Lynyrd Skynyrd - Free BirdSo here we are, I've actually got Internet in my room - I don't envisage leaving it now, really, as it's more kitted out than my room at home - I've got a TV, DVD and video players, PS2, GameCube, DS and PSP all right here.
Oh, yeah - I bought myself a PSP. You wouldn't know that. It's absolutely fucking awesome - but don't get me wrong, so is the DS. It's great though, as each is awesome in its own way. It actually is completely pointless comparing the two, as each does its own thing excellently and doesn't even try to emulate the other - although of course there are games on each that suit the other much better (a perfect example is Lemmings on PSP, a control scheme that would be much better on DS, and Splinter Cell: Chaos Theory on DS would work much better on PSP due to the wider variety of shaders etc, not to mention control scheme) but some things just are THE defining game for each console.
It says a lot that the defining game for each console is not just one game, but a spread of about six - and that's only now, a month after the launch of one and about half a year after the other. It brings me to the idea that, really, there's no such thing as a 'killer app'. For a perfect example, look at Nintendogs and Wario Ware: Touched! - both excellent games in their own right, making superb use of the hardware, and both completely different - yet each an essential purchase for owners of the console (and if you don't have either of these, you're missing out).
Now, in other news: the Revolution controller. I typed up quite a lengthy post on this on VGC, and I'll probably just copy and paste it later, but basically it's got great features and it's got a few faults. The main fault being, of course, is that most gamers are simply [i]too[/i] used to a controller than anything else, and won't accept it. In this thread, there's a lot of people (who are, of course, utter cretins, but that's by the by - and that's not because of their console preference, either) who just take the piss because it looks like a remote control. Those of us who can see the possiblities are intrigued, but unfortunately we're in the minority - it is surprisingly rare to see an unbiased, intelligent, mindful gamer. The sad truth is that, as a whole, we are the utter cretins mentioned earlier, looking for a quick fix of adrenaline and possibly immersive escapism - although that is becoming rarer.
Nintendo seem to be clutching on to some distant relic of gaming past, where games were coded by sweaty people in a bedroom somewhere rather than in huge publishing houses, and games weren't made to sell but to play, when projects weren't driven by what the market majority wants but by original ideas that weren't constrained by what had gone before.
In some ways it's good, I guess, but in others it displays an oversightedness that such an established company shoud have known to work around.
I'm finding myself constantly disenfranchised by Nintendo, oddly enough - as much as they push their own franchises into the fore. The more I buy into the commercialisation of the real gaming world - and by 'real' I mean in a business sense rather than a gamer's sense, although I suppose it's about 70/30 - the more I see thier views as slightly archaic and out of touch. Sure, why not keep games pure and unadulterated entertainment? Games don't offer a story, it's an experience, separate from films, and all that. It's the reason games like Alien Hominid and Katamari Damacy thrive so well. Although of course, there's those gamers that DO want a story - which is why Final Fantasy and games of that ilk manage to shift a few grillion copies. And then there's both - The Pokémons and the Metal Gear Solids.
A balance, then, of old versus new, of innovation versus time-honoured tradition. And I'm beginning to sound like Dolores Umbridge, which is possibly the POINT, but never mind, I'm losing track of myself. Maybe what Nintendo are doing. Argh...
So what was this again? A software journalist's commentary box? Or just a blog of a semi-socialite trying to make his opinions seem more important than they are? I think you know the answer to that, so back to the mundanity of everyday life... for me, anyhow.
Now, I'd LOVE to say that there wasn't much to report, but that would be a horrible, HORRIBLE lie, and I'm not going to do that to you. So here goes.
The biggest piece of news is that of a new arrival in the family, a new little cousin and a brother from Ben - Lily Smith, whose middle name escapes me for whatever reason - I keep wanting to say Peaches, although that is, even by today's modern standards, ridiculous. I was extremely tired when I was told the news, and as such haven't had much chance for it to soak in, but hurrah! A new life the stork has brought us, named after my late great-aunt (I can only assume) and I can't wait to meet her - or at least to make stupid faces and say 'I'm your cousin William, blooargh!' only to repeat it once or twice an hour, every day. I assume it will be Christmas, although if at all possible I want to arrange something before then.
I have a lecturer called Steve Harriman - he oversees my Professionalism and Communication Skills lectures (or is that Communication and Professional Issues? Damn timetabling), and he's worth me making the choice of this place over Hull alone, simply for the comedy value. Rob Miles, thou hast found thy match. He greeted us in our first seminar with the line 'Two things: first - who's the daddy?', and we all sat in shocked silence, wondering if we should break the sacred student-teacher bond and, gods forbid, actually become INFORMAL. He repeated the question.
'You the daddy?' Brett responded.
'Right,' he said. 'Second, our seminar's been moved from 9am until 11am next week so you can all sleep off an extra two hours of that hangover from Monday night.'
Oh, the hangover would be from a Gatecrasher Monday night, known as Blessed. You've head of Gatecrasher, I assume, so I won't bore you with the details - in fact, in the last few posts I've made on this pitifully-updated thing I like to call a blog, I may have mentioned it - I don't remember, and as ever I'm too lazy to check the archives. Basically Blessed is... well - awesome. there is literally no other word to describe it. the only BAD thing about it is that last week Science from Big Bother showed up randomly - no, that isn't a typo, by the way - and they stopped the set to give him a load of random questions about this year's show. The bugger that he was. By that time, though, I was rather too inebriated to care much, and was much delighted by the young girl from Sheffield Hallam stripping for him on stage to prove that we were, after all, better than Sheffield University. Oh, indeed sir.
Oh, and did I mention that this lovely venue had the legendary DJ Jazzy Jeff on stage last Wednesday? Non? Well, that they did, and I thoroughly enjoyed myself - although I did feel myself rather the subject of ridicule, the crowd being as it was 80/20 black to white. Well, bollocks to anyone who sees fit to have me as the subject of racism. I've been subject to bloody spot-checks at the airport for looking Arabian, for Christ's sake. I likes what I likes, and that night? Oh, I likes a lot.
Anyhow, I'm not out tonight. That's even for a congratulatory-couple-of-drinks-and-a-few-shots-then-a-few-more-and-then-a-couple-off-some-random-chick's-back, I'm not out, which takes some doing. I'm giving blood tomorrow, so I have to keep myself as pure as is possible - that's my blood, of course, not my mind. I have all night to foul that up as much as I can.
Oh yes.
