I have spent the last couple of weeks trying to think of a way of summing up the bumper crop of albums and songs that burrowed their way into my head over the last 12 months. And my conclusion is I can’t. Everything just came out as trite garbage and if I’m going to write trite garbage it might as well be trite garbage that hasn’t been in every magazine or paper this side of the moon. So I have knocked up a CD available to anyone interested, un-mixed as I don’t yet have the technology and I will leave the end of review subject well alone as of now.
So instead I am going to have a quick(ish) videogame rant. I find myself more often than not becoming a wee bit obsessed by a game. I try to keep myself busy and social etc and usually stay on top of lending my life to a series of moving pixels of polygons. But every now and then something comes along that will insist on making me late for appointments, stay up ‘til stupid o’clock in the morning and contemplate whether it’s better to finish the next level than go out and actually talk to people. I am not proud of this and do try to avoid slipping into this state as much as I can. I do have an incredibly short attention span and as a result the length of most new games kills off my interest before the hooks take hold. The current glut of big budget, bombastic productions coming out of most of the major developers has given me back my life and for that I am happy.
Geometry Wars & Crayon Physics Deluxe
Then I discovered the wonderful array of low cost, short but unfeasibly addictive games that have become available on various places on the web and on both Xbox and Sony’s online networks. Games like Braid, Geometry Wars, Puzzle Quest and The Last Man are ruining all the hard work I have done of pulling myself out terminal geekdom. They hark back to when games were immediate and instinctive grabbing by the throat after the opening few seconds and refusing to release their grip until you have either finished them or gone blind and arthritic trying. They are sadistic and evil and I love them for that.
The latest one to hook me in is far more tranquil than the usual fare but has started stealing hours of my life from under my nose without me even noticing. The game is about getting a ball across the screen to a star avoiding obstacles and all you have to achieve this is a wax crayon. Said wax crayon will make whatever you draw on screen materialise in the gameworld as physical object. Very simple. For example if you need to move the ball over a large gap you could draw a hammer on pivot and knock it over, draw a bridge and then a car and drive it over or any other means your brain will allow you conjure up. It is an amazing game and I hate it for that very same reason.
But the sucker punch that these games give me is in their completion. When, or if, I ever complete one of these games there is an extraordinarily hollow feeling of satisfaction. Yes, I may have bested the designer’s best curve ball but soon there is a wash of, “What did I actually achieve out of that?” Have I bettered my life? No. Could I have used those 20 odd hours more constructively? Definitely. Will I ever receive any kudos for it outside of the flashing ‘Well Done’ on the centre of the screen? Unlikely. Will I do it all again when the next interesting set of pixels bob their way onto one of my systems? Almost certainly.
So in an attempt to make myself feel better by virtue of bringing more people down to my level, here is the link to Crayon Physics Deluxe and some other life destroying games.
http://www.puzzle-quest.com/
Of course I’m sure almost everyone else has a much stronger constitution than me and wonder what the hell I’ve been banging on about.
No comments:
Post a Comment