanced, it’s just two completely different styles of playing.

Another reason why this is probably bothering me more than it should is because of all the “new comers” coming into my beloved series that don’t understand the mechanics of it. Focus attacks, Ultras, cancelling and a unblockable moves seem to make these people think that the game is broken and, again, call me a “cheating pile of shit!!” Newsflash! Play the game for almost two decades and you’ll understand all the greatness that this series has to offer.

So, in summary, should you see a player on Xbox Live! with the username Purplelink choosing a blue Ken, don’t you fucking dare call me cheap or I will purposefully destroy you, take some damage then perform a Shoryureppa only to lead in to a Shinryuken, land and then laugh in your face.

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When I was going up, my parents took my brother and my sisters to Montgomery Ward one day because that’s just what families do, except this time we came home with something awesome;  a Nintendo Entertainment System!  This wasn’t the first console that we had since we did have an Atari that we all used but it wasn’t until we played the NES we knew what gaming REALLY was.  This is the conundrum that arises throughout my memories.  If I liked games like Super Mario Bros., Tetris, Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles, Zelda II: The Adventure of Link and many more, why am I complaining about how they’re not going for my tastes when these early games are just as easy for little old grandma to pick up as it was for me?  The thing is that these games were anything but easy.  Super Mario Bros got extremely difficult in the later levels while Zelda II was just a sex crazed lion ready to fuck your eye sockets!  Underneath those 8-bit visuals were games that were ready to train your reflexes, test your patience and, above all, make you feel like completing the game was an achievement.  This is one of the parameters that Nintendo has failed me in this generation. 

Having played Twilight Princess, Galaxy, Metroid Prime 3 and many of the other “traditional” games that are supposed to appease to my tastes, they left me craving more difficulty.  Although my age has risen considerably since we first popped open the NES box, I found out that when a game is invigorating enough I will get extremely involved that sleep eludes me.  A recent case of this was Gears of War for the 360.  My friend and I, who are both reasonable men with responsibilities, threw ourselves into the gauntlet in order to complete this game on Insane Difficulty.  What’s even more off the wall about this tale was that we had beaten it twice before but were so entranced by the game’s gameplay, visuals, interaction, variety, storytelling and difficulty that we HAD to do it.  Then I bought me the Wii and my initial hopes were extremely high.  Then this motherfucker decided to crush, broil, serve and then shit them out.

Upon first opening the packaging for the system, memories from my childhood came rushing back to me like no other system before it had done.  I eagerly plugged in the system, popped in the game [Twilight Princess] and proceeded to save Zelda all over again.  Like my first time of sex, it was over all to fast with some disappointment.  I didn’t think that the game was over because it was, frankly, just too easy.  Ironically, the preceding console game [The Wind Waker] was easy too but that game had character while Twilight Princess was just a brown mess filled with a DSL packed Link, an imp who doesn’t get the screen time she deserves and a bunch of weird creatures that are VERY suggestive.  After completing this game it finally hit that it was over because, unlike Gears of War of Corruption, there is only one difficulty to complete the game at.  Some may have found it hard while others may have found it just right.  Well you know what?  Fuck them!  Give me options to at least increase the amount of time playing it rather than just saying, “Oh you’re done?  Here’s the bill.  Get out.”  It was the exact same way with Super Mario Galaxy.  Corruption actually bucked the curve and went and gave us three options like all good games should do which I am glad they did even if Hyper Mode Difficulty was easy.  At least they gave the option to make it more difficult.

The most common rebuttal for these types of rants from people who like the games that come out for their system is that the Wii has tons of good games that provide hours of fun while providing unique control methods and this argument holds merit on some grounds.  Where their convincing fails on me is that the games they talk about are ones that really have no progression methods that I’ve grown accustomed to.  Also, like the proverb of teaching an old dog new tricks, I am extremely comfortable with complicated methods of controlling my character.  I find games with no story progression to be pointless to play just because what is my motivation in playing it:  high score?  There are some exceptions to this “rule” in that I love music rhythm games with a passion while some puzzle games tickle my funny place so nice I dream about it.  A theory I have concocted is with music games I really enjoy actually being a part of a song I like and with the introduction of the drums, I can actually get more involved than ever before.  Puzzle games are a different story just because some are good while others suck.  One puzzle game that completely turned me on was Polarium.  This game wasn’t about quick reflexes or falling blocks but rather a game you could stop and think about for weeks on end only to get that “AH HAH!” moment while at work.  Simply lovely.

Story progression was something I really didn’t care about when I was growing up but that might be because storytelling in-game wasn’t implemented all too well.  As I got older I started going towards more sophisticated means of getting a really engrossing story which came from books, movies and even well laid out tracks on albums.  Video games weren’t even on the radar when it came to narrative until 1999 when Final Fantasy VIII came out.  VIII may be the asshole of the bunch, but its story entranced me because I had never seen a fully played out love story done in a video game that was full of emotion.  The year before that Ocarina of Time had come out but that game’s story was almost as non existent and full of “ORLY” moments that it wasn’t what I was craving.  VIII gave me a reason to actually feel for the characters, what they’re feeling and the rejection that every young boy feels in his life when the girl he loves gets possessed by an evil [but smokin’ hot] witch lady.  This game single handedly changed my perception on the narratives found in this medium and only expanded the already filled database of wonderful stories inside my noggin.  Just like books though, as I age the stories that I get more involved with are about things I like.  At the time when I was introduced to stories within games, I was an angst ridden teenager with raging hormones whereas now I’m a mid twenties grownup who likes intense scenes rifled with everything that makes me enjoy being a guy (explosions, busty women and curb stomping).

Apart from ripping the Wii a new one, it did make me realize just what type of gamer I am.  I like games that actually have some meat to them more than the bones of gameplay.  I want motivation, options, satisfaction and, above all, a memory that will stay with me when I get older and even more decrepit.  Shadow Link from Zelda II isn’t in my memory because he was just challenging but more because he was fun to play, he was my doppelganger who needed to get busted up, I had multiple ways of beating him and when I beat him I threw the controller to the floor in accomplishment.  This memory is one that has stuck with me since I was five and will probably follow me to the grave. The Wii does have also one more redeeming quality within its gizzards and that is the ability to try to beat that fucker again on the Virtual Console because, as of writing, I still have yet to beat him a second time.

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