Gaming Confessions & Blasphemy

Aaron D. wrote:

Not challenging your opinion or anything, but since Freespace 2 was PC exclusive, wouldn't the lack of sales fall squarely on the shoulders of the PC gaming community?

(I'm one of those 27K sales.)

Good for you! I was too, but no, I don't think it can be placed squarely on the PC gaming community, since there's enough cross pollination between the communities of PC and console gaming. I think consoles have helped make gamers less patient, and more detailed game like simulations have suffered as a result. Since the PC market had to adapt to this, I feel, it's not contained solely within either community.

Veloxi wrote:
Aaron D. wrote:

Not challenging your opinion or anything, but since Freespace 2 was PC exclusive, wouldn't the lack of sales fall squarely on the shoulders of the PC gaming community?

(I'm one of those 27K sales.)

Good for you! I was too, but no, I don't think it can be placed squarely on the PC gaming community, since there's enough cross pollination between the communities of PC and console gaming. I think consoles have helped make gamers less patient, and more detailed game like simulations have suffered as a result. Since the PC market had to adapt to this, I feel, it's not contained solely within either community.

Console gamers have load screens from hell. Trust me, consolifying a title is a good way to teach patience!

EDIT: of course, being forced to be patient for stupid reasons might lead to a lack of patience with game elements...

Dakuna wrote:

Console gamers have load screens from hell. Trust me, consolifying a title is a good way to teach patience!

EDIT: of course, being forced to be patient for stupid reasons might lead to a lack of patience with game elements...

Hahaaha, that's not the kind of patience I'm talking about. I'm talking about simple controls (some call 'em streamlined, sure) and so on. In some ways this helps make gaming more accessible, which is good I admit. In other ways, it makes these kinda games look at a game like Freespace 2 and go "WTF? I just wanna blow sh*t up, not target this and escort that..."

Fair enough, Veloxi.

Guess I've always viewed deep-end PC gaming as a completely different audience than mainstream console gamers (though I agree there is obviously cross-pollination).

Hardcore sim gaming strikes me as a pretty insular sub-genre of interest, just like any core sub-genre (auto enthusiasts, audiophiles, etc.). As such, I see little correlation between interest in a popular military game like CoD vs. a core PC sim like Red Orchestra or Operation Flashpoint.

While I agree that the military sim folks are more insular (I totally blame rivet-counters for the decline of that genre), I've never known the space genre to be as insular because of, I think, it's much broader appeal. While yeah, space gaming is a specific niche within gaming, I've never seen it as particularly exclusive.

Veloxi wrote:
Aaron D. wrote:

Not challenging your opinion or anything, but since Freespace 2 was PC exclusive, wouldn't the lack of sales fall squarely on the shoulders of the PC gaming community?

(I'm one of those 27K sales.)

Good for you! I was too, but no, I don't think it can be placed squarely on the PC gaming community, since there's enough cross pollination between the communities of PC and console gaming. I think consoles have helped make gamers less patient, and more detailed game like simulations have suffered as a result. Since the PC market had to adapt to this, I feel, it's not contained solely within either community.

I think you're scapegoating here.

Going through the history of games made for consoles involving space flight, I can't think of a lot. There's Star Fox, which is more arcadey, and in recent years there was Project Sylpheed, a (spiritual?) sequel to a Playstation 1 (and 2?) franchise that barely left Japan. There may have been other games, but for the most part there hasn't been a lot of games made in that genre on console.

Does this mean gamers aren't interested? Well that's a Bobby Kotick way of looking at it, sure, but I'd rather say developers just aren't interested in making such games for console, at the current time period, or what have you.

Plus, let me bring a rather big and successful console franchise into light for you. Armored Core. I can't play this game personally because, no, I'm not interested in the fact that having a rifle that's too long will create drag on my mech or whatever wind resistance will do blah, etc. etc. If you want to talk over-complicated simulationist territory, just go to Armored Core. It's the "simplified" version of Steel Battalion, if you want a comparison.

