Why Being A Young Or Old Gamer Isn’t That Different.

I’ve always retained an effusive avidity for my adolescent days of carefree indolence. Exalting an attritional revulsion to the notion of growing up, maturity and concept propagation. “Never!” I lambasted in the isolating solitude of my room, the classic PlayStation sigil illuminating my darkened confines as I began making a concerted effort to negotiate the vacant remnants of a police department in Raccoon City at 2 in the morning, on a school night no less! Those days of professing flippant censure enmity to these naturally complicit assurances have long since passed. I’m older, the grey hairs adorning the sides of my scalp are certainly indicative of this. Though my mind consolidates the puerile affection for smirking when someone utters the word “blue tit” and laughing at fart noises, or any bodily functions for that matter, I do command an analytical persuasion towards the necessary constructs of preferential maturity. With the arrival of my first child this coming April, which I’ll admit elicits excitement and provokes equal trepidation, the detached stupor evoked from my interspersed gaming, that facilitated interim glimpses of those heady days and blessed reprieve from my spouses nonsensical television programmes will likely (definitely!) diminish. Leaving traces of those embellished memories to conflate my absconded freedom, even the blissful staving of the compulsory provisions of maturity through convenient gaming interludes is a cruel declination for freedom. So what’s left for me now? Sorry? Watching my child grow up and all the blissful years of contentment I’ll share with said child and girlfriend as I introduce her/him to the exultant world of computer games? Well yes, of course there’s that….I guess. But you can’t make categorical comparisons to paternal tutelage and enduring a night in Raccoon City, obviously. Resident Evil is far more rewarding. I jest of course (I think?), but it does occur to me that I’ll never obtain that level of equanimity associated with being a child again. Well until I retire that is.

I’m not wishing away my life, I will continue to enjoy the anarchic vacuity of action movies deprived of any construct meaning and resist game shows or any television series structured around the densely boring world of antiquities *shudder*. But I must confess that the life of a pensioner, an asserted period dedicated to convalescence and the prohibition of mandatory employment is an appealing notion, one that is familiar to the mercurial inactivity of adolescence. Sure I’ll have a diminished dexterity in my thumbs which will likely be afflicted by arthritic inflammation. My skin will be as brittle as a grade 2 listed building, my hair will be deprived of rigidity and likely matted. My memory will be as reliable as a Republican manifest and I’ll be as medicated as Charlie Sheen in a lesbian strip club. But there is something profoundly alluring about prospective isolation. I think I’d enjoy the solitary optimisation of centralised accommodation, thrust into my retirement quarters in a lavish multi housing facility dedicated to the care of retired gamers, discussing the good old days in the communal gardens with the other residents. Sipping prune juice and sucking on Werther’s original while being besotted by the promiscuous 72 year “young” woman called Gertrude in her sexy knitted jumper, ankle high tartan skirt and in possession of all of her original teeth! Whittling a PlayStation 6 controller that has been fashioned from my own home grown produce (perhaps a turnip?) and arranging my collection of Uncharted ceramics, paraphernalia and assorted ornaments adorning every shelf space with symmetrical precision. I’ll be reclining in my rocking chair cursing the youth of the day and generally soiling myself. What a life! Just imagine all the time I could dedicate to gaming?! Rasping and wheezing like a 90-year-old hooker every time I lose a match on Fifa 58, whispering hoarse profanities to some teenage kid in Rochdale because I can’t afford to lose any more bodily fluids in case I dehydrate or conceivably lull into a diabetic coma. Go into a seizure every time I activate my ocular game system that has been integrated into my brain. Hmm? come to think of it that’s not actually sounding that appealing any more. Perhaps I’ll just sacrifice sleep when our offspring is born, in favour of nocturnal collaborations with my PS4 instead!

Whatever happens I just hope I can be half as cool as Hilda Knott I’ll be happy!

Character Creation Frustration.

