Man oh man... it's been a crazy few days! I've got two weeks of (relative :P) relaxation time from my otherwise busy schedule, and what's the first thing I do? Play Crash Bandicoot! Fuck catch-up, fuck preparation for the future and fuck socialising with friends I don't have; it's time for some old school platforming with our favourite marsupial friend! Perhaps the title should have been "Priorities: I Don't Has" :P I have been doing a lot of work for LittleBigShow in between sessions -- it's taken ages to edit because a new game calls for changes aplenty -- but that furry little bastard has swept me away to a land of pure digital bliss... and seemingly endless cursing that's eventually met with a platinum relic :P It's crazy how something can suck you in like this, and many would consider playing video games for (what I consider to be) long periods of time bad for one's self in terms of physical and mental well being, but those fuckers are probably bored stiff from their 9-to-5 routine and a lack of self esteem that causes them to call anything differing from the norm "unhealthy" -- they should play some Crash Bandicoot! Give these people a PlayStation and the original trilogy! Relieve them of their piousness to conformity!
I actually started out playing Crash Bandicoot 3: Warped, skipping the first two games in exchange for something I was more familiar with, seeing as I grew up playing Warped and never had the other two. The nostalgia is mind-blowing; playing a game where I used to scrape through and barely got past the main storyline, but now having the skill and ability to go back and get everything there is to get... it gives me a strong sense of power, as if I'm some kind of gaming God. It's amazing how I can ignore the blocky graphics and the low polygon count, being able to just play and play, enjoying the game for what I'm doing in it rather than what I'm looking at during gameplay. We all know from experience that a more powerful system does not necessarily make for more enjoyable titles; the responsibility for AAA content always has and always will lie with the developer, and Naughty Dog knew what the fuck they were doing :P After I got all the gems and gold relics, I finally earned me 105% completion -- and for those of you pondering on that, remember: this game puts you in the role of a bandicoot with a mystical mask for a friend and a wumpa-bazooka as a weapon; 105% completion is far from the most illogical concept this game has to offer :P -- but I still wanted all the platinum relics, so off I went trying to get them... and fuck me, they can be hard! A few of them are easy, but some of them are damned tricky! You usually can't make a single mistake, or you'll have to restart. Every jump must be timed perfectly, every jump justified, and every time box broken, or you're sweet outta luck, jolly well fucked, and restarting the level as you swear and curse your way in to mental oblivion -- it makes me wonder why I play if I'm just gonna go ape-shit at a TV screen :P And don't get me started on the jet-ski levels... just don't.
After I got all 30 platinum relics (a feat I thought was far beyond my ability) I wondered what to play next... well, isn't it obvious? Let's play the next Crash Bandicoot game! I'm evidently losing control over myself here :P The next one required me to blow the dust off my PS2 -- I'd play it more, but the component cables I used to use to hook it up to the TV are now permanently connected to my capture card for my PS3, and I can't be fucked buying more cables, so the poor bastard's been left alone for months at a time over the past year or so... oh well, this is sure to get his spirits back on high! Crash Bandicoot: Wrath of Cortex is basically Warped, minus the cartoony PS1-era presentation and with a few level changes: namely no stinking jet-ski levels, and the added ball-rolling levels! They are sweet! If there's one good thing that came out of this game, it's the ball-rolling. *You may insert a reference to Chamillionare's "Ridin'" here if you find such references humourous.* For every good idea, however, there's a whole bunch of fuck ups -- take the camera, for instance: it's god awful, especially in the underwater levels, where enemies appear on screen out of nowhere, giving you only half a second to react... annoying shit, let me tell you. Speaking of annoying, how about the loading times? The original trilogy didn't even have loading times, and this is the PS1 we're talking about here! These loading times, whilst not totally unbearable, are still irritable... and the music doesn't loop! Naughty Dog figured that shit out; why can't these new guys do it?
They're both enjoyable titles though (hence why I've been barely able to put the controller down) but when I play video games with this chronological density, I wonder... am I playing because I enjoy it, or am I playing because I need to? Did I go "hey, you know what would be fun? Playing the next game in the series" or "gimme a game gimme a game gimme a game any game I don't care so long as I'm not doing anything productive gimme gimme gimme!" What's gonna happen when I finish this one? Am I gonna go out and get Crash Twinsanity in my urge to manipulate this little bandicoot digital existence? Am I gonna go back and play the first or second game in the trilogy? Am I gonna go outside due to a critical Vitamin D shortage? I don't wanna spend my days getting crystals, gems and relics, no matter how fun it is! I have a girl to chase, damn it, and she sure as fuck ain't gonna be impressed by gaming statistics of any kind, even if they do defy the basic laws of mathematics.