I guarantee you that Armored Core hits complexities and simulationist territory that makes MechWarrior looks like Baby's First Mech Game, and yet for some reason the PC Master Race ignores it whenever they decide to go and say "console gamers are dumb and have short attention spans".

In fact, why don't we turn this onto the reverse. I grew up diving into my brother's collection of strategy games on the NES that Koei developed before they decided to give up and just make Dynasty Warriors forever. Games like Nobunaga's Ambition II, Ghengis Khan and Romance of the Three Kingdoms. These games involved more than just war, but having to balance things like taxes, food rations, training military units, allocation of funds, alliances with other territories, etc. etc. in addition to smart strategy on the battlefield.

Then StarCraft comes along and is effectively the Halo of Strategy Games. It takes out anything resembling puzzle elements and breaks it down into pure combat.

Now I know that's not correct, as games like Dune II were what truly started the RTS sub-genre, but StarCraft is where it really hit the mainstream. Now Total War is one of the few bastions of big budget strategy game left, or so it seems. Why? Because one PC game dumbed it all down. I've played strategy games on the NES more complex than StarCraft.

Plus, I and many others that grew up loving JRPG's and games like Metroid and Zelda have found that the growing presence of Western gaming studios has introduced a measure of same-ness and sheer design stupidity not found in the old days of console games (or how about the fact that Super Mario 1 was always a more complex and well designed game than any platformer Western gamers were able to poop out of their butts).

PC design and console design each had smart and great features. They also had very stupid things, too. Door swings both ways. Get over it and just accept that some of what you loved was only fit for a niche audience and move on.

gore wrote:

6. I read and post in P&C more than I read and post about video games on this here video game web site

Well then...

7. Dear Esther made me cry actual goddamn literal tears

... yeah. I mean, it was pretentious nonsense, but I guess I fell for it?

I'm with you on both these points. I don't know whether I'd call Dear Esther pretentious or not, but it was one hell of an experience.

ccesarano wrote:

Get over it and just accept that some of what you loved was only fit for a niche audience and move on.

NEVAR!

I see where you're coming from, but I'll never have to like it. Space gamers were abandoned, plain and simple.

I have also never played a single minute of any COD
Yet I hate them so much. I just don't talk about them.

I think Goldeneye on N64 is complete garbage.
While my friends were "marveling" over this thing, I was playing Quake, Quake 2, and Unreal Tournament over LAN. It boggles my mind.

Aaron D. wrote:

Yeah, it's no fun to see a genre you cherish fall out of fashion for whatever reason.

I loved Freespace 2 and to this day still marvel at my ability to crush the game with my Sidewinder stick and keyboard, flipping between the two as if I had four arms. That was some serious granola crunch (though I don't think I have that level of stamina, focus and dexterity in me in the years since).

Heck, I'm still wondering what happened to the killer Colony Wars franchise back on the old Playstation 1. Those seemed pretty popular too.

Exactly. I'll likely remain bitter until Freespace 3 becomes a reality.

As for Colony Wars, I tried 'em a little bit ago, but the d-pad only controls REALLY threw me.

Yeah, it's no fun to see a genre you cherish fall out of fashion for whatever reason.

I loved Freespace 2 and to this day still marvel at my long-lost ability to crush the game with my Sidewinder stick and keyboard, flipping between the two as if I had four arms. That was some serious granola crunch (though I don't think I have that level of stamina, focus and dexterity anymore).

Heck, I'm still wondering what happened to the killer Colony Wars franchise back on the old Playstation 1. Those seemed pretty popular too.

Veloxi wrote:
Aaron D. wrote:

Yeah, it's no fun to see a genre you cherish fall out of fashion for whatever reason.

I loved Freespace 2 and to this day still marvel at my ability to crush the game with my Sidewinder stick and keyboard, flipping between the two as if I had four arms. That was some serious granola crunch (though I don't think I have that level of stamina, focus and dexterity in me in the years since).

