Almost more than books at this point in my life.
I have loved books since I was a child. But now in the last 5 years or so, I have turned to games.
I am the kind of person who loves games because of what they are and the work that has gone into them.
I loved how they did the water in Counter Strike. And the work they did on the walls and floors of buildings. I also love killing my friends in Counter Strike. I remember sniping a guy once... so good, nothing feels that good, ever. I got killed a lot more than I got to kill, but hey I never said I was a good gamer.
I loved Unreal because of the water as well, and the sounds in the background. Everyone who developed that game worked hard, and I appreciate it.
I used to love how in Doom, you could explode certain monsters with the rocket launcher. And how you could often hear the monsters before you even saw them. It gave me chills but I liked it.
I enjoyed very much the trash-talking feature for Duke Nukem 3d... ah the scum sucking bottom feeding algae eater line...
I remember my happiness at finishing Wolfenstein 3d... Ah and the secret bonus levels. And weapons... And the scary bosses. I grew to love the chaingun after playing Wolf.
I love how in rpgs, some characters have an accent or a different way of talking. I also really get a kick out of the music and the little extra attention to detail that the background designers seem to always excel at. Like secret treasures, or things you can pick up off the ground unexpectedly. Not dog crap or whatever, I mean like a mushroom or acorns or whatever, and how they are useful, instead of poisonous as they would be in this world. And ah, how a hamburger or an icecream can keep you alive instead of make you fat or get diabetes. Gaming world rules are amazing.
I miss the older games though, the older Zelda, and Secret of Mana, and also Jazz Jackrabbit, and the original Duke Nukem and Commander Keen, all of them. I loved them all. I am not good at side scrollers, and always sucked bad at Mario and Sonic (and Jill of the Jungle, and Tombi and Alex Kidd, and all the others...) but how I loved them, even now, the music is still a pleasant memory refresher for me. And the yelling at the screen when the game helpfully says, 'You are dead' or 'You Lose'.
Oh Mortal Kombat, I loved all of the versions, and I even beat them all. I hated that narrator guy ('Fight!') except for when he announced the Fatalities or Animalities. Even if I lost, I would always be amused by the gory endings for the losing character. I used to have a crush on Liu Kang. Haha, other girls liked singers... I liked a pixelated street fighter... which is less real? I know that the Mortal Kombat characters were based off real people at least.
Not like some game characters.
And no, I never had a thing for any of the Street Fighter guys except maybe Vega/Balrog, and also... Guy... (blush). Weird opposite types of crushes I know. If I were a guy... Chun Li of course. She is sooo cute! Amazingly disproportionate but hey. She could probably kill you if she wanted, so she is not just a Chinese bunny. Never thought too much of Cammy. Most games have a blonde character, Cammy, Nina, Sonya, and so on. Never could quite like them. Even the blonde guys. But although I also disliked Ken, I found I was able to beat the game when playing as Ken, to my despair. Same with Paul Phoenix. Whyyyy????
Rpgs are only my favourite because they are like a book, in a way. Sometimes I do just want to pick up a sword and slash through countless enemies or shoot lots of monsters, but generally I like to meander along the way, and have fun just wasting time on frivolities (sp?). Oh, I loved the SNES Sailor Moon RPG, it took me forever to get far in that and I always seemed to lose my saved game when I had to go up against the harder bosses.
I have played so many games, and I sucked bad at most of them but still, the joy was there, and still is. I loved building my teams carefully and lovingly, and painstakingly gathering items. The actual game was often the last thing I ever considered.
But you know what? I loved Myst, yeah, all of them, 1, 2, 3, 4 (and more?). Everything about them except for the actual gameplay. If the Myst series were people, I would run up to them all and say, 'I Myst you guys.' Wow, bad pun. Can't help it. And then they would say, 'Why did you never finish any of us, even the easier ones?' Then I would hastily mention an appointment elsewhere. Ok enough of that scenario...
I can put a game down and forget it for months or even a year, but then I will pick it back up and finish it one day. And then stop, with a hollow sense of loss, because everyone is gone, the book is finished, and I feel sad to think that it is all over now (this is my only reason for not yet finishing any of the Final Fantasy games I have. I could probably clock them because I don't suck at RPGs like I do all other games but I don't want to finish them, ironic, isn't it?). Sure, I could play again but even so, it is never the same as the first time you play a game or read a book.
The first time is always a magical feeling. Some movies have given me that feeling too. It's always a nice, cozy feeling, isn't it?
The good thing about shoot-em ups is that I enjoy playing them over and over, I don't feel sad to complete them, because I don't get connected to anyone. Yay!?
Well, I'm not sure what my point was but I am glad I said all that.
I also hate real-time games like Nintendogs (breaks my heart because other than that annoying realtime factor, I loved that game, I even basically clocked it but I got so tired of those yappy things needing more attention than a real animal so I reset and traded it) and Harvest Moon (again, I loved it so very much but eventually I cracked under the pressure! Oh Grey... and Ann... my two faves, and Mary, and Cliff... and - Doctor... why did he not have a real name?). I miss you Harvest Moon. I miss you my Nintendogs, my Jouey and Napoleon... (and I may have gotten one other dog but who cares it's so over now). The joy of using the microphone to train my puppies. They were slightly more easy to train than real puppies. I mean it. It was almost the same...
Ok ok, I loved the game but it was annoying, the end.
I miss that plastic gun controller you got with the Sega, back when I was about 11 years old. At that time, the Gulf War was on, and I asked my father, 'Why did they let that Saddam guy live? Why didn't they kill him? Now he might come back.' I thought of him as being like a supervillain on a tv show. 'Real life isn't like that', someone should have said. Only they would have been wrong in this case. He came back alright. Interestingly enough, my dad was never one for lying about stuff liek that. He just said, 'I don't know. They should've killed him, but they didn't.' And so I learned that adults not only don't know as much as we are set up to think that they do; but also they do dumb crap like what kids would do, only with serious consequences which cost hundreds of lives, or more. So I felt like I was let down. I was alway one to believe what I was told. So discovering the grimness of reality was like a kick to the stomach, every time.
Funny how a plastic gun and a war game remind me of all of this. 'Medic!' the soldiers would cry when they got shot. Or was that another game? Who knows.
But I need to tell you this, it is very important. After a while, all games blur and seem to be the same in many ways. It is because they are. Most shoot-em ups are similar, and rpgs, and puzzles, and so on. Diff engines or whatever, diff music, characters etc, but after a while, you recognise patterns and become a seasoned veteran. You say, 'Oh, I remember that plot point was just like back in ***** solid. Or, that gun is like the one from *****triads. And this spell is just like that good one in *****&dragons. And ***** from FF** is really just a white mage, like ***** from FF*.' And so on.
Well, enough about that. Even though I complain, in the end, I still love it so much. I'm not jaded and tired of it all yet.
:)
Oh wow badasses like Raiden and Auron are awesome. Just have to mention them. I always feel sorry for them though because they would find it hard to live a normal life and get married etc. Too serious or scary looking. Right? Ok ok I must stop talking, I wanted to mention something else in another post, must go.
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