The Year Ahead in Gaming: My 2014 Wishlist

As gamers, we've developed little quirks, preferences, and (let’s face it) obsessions over the years of playing. Whether you started playing beloved platformers like Super Mario Bros. 3 or are a more recent gamer and stick to your guns in Call of Duty or Battlefield, you’re likely looking to the gaming industry to give us newer and better things every year. In a year that gave us 2 amazing new consoles in the Xbox One and PS4, 2013 was far from disappointing in the realm of exciting things. Console innovations like the Ouya and Oculus Rift are proof that video gaming is in the verge of a revolution where game development will be more open to the public to create and share, but gameplay now has the potential to immerse us into an experience we've dreamed since the term “virtual reality” was coined.

As we look ahead to what promises to be an amazingly exciting year in gaming, I’d like to share some things that I hope to see (and not see) in the next 365 days or so. With new consoles, tons of amazing games, and even some new and potentially annoying innovations on the horizon, there’s plenty of room for opinions all around. So please, enjoy mine:

Continued Support for the Xbox 360 and PS3

If there’s one thing that the lifespan of the PS2 taught the gaming world it’s that a console can live a long time after a new generation of consoles is released. The unusually long tenure of the PS2 was due in no small part to the fact that developers still gave the little black box attention years after the PS3 was on the market. Sure, it may not have had any of the flashy new series like Uncharted or Resistance, but people who loved sports titles like Madden or were interested in Japanese ports had plenty of reasons to keep their PS2 plugged firmly into their TVs. If Microsoft and Sony wish to please their customers, they’d be wise not to shift all their attention to the PS4 and XB1 too soon. Personally, I’ll be hanging onto my Xbox 360 for another year or two, and until I jump to the next generation of consoles I’d love to see plenty of support for those still hanging onto their beloved 360s and PS3s.

Seriously, nobody has that many hands!

Gaming Industry to Stop Shoving Peripheral Gaming Down Our Throats

This post has nothing to do with people using their Androids and iPhones for playing mobile games. By all means, have fun playing Angry Birds, Candy Crush, and Temple Run on the toilet – I won’t judge. Instead, this is about the latest, and in my opinion most obnoxious and pointless push by the gaming world at large to get every gamer out there to use their smart phones, iPads, Kindles, FitBits, and anything with a wireless signal to play console games with their friends or when away from home. I’m not opposed to playing mobile games or playing with friends, but so many next-gen games are touting this new functionality to play games on both the console and a tablet when it seems like nobody really asked for it. If Sony and Microsoft are trying to piggy-back off of the WiiU, they’re missing the mark IMO.

Fewer “Gamers” and More Gaming

Seriously people, let’s all just get along. If you play video games, you’re a gamer. This has irked me for some time, not because I've come under any scrutiny myself, but because I hear this argument far too often from other gamers, mainly online. Anonymity makes even the nicest people IRL dicks online, and it seems that priority #1 is trying to make other gamers feel like they aren't “real” gamers. Before I turn this into a full page rant, I’ll just point you to this amazing post by Yamilia over at Twinfinite who sums up the ridiculousness of this “debate” quite nicely.

Never underestimate the power of nostalgic gamers in large numbers.

Extended Appreciation of Retro Game(r)s

For years people have been clamoring on about an HD remake of the NES classic DuckTales, and in 2013 they’re patience and passion was finally rewarded. On top of that, Nintendo released a lot of classic (S)NES games to their Virtual Console on the cheap to satiate the appetite of those rabid retro gamers. This trend needs to continue into 2014. The video game industry didn't get to where it is today overnight. Over the last few decades it’s been built on the backs of dedicated gamers, classic consoles like the 2600, SNES, and Dreamcast, and people’s nostalgia for their now-classic games. Rewarding those fervent fans with re-releases on XBLA, VC, and/or PSN, or even better with HD remakes is like saying thank you to their tireless dedication over the years. Besides, it’s not like they’d have to give the games away – they priced DuckTales Remastered at $15 and it’s sold pretty damn well so far. We aren't asking for much; just a little appreciation.

There you have it – what I’d like to see happen in the world of gaming in 2014. What about you? Have any burning desires for the New Year? Any awesome games you’d love to see announced or amazing innovations you’d love/hate to see? Let me know in the comments or on Twitter. 