Heck, I'm still wondering what happened to the killer Colony Wars franchise back on the old Playstation 1. Those seemed pretty popular too.

Exactly. I'll likely remain bitter until Freespace 3 becomes a reality.

As for Colony Wars, I tried 'em a little bit ago, but the d-pad only controls REALLY threw me.

Every space opera needs James Earl Jones' voice to make it epic.

*edit* I still have my copies of Colony Wars and, I believe, the sequel if you wanted them, Aaron D.

Oh, I have a supplementary one:

a) I used to connect to the Dreamcast Q3 servers with the PC version of Q3 and kill everybody on them repeatedly

It was a relatively little known fact that the Quake 3 Dreamcast port was actually fully compatible with the PC version of Quake 3, and that the DC Q3 servers were actually just public Q3 servers running special maps. Some intrepid young hero extracted those maps and made them available to PC players, and the slaughter commenced.

So, on particularly frustrating days, I'd log into a DC Q3 server and just go to town.

Now, I was an OK Quake 3 player in my day, but I had a mouse and those poor suckers had a stupid gamepad, which made me like some kind of super-god stepping on ants. I didn't do this a whole lot, because I eventually felt kind of bad for them.

gore wrote:

Oh, I have a supplementary one:

a) I used to connect to the Dreamcast Q3 servers with the PC version of Q3 and kill everybody on them repeatedly

It was a relatively little known fact that the Quake 3 Dreamcast port was actually fully compatible with the PC version of Quake 3, and that the DC Q3 servers were actually just public Q3 servers running special maps. Some intrepid young hero extracted those maps and made them available to PC players, and the slaughter commenced.

So, on particularly frustrating days, I'd log into a DC Q3 server and just go to town.

Now, I was an OK Quake 3 player in my day, but I had a mouse and those poor suckers had a stupid gamepad, which made me like some kind of super-god stepping on ants. I didn't do this a whole lot, because I eventually felt kind of bad for them.

That sounds amazing.

Grenn wrote:

*edit* I still have my copies of Colony Wars and, I believe, the sequel if you wanted them, Aaron D.

Hey thanks, mang. That's very kind of you.

I've actually got all 3 Colony Wars titles tucked away somewhere. Wonder how they would run on PS3?

Lex Cayman wrote:
gore wrote:

Oh, I have a supplementary one:

a) I used to connect to the Dreamcast Q3 servers with the PC version of Q3 and kill everybody on them repeatedly

It was a relatively little known fact that the Quake 3 Dreamcast port was actually fully compatible with the PC version of Quake 3, and that the DC Q3 servers were actually just public Q3 servers running special maps. Some intrepid young hero extracted those maps and made them available to PC players, and the slaughter commenced.

So, on particularly frustrating days, I'd log into a DC Q3 server and just go to town.

Now, I was an OK Quake 3 player in my day, but I had a mouse and those poor suckers had a stupid gamepad, which made me like some kind of super-god stepping on ants. I didn't do this a whole lot, because I eventually felt kind of bad for them.

That sounds amazing.

I did this too.

Ah, the glory days.

1. I really hate consoles, but I still buy them for the exclusives

I own a 360, PS3, and Wii. I hate them all but keep them around for games that I can't play elsewhere. I bought the 360 for Fable II and Rock Band, Wii for Wii Sports and Zelda, the PS3 for Heavy Rain and Journey.

In the case of the PS3, I felt that Heavy Rain and Blu-Ray playing justified the purchase. Maybe Wii Sports paid off for the Wii too. But the 360 is a horrible investment since although Fable II was good, it wasn't $250 good, and the PS3 does everything the 360 does just as well (or better).

2. I think about games dramatically more than I actually play them

I have a kid, and both mom and I work. I don't really get to play video games much. I get my fix in podcasts, and I try to understand what games are like by listening to other people talk about playing them.

3. I hate analog sticks on controllers and suck at using them

I guess that goes back to the first point, but it also applies to PC games with the 360 controller (sometimes, this is obviously the "right" way to play something, and I don't fight it). Kids these days.

