videogameHey andPOPpers, Josh again with my weekly ranting. This week’s topic, how do you play video games? What is your ideal setup? How long is a good gaming session for you? When I play, it all depends on the mood I’m in, what kind of game it is, and what happened earlier in the day. If I’m having a crappy day, bad traffic, annoying people, and I’m just in a downright foul mood, I like to cause some havoc. Take my anger out on virtual citizens of a cyber world. I may go home, crack open a nice frosty coke, plop on the couch and pop in some Horde mode of Gears of War 2 and just slaughter alien scum for a good hour or two. If I’m awake and relatively bored I might go back to my old MMORPG ways and play some online final fantasy 11 (either on my PC or Xbox depending on the mood) and slash 3 to 4 hours off my day. When the mood strikes and I feel like watching a movie but want that interactive vibe to it, I would usually play some good, theatrical, and beautiful Metal Gear Solid 4, pop in my Jabra earpiece (that came with Warhawk for PS3) and play with that much more involvement… and yes, if I want to be 100% in the game, I may even toss on my eye patch every now and then.

The problem I have, and would like to rant about this week though is what happens (and lately it’s been happening a lot) if I’m feeling lethargic, lazy, bored, just wanting to shut off my brain and do something relaxing for a couple of hours in front of my TV. I browse my gaming titles, usually starting from the games I’m currently in the middle of, usually starting with Xbox 360 titles, my choices usually include: one of a dozen shooter games, a plethora of music titles, horror games, sports titles or a movie trivia option. Nope, don’t feel like playing any of those, I move onto the PS3: a lot of the same, more sports, less horror, Little Big Planet or Eye of Judgement (both have a lot of setup involved either in the game or physically, much too lazy for that). Onto the Wii… ya, about that, as most of their games involve movement as it is… I skip over the majority, otherwise they’re all just too fast paced for me to relax to. I can’t seem to find my PSP and the DS is in my backpack in another room. I know what you’re thinking, ‘boo hoo little Josh has all this choice and is bored, cry me a freaking river’, yes, I know I am ridiculously lucky to have such a job, and it does have it’s benefits, but when your mood is ‘blah’ there really isn’t much you can do, and it’s frustrating!

No reason for this picture, I just love the power glove

No reason for this picture, I just love the power glove

What would you do if you went though an entire library of games you KNOW you enjoy, but just don’t feel like playing? Go outside? Take a nap? Watch TV? I had to figure this out, and I came up with an interim solution to keep me busy until my mood changes, first option: Set up a blog and tell the world how annoyed you are, if you’re lucky maybe they’ll respond and tell you how annoying YOU are! Option two: check out downloadable options for your next gen console, Xbox 360 has Live Arcade, community games, and original Xbox titles, PS3 has the PSN that offers downloadable games, PSP titles, and older PS1 titles, Nintendo Wii offers not only a huge selection of older titles through their virtual console, but also WiiWare titles for download as well. Option three: check out the downloadable demos available on your consoles! Just because you never thought about buying a game doesn’t mean you shouldn’t at least try the demo for it for free anyways. Even the downloadable titles usually have demo options available to test the waters before buying and downloading them. Finally option four: go to your local gaming store and take a look at the overabundance of classic game compilations available for almost every system, if you’re lucky, you could even pick up a used copy of one. So which option did I go with?

Well, I did all four, you’re reading my blog, I downloaded Castle Crashers for Xbox 360 and Wave Race for the N64 on the Wii, tried a few demos and just came back from my local gaming store with a copy of Sonic’s Ultimate Genesis Collection for the Xbox 360. I figure with over 45 classic Genesis games to play, some I loved but had a hard time tracking down to play again, some I had never heard of that when the mood to not play any of my previously loved titles strikes, I can try my hand at something I enjoyed 15 years earlier!

So, there’s my rant for the week, I’m sure a lot of you have a lot of things to say, rant about yourselves, comments, ideas, etc. So leave a comment, tell us what your favourite fall-back title is and what makes it the game you can play at any time no matter what.






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