The music intensifies as all other sound becomes a damp whisper. A single gunshot is fired and a beloved character slowly falls to the ground while their comrades yell out in shock. What an emotional scene! Or at least, it would be if it weren’t for the fact that the character in question already received about a thousand bullet wounds earlier in a gameplay segment.

This is a problem that plagues many gaming narratives. Story is often governed by a very different set of rules than gameplay, resulting in some very awkward and even comical moments in what should be distressing scenes. Because of the interactive nature of games, it’s difficult to avoid these pitfalls. Yet, some games manage to handle it a cut above the rest.

Permanent character death by player action is one way to drive the point home. Of course, not all games can support this variable approach to storytelling, but the ones that do have proved quite effective.

Consider the suicide mission found in Mass Effect 2. Every party member’s life hangs in the balance. A single wrong decision on your part means you have to watch them die. To make things even more panic-inducing, that means you won’t just miss them in the final portion of the game, but also its save-importing sequel, Mass Effect 3. The fact that it can happen to anybody and that it’s your own fault gives it a sense of weight not commonly found in the medium.

But permanent death (or “permadeath“) is controversial. Even Fire Emblem, a series known for its consistent use of this idea for over 20 years finally added the option to turn it off for the first time ever in its Japan-only remake of the series’ Super Famicom debut last year. This decision was not made lightly, however, as an Iwata Asks column revealed it involved four months of heated debate between Nintendo and Intelligent Systems.

Giving the option to remove the feature may have made the game more accessible to beginners, but there’s a reason project manager Masahiro Higuchi stated, “…this would make the game cease to be Fire Emblem.” It’s about more than losing a playable character and a few lines of disposable dialogue.

My own experience in 2005′s Fire Emblem: Path of Radiance showed me that permadeath can change the entire tone of a mission. By keeping Jill (a defected soldier from the enemy side) alive, you’ll eventually come in contact with an enemy general named Shiharam who just so happens to be Jill’s father. Had Jill not been alive and kicking, I wouldn’t have witnessed her emotional turmoil at the situation or the danger of her father convincing her to rejoin the opposing army (yes, that can actually happen if you’re not careful). So the death of Jill, or any Fire Emblem character for that matter, carries not only the weight of losing their personality and strategic advantages, but also potentially missing out on a far more personal context to certain scenarios.

I’m not saying that scripted deaths are never the answer. In fact, the threat of character death by player action can actually enhance the effect of a scripted death. It may sound crazy, but stay with me.

I don’t think I’ve ever felt as down after a scripted death as I have after one featured in SEGA’s tactical gem, Valkyria Chronicles. Don’t worry, I won’t spoil the details. VC’s handling of death was so effective because of the way the game trained my brain beforehand through the aforementioned use of permadeath.

Much like Fire Emblem, every single one of your soldiers in Valkyria Chronicles is a unique character with their own personality, appearance, abilities, and backstory rather than the empty shells you’ll often find in games like Final Fantasy Tactics. As you use a character, their bio will gradually fill in allowing you to get to know them. And to really tug at your heart strings, the game makes excellent use of its visual style if a character dies. With their last breath they say their final words as the watercolor is removed from the scene, leaving only the pencil sketch of their now lifeless body behind.

It’s enough to make you want to save every last soldier in your squad. This teaches you two things: Death is a constant danger and by playing well you can keep all your troops from dying. But the latter is a total lie. At some point the game will remind you that this is a war and not everybody is coming home. This reminder comes in the form of a scripted death that turns your former feeling of control into a sense of powerlessness.

The fragile mortality of your soldiers up to this point makes the scripted event feel all to real. The only difference is that this time, like many things in life, it can’t be prevented. It was at this point I had to stop playing for the night. I needed some time.

Another powerful portrayal of death is found in letting the player control a character’s final moments. While probably not the first game to do it, the earliest example of this I can recall is Final Fantasy VII‘s PSP prequel, Crisis Core. By having the player actually interact with a completely hopeless situation, it portrayed death in a far more effective way than any cutscene could have hoped to. Since then, I’ve still only played a small handful of games that used this method including Naruto SUNS 2 and Halo: Reach (though neither executed it nearly as well).

Games have the ability to approach death in ways that simply aren’t possibly in other mediums. While the examples that take full advantage of this are few and far between, it’s my sincere hope that this will be something that helps set gaming’s narrative capabilities apart in the years to come.

We are in that time of year which traditionally gives gamers a break. A break from the seemingly endless stream of high-profile, triple-A titles from the industry’s biggest publishers. Many use this time to catch up on their backlogs, like our friends over at SideQuesting. Others, whom I can only guess are younger gamers with a lot of free time on their hands, don’t really know what to play during this slow period. Maybe they use this time to get even better at [insert popular FPS here]?

