I’ve been waiting on the follow up to Arkham Asylum for a long time, and so far Arkham City isn’t a disappointment. The combat is just as addictive, as is soaring through the crime-infested city, solving riddles and, umm, admiring Catwoman. It’s become that game that makes me will 5pm to come along sooner every evening, and I haven’t had one of those for a while.
A couple of people found it amusing when I casually mentioned my loose gaming schedule I’m attempting to follow. I guess this is one of many sad attributes that explain my prolonged singledom. If I don’t plan, I find it slightly unnerving not knowing what releases are ahead and how I can strategise what games to play around any up-coming titles. Take my current situation; it’s a bit of a busy one with various games vying for my attention, but with a degree of planning I should be able to coincide everything perfectly and have minimal overlap. Yes, I’m that geeky.
Christmas has just passed, and, like you, I’ve added a few new additions to my video game arsenal. To be specific, I currently have Lego Indiana Jones, Batman Arkham Asylum, and Dragon Age: Origins fresh in their wrapper. At least all three were until I decided to play Dragon Age: Origins. You see, it would have been a quick and dirty run-through of Batman (I’ve heard the story isn’t particularly long) if Mass Effect 2 wasn’t released less than 4 weeks away. Make no mistake, the Mass Effect sequel is taking well deserved priority in my schedule, and so I have to plan around that. Comprende?
This becomes tricky considering I stick to one game at a time. If a game has a story, which most do, I’ll see it through from start to finish without interruption from another game. I can break it up by playing something casual a la Trials HD or Battlefield 1943, but to swap between, say, Dragon Age: Origins and Mass Effect 2 would kill me. This is why I need a schedule!
2009 was to be the year my concentration for gaming dwindled to a considerable low. People say that gaming is a hobby you inevitably grow out off, but the fact I returned to it on my 19th birthday after a 4 year hiatus, and have since spent a lot of time doing, proved to be the opposite for myself. However, something odd has happened to me over the past 12 months, and I find myself notably less excited about gaming than I ever have been. Where did it go wrong, and why?
On January 25th, my birthday, I found myself having “the talk” with a guy I was seeing. You know the talk, the awkward one where you’re furtively investigating how serious you’ve become, whether you’ve made the leap to exclusivity or are still seeing other people. For whatever reason, having a boyfriend who didn’t game meant that I also paid less attention to my Xbox, especially as only a few months earlier I had finished with a guy who was as big a gamer as I. It was at this point I was playing Skate 2, the follow-up to one of my favourite games of 2007.
Skate 2 was meant to have me as hooked as the original, especially as Black Box had done a great job of building on and improving the foundations of Skate. Somehow it failed to be the game that had me itching to finish work just so I could freeskate around San Vanelona, which was odd as it was undoubtedly an improvement over the original. It wasn’t logical… I loved the original, and now I was playing an improved version of that, so there really should have been no reason I was struggling to get excited about Skate 2. Yet I was. Even though I had put my inability of getting hooked on Skate 2 as a direct result of my new relationship, it was to set the unfortunate tone for the coming year.
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I’m playing a PS3 game. Yes, you read that right. I couldn’t resist, though, as Ni no Kuni is a PS3 exclusive and a JRPG. It seems like I haven’t played a JRPG in forever as they’re feeling increasingly sparse on current-gen consoles, which is disheartening as they are one of my favourite genres.
I’ve added trigger pads to my PS3′s controller so it’s more suited to people who have normal sized hands. That, coupled with the fact Ni no Kuni is (so far) astonishing, is enough to have me glaze over the fact I can’t chat to my friends whilst online, or I won’t be unlocking any Achievements (Trophies just aren’t the same).
10 hours into Ni No Kuni and I’m thinking the PS3 ain’t so bad. It seems suited to JRPGs, the type of game you don’t mind shutting yourself off to play. Still, I’d like to see more traditional JRPGs on the 360.
The Tomb Raider series means a lot to me, and while I admit it has lost its footing in recent years, I’ve always stuck by Lara. The latest Tomb Raider, however, has been completely re-imagined and – at some points – doesn’t even feel like a TR game. It’s a welcome change, though, and has me well and truly hooked.
Alan Wake Aside Asides Assassins Creed Avatars Batman Arkham Asylum Bioshock Bioware CandyStoreRock Currently Playing DLC Dragon Age: Origins Epic Fable 2 Fallout 3 Fallout: New Vegas Gears of War Gears of War 2 Grand Theft Auto IV Guitar Hero II Guitar Hero III Infinite Undiscovery JRPG Left 4 Dead Lost Odyssey Mass Effect Mass Effect 2 Mass Effect 3 Microsoft Modern Warfare 2 Nintendo Wii Playstation 3 Rainbow Six: Vegas Rainbow Six Vegas 2 Resident Evil 5 Rock Band RPG RPGs Skate 2 Skyrim Splinter Cell: Conviction Tomb Raider Tomb Raider Underworld video Xbox Live