 

Let’s just modify the gradient of my nose. Yep that’s better. Not sure my eyes are quite symmetrical, just a little more structural alteration needed there…..let’s separate them a little more, yeah that’ll do. Wait, why I am I black? Need to amend that promptly to reflect my pasty Caucasian skin. Don’t want people to think I’m Rachel Dolezal now do I? Oh come on, I don’t know what height I am in centimetres?! Can’t you give me the measurements in feet! All right very well; 170 cm? That must be around 6,2 right? Whoa, my hair has never retained that much volume! No that’s too long. Too short. Too effeminate, though I do like the way it brightens my eyes. Ah, that’s much better. You handsome devil, you’ll be slaying more woman than you will necromantic mages. Now for some additional cosmetic definition. Let’s define those cheekbones a little, allow my skin some modest blemishes and allow my face to be studded with some mild pigmentation just to reduce my punctuated masculinity (don’t want the woman to be too distracted). Now with the application of a cleftal philtrum and some alluring stubble…..I…..am……finished. Say, your looking…..OH MY GOD! KILL IT! KILL IT WITH FIRE!

That is my reaction to almost every character I have ever designed!

“Meet the saviour of Tamriel: a registered sex offender apparently.”

Moulding a creatively affable entity that’s both expressive and displays a semblance of humanity requires inherent facilitation of patience I simply don’t have. This particular brand of inertia is indicative of my ruthless need to progress into actual gaming elements, rather than expel the few precious hours I have pruning the nuances of my forehead or moderating the precise specificity of my ear alignment. I have effusive respect for the creative solicitation demonstrated by those with a fastidious requirement for accuracy and the extrapolation of detail that goes into animating a form, where the subtle contours of an individuals face mimics their own anatomy. This projection of creative influence is evidently latent in my own depictions, as I’m left to settle for interpretive tendencies that strongly alludes my tolerance for authenticity. It’s not that I don’t try, I just have little time to be that finicky, instead settling for colloquial interpretation of an androgynous being. I could, time permitted and suitable intervals of astringent discipline generate a loose familiarization of myself, where I’ve adhered to the subtle concavity of a dimple, or the accurate dimensions of my pout. But due to certain nonchalance restraints, measured details allude me as my eagerness takes precedent. As a result I’m left with a character that retains a culmination of my attributing parameters, much of which are dependent on vague definitions, that contort an image with contravening misinterpretation, thereby depicting me as a vacantly expressive rapist, with stunted verticality, a cleft chin and derp face that is most likely to be convicted for the violation of your anus with a machete rather than hailed as a saviour of a civilisation. What’s the point when your efforts result in a creation that looks like a stubbed toe and leaves the elephant man questioning the legitimacy of your humanity?!

“Me. But on a really good day.”

I’m always a deftly hideous creation with dearth of facial authenticity, With parameters so banal you can’t resist but settle for a stock version of yourself. In Skyrim the surplus parameters at my disposal afflicted my Nord with a visibly necrotic complexion, with symmetrical rigidity applied to the jaw so I resemble a Hexagon, with an irregular space between the eyes. He’s burdened visage sends out warnings such as “Caution Do not approach. Recently escaped resident of Arkham Asylum. Known degenerate and Bum tickler!” Fifa complied with similar interpretive variance, only this time the character, a supposed reflection of myself was so strikingly handsome that I feared he’d run away with my girlfriend?! When even a mii that I contributed to my mother’s Wii console presents a more realistic adaptation of myself, then there has to be something amiss. I’m hardly in possession of features that are distinctive, so you’d expect fashioning an accurate imitation of myself would require minimal fiddling. Dark hair, hazel eyes, expression of constant neutrality, cheekbones you could cut your hands on and a bulbous nose. I don’t want a vaguely recognisable me if people have to squint to the point there eyes are closed to recognise my features. I know it shouldn’t matter how closely related we are in appearance, but I feel more immersed if it’s “me”, or an inert perception of it. And I’d be OK if there was a capacity for passive intervention to tweak the characteristics later on with posthumous amendments, rather than having no retroactive reparations conferred to change my character. I don’t want to endure the trauma of being some mutated freak that looks like, wait. Unless, oh no. Is, is that what I look like?! Oh god no!

Let me know about the bad experiences you’ve had in creating a characters. Cheers.

Do You Still Trust The Games Industry?