It has given me a chance to take a step back and reflect on my habits as a gamer and how they relate to the industry as a whole. Video games have become increasingly disposable as entertainment. As soon as you finish one title (or more often than not, before you even get a chance to really dig into the game you just purchased), there are ten more waiting on the shelves vying for your hard earned cash.

Media coverage is all around us as citizens of the internet. The big gaming blogs generally can’t linger on any one title because they work in a medium that is only rewarded when things are kept fresh on their home page. That isn’t a dig at what they do, it is just the nature of the beast. Core gamers are more than happy to jump from game to game every week. I find this odd considering the cost of new games has been in the $35 to $60 range this entire console generation, and those price points are driven even higher with special editions.

One of our own Contributing Editors, Michelle, recently wrote an article for Pioneer Project with the title, “Play What You Feel Like“. Those five simple words really struck a chord with me personally.

What I love about video games has absolutely nothing to do with the next iteration of Popular Annual Franchise. Trying to play every high profile game, even for a single platform, is nearly impossible for your average gamer. I’ll leave that to the big outlets that get review copies of every game and have enough staff to adequately cover them.

Really, what I want out of my games are fun experiences. The kind of things that you excitedly told your friends about on the playground in elementary school. I have been fortunate enough to have that experience on occasion in my adult life while playing through Fallout 3 and New Vegas around the same time as a few of my co-workers, but it is increasingly rare.

It is one of the core reasons I started up my “Tales from the Backlog” series. There are so many great games that I’ve never had a chance to finish that I’m increasingly having trouble justifying new purchases.

The other side of the coin is that, as a gamer, there can be an incredible draw to be in on the new releases. Listening to gaming podcasts and reading my favorite blogs does start up that new game itch from time to time. But I have found the best way around that is to just be patient. These days, it doesn’t take long before that $60 game becomes a $40 game. I’m not talking about used sales either. There is a surprising trend with modern games of sudden and drastic price drops. I can only assume this is directly related to the disposability that has become synonymous with the industry.

This may sound like the rantings of a crotchety old man, but I bring it up because it makes me worry about the game industry as a whole. Video games are my favorite form of entertainment, and I want to see them improving and innovating throughout my lifetime. What I see more and more is a churning out of yearly franchises and quick cash-ins.

When a game is finished, it is more and more common to hear about studio closures and mass layoffs, even when a game ends up with long tail success. Anything below a review score of 8 or equivalent is seen as a failure, which is incredibly silly. Some of the games you hear people talk about for years aren’t perfect games. They are the ones that tried to do something different. How often do you hear anyone discuss a Madden game that isn’t the most currently released version?

It is sad to see this console generation treated as disposable by such a large segment of gamers. It makes me wonder; will kids playing games now remember the games of today as fondly as my generation does of the 8 and 16-bit eras? Are there going to be those as passionate about preserving the history of today’s games as say, the guys over at The Museum of Art and Digital Entertainment?

I certainly hope so. I am sure for developers, disposability is the farthest thing from their minds when designing games. I can only imagine that this development is heartbreaking for them.

Back in my younger days, I swore by genre definitions. I had a very clear idea in mind of what I thought classified a game into each genre. Any deviation from those rules outlined in my head required a subgenre. But as time marched on, I’ve come to realize how incredibly ridiculous all this is.

While genres are a nice way to quickly identify what to expect from a game, I’ve run into quite a few issues with the concept. For one, different people classify genres differently. There’s also the issue of the increasing trend of blending genres. And what about the literal names themselves? Some of them just don’t make sense any more.

Different strokes for different folks

There is no master list of what each genre means and what games they apply to. Because of this, everybody has different definitions of genres. For example, I’ve always considered The Legend of Zelda series to fall under Action/Adventure. Action is self-explanatory enough, and Adventure games (especially of the point and click variety) are known for their puzzle solving and interaction with NPCs.

Yet I’ve heard Zelda referred to as a Role Playing Game or “RPG” countless times by a wide range of people. I suppose you play the role of Link. But in that sense, it seems like every game with a main character would become an RPG. In Super Mario Bros., you play the role of Mario as you attempt to save the princess from Bowser’s castle, yet many years later Nintendo and Square released Super Mario RPG: Legend of the Seven Stars. The title suggests, unsurprisingly, that previous Mario games were, in fact, not RPGs.

Where do these names come from and what do they mean?

In Super Mario RPG, you again play the role of Mario. So what makes it an RPG? The answer lies in the Role Playing Games of long ago. I refer to the pen and paper RPG. In a pen and paper RPG, you often create a character and develop their skills, usually fighting as a group or “party”. It’s also common to have a heavy focus on gathering new equipment and items. Finally, the combat relies on a lot of statistics and a bit of chance which is determined by dice rolls.

Similarly, Super Mario RPG features a party of heroes, skills that develop as you progress, equipment and items, and combat based on statistics and dice rolls (in the form of behind the scenes, randomized calculations rather than actual dice). But unlike the Pen & Paper RPGs of old, you don’t create your character (or role) and you don’t forge your own path through the story. Instead, you play a predetermined character in a linear story that you can’t change.