4. I haven't liked a Zelda game since A Link to the Past

Well, I guess I'm not alone in this one, but I'll still mention it. I really feel like the modern Zelda games are highly overrated.

5. I played GTA:Vice City about 10x more than all other GTA games combined, and it's the only GTA game I ever finished

I feel like GTA IV is probably a great game, but I didn't want to be Niko (or whatever his name was). I don't even remember who the main character in GTA:VC was, but I do remember a sense of time and place in VC that resonated with me in a more powerful way than almost any other game. I actually own the soundtrack to GTA:VC, and I listen to it to this very day with no hint of irony.

6. I read and post in P&C more than I read and post about video games on this here video game web site

Well then...

7. Dear Esther made me cry actual goddamn literal tears

... yeah. I mean, it was pretentious nonsense, but I guess I fell for it?

8. I put over a hundred days into the original EverQuest and sold my account for a few thousand bucks

Yeah, days, as in hours x 24. Figures I can't be bothered to stick with an MMO ever again.

9. I didn't finish Fallout 2 at the time and can't bring myself to play it now, and I think FO:NV is way way better

Seriously - have you tried this game lately? Combat sucks a big one. I'd much much rather play more FO:NV instead.

Also, FO:NV is maybe my favorite game of all time, and screw you Obsidian for making Project Eternity instead of another Fallout game!

Lex Cayman wrote:

I think Goldeneye on N64 is complete garbage.
While my friends were "marveling" over this thing, I was playing Quake, Quake 2, and Unreal Tournament over LAN. It boggles my mind.

That's because it was utter garbage. So was the multiplayer for the original Halo.

Aaron D. wrote:
Grenn wrote:

*edit* I still have my copies of Colony Wars and, I believe, the sequel if you wanted them, Aaron D.

Hey thanks, mang. That's very kind of you.

I've actually got all 3 Colony Wars titles tucked away somewhere. Wonder how they would run on PS3?

They run great on a PS3. Apparently the PS3 is totes backward compatible with PS1 games.

Lex Cayman wrote:

I think Goldeneye on N64 is complete garbage.
While my friends were "marveling" over this thing, I was playing Quake, Quake 2, and Unreal Tournament over LAN. It boggles my mind.

Goldeneye can't hope to hold a candle to PC multiplayer shooters. That said, I think Goldeneye's single player game is way, way more ambitious and more fun than any of the above campaigns. Call me a heretic but I think Quake 2's campaign loses it's charm after the first map and Quake's never had any to begin with.

Edit: And getting in to fights over who's using Oddjob with a bunch of friends sitting around the living room has a certain charm that 10 people staring bleary eyed into their monitors and isolated in their sennheiser cans lacks

Wow. I just read 36 pages of confessions and blasphemy, and I have to say I nodded in agreement less than I shouted at the screen for insubordination at some of you. I'll chyme in:

Final Fantasy 4 and 6 are superior to every other iteration, be it main franchise or other. 8 and 12 are not bad entries. 13 is awful, and Square should be ashamed. 7 is good, but was the beginning of the end. Pre-7, they weren't as anime or Jrpg's. They followed a more medieval, abstract tone, closer to home, at least for me, and that worked. 7's steam punk was a nice touch, but it began the fall of everything.

I agree with what someone said about JRPG's being about a prepubescent 12yr old trying to save the world. I agree and is the reason why I look at Square Enix now, and cry. I was a diehard fan of the FF franchise, and now I hate it.

Playstation controller is superior to the Xbox one...by FAR.

Have not played a Zelda game after Ocarina. Link to the Past is the best.
Have not played a Metroid game after SNES's Super Metroid. That one's the best.
Have not played a Castlevania game after SNES's Super Castlevania. Dislike everything they did after.
Have not played a Street Fighter game after Super SF II Turbo for the SNES.

Not a big racer fan, but F-Zero for the SNES is still the best racer. I love the sh*t out of that game.
Not a big fighter fan, but Tekken is the best series.