For most of us its easy to reminisce about the joys of retro gaming with complacent pride. Swirling a brandy in a crystal glass embossed with thatched crevices, nestled atop a short stemmed glass–an action that was intended to be more pretentious than this sentence–as you observe your niece or nephew crying in exasperation because Driveclub has crashed again. With years of wizened experience you chortle an inaudible jape that mocks the advent of glitches before declaring that “things used to be different in my day.” Our eyes glazed by hindsight begin to project visual synapses that reveal the endearing inflection and the fragility of childhood memories. Memories commemorated by the coddled perception of bias. We allude to the economic neutrality of the industry that cared not for the futility of “earning profits.” That each game commanded respect and encouraged your capacity for love rather than the gratuitous atrocities committed by the adolescents of the today. When games were fortified by the suppression of cartridges there was a sense of permanency, with an inherent awareness that in 20 years from now you could dust off the secretions of time and carry on from where you left off. Now your lucky if the game works straight out of the case, as you grasp discs with such delicacy for fear that a wayward dust particle could inflict paralysis on it. You fantasize that when you were young gaming was reasonable, affordable and fair. Now I can assure you with honest impartiality that this is complete…..truth! Probably because they didn’t know how to exploit you effectively yet.

Take The Witcher 3 for instance. It acquitted itself with diplomatic equanimity. The game, though delayed for necessary servicing was eventually released without incident. Publications were granted access to the game weeks before its general release when normality dictates embargoes to free expression, allowing reviewers to impart honest parity to a games credentials rather than subsidised influences. Fluency and functionality is without reproach which is all very lovely, nice and harmonic. I feel all warm and fuzzy! But this shouldn’t be a cause for celebration? The minimum requirement of a game is that it works?! It’s a sad reflection on the industry when a games most commendable aspect is that it works! There seems to be mandatory conscriptions that dictate the manner in which some lazily created games are promoted, seemingly to inflict maximum austerity for its recipients that are now presented with limited time for intervention and duly cancel their pre-order. Gamers need an earthquake style early warning system that can detect tiny variations in a games shifting quality, just so preventative measures can be fulfilled before world-wide distribution of the product. Of course the companies responsible protest innocence that the lamented content is how they intended it to be. Watchdog’s, The Order, Assassins Creed and Destiny were remorseless in their provocations for philandering your money through misdirection. Promising you one thing but neglecting to mention numerous prohibitive bugs and omissions. You couldn’t publish a novel with chunks of narrative excerpts missing! And it’s not that they aren’t warning you, but rather concealing the formative information amongst articulated presentations. During interviews or previews they become susceptible to passive interrogation, often subverting the enquiries behind concealed pleasantries and logistical nonsense. They begin preaching misdirection through evasive deferences, like stating their games are “cinematic”, which is just another way of saying “we filled this game with QTE’s because it was difficult to fit development around my 14 hours of sleep”. Of course this distrust is further perpetuated by the media’s collusion with devs.

“That’s not a sunset in the distance, it’s just Bethesda exploding.”

There is so much alleged discrepancies when it comes to the transparency of publications, with claims from gamers of deceit from more liberal reviewers that retain an all to cosy relationship with devs and publishers, thereby corrupting results. Of course they dismiss claims that they lied about the quality of a particularly game that possess a noticeable drop in quality from resoundingly polished previews that were submitted months before, simply to cover for their surreptitious benefactors. I think gamers have every right to judge the legitimacy of a claim and I think they are entirely ratified to be cautious of reviews that appear too good to be true. But I fear scepticism will ultimately lead to cynicism. I mean you’d be naive to believe that certain assurances and exchanges of influence aren’t being conducted in some fashion within the industry, it’s a precedent that is beset against almost every industry. It’s politics, and politics has a muddied opinion for ethical sovereignty. But when I see reviewers fawn over the likes of FIFA and COD, my gut reaction isn’t one of suggested influence, but rather emblematic of someone who loves the series. Bias is a fundamental principle–in the loosest sense–when appraising a game. You can’t help but remark on past experience and rely on your own emotions. Perhaps that’s complacent, maybe even misleading, but deceitful? I don’t think so.