Most Japanese RPGs or “JRPGs” similarly follow a linear story with predetermined characters. Western RPGs or “WRPGS”, however, often feature character creators, branching dialogue and morality choices, as well as a generally less linear structure (to an extent). It’s for this reason that many gamers bother to make the distinction when discussing JRPGs and WRPGs instead of just RPGs.

For the record, this is not a discussion of quality, but of classification. I personally prefer the guided experiences often found in JRPGs. Also, I’m not saying there aren’t very linear WRPGs and very open JRPGs, I’m merely mentioning what’s seen most often in both subgenres.

We’re half-way there…

So it seems that JRPGs commonly fit only half of the definition pen and paper RPGs laid down. Lately, I’ve been putting a lot of time into a game that features the other half. That game is Mass Effect 2.

In Mass Effect 2, you start by creating your character or bringing over your created character from the first game. Aside from your appearance, you’ll also decide on one of several origins for your character and a class with it’s own unique set of skills to build up as you see fit. Throughout the game, you’re presented with countless dialogue trees that allow you to forge your own version of the story and main character, though the overarching narrative will always follow the same direction.

The combat, however, has more in common with a third-person shooter. Your shots aren’t based on digital dice rolls (as they were in the first game). Instead, you rely on the mechanics found in all cover based shooters, supplemented with your characters’ skills.

And yet, Mass Effect 2 and Super Mario RPG are both RPGs. If somebody who lived in a cave all their life, never hearing any of the names or applications of our genre labels, were told to group games together into the genres they came up with, I doubt the two games would be next to each other.

Will it blend?

It seems like every other game that comes out now has “RPG Elements”. It doesn’t matter if it’s a first-person shooter or a 2D platformer, they sneak these aspects in everywhere. What we’re left with is a lot of unique and satisfying combinations that, despite being a blast to play, are simply maddening to try to classify.

Take Valkyria Chronicles. The back of the box assures you it is a “Simulation RPG”. I don’t know about you, but I’ve never seen that genre before or after that game’s release. I don’t think that label caught on.

Since the words Simulation RPG mean nothing to anybody except for people who have already played Valkyria Chronicles specifically, I’m often left trying to explain it to people as a Strategy / RPG / Third-Person Shooter hybrid. Frankly, that just leaves people confused and with misconceptions of just how those existing genres are combined.

What are we going to do about it?

Nothing. There’s never going to be a master list of genre definitions and as games get more and more complex, they’re even more likely to combine existing genres and make new ones in the process. This is only going to make games even more difficult to classify.

But genre labels are still a nice crutch to have. While they may often fail to represent what a game really entails in detail, they at least give us a starting point that helps us find the games we’re looking for.

That being said, it’s not very useful to argue about which games fit into which genres. People are naturally going to think about different aspects of a game with different levels of importance which could alter which genre they feel they go in.

So the next time somebody tells you Game X fits into Genre A, politely discuss with them why you feel it might better fit in Genre B instead of telling them they are wrong. Because with the lines of genres as blurred as they currently are, it just isn’t worth it to argue.

The big budget triple A games can be fantastic. They have huge teams backing them, allowing for the use of the latest and greatest tech. Graphics are slick and always pushing to look better than everyone else. Plus, you know everybody who’s anybody is going to be talking about them in your circle of gaming friends/podcasts/blogs/forums.

Often when I sit down to play one, I will end up spending several hours in front of my TV or computer working my way through it. Sometimes, this can lead to a strange mental block right before I get started. Since I know I will inevitably spend a lot of time playing one of these games once I start, it can be a little intimidating.

Like a lot people out there, gaming is just a hobby. I have a day job and a family which take priority. Writing for WingDamage, podcasting, and playing video games (the past-time that lead to the previous two) is secondary at best.

When the affairs of the day are all said and done, it’s rapidly approaching a self-imposed “bed time”, but I still want to relax with a game before calling it a day, I find myself, more often than not, gravitating towards simple games; games like Peggle or Pac-Man: Championship Edition instead of Monster Hunter Tri or Uncharted 2. Going into a gaming experience knowing I will need to commit a large chunk of time to fully enjoy it can make me apprehensive about booting it up.

This isn’t to say that starting on of one of the afore mentioned “simple games” doesn’t often lead to long play sessions, but I end up feeling more relaxed about the whole situation going in.

I recently read an article by Jeffrey L. Wilson titled “Confessions of a Dumb Gamer” (which inspired this article), in which he talks about his feelings on why he prefers simple games over big budget titles. I agree with a lot of what he is saying. We are gamers because we enjoy the medium. The division between levels of coredom are inherently idiotic. I have no problem telling fellow gamers about what Mr. Wilson refers to as a “dumb game” with as much enthusiasm as I would a big budget title.

