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I am continually getting more itchy (only word I can think of) about gaming. The last time I remember feeling like this was right around my sophmore year of highschool, when I figured it was about time to drop gaming and "grow up". Now, I just feel like there isn't enough time to do all my gaming, but yet I feel like I need to plow through some of my games, despite me not liking them a huge amount, or just finding them flatline.

For example, I'm currently playing through Deadly Premonition. Its a nice game and hits a certain bit of nostalgia twinge for me. Odd thing is, when games more similar to this were coming out, I was not playing them. There's just a certain feeling about it that gives me that tinge, but I otherwise find the game flatline boring. Its not bad, it just doesn't work for me. But I feel like I must 100% the game so I get my money's worth out of it, and for my "gaming cred" I can at least say I've played it. Which is honestly quite stupid, I know very few people who game in real life, and even fewer who would know Deadly Premonition.

I'm also getting some tugs in my mind that I need to focus more on retro gaming, since I'm currently doing about jack squat with it, but my time and ability are limited. I think that popping some emulators on to my laptop and grabbing a USB Snes controller my be a way for me to get the feel without having to push out the dough, at least until I can get some money. There's also the buttons of research, finding the games, and trying to find out a decent price. I'd hate to drop $150 on a rare game just to hate it. I also wonder at times how many of the games I'd actually like- thinking over the years, my gaming has always been limited in scope, but deep into certain games/series, but at the same time time, I don't want to be the guy who's only into the popular stuff. (Again, worrying about "gamer cred" that doesn't matter...) Plus, I don't want it to be like my N64, where I buy a system to play like 10 games.

On the other hand, I'm trying to figure out how to properly balance my time in general, because no friends and no dating life in college when I'm jobless is just sad. I'm starting back with the counselor once school starts back up, but as of where we stand now, she can't figure out why I don't have friends, and is nudging me towards online dating, which is a decent idea but has some issues.

Not enough time in the day... and trying to find good news sites for gaming info, and trying to find some useful Youtube channels sucks up time. Plus, the many other hours I sit in front of my computer pointlessly. Gotta talk to the counselor about that.

Forlorn Drifter wrote:I'm currently playing through Deadly Premonition. Its a nice game and hits a certain bit of nostalgia twinge for me. There's just a certain feeling about it that gives me that tinge, but I otherwise find the game flatline boring. Its not bad, it just doesn't work for me.

It's not just you. I put about 20 hours into that game last month (for the first time), and I'm having a hard effort making myself go back to it.

Deadly Premonition's atmosphere, plot, dialogue, sense of quirky humor, and especially characters are all top notch. Really fantastic stuff in that department. That's what gives it its cult status.

However, Deadly Premonition's actual gameplay is terrible. I'm just gonna be bluntly honest. The driving mechanics are sloppy, the puzzles are dirt simple, the menus are slow and inefficiently designed, and the clunky third person shooting against endlessly respawning ghost zombies is monotonous as hell. Since you spend so much of your time driving and shooting, this is a big problem that only gets more and more aggravating the further you get into the game. After 20 hours of it, I had to take a break. And hell I was only halfway through the game according to a cursory glance at a walkthrough. It also doesn't help that the graphics are PS2 level at best, nowhere near even the low tier standard for 360 or PS3.

So because of Deadly Premonition's awesome atmosphere, great plot, and cool characters, a lot of folks laud the game and gloss over its actual shitty gameplay. I'm one to call a spade a spade though, and this game is simply not fun to play for as long as it requires in order to finish.

Honestly I wish Deadly Premonition had been an anime series or film instead of an amateur hour game. Hidetaka Suehiro is a whole lot better at writing stories than actual game design. And that's a fact Zach.

noiseredux wrote:I put that new Console Wars book on my Christmas list as well, so hope to read that soon.

I read that over this past summer. Great book, especially for those of us who love the 4th generation console war.

Forlorn Drifter wrote:I'm also getting some tugs in my mind that I need to focus more on retro gaming, since I'm currently doing about jack squat with it, but my time and ability are limited.

I know that feel hardcore. I'm in my second year of teaching, so my free time is almost nonexistent, and my disposable cash is even more scarce. What time and cash I do have has gone to new games recently with the end-of-year releases (Fallout 4, Xenoblade Chronicles X, EDF 2 and EDF 4.1, Mario Tennis, etc).

I REALLY want to expand my Sega CD and Atari Jaguar collections (and I always want to expand my NeoGeo collection, but the aforementioned teacher's salary makes that exceptionally difficult to do).

One thing you'll realize is that you never have enough time to do everything you want to. Even if you didn't need to work and were sitting on a giant trust fund you'd still run into the logistics of time. So don't sweat that you're not spending enough time on one thing or too much time on another. Do what feels right at the time and don't be surprised as your priorities ebb and flow.

If not even MrPopo has enough time for adequate gaming none of us have any hope.

MrPopo wrote:So don't sweat that you're not spending enough time on one thing or too much time on another. Do what feels right at the time and don't be surprised as your priorities ebb and flow.

This has become the mantra of my life. I'm SUPER behind on all of the My Little Pony fanfiction I'm following and have bought like 30 games in the past 4 months that I haven't even put into my consoles, but with my time constraints, I just play what I feel like playing, and everything will get played when it gets played. Or it won't. I have games on my shelf that I am fully confident I will die having never played.

That's why I have effectively donned the "collector" mantle. It lets me justify the massive backlog without all the guilt and shame associated with it.

When I'm broke, I'm just a gamer.
When I have money, I'm a collector.

TSTR wrote:When I'm broke, I'm just a gamer.
When I have money, I'm a collector.

This is basically the mantra of my life.

Sarge wrote:That's why I have effectively donned the "collector" mantle. It lets me justify the massive backlog without all the guilt and shame associated with it.

Yeahhhh, just look at my Backloggery page, and you'll see that I'm in the same boat. Hell, I'm probably the captain of the damn boat.