“Just your typical Ubisoft meeting. Mwahaha!”

It’s very easy to discern negligence from developers, publishers, publicists or whoever else can be identified as a potential candidate. It’s a melded composite of all these things. The game is the representative of all aspects of the industry. It’s too easy to perceive “them” as being faceless corporations extracting the purest essence of video games (which taste like cookies apparently) operated by tyrannical dictator stroking a white cat or in possession of one augmented appendage, twiddling their moustaches for added effect. There’s certainly an indication that morality isn’t a commanding construct as they continue reneging on promises widely publicised before, and its these types gesticulating sleight of hand that galvanise fans to facilitate dubious reserve to companies and their representatives. Sure there are inherent risks with any investment, and you certainly can’t rely on the opinions of people with monetary influences with the expressed purpose of gaining more money, but the general consensus can give a clearer perspective on a singular game. The problem is that kids these days (ugh!) have been conditioned to believe that consoles and even PC’s should capitulate to the restraints of developer’s whimsies, that the enamoured pretext they project to ensure the monetary safety of their respective wares is a consensual right?! Trust is certainly an issue, with glitches, unfinished content being distributed and DLC that looks suspiciously removed from your default purchase are commonalities that are only mutely disputed. But these are instances the entire industry appears to regard with nonchalant shrug that says “Oh well. Your still buying our games.” The future it seems is one of compliant debilitation, and that scares the hell out of me!

Do you still trust the games industry? Or even reviewers? Not me obviously……right? Right?!

Why So Repetitive? Why So Repetitive?

If there is one beautiful and universal, archetypal motivation, the one underlying constance that guides the ethereal normalcy of gaming conduct is, well….money. But if you omit the fiscal acclamation, simply for the purposes of this article, the other “singular” canonical mandate is that you should never give fans what they want, but what they don’t know they want. If gamers such as myself were granted dictatorial providence over what developers should be cultivating, then Uncharted 5 would already be here with any subsequent sequels already renewed and slated for bi-annual release. Oh and the cinematic adaptation should definitely star Chris Pratt as the titular forager of antiquities, with Bruce Campbell portraying the cigar chewing renegade Victor Sullivan (This has absolutely nothing to do with anything, I just really want this to be true). If we did acquire the specious right to neutralise any new or deviating notions solicited by devs, then we would resent being lumbered with generic, rehashed versions of games we’ve already intimately experienced before, just more expensive and in essence, crap. Though this affluent rule is innocuous at best, in an industry that hardly abides to a subscription of conceptual productivity or being principally brazen with its narrative, but repetition is the number 1 cause of most gaming stagnation. Its true, I made it up! But my primary concern isn’t systemic duplication, but the fervent use of the word repetitive to describe a bad game?

Let me explain, surely by design all games are repetitive, good or bad. There is a set expression that implies repetition is the embodiment of monotony, an accusatory diminishing of a game, and at first glance it appears to be cogent to convey derivatives as mundane. I’ve certainly infused various capricious statements to rationalise my inferences by stating in a complicit tone that repetition means bad, which simply isn’t true. “I enjoyed this game for a spell, but it does become very repetitive, very quickly”. Well of course it does Karl! All games pursue a regimented ideology that if altered with no prior explanation, will leave participants more perplexed than I was at the casting choice of Stallone’s beard in the Expendables! You don’t want to progress through Shadow of Mordor, dispatching hordes of Uruk’s, to then be dispossessed by Lionel Messi and wondering why reptilian adversary Smaug, has been replaced by Spyro the dragon. It’s a very liberal interpretation, a deceitful adjective who’s diminished definition has been spuriously misinterpreted, with the practice of indicating a specific or general grievance as repetitive, is a diluted connotation of the definition. It’s a regressive terminology mutually affiliated with linearity too, as though liberation from conceptual restraints is the only way to achieve a truly immersive and fun experience, despite the fact that some games benefit from conceptual or narrative restrictions, in the same way others thrive on the spontaneity of exploration.