Graduated Gamer's Game of the Year 2013

The end of another year is nearly upon us and like clockwork every gaming site, magazine, and blogger big and small is making a list of their top games of the year. I’ve never really been much of a sucker for this sort of thing, whether it’s done by self-touted experts or fan voting, because as I’ve said numerous times before on this blog, on Facebook, and on Twitter, gaming tastes are extremely subjective. Sure, there are some phenomenally rated games every year, but does it mean that they should be considered Game of the Year (GOTY) over lesser-rated games? Does a number truly dictate if a game offers significantly better entertainment value to a gamer?

These matters are what drive websites to more hits, because humans are drawn to interaction and discussion with others, even if it involves nothing more than fanboy arguments and homophobic slurs (if you’re not sure what I’m talking about, just check out any IGN or YouTube comments section about anything). Still, opinions are like assholes (and even worse, it’s mostly assholes who share their opinions) and every year the voting and conversations about GOTY lead to arguments about games that get the most press because “experts” use their groupthink to give them all near-perfect scores in an attempt to avoid the wrath of the deranged masses. It makes me sad to think that we live in a world where people demand a reviewer be fired for giving GTA 5 less than a perfect score, but alas it’s true.

Well somebody's getting fired!

Regardless, I like to think that there are still sane, reasonable gamers in the world who prefer to think for themselves rather than let the opinions of others sway them. I mean, do you really trust someone who thinks a single sentence and a paragraph can be the same thing?

I know I certainly don’t.

But I digress – I’ve decided to cave this year and tell you all what game I’ve chose as my GOTY. Now I’ll admit right now that about 95% of my gaming is done on the Xbox 360, and I also didn’t start gaming seriously until about halfway through the year. Oh, and one more caveat – I played a lot of retro games and games not from 2013 this year. So essentially, when you boil down my seriously playing time to games from 2013, you get Grand Theft Auto V and Dynasty Warriors 8. And this is where most of you should stop reading, because I’m about to name a personal GOTY based on non-empirical and highly subjective data from a severely limited pool of games from this past year on one console (are you beginning to see yet why I hate GOTY awards?).

If you’re still reading, I apologize, but I’ll just get to it. The winner of the inaugural Graduated Gamer Game of the Year Award (henceforth known as GGGOTY) is Grand Theft Auto V. This should come as no shock to my followers and readers, as I spent an unacceptable amount of time playing this came when it released. For one, I was at the midnight release which I’ve never done before for a video game, and I played it for almost 8 hours straight that first night before going to bed for a few hours to promptly wake up and play it the entire next day.

Rockstar, you're a bunch of mad geniuses.

Now amount of playing time doesn’t necessarily make this a great game, but the reason why I was so enthralled does. For one, the story is at least engaging, which is a plus for a GTA game. After the now-understood abomination of a game in Grand Theft Auto IV gave us not only a boring story but uninteresting characters with no emotional attachment, the geniuses at Rockstar seemed to realize their mistake and put a lot of effort into the design of the characters and their respective story-arcs. I was extremely engaged and invested in these characters, and even more so I found myself laughing out loud at the in-game and cut scene dialogue. If the game wasn’t so absolutely gorgeous to look at, I’d say that the writing was the best thing about this game.

But alas, the graphics are phenomenal, and as someone who always stays away from the argument of “game X will be amazing because the graphics are great”, this pains me to say. But I can’t deny a game so beautiful that I actually spent moments in the game taking in-game pictures of scenery and just moving the camera around to catch the perfect shot of a sunset over a mountain. For a world this large with various ecosystems and a large city to explore, the textures are well-done (even if it does take them a few seconds to fully realize when you’re moving across the map) and I found myself just staring in awe at how well-designed every detail was. You could certainly tell that the makers of this game took pride in what they were doing, and I have to appreciate this.

Gorgeous mountain views await you in Los Santos!

Lastly, the gameplay is a blast. The GTA series has always done a good job (understatement) of adding new and revolutionary ways to play in their wide open worlds, and they certainly set the bar pretty high in their latest installment. Almost everything you see in the game can be driven and/or explored and/or stolen and/or reached and/or destroyed and/or killed. The amount of freedom you are given in this game is impressive, and the nice little touches to crimes you can commit and missions you can complete make all the difference between a great game and my GGGOTY. Store clerks shooting at you after you rob them isn’t a necessary touch, but it adds a small detail that will make you stand up and slow-clap…once you get the hell out of there and evade the cops that is.