So what helps my enjoyment of the big bockbuster games and makes booting them up less intimidating for me?

Save Anywhere

In this day and age, there is no excuse for your game to have save points. If my wife and I decide, spur of the moment, to head out and go do something else, or realize that we have to leave now to hit the pet store before they close, making me walk ten minutes to the nearest save point is unacceptable.

People are busy these days, and if I know I can leave at a moments notice without losing a ton of progress, I am much more likely to want to play a particular game.

Skippable Cut Scenes

This is a huge point of contention for me in any game. RPG’s may have made it mainstream by pushing for shinier cinematics, but when you force me to sit through them when I only have a few minutes to play, it can lead to a lot of frustration.

While I personally enjoy watching them when I have the time, I know many gamers who don’t care about the story in any game ever. They will always skip your painstakingly rendered story content, developers. It is just the way things are.

Frequent Check Points

Being able to save anywhere is important. Almost equally important are frequent checkpoints. In the 8 and 16-bit eras, it was the norm for me to have to replay entire levels from making a single mistake.

If that happens in a modern game, it is usually when I shut it off; either for an extended period of time, or forever. It depends on just how frustrating the lead up was.

Uncharted 2 is an excellent example of a game with good checkpoints. They aren’t every step of the way, but they are frequent enough that you don’t feel completely destroyed by making a mistake. This leads to me wanting to take chances and be more bold with my exploration of a game’s world; knowing I wont be punished for doing so if things go badly.

I’m sure there a lot of other things out there that could be mentioned (feel free to do so in the comments). This isn’t meant to be a list of gripes against developers on modern gaming, just some random thoughts on what I am personally motivated to play through.

Much like Dragon Quest, the Monster Hunter series is one of the biggest names in gaming in Japan and almost unheard of in North America. Most people over here just don’t “get it”, and many of them don’t want to put forth the effort required in order to really understand what the game is all about. After all, even with more accessible entries in the series such as Monster Hunter Tri, there is still a very steep learning curve to overcome.

Originally I wanted to write a review of Monster Hunter Tri in order to spread the word. However, after over 100 hours of playing the game, I still haven’t experienced all it has to offer. I’ve come to realize, it’s not a traditional review that’s going to spark interest. My hopes are that by sharing the reasons that the series is so engaging (many of which are not immediately obvious to the new player), it will help more people realize the joys that can be found from becoming a Monster Hunter.

The Ecosystem of Monster Hunter

Quite possibly my favorite aspect of Monster Hunter is how it makes you feel like a real hunter within the game’s world. When you set out on a quest, you’re not immediately attacked by every creature in your general vicinity as you progress to the end of a level. Instead, you have a goal that must be carried out within a living, breathing ecosystem.

If you’re on the hunt for a large monster, it’s not waiting for you to finish a linear stage and fight it. It is traveling as it pleases throughout the interconnected sections of map it calls home. It’s up to you to track it down and, well… hunt it! On the way, you’ll encounter any number of creatures including docile herbivores who are going about their business, as well as other more aggressive creatures that want you dead.

When you find the monster in question, those other creatures don’t just disappear. This is their home, too. They’ll join in the fight, run away, or even attack each other based on their behavior types.

The same monster can also vary in size (within reason) adding more believability to the ecosystem. With these size variations come personality differences as well. You might fight the same giant monster twice and have it be much more aggressive in one fight than the other.

A hunter must have keen eyes

In Monster Hunter, only you and your friends have health and stamina bars. Sure, you might fight a giant monster for upwards of half an hour, but you won’t find a section of HUD displaying their HP. In any other game, this would be downright awful. But Monster Hunter is no ordinary game.

Much like the ecosystem they inhabit, each monster is believable. There are many nuances to their behavior and movement. There may not be a bar indicating it, but a wise hunter knows when a monster is tired, weak, ready to be captured, or about to decimate the entire party.

Every monster has “tells,” and lots of them. A monster who once proudly charged into you now trips on his way over. He starts to slow down, begins drooling, and even develops a limp. These are the signs that get hunters excited, knowing their work is paying off.

You make the story

It’s often said that Monster Hunter has no story. In the traditional sense, that is entirely true. However, when you play Monster Hunter with friends, rarely does a night go by without a handful of stories crafting themselves.

One of the very first times I played a multiplayer session of Monster Hunter was with Jonah on Monster Hunter Freedom 2. We had just started and were doing a simple herb gathering mission. Traversing mountainous terrain, we searched for the needed materials when out of nowhere a giant bull creature known as a Bulldrome appeared. As fresh new hunters, it was a creature that could and would (given the chance) “mess us up” so to speak.

Our only safe bet was to run away. But every time we’d think we lost it and had found another good herb gathering spot, one of us would see it out of the corner of our eye and shout, “OH MY GOD! IT’S BACK! LET’S GET THE @#$% OUT OF HERE!!” Sometimes it would charge us down unexpectedly and the other would have to try to distract it so we could get to safety.

