Yeah sorry I'm late. I was putting miles on Ni No Kuni. I forgot how good it feels to lose days to a traditional JRPG. There is so much crap given to linear adventures in the old style these days. When the Personas and the Ni No's appear they are old friends come to visit, it's a pause button on real life.
You meet new friends and see new and strange sights. You wander into a town with beautifully jaunty theme music and no one familiar. Lost in the journey, as it is. It's been about ten years since MMO's showed up, right? Just about. I never thought about what the loss of this medium would be. I realize now that losing traditional sixty hour RPG adventures would be like losing the closest things we gamers have to books.
We can pretend that MMO's do this, but c'mon. They are too OCD to ever let the story take the lead. More operant conditioning than breadcrumbs. In Ni No you could idle in an overland field for hours, and that is part of the story, the art could hold the walls up by itself, now that is something.
I'm not going to harsh on the how reviewers went in on the game. Opinions are opinions, and the game mechanics are not perfect. But I can say with certainty that there is a generation of game type people that have no idea what we are talking about when we wax poetic and rose colored on a Suikoden or an Illusion of Mana. they don't have that back catalog. A generation of children that never went to summer camp. And that has to be ok.
Oh and btw the consensus from my question last week is that design would be an area I have the least chance of fucking up. Thanks guys, I think.
And now the news..
- THQ is dismantled and its parts spread to the four corners of Earth
THQ has been the gaming industry equivalent of the Terry Schiavo case for the last few years. It kicked and sputtered and fought for life, while we all stroked it's hair and looked on in despondent expectancy. Well, this week it's official, the day has come, the giant purple dildoes have left the building. There are no words that can make it better. THQ got as close as anyone to knocking on the door of the majors, but the wax wings ended up being, well, wax wings.
But the THQ team ain't much for crying, they even poured a 40 out for themselves. Baller. Shit happens, see you in the SCRUMM's folks.
- Atari Files for Bankruptcy. Also, Atari Has Still Been In Business All this Time
Atari, A.K.A the company that saved the whole industry's collective asses that one time. A.K.A. the company my dad learned to play on. A.K.A. Pitfall Harry. The company saw a 34% drop in revenue since last year and were not able to secure private buyers, so time to call it quits.
You know what, this is getting depressing, and the rest of the news is studio closes or PR fluff. And I know half of you skip to the videos anyway so I'm going back to Ni No land where happiness is. Thanks to the Escondito fighting game clan for the hospitality and ass woopin, Hope you all choke on information as usual and Jerbz.
The Protoculture Mixtape v.145 Issue : People : B@#ch Bad pt.2