I could continue to drone on and on about how Grand Theft Auto V is my GGGOTY, and I haven’t even gotten into the online portion of the game (which, depending on your viewpoint and experience, could make or break my argument for this game being the best of 2013), but I don’t want to bore everyone to sleep. Besides, as I said earlier this is all subjective garbage that most of you will disagree with, and frankly I want you too. My experience is extremely limited with games from 2013, and sticking to only the Xbox 360 this past year I’ve missed out on amazing titles like The Last of Us, Diablo III (PC), and Gone Home.

So please, disagree with me, and take everything you read from so-called experts with a grain of salt – the truth of the matter is, your opinion is just as valuable and chances are more informed than those who write for the likes of IGN and Game Informer. Happy New Year everyone – here’s to an amazing 2014 filled with great gaming and fewer fanboy fights about XB1 and PS4. Cheers!

Graduated Gamer Waits On Next Gen Consoles

It's that time once again when new consoles are announced and fanboys/gals take precious time away from their 360s, PS3s, and even Wii's to argue for the glory of their chosen gaming medium. It's been hammered out long and hard even though we've only known details about these consoles for a couple of months, and blood has already been shed. Sony took pot shots at the Xbox One, everyone and their mother moaned about Microsoft's questionable intent with their new console, and Microsoft (wisely, IMO) listened to it's consumer base and reneged on regular online authenticity checks and restrictions regarding used games. This is all old news, and although it added a lot of hilarious content for me to eat my popcorn to, it didn't really change my approach to deciding which console will be my next investment.

Despite what anyone is saying about the pros and cons of the PS4 or the XB1, I'm going to patiently bid my time before I buy my next gaming console. Perhaps it's the fact that I was raised by parents who made me earn everything I got in life. At the young age of 12 when I asked my father for a Nintendo 64, he bent down, put a hand on my shoulder and said "get a paper route". I was the last kid in my neighborhood to own an N64, but I think I was the only 12 year old to throw down $200 of his own hard-earned cash to buy his. Since then, I've looked at bigger purchases throughout my life with more scrutiny, and I certainly know the value of my money vs. what others tell me (especially when those "others" are corporations that see me as part of their quarterly figure). Even at the age of 26 and making way more than my 12 year old self, I find myself unable to preorder either of these powerful new entertainment systems on the opinions of others (and because nearly nobody has yet to play these systems, that's exactly what they are: opinions).

There's also what I like to call the "PS2 Effect" (I'm working on a trademark so don't try anything). The PS2 is arguably my favorite console of all time. With a massive game library, killer graphics for it's time, and exclusive tie-ins with some of gaming's all-time greatest franchises, it was hard not to love that slim black box. Possibly the best part about the PS2 was it's shelf life, which saw the storied console last for 10+ years on the market. Not only did sales of the console continue for over a decade, but the library of games continued to grow in that time, even when PS3 and Xbox 360 were slugging it out for space below Christmas trees. At that time, I was a poor college student who saw Subway as a luxury, and thus was in no financial position to buy a $500 piece of gaming glory. But I didn't really care that much because I still had hours of gameplay left with my PS2. Why buy hundreds of dollars worth of gaming when you have 40 hours left in Final Fantasy X, or lap times to beat in Gran Turismo? Why battle it out with the Chimera when you still have so much to explore in Vice City (also on my list of greatest video game soundtracks of all time)?

 

So as the end of 2013 edges closer and closer, I find myself in the same position as I did in 2006, except this time it's the Xbox 360 that still has a lot of life still to go (that, and this time I have more money and eat all the Subway I want). Even more so now because I made the terrible transition to adulthood (I don't recommend it, and college definitely doesn't count) and gaming has forcibly taken a  backseat in my life. Still I find time to play Minecraft and explore Pandora with my pals, but there are literally hundreds of hours of gameplay I still have left with my 360, and that's just counting the games I own and haven't played yet (seriously, why does GTA V have to come out this year?). So as the days continue to get shorter, fanboys/gals will continue to squabble, Sony and Microsoft will make their billions in preorders, and I'll grab another bowl of popcorn, because there is no way I'm going to drop hundreds of dollars on a new toy when the one I've already got still has a lot of entertainment to give.