I love FPS, but agree they are killing the industry. Or at least, responsible for dudebros to join us.

I always, ALWAYS get confused when someone types GOW. I don't know if they mean Gears of War, or God of War. It frustrates me.

Shadow of the Colossus sits among my top 5 games of all time. Still have to give ICO a try, I'm just waiting to get it back. (ahem, hobbes)

I hate Sonic with a passion, as well as Kirby, and all Pokemon.

I also absolutely loathe Handhelds, and hold them responsible for never getting a proper console revamp of my favorite FF game, FF6.

Little Big Planet didn't engage me. It bored me.

Never played Halo's, COD's, Battlefields, MOH's, WOW's, MMO's, Skyrim, Diablos, Star Wars, and never plan to.

I actually think Starcraft 1 had an amazing story with rich characters, atmosphere, lore and universe. Then Starcraft II dropped the ball and made it all cliché. Still excited to play Heart of the Swarm SP though.

Grim Fandango still remains as one of the best written stories I've played on a videogame, on any console, any decade.

Yeah, that'll do for now, but I certainly have tons more to keep the fires going!!

Irishdoom wrote:

I don't get the allure of the GTA games

Well, at least not for anything more than a quick diversion of driving around like a maniac. When I hear people say "they made the combat better" I hear "they polished the turd a little bit more." I have never gotten more than a few hours into any GTA game.

Surprisingly, I finished Red Dead.

By "they made the combat better" I assume it means "they made the combat more like Red Dead. as it happens, I'm playing through Red Dead again. Damn even the second time, that game is fantastic.

JillSammich wrote:

By "they made the combat better" I assume it means "they made the combat more like Red Dead. as it happens, I'm playing through Red Dead again. Damn even the second time, that game is fantastic.

Right? I'm on play-through number 3, and this cowboy stuff never gets old. Even now, I still ride everywhere - I often forget there's even a fast travel option in the first place. Which sorta leads me to my blasphemy:

In most games where present, I really like fast travel.

And I say that as a guy who got endless pleasure out of navigating Morrowind. Sometimes, though, I don't want to have to trek all the way across the entire known world just to cash in a quest. I find this is the case as I get older, and have less time to spend totally absorbed in a game.

kexx wrote:

Final Fantasy 4 and 6 are superior to every other iteration, be it main franchise or other. 8 and 12 are not bad entries. 13 is awful, and Square should be ashamed. 7 is good, but was the beginning of the end. Pre-7, they weren't as anime or Jrpg's. They followed a more medieval, abstract tone, closer to home, at least for me, and that worked. 7's steam punk was a nice touch, but it began the fall of everything.

No love for 9? In many ways it was a return to the pre-7 games. But yea I like how all the characters in 4 were like real warriors with many past battles under their belts and how the ones who weren't showed that they weren't. Keeping Rydia alive through her first couple of battles was a huge pain and Edward was nearly useless anytime he was in your party.

kexx wrote:

Have not played a Zelda game after Ocarina. Link to the Past is the best.
Have not played a Metroid game after SNES's Super Metroid. That one's the best.
Have not played a Castlevania game after SNES's Super Castlevania. Dislike everything they did after.
Not a big fighter fan, but Tekken is the best series.

I agree about Zelda. I did play a little bit of Majora's Mask but didn't really like it. If I didn't also hate handhelds I would like to play Minish Cap someday because I hear it is a lot like A Link to the Past. Also agree about Metroid. I did play a tiny bit of Prime and it seemed good but very babies first FPS at the same time. I have heard that some of the portable ones were good though. Can't agree with the Castlevania thing though. Symphony of the Night is the second best Metroidvania style game IMHO right behind Super Metroid (third on my list being Shadow Complex). Agree on Tekken as well though. I have really lost interest in it post Tekken Tag Tournament though.

kexx wrote:

Final Fantasy 4 and 6 are superior to every other iteration, be it main franchise or other. 8 and 12 are not bad entries. 13 is awful, and Square should be ashamed. 7 is good, but was the beginning of the end. Pre-7, they weren't as anime or Jrpg's. They followed a more medieval, abstract tone, closer to home, at least for me, and that worked. 7's steam punk was a nice touch, but it began the fall of everything.