Again, this was an herb gathering mission. Yet, it was a rush and I had trouble thinking of any other gaming experiences quite like it. It happened several iterations ago and I still remember it like it was yesterday.

Similarly, I’ve been hunting a giant monster only to have an even larger monster, stronger than the one the quest wants me to kill,  just show up uninvited. It’s one thing to take down monsters many times larger than yourself, but it’s another to know that while you’re doing it, a dragon could swoop in and dwarf both of you at any moment. It’s these types of situations that develop interesting, personal stories between you and your friends.

A constant sense of discovery

Monster Hunter games are very deep. Take weak points for example. All the large monsters take damage to their various body parts differently. Then you have to factor in different types of damage. A monster’s tail might be weak to the slicing damage of a great sword, but resistant to the impact damage of a hammer. Even a monster’s elemental weakness can change with the context.

Most monsters have parts that can be sliced off or smashed to pieces. These can change their attack patterns to make things easier as well as grant you additional rewards. But even if a part can’t be broken, it can still give you an advantage. Continuously attacking a monsters legs, for example, can cause them to fall down, allowing you and your friends to score some easy hits.

But the discoveries aren’t just found in the monsters themselves. Your inventory and equipment have a ridiculous amount of details to learn about. Each piece of armor grants skill points which, at certain increments grant skills. Discovering new armor and weapon combinations as well as supplementing them with gems to add more skill points leads to endless equipment combinations to fit any number of different situations.

Similarly, inventory combination is a huge part of Monster Hunter. Monsters only drop their own body parts when they die. You wont get gold, equipment, or potions from carving up a carcass. Quest givers will give you gold, combining monster parts will the help of a blacksmith will get you new equipment (for a fee), and combining an herb and a blue mushroom will get you a potion,which can then be combined with honey to make a mega potion, and so on.

There is an insane number of items that can be made from combining, only a handful of which the game tells you about. It’s up to your own sense of discovery to find out what they all are. And since there’s way more details to the game’s systems than any one person could ever hope to remember, talk of equipment sets, item combinations, and monster strategies have dominated conversations between my friends and co-workers as we share our discoveries.

A legitimately helpful online community

I am still shocked at how nice the online community of Monster Hunter Tri is. In over 100 hours of time with the game, most of which has been online, I’ve encountered approximately 3 jerks, and way more helpful strangers than I could hope to count.

One of the first players I encountered online started our play session with the simple words, “I’m here to help.” He was much stronger than the rest of us, but when the going got tough and he did end up dying once, he quickly responded with, “I’m sorry.” I busted up laughing. How on earth can I be encountering people so incredibly polite in an online game? This is the exact opposite of what I’m use to from the medium.

Food for thought

Monster Hunter manages to take the good aspects of the MMORPG genre (large online community, disturbing amount of depth, etc) and wrap it around a solid action game that relies on quick hand-eye coordination and timing instead of repeated clicks, shortcut keys, and macros.

You will get as much out of Monster Hunter as you are willing to put into it. Pick it up and attempt a quest or two and you might be just as confused about what makes it great as you were before you started. But if you delve deep into the millions of nuances contained within, it might grab hold and never let you go.

The moment I first picked up a controller, I knew games were for me, firstly because of the way that solid black and red joystick fit snugly into my hands, and then the way the console pumped out those crunchy Atari melodies. My first experience with a video game was a sensory one. Enjoying this new experience, I basked in the frame of my TV for hours, transfixed in equal parts of awe and wonder. I was four years old and over 20 years later very little has changed.

I fell in love with video games instantly, not out of some primeval need to destroy, or the desire for addictive enjoyment. I wanted to understand how this seemingly magic concept worked, to pick apart this package of hardware and software that someone had made and try to figure out what made it tick.

What makes games tick

Even now I can’t help but wonder;  how did someone manage to tumble together the perfect combination of challenge and fun and shrink it into my living room, created so carefully that even a child could understand how to use it? In the years since my first forays into gaming, it became less of a way of passing time and more part of my personal identity. I noticed a change in people’s perception of me. Describing my hobby takes more explanation than most – as a simple sentence “I enjoy playing games”, but describing it as simply this does my lifetime’s of gaming experiences a great disservice – as you describe a love of games you can see the connotations are already building in the mind of the other person.

Like my inner child, I still enjoy the wonder of how a game is put together; the craftsmanship, intelligence, and dedication that each new game requires. Designing a new experience takes more time and sometimes more expertise than other mediums. When I admit to enjoying games, it’s a shorthand for an appreciation of all these factors: the artistry of concept sketches, the brilliance of soundtrack, even the minor details intended to go unnoticed, the often smooth experience guided by rigorous testing scripts, the careful lighting choices showing me the way to go, sometimes it’s hard to forget that I’m being guided through an adventure by the thousands of tiny decisions made by an almost invisible team of hundreds.

