Frothing Demand

Braid and Limbo are the video game medium’s equivalent of Oscar bait, and Eternity’s Child is what happens when you go “full retard”.

Poor Frothing Demand hasn’t got much love this year. It’s mainly because I haven’t been paying too much attention to new releases this year. There will be new rants coming today – part of an agreement with myself to allow Red Bull consumption today.

I have decided that next week will be the end of my commercial freelancing career. I won’t stop writing completely, but with a return to both work and study, I cannot commit to regular pieces and commercial pressures. I’ll still continue to produce content for this blog and Retro Gaming Australia, however. I have been writing about games in some capacity for 10 years – now I can worry less about being on the cutting edge, and play games for fun.

Decided to pull my finger out and get started on the projects I wanted to work on this year. The first one is a retro gaming community site with a forum and blog. I’ve registered the domain www.retrogamingaus.com for it. Once the domain is ready, I can start work on that.

The intention behind the site was to establish a local community hub for fans of older consoles, where they can discuss the games of yore with folks who share their interest, and hopefully foster some sort of trading forum so we can get the things we want, in the condition we want, without dealing with the undesirables of the world.

My other project is working on cutting down my substantial gaming backlog. I would like to see the backlog fall under 400 by the end of the year. It’s currently 424, and there are some easy games on there to get it down – the trouble is just making sure new games don’t pile up. Not that it will be a problem with my lack of income for the first six months of this year.

Copped it again. Not sending this one in for repair since it’s out of warranty – going to hold out until the 23rd for the pricedrop + Halo 3 ODST bundle. In the mean time, I can use Charly’s machine to get my work done.

Time for some quick capsule reviews in the mean time.

Professor Layton and the Diabolical Box
The Layton sequel brings more of the same sorts puzzles and mystery solving – fortunately it fantastic the first time around and works well again here.

Dissidia: Final Fantasy
Battle of the Androgynous Sissy Boys with a decent fighting system and solid RPG elements surrounding it. Jarring difference in the quality of character conception between the first six Final Fantasy heroes and the later four.

Batman: Arkham Asylum
Latest Caped Crusader outing is one of only two games he’s in that doesn’t make me want to puke. Succeeds as both a Batman product and a video game due to high production values (including the involvement of the animated series crew) and some fantastic gameplay that makes players feel like Batman for once.

Too many games are released with the subtitles Heroes, Origins and Legends. I propose that we outlaw these subtitles. To appease the poor sods in marketing who rely on these titles, I suggest consulting a thesaurus.

How about an example. Instead of Origins, why not use Genesis, Alpha or Emergence? They convey the same thing, but sound cooler, and haven’t been run into the ground.

Was busy yesterday, so I didn’t get time to do this.

I noticed this week that The Simpsons (in the states, at least) debuted with a new intro. It made me feel physically ill, because it shows front-and-center many of the things that make the show bad. Lifeless and sterile animation, too many minor gimmick characters, lousy character expressions and couch gags that defeat the purpose of the couch gag. The only thing it doesn’t show is the lousy writing and phoned-in voice acting.

Reviews
Skate 2 (PS3) at Games On Net

Features
Coming Attractions – 11/02/2009 at Games On Net
The Warp Pipe – Fighting Back at Games On Net

It has been a long road, plagued with many awful, awful games, but tonight, I finally cracked the Australian Top 50 on MyGamerCard.net. I had previously given up hope, but a discovery of some easy achievements on games I had already played pushed me over the line.

The reason I pushed myself with the GamerScore system was because it shows my dedication to my hobby and craft. That when I recommend a game or tear it to shreds, I know what I’m talking about. That I have integrity, by not reviewing games after only 30 minutes of play. That I will play any game, good or bad, just to gain a better perspective of what makes separates a good game from a great one.

I had two objectives for the system: 1) Crack 50,000 and 2) Make it into the top 50. Now that I have achieved both, the chase for achievement points can end, and I can move on.

This week’s Warp Pipe written and submitted, same for the No More Heroes review. Started Assassin’s Creed DS for the review; tis rather horrid. Lost for Xbox 360 and Gothic Universe coming from the brit site. Found a cheap copy of FIFA 06 for some easy achievement points. Xbox 360 is on its way home from the service centre.

Final Fantasy I & II Anniversary Edition reviews completed and submitted to SI. Lost: The Video Game and Gothic Universe up next for them.

Working on a Turok review today, and trying to bash through No More Heroes for tomorrow’s review. Current review backlog is 9.