Proud of you, bro.

kexx wrote:

Have not played a Street Fighter game after Super SF II Turbo for the SNES.

I once beat him using my feet. True story.

kexx wrote:

Shadow of the Colossus sits among my top 5 games of all time. Still have to give ICO a try, I'm just waiting to get it back. (ahem, hobbes)

**scratches his head. I'm sure it's around here somewhere.

kexx wrote:

Grim Fandango still remains as one of the best written stories I've played on a videogame, on any console, any decade.

I'm gonna +1 this now.

Carry on.

Hobbes2099 wrote:

I once beat him using my feet. True story.

I had blocked that. Thanks. Time to destroy an inanimate object with the sheer power of rage!!

Also, he once beat me playing with the controller behind his back, and once while not even looking at the screen. He was facing the wall, I was Blanka, he was Ryu, and he didn't spam Hadoukens. Traumatizing.

It's all good, though. He's my Female Doggo on Tekken.

Rykin wrote:

No love for 9?

Played it once, don't remember it at all. I remember reaching the end, having the final boss being introduced to me right then and there, and hated it for it. Bought it on PSN to try it again, haven't really touched it. I plan to at some point, though.

Rykin wrote:

Agree on Tekken as well though. I have really lost interest in it post Tekken Tag Tournament though.

Yeah, same here. Last one I played was Tekken 6, and it really shows how little effort they put into it.

Playing with the controller behind one's back isn't too hard, right? It's not like you're ever looking down at it when you're playing? Playing with your feet, or while not looking at the screen, though, sounds impressive!

1. The best Final Fantasy games are 1, 4, and 10, in that order. 7 was meh. Admittedly there's probably a good amount of nostalgia in that pick of FF1 as my favorite -- although it at least kind of still holds up for me, since I recently played through it again in the iOS remake.

2. The GBA game Final Fantasy Tactics Advance is better than the original. For me, at least. I played all the way through the GBA game, but have tried twice to play the iOS (iPod Touch) version of the original and have gotten bogged down a couple of hours in both times. Maybe this is a function of the game not being terribly well suited for the small screen on that platform? I never played it on the Playstation.

3. The best Zelda game is the NES original. Nostalgia again? Although, again, I played through it fairly recently -- going so far as to not pick up any of the heart containers after defeating bosses to try and make the combat as challenging as it was when I was a kid. Couldn't beat the final boss, though, due to not having the magic sword, due to only having 3 hearts.

4. Zelda: A Link to the Past was merely okay. I remember being impatient with the slow speed of Link in that game, and therefore always using the dash boots to move around, and ending up as a result slamming into walls wherever I went. I also remember feeling like the game threw too much money at you, making the money not very meaningful as a result -- it was tedious always having to go visit the fairy who would upgrade your arrow or bomb capacity and spend lots of rupees there just to get away from being at the maximum rupee cap, to try and make picking up rupees meaningful again.

5. The best RPG combat system of all time is Paper Mario for the N64. Basic attacks only doing 2 or 3 points of damage and enemies often having HP totals in the single digits meant that each combat could be carefully planned out to optimize efficiency, if you wanted to play that way. I like that much better than attacks dealing 3764 points of damage towards the end of a typical Final Fantasy game and therefore being fairly meaningless. Oh, and Jr. Troopa was hilarious!

Skipping ahead to add my own 2¢...

I genuinely love the multiplayer mode in New Super Mario Bros. Wii. I think the player collision physics is one of the strongest points of the game. I like that you have to communicate and coordinate with other players in a damn cooperative game.