As I understand more about games, I can’t help but build on these feelings of amazement and wonder from childhood as our games become more and more capable, able to please, scare, or anger us in equal measure.

And this means gaining an appreciation of all the things that annoy too: the foibles in menus, the design decisions leading to awkward controls, the hundreds of little problems with a game that, regardless, still lead to an experience of some kind. Be it profound or disastrous, the discovery of each game is a pleasure in itself. It’s always puzzled me how something that takes so much hard work to create, and so little faith to enjoy can be so negatively perceived by others.

Negativity

Part of the problem is that games are often taken at face value, a tool for the socially inept, the very opposite of what any person should aspire to – an unhealthy, lonely and unchallenging lifestyle. As we’re locked in the glow of the screen, people can confuse concentration or wonder with illiteracy or laziness. It’s such a shame that we are often challenged about the productivity of gaming while we’re partaking in it, and frankly it’s an unfair approach.

Video games have an unfortunate legacy of negativity, quite unlike any other medium. It is the bad aspects of our community that are magnified out of all proportion, we receive an unfair amount of scrutiny compared to other “okay” activities, with gaming’s detractors often leaping at the first chance to whip up moral panic over a tiny detail of a game which is not outwardly reflective of the complete output of the gaming sector. While not always unfounded in the vast spectrum of issues that games attempt to convey, they are issues monitored by a community of technically agile and (largely sensible) adults capable of holding developers and publishers to account like never before, mainly through their impassioned choices as a consumer.

A hobby like any other

The crux of the issue is the interactivity of games – a feature much lauded when something dubious appears in a game, but quickly forgotten in its day-to-day context. The connection between game and gamer opens a pathway for so much more: the way that playing games can influence our personality – for the better – the benefits that the social aspects of the gaming community bring, the many friend based, co-operative experiences or random encounters brushed over by the inexperienced eye as just another character moving on the screen.

Gaming is something that we’re fiercely protective of. We rise to the bait when we’re questioned, but it’s worth remembering that the scheme of things games are at the heart of what keeps many of us productive. They offer those little moments of pleasure or challenge that we spend all day waiting for – the target for the day – the happy little focus for the evening. Ultimately, games propel us forward, whisking us through the hectic rush of the day into the arms of an interest not too dissimilar to any other. Just one of many hobbies that keep the world ticking along.

So despite the negative perceptions gamers often receive, I still think four-year-old me chose extremely well.

I really enjoy playing old games. This will come as no surprise to readers that keep up with our Friday Old Games series. But when I do get in the retro mood, I almost always do it on the real console. ROMs, collections, and downloadable releases just don’t feel the same as hooking up an NES (or whatever other system) and playing the game with the setup it was intended for, controller and all.

Lately, this has got me thinking. 20 years from now, will we still be able to experience this current generation of games? And if so, to what capacity?

While this isn’t the first generation of consoles to have online functionality, it has made the biggest leap into online integration by far. Achievements/Trophies, leaderboards, patches, DLC, digitally distributed games, online multiplayer with no options for local; these are all common aspects of gaming on the Xbox 360 and Playstation 3.

Achievements and Trophies pose arguably the smallest problem. By the time support for hosting your gamerscore is finally pulled, I doubt many will care. By then we’ll have some new type of point value to feed our narcissism and, after all, who cares about the points anyway if nobody else is actively looking at them?

The lack of local multiplayer is a bigger issue. At some point, this generation of games’ online multiplayer functionality will cease to function. Games such as Halo 2, which is only one generation behind, have already had their servers shut down. While shutting down Halo is a less of an issue due to it’s robust local multiplayer options, what about a game like MAG?

MAG is an online-only game. When the servers go down, the game can no longer be played. While this is a more extreme example, think of games based on user-generated content like Little Big Planet. Sure, we’ll still be able to play the developer-made levels and even create our own, but arguably one of the biggest draws of the game is playing a seemingly infinite number of levels from the online community.

Games are being patched more than ever before. Some of these patches tweak aspects of the game to make them more enjoyable while others fix game-crashing bugs. If one day, a console generation or two from now, I pick up an old game from this generation, it’s likely that I’ll be at the mercy of whatever the developers managed to get on the disc. The “we can just patch that problem later” mentality could end up with some repercussions in the future of retro gaming.

Digitally distributed games are something I can only hope console makers are thinking actively about. I sincerely hope the Playstation 4 and Xbox 720 will be able to play the PSN and XBLA games you’ve purchased, but at this point it’s hard to say what exactly will happen. If those storefronts close, it’s a sad thought to think of games like Geometry Wars 2 having no way to be purchased.

My biggest concern, though, is the systems working at all. Remember the ApocalyPS3? An internal clock-issue caused all kinds of havoc for a short time, regardless of whether you were trying to connect online. The point is not that I think this exact same issue will happen again. But what about similar issues? Who is going to care to fix a system breaking issue on a system that is two console generations old? If console makers don’t support backwards compatibility with the next consoles, emulation might end up being the only way to continue playing these games.