That's one question I asked myself during a gaming session: if I had the choice between playing a new game I've been eager to get for a long time, and a date, which would I choose? In theory, I'd pick the date -- that's a fuckin' no-brainer right there -- but in practice... I'm not even sure anymore :P I'd have to put the controller down to get to the stage where I'd be offered a date, so I suppose it's not as simple as my hypothetical makes it out to be. I thought about my fancy as I was doing some work in between gaming sessions (or am I gaming in between writing sessions... o.O) and one lone butterfly came to say hello to my stomach. It makes me glad that I'm not so warped (pardon the reference :P) by games that my mind leaves reality and enters the simulated one; that would suck, hard. I suppose that means I'm OK -- if I can still dream about bliss with people, I can still engage in my bliss with my gamepad.
What? I fell down that hole again!? AGAIN!? Oh, for fuck's sake!
Showing posts with label crash bandicoot. Show all posts
Showing posts with label crash bandicoot. Show all posts
Wednesday, 13 April 2011
Wednesday, 9 March 2011
Nostalgia: Raping my Schedule
I spend far more time on my desktop than on my PS3; not just because my PC is more versatile and can actually be used for purposes more productive than mowing innocent civilians down in a taxi cab or taking control of a sack of burlap as he swings over hazardous gas, but because I can unleash the awesomeness that is: The Emulator. For those of you who have their heads stuck in the now, console emulation is, from a gamer's perspective, using one system (usually a PC) to play games developed for another system. With even today's average machine, you can be playing all your favourite classics, from right back when Atari ruled the console realm, all the way to the turn of the century playing the last games of the 5th console generation; basically, anything from the ol' 2600 and the arcade legends of the 1970s right up to the last games released for the Nintendo 64 and the original PlayStation. PS2 and Wii emulation is also in its early stages, but you'll need a damned good PC for that kind of emulation :P
It's amazing to go back and see what gaming has evolved from. Playing the first Super Mario Bros. is just as much a terrific experience as it is a frustrating one; 3 lives? Are you shitting me? Since when did I have a limited amount of retries? And Contra... holy shit! Talk about hard! The slow bullets and one hit deaths coupled with that rectangular prism of a controller must have made for some run-and-gun-and-get-your-hands-sore memories :P Of course, it's not just the games and the hardware made things difficult, as back then, you had no "Google" or "GameFAQs" to go to if you needed help getting past that crazy puzzle or that final boss fight. In the 70s, 80s and early 90s, it was either print media, word of mouth, or pure perseverance and skill that got gamers through the tough times. And online multiplayer? You had to have real friends to get some competitive action going! Split-screen on a 13 inch CRT TV? My 32 inch LCD, my internet connection and I can only imagine. No wonder I see so many middle-aged nerds with glasses :P
Having said that, split-screen multiplayer on a screen big enough to split is one of the best experiences I've ever had as a gamer. I remember a while back taking my laptop chock full of emulators and games, 4 controllers and 3 friends in to our school's lecture theatre (with its awesome data projector) and playing Mario Kart 64 and Super Smash Bros. for hours on end. It's competition without all the unnecessary cursing and macho bullshit. No dumb motherfuckers with microphones telling you how much of a faggot you are, no hackers or trolls, just people you know to be good people playing a game you know to be a good game. You can ignore the 90s era graphics and lack of modern features when you're, you know... having a ton of fun :P It's that whole "pick up and play" environment that's brings it home for me. Battle Mode in Mario Kart 64 with 4 people is tricky business ever for the most experienced player; those green shells are (quite literally) a pain in the arse to avoid :P Mario Party is another awesome game for non-gamers; even if they aren't winning, they can still laugh at the humping-eqsue animation when someone wins Tug of War (look it up if you don't know what I'm talking about :P)
My favourite retro data package has to be Perfect Dark; think GoldenEye 007, but in the future, and with bots in multiplayer. It is some fun shit! Get this: you have to find weapons. You actually have to look for a weapon! How long has it been since you've done that? And you have a HUD that stays on the screen! Sure, it's a little blocky, but I can actually see how much ammunition I have without having to fire the damn gun for the information to pop up! None of that "red screen" crap either. Rather, we have what I like to call a health bar. It tells you exactly how much health your character has rather than how much blood is in their eyes. The amount of health they have doesn't magically go back up if you avoid damage for a few seconds either. Gunshot wounds don't just magically go away, kids. Try to remember that when you shoot up your school because of your own inability to deal with anxiety issues. Your pal isn't going to disappear 10 seconds after you blow his head off, appear somewhere else in the school and invite you to a movie. He's fuckin' dead.
