Life’s Too Short for Crappy Videogames
I play a lot of videogames. I like to think I’m fairly discerning: I don’t buy games based just on a positive review score without considering the source, I don’t buy a sequel to a game just because I liked the first, I don’t buy games just because they’re popular, etc. Sometimes, something slips through the cracks. Some games don’t quite live up to even my most informed of expectations and I’m left disappointed. I play a lot of videogames though (I don’t know if you realized that). Usually that means the game gets tossed aside for a few months before I come back and finish it.
Something changed recently. I don’t know if I’m getting more discerning, if I’m coming to terms with the (apparently) increasing number of high quality games and my (apparently) decreasing amount of free time, or if I put too much faith in my well-researched opinions and just ended up with a couple of stinkers. Whatever happened, I’ve got two games on my shelf right now that I have actively decided I am never going to play again.
It’s hard to express the significance, but I’m not one to just drop something I’ve invested in. I buy comic books I’ve lost interest in because I’m committed to finishing a set number of issues that make up a story or a specific creator’s tenure, I finish out a season of a disappointing TV show because maybe, maybe it will all come together and be awesome in the end (Lost), I finish books I’m not thrilled with because, well, I don’t know why.
That’s changing with these two games. I’m done with them. Full stop. I’m not going to pick them back up if I have time. In fact, I plan on giving them away to the first person I can find who actually expresses any interest (and doesn’t cost me shipping, sorry random internet strangers).
Phoenix Wright: Ace Attorney (Nintendo DS)
This actually came out last year, but I just bought it a month or two ago. I can’t believe I fell for the hype on
this one. I usually have a pretty good feeling for who to trust about what types of games. Phoneix Wright is an adventure game that makes me long for the “sophistication” of the tedious pixel-hunts the genre is known for.
Your character, Phoenix, is a young lawyer out to prove himself, save his law practice, defend his friends, whatever. Each chapter, or case, is divided into a few days of questioning witnesses and gathering evidence, and the trial. No part of that is even as fun as it sounds. If you’ve got two brain cells to rub together, you’ll know things hours ahead of Phoenix and just have to make stupid conversation choices and fumble through the trial and error of what order to visit locations and witnesses to get the game to advance. Forced failures in witness examinations during the trial are scripted as part of the game, which means that you’re not actually “failing” the “game”, because you’re advancing the plot, but boy do they make you hate playing. This game is just a series of illogical conversations that leave you feeling intellectually emasculated. I’m halfway through the third case (of five), and I’m never going back to this one. Dare I say it? I dare: Case closed.
Kingdom Hearts II (Playstation 2)
This is supposed to be some kind of action-RPG that brings the best of Square’s* stable of characters together with more Disney characters than you could shake a copy of Bambi 2 at. Several hours into this game and I was ready to take up more exciting hobbies, like stamp collecting. Actually, even just licking stamps would’ve been more fun. The first few hours were a horrible nightmare of the worst in-game-tutorials have to offer mashed with what feels like the entirety of the first game thrown back at me in nonsensical dream sequences. How could so much exposition tell me so little?
I honestly hate this game. I picked it up because of generally good word of mouth, too many Disney films in my youth, and the vibe that they “fixed” it. I didn’t play the first game at all because, while the idea sort of intrigued me (and there was the Disney appeal), I was at the height of my Japanese-style RPG burnout and heard bad things about repetitive combat and…whatever. I don’t remember exactly what the complaints were with the first game, I just remember it was supposed to be “fun, but flawed.” These days I’m a little more willing to give Square a try, and like I said, I heard they fixed what was broken, (and it was on sale when I bought it). I am a fool.
I was more than two hours into the game before the opening credits rolled.** It was mostly painful, hand-holding introductions to a cast of characters and a town I learned shortly do not exist. They were the dreams of the real characters I was about to “start” my adventure with. Even if any of this was interesting, the production and presentation was lousy. The dialog and story moved along through disjointed scenes; the whole game is broken up with awkward blackouts between areas, between scenes, even between sentences, that try to be fast enough not to resort to a full on “LOADING” screen, but succeed only in angering me. Throw in some horrible delivery*** for all this exposition, and I can’t imagine much they could do worse at this point in the game.
The only good news is that those same forums that tricked me into buying this were kind enough to explain that no, it doesn’t get better, don’t waste (any more of) your time. No, I don’t know why I ended up with so many footnotes for this entry.
* Square makes the popular Final Fantasy video games. They have a huge cast of characters from their catalog of games, and a rabid fan base to support them.
** Some video games, usually RPGs, are pretentious like this. They kick things off like a movie, usually with a few scenes (or in this case an entire afternoon of my time) before showing the title and then crediting the big shots involved in the game before getting things started.
*** The individual lines are spoken fine for the most part, it’s not like cheesy over the top B-movie voice acting that so many video games end up with, but there are long pauses between everything that just punch you in the brain and scream “YOU’RE PLAYING A VIDEO GAME, AND IT’S TRANSLATED TOO!” every 4 seconds. Ugh.