Late to the party but here goes:

1. I feel extremely guilty when I don't finish a game, and the guilt doesn't ever really go away.
I have a large shelving unit behind me in the office/game cave. It's covered in games that I only got 50%, 70%, maybe even 90% through. Those games are flanked by dozens and dozens of games I did see through, yet I still see it as a Hall of Shame and feel bad that I have so many "unfinished" projects laying around.

This character trait probably originated in my childhood NES days, when I actually kept a list of all the games I had beaten, lovingly carved into the back of a Michael Jordan calendar I'd pulled out of a cereal box or something. I completely finished over 100 NES games back in the day, including some of the stupidly hard ones like Ninja Gaiden and RC Pro Am. Nowadays it's an effort to even come close to finishing great (but comparatively easy) games like Bioshock 2, Red Dead Redemption, and The Witcher. It makes me feel bad and I'm a bad person for not putting in the effort. Not to mention I frequently blow $60 on a game I won't get around to playing until it's going for $5 or $10 on Amazon/Steam.

And then later when the guilt becomes too much to bear I end up finishing the game finally and realize I was almost done with it the first time around. True story, I played through both System Shock 2 and Dragon Age Origins when they first came out without finishing them, only to return much later and play through the whole game again from the start (because I couldn't remember enough to jump back into the "middle" again) only to find in my original play-through I was less than 10 minutes from the end in both cases. Why do I do this to myself?

2. I can only enjoy MMOs when I'm drunk
I feel for MMOs as Indiana Jones does for snakes. I have the same contempt for MMOs that Electronic Arts has for its employees. I hate them the way Francis hates.... everything. I beta tested but never paid a dime for Everquest, Asheron's Call, AC2, Warhammer Online, and a couple of lesser known titles. I played all of those only because it was what my friends were playing. I got a 7 day trial of WOW (for the same reason) and made it through 2 days before I gave up in disgust.

I've only ever paid for City of Heroes and EVE-Online. City of Heroes I can blame on going through a divorce - it was a good escape at the time and the character creation was pretty damn amazing, but it still devolved into a grind-fest. EVE-Online I played for years but mostly for the metagame, and only for so long because after the first 6 months I made enough passive income in the game to buy time cards and therefore play for free. The fact is EVE is a terrible game. I also confess to joining Goonfleet and harvesting tears for fun, something I'm not exactly proud of but it was damn fun at the time. Eventually though I had to quit to save my soul from turning black and rotten save my liver. Because I could only ever enjoy the, uh, "software", falsely presenting itself as an actual GAME with actual GAMEPLAY, when my perception was clouded by an alcohol-fueled mental fog.

It baffles me that in this day and age, 15 years since the release of Ultima Online, nobody has managed to create a good massively multiplayer experience that is also a good game.

3. I will play an old "comfort" game rather than spend the time trying to figure out the new, cool game.
I have Supreme Commander: Forged Alliance on my PC. I'm on my 5th or 6th PC since it came out. I actually look forward to getting a new PC not only for the obvious benefits, but because when I install Supreme Commander on it I'll have reset the campaign and get to play through the whole damn game again.

I never lose at this game. I know every which way to win, the fastest and longest way to do it, when and where the AI is going to do what, and everything in between. I almost literally do not have to think to play through this game. It hold zero challenge, zero exploration potential, zero unknowns whatsoever. And yet I will often boot that up and play a level or two rather than fight my way through the latest challenge in Demon's Souls, level up a bit in Borderlands 2, finish those last few levels of Legend of Grimrock, or make some progress on my 4th (5th?) attempt at the Neverwinter Nights 2 original campaign which I have repeatedly told myself I have to finish before I move on to the supposedly spectacular Mask of the Betrayer.

Supreme Commander isn't the only example though. I once played through the entirety of Baldurs Gate 2 again (including expansions) while I had a pile of new games waiting to be played. I've played KOTOR 3 times over the years, despite being able to recite the plot start to finish before I ever booted it up the 2nd and 3rd times.

Why do I do these things? What do they say about me? I don't know. I'm not sure I'd like all of the answers if I did know. But I didn't come with answers, only confessions. I await absolution.