Don't get me wrong, though. I love some of the modern conveniences we all take for granted. To me, infinite lives are just common sense; my house is not an arcade, my console does not survive on change, and there are ways to test my skill that don't involve taking me all the way back to the start of the game because of a few slip-ups. But, sometimes, the classics can provide you with something a modern game simply doesn't. It depends on the game and the player, I suppose. Take Crash Bandicoot, for example: that series has gone to shit from a critical perspective ever since Naughty Dog sold the rights. If you want to have fun as Crash and Coco, you're gonna have to go back to the mid-to-late 90s and play the original trilogy. A simple premise combined with simple platforming and a simple rewards system; simply fun! Going through 'em without touching YouTube, GameFAQs or Google is an even more thrilling (albeit difficult) experience, because think about it: when was the last time you completed a game without any help?
Can't answer? Neither can I :P
It's amazing to go back and see what gaming has evolved from. Playing the first Super Mario Bros. is just as much a terrific experience as it is a frustrating one; 3 lives? Are you shitting me? Since when did I have a limited amount of retries? And Contra... holy shit! Talk about hard! The slow bullets and one hit deaths coupled with that rectangular prism of a controller must have made for some run-and-gun-and-get-your-hands-sore memories :P Of course, it's not just the games and the hardware made things difficult, as back then, you had no "Google" or "GameFAQs" to go to if you needed help getting past that crazy puzzle or that final boss fight. In the 70s, 80s and early 90s, it was either print media, word of mouth, or pure perseverance and skill that got gamers through the tough times. And online multiplayer? You had to have real friends to get some competitive action going! Split-screen on a 13 inch CRT TV? My 32 inch LCD, my internet connection and I can only imagine. No wonder I see so many middle-aged nerds with glasses :P
Having said that, split-screen multiplayer on a screen big enough to split is one of the best experiences I've ever had as a gamer. I remember a while back taking my laptop chock full of emulators and games, 4 controllers and 3 friends in to our school's lecture theatre (with its awesome data projector) and playing Mario Kart 64 and Super Smash Bros. for hours on end. It's competition without all the unnecessary cursing and macho bullshit. No dumb motherfuckers with microphones telling you how much of a faggot you are, no hackers or trolls, just people you know to be good people playing a game you know to be a good game. You can ignore the 90s era graphics and lack of modern features when you're, you know... having a ton of fun :P It's that whole "pick up and play" environment that's brings it home for me. Battle Mode in Mario Kart 64 with 4 people is tricky business ever for the most experienced player; those green shells are (quite literally) a pain in the arse to avoid :P Mario Party is another awesome game for non-gamers; even if they aren't winning, they can still laugh at the humping-eqsue animation when someone wins Tug of War (look it up if you don't know what I'm talking about :P)
My favourite retro data package has to be Perfect Dark; think GoldenEye 007, but in the future, and with bots in multiplayer. It is some fun shit! Get this: you have to find weapons. You actually have to look for a weapon! How long has it been since you've done that? And you have a HUD that stays on the screen! Sure, it's a little blocky, but I can actually see how much ammunition I have without having to fire the damn gun for the information to pop up! None of that "red screen" crap either. Rather, we have what I like to call a health bar. It tells you exactly how much health your character has rather than how much blood is in their eyes. The amount of health they have doesn't magically go back up if you avoid damage for a few seconds either. Gunshot wounds don't just magically go away, kids. Try to remember that when you shoot up your school because of your own inability to deal with anxiety issues. Your pal isn't going to disappear 10 seconds after you blow his head off, appear somewhere else in the school and invite you to a movie. He's fuckin' dead.
Don't get me wrong, though. I love some of the modern conveniences we all take for granted. To me, infinite lives are just common sense; my house is not an arcade, my console does not survive on change, and there are ways to test my skill that don't involve taking me all the way back to the start of the game because of a few slip-ups. But, sometimes, the classics can provide you with something a modern game simply doesn't. It depends on the game and the player, I suppose. Take Crash Bandicoot, for example: that series has gone to shit from a critical perspective ever since Naughty Dog sold the rights. If you want to have fun as Crash and Coco, you're gonna have to go back to the mid-to-late 90s and play the original trilogy. A simple premise combined with simple platforming and a simple rewards system; simply fun! Going through 'em without touching YouTube, GameFAQs or Google is an even more thrilling (albeit difficult) experience, because think about it: when was the last time you completed a game without any help?
Can't answer? Neither can I :P
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