While a bit grim to think about, we can always hope for the best. I suppose we can’t hold onto the past forever, but a man can dream.

As the economy continues to dip as low as Hermes doing the limbo, once thriving businesses are forced to declare bankruptcy and even close up shop for good. And so it went for Gamecrazy and its parent company, Hollywood Video/Movie Gallery.

I am no economist. All the economic theory I know I picked up on the streets listening to the Wu Tang Clan, so I can’t tell you if the the Hollywood Video/Movie Gallery business model was destined to fail as we transition into the age of Netflix and digital downloads. However, I am a gamer and I can tell you the loss of Gamecrazy hurts us all.

I worked for Gamecrazy six years ago. My third day on the job was the midnight launch of Halo 2. I worked there until soon after the launch of the Xbox 360. I have first hand experience with the way Gamecrazy did things. I talked with District Managers and Regional Managers as they explained the Gamecrazy philosophy. I watched as the company grew to the point that it seemed like it was going to challenge mighty Gamestop for supremacy. After I left, I would still pop in from time to time to various Gamecrazy stores. Even after all the employees I knew had long gone and no one knew that I had worked there once upon a time, I was still treated with respect.

Gamecrazy seemed like the last big-time alternative to the evils of Gamestop. Yes, Gamecrazy was a giant corporation that, at its worst, pimped used games and pushed trade ins, MVP’s, and pre-orders with the best of them. For me, though, their prices always seemed a little more fair than Gamestop. You got a little more for your trades and they dropped the price of used games more than $5. A stack of games that would get you $20 at Gamestop would often get you $35 or $40 at Gamecrazy.

Since the stores were not generally in malls, you didn’t have to worry about 5,000 bored teenagers milling about, killing time on the demo stations. You could generally have a conversation with the Gamecrazy store associate and they often knew their games pretty well. They would also take the time to remember your name and what kind of games you liked. Sure, it might have all been a sales tactic so they could sell you an MVP card or a pre-order, but I like walking into a store and getting recognized by the employees. I like when employees see me as a person and not just another transaction.

I went into a Gamecrazy yesterday and the place had been gutted. Most of the stock had been sold off as the store tries to liquidate its remaining stock. Walls that had been filled to the brim with games had been stripped down to next to nothing. The DS section was down to the games that have those crappy generic cases, Xbox 360 had a whole lot of copies of Call of Duty 3 and not much else, there were stacks of old Guitar Hero guitars, and everything was 20- 30% off. The store was just starting to take down names of people that wanted to purchase the fixtures and display cases. The lone employee tried to frantically answer everyone’s questions as he went about his business with a sad desperate look in his eyes.

I went in expecting to take advantage of some deals, but left feeling sad and ashamed.

Gamecrazy did not deserve to die. Its employees shouldn’t be out looking for new jobs. They should be happily selling you MVP cards and trying to get you to try Bayonetta.

Goodbye Gamecrazy.

You will be remembered.

In a real life fight, some people will scratch, claw, bite, and pull hair in order to win. They will use whatever tools will give them an advantage, regardless of how unfair it might be. These are the type of people whose first move in combat will always be the kick to the groin. These are the type of people that always have an over-shield in Halo or an RCP 90 in Goldeneye.

To some, they are cheap bastards, to others they are simply taking advantage of what the game provides.

I have seen battles between people that exploit every advantage the game provides and those that try to play the game with a sense of honor. It often leads to harsh words, ill will, and punches in the arm. Neither one understands how the other can play that way.

When I play an FPS, I subscribe to a martial code. I do not abuse body armor or rocket launchers. I do not camp out at spawn points. I don’t steal a couple kills when the phone rings and you have to put the controller down. I would rather die an honorable death than win unfairly.

To some people this makes me honorable. To others it just makes me an idiot.

I often feel like I am playing a different game than everyone else. I don’t want games to be about finding the overpowered weapon or the perch no one else can see or hit. I want games to be a test of skill; either I beat you or you beat me. I want to win because I am better than you. I want you to win because you are better than me. I don’t want to have to worry that I only won because my gun does three times the damage of yours or you won because you had armor that let you absorb more punishment than me. I don’t understand the thrill of spamming an unblockable move over and over or making your kills with an overpowered weapon.

I grew up in the halcyon days when an arcade was still a viable business. Street Fighter 2 and Mortal Kombat sucked up hundreds of my quarters. You would put in your quarter and start battling. Gamers would put their quarters up on the screen to signify they “got next”. Sometimes there would be a line of people waiting to take you on. There was something so satisfying about crushing a line of guys. Other times you would see a gaming Titan obliterating all comers. You would see guys that were so good that it was worth 25 cents just to watch them annihilate you.