The overused nuance that repetition symbolises perfunctory castigation that ratifies an individuals criticisms into a nicely bundled summation: It’s bad because its repetitive. But its a dereliction of expression and shouldn’t be the principal derogation, because every game utilises repetitive procedurals. That’s like saying breathing is repetitive! A game can be bland, dull, unoriginal, or not your cup of tea if you’re a middle class Brit or a 19th century detective. It can hinder enjoyment, provoke aggression or just be plain bad. But describing a poorly executed game as repetitive is inaccurate and lazy. Remember that for next time Karl!

Do you think games can be repetitive and fun?

Sporting More Than Just Simulation

“The resilient humidity is causing real respiratory issues for the players, stifling their assault on the respective goals. Their beginning to modulate their mobility to accommodate their laboured pacing to sustain and regulate their abating fatigue. The game progresses regardless and that’s a great ball through to Ronaldo! He weaves past the attacking defence, he shoots….Oh but it’s blocked by the defence and recalls off the besieging defender and its out for a corner. Ronaldo nestles the ball down analysing the desired trajectory but, wait, what’s this? Its, its, its a……..Zombie?!” I mean honestly, what can you do with a sports game? Whether its Football, Basketball or the alternate Football game where participants use their hands, so in actuality it isn’t technically “foot ball”, how can you vary the basic premise? Their concerted heritage is hardly anointed as a fable of distinguished gaming either, whispered by the community with hallowed reverence or respect. It’s a divisive genre often disregarded by the more opulent of gamers as just commercialised legal tender, like printing money. You can’t annotate such an apocalyptic thesis such as zombies in the context of a football simulator?! Their assertive dominance in mainstream gaming certainly ruffles the feathers of many, particularly the notion of an annual release, and there is always the obligatory sustainment of many sporting recreational simulators at E3, but what can you give fans that they didn’t possess last year?

“Zero gravity Basketball could be next for the series.”

What can be added that is truly differential from previous iterations; the compulsory generic commentary, updated kits of jerseys, more defined graphical fidelity, navigational cordial menus. Yes. Accurate simulation of body impact and individual running styles, sure though you’re pushing it. Introducing a Zombie apocalypse during an interval in Tiger Woods PGA Tour? Not really. All the municipal façades and auxiliary components can be altered, but fundamentally its still just golf. They can be fortified, cosmetically amended and graphically polished; but once these superficial pretences have been changed there really isn’t much accommodation for conceptual diversity, and the rate at which these sort of titles are discharged every year, there is very marginal procurement of time invested in originality. Your actively trying to accurately imitate a real recreational activity, so are limited to what they can do. You can’t be imaginatively robust with such resolute parameters, as they are so collectively inured in its own hereditary procedures that its impossible to create a distinctive hubris. Of course you’ll always encounter the connoisseurs of sports gaming vehemently attesting to the subtle alternations of individual titles, but not to discredit their profaned resilience to the contrary, but they are wrong! So how can you stifle EA’s curated impotency and manipulate their expanding dower? Simple; STOP BUYING THEM!

“Tiger Woods here, trying to earn more money for his alimony.”

The biggest issue is us, consumers. Despite my derisive resignation of games such as FIFA, bemoaning their consecutive prosperity; with the exception of last year–I have purchased every FIFA game since 2003! That’s 10 games! There’s probably a separate account at EA headquarters that calculates my annual contribution to their generated revenue. But resolution lies in our/my absence. By deliberately abstaining from purchasing their content annually, we could finally liberate ourselves from the sustained duplicates we’ve become accustomed too. Perhaps this annulling shift could usher in a new, exciting narrative for sports genre? Messi: The Vampire Slayer, Madden Ballet, NBA Jam could actually be a riveting simulator of the competitive world of Jam making, and Baseball could actually be turned into an exciting sport that non Americans would actually want to play. Just imagine the opportunities. “After an embittered annulment from his wife of 3 weeks, Tiger Woods must fight for full custody of their pet chihuahua and acquire sufficient alimony. But by night he must fight the reanimated corpses of America’s most influential, and long since deceased presidents, with just the aid of his serrated nine irons. Oh and plays golf occasionally.”