There was still trash talking, but it was kept to a minimum because there was no anonymity. If you were a jerk you had to do it to a guy standing 6 inches to your right. You wouldn’t dream of talking trash to the 25 year old on his lunch break who smelled like cigarettes and weed. I hear kids on Xbox Live cursing up a storm and I wonder,  “Would they be like this if they were 6 inches to my right, staring 2 feet up at my chin?” Sure, people still abused glitches and unfair advantages (Guile’s Slow Sonic Boom to throw move for one), but it felt like that was the exception rather than the rule. Because again, you had to do it to the guy 6 inches to your right.

I hear kids talk about Care Package cheats and the mods they got for their controllers and I feel like they’re missing the point. A victory attained through cheating just feels hollow and empty. If you beat someone by cheating did you really win? Or did your modified controller win?

No game has achieved perfect balance. There is always that one weapon or character or move that is a little too powerful. There will always be people that will exploit that weapon to achieve victory. Maybe they’ll read this and think twice about spawn camping. Maybe they won’t pick up that rocket launcher when the other guy has a pistol.

More likely, they will be invisible with an over-shield, hiding in a hole in the games geometry, reveling in their victory, completely oblivious that they did anything wrong.

My game playing habits are based on one key principle; a very good understanding of my gaming tastes and what they involve. Put simply I know the style or type of games that I’m likely to enjoy in the future based on the knowledge of the games I’ve loved before.

Varied game tastes help to sustain the thriving gaming community that we’re all a part of. Ultimately our differences and shared passions are what bring us together or fire up discussion, to me – and many others – those agreements and disagreements help to offer new and changing perspectives on games I wouldn’t have looked twice at before.

In-game, we’re making hundreds, maybe even thousands of tiny, instant decisions, but before we can start enjoying a game providing entertainment or mental challenge, we have a much broader decision to make about whether a game is right for us.

Developing a gaming sense of self

We frequently talk about casual and hardcore gamers in this community. I’m not fond of either term, but I think anyone that plays games more often than not is more discerning – far more aware of what they enjoy, making frequent yet informed decisions about their gaming wants and needs. Gaming preferences establish our gaming identity; how we’re perceived by others, our eclectic choice of favorite games are the making of us, establishing who we communicate with, and what games we play and talk about with others.

As with food, a particular palette for certain games is something that develops and changes with age. We find ourselves developing the patience for games we’d never have considered as children. Similarly, we find ourselves returning to genres or series that we played when we were younger, and a lifelong love of gaming can start by finding the first genre or platform you click with. Those tastes may not always move with us into adulthood, but the fond memories of playing something enjoyable are lifelong memories akin to a favorite album or movie summing up a period of our lives.

This idea of “game fondness” is buoyed up by a long list of recent re-imagining of childhood classics. Developers and designers now attempt (for better or worse) to tap into that sense of nostalgia and familiarity and release something new which balances the desires of the child gamer within us with our more mature gaming tastes.

One thing that never changes regardless of age is the feeling of anticipation for a game we’re waiting to be released. Often the game we’re waiting for contains the right mix of features of games we’ve played before, but it something that essentially plays like no other. The mixture of all the components enjoyed in previously familiar games, but tweaked enough to improve the format. Ultimately, this is how support for a new IP can gather momentum through a combination of word of mouth and game familiarity. A successful game pitches itself to those with a clear sense of gaming self and encourages them to spread the word to others they know that might be inclined to play with them.

Social circles in the gaming community

We’re all wired differently and this is what makes the difference between someone who enjoys First Person Shooters, Shmups, Rhythm Action Games or someone who enjoys all three that much more interesting. I don’t just see gaming as a lifestyle choice or even a pastime, I find myself thriving among a community of others, and this variety doesn’t lead to a quiet existence or even a solitary one as often thought; it’s a deeply social atmosphere held together by our fundamental differences and agreements about what we enjoy.

Having a clear idea of the games you like means that you are seldom disappointed. The merest glimpse at a games story, developer, genre or gameplay is enough to tick the boxes of your mental list of requirements. We all have different means of establishing a game’s merit, and as we get more and more comfortable with our own gaming preferences we get a clearer idea about who to share each gaming experience with.

The downside to a well defined gaming taste is that it’s often difficult to explore new games if you don’t have previous experience with a particular aspect of them. This is where collaborative games recommendation becomes more important. A customized recommendation from a friend or someone you trust based on your gaming taste is worth more than even the most elaborate review.

As gamers, we often want to tap back into the great feelings that our most appreciated games provide us with. As such, it’s in the best interest of the gaming community for developers to keep striving for the widest of goals; to create a varied catalog of memorable, or even disposable games that suit each mood, each snatched moment of time, every happy niche.

Gaming wouldn’t be the same without those feelings of nostalgia or future need, and it wouldn’t be expanding at the rate it is without the growing appetite for games that create that desperately happy (yet universal) feeling of anticipation. There is after all, no greater wait than the one for the game that was made for you.