@feenwager After hideously failing your challenge, just because I really don’t want to overwork my ailing machine, all I’ve got in my foreseeable future is Endless Space on PC and Gravity Rush on Vita. Feels…good. I’m sure some indie business will pop up, but that’s about it. Will aim to add Walking Dead to the list at some point. Of course, I’m still battling through Gladiator Begins, and it’s damn tough. @beige, did you pick it up for your commute?

Endless Space remains oh-so-good, by the way. Oh so very good.

@feenwager *hands you a boutique ale*

—

In regards to my own Feenwager Challenge list, I’ve hit a bit of a tech issue on my laptop…namely an ageing machine and wearying guts that now, for some reason, heats up and could conceivably cook steaks to perfection. I can still play things, provided I don’t stress the GPU, but the PC has now taken a backseat and I don’t really turn it on with the same relish, burdened by the knowledge that graphically-pressing titles are now potential machine destroyers. I cannot justify a new laptop for gaming, so for the time being, I’m enjoying the odd spot of FUEL, a touch of GalCiv2, Reign: Conflict of Nations and some curiosities like A.I.M. 2 (a Russian sandbox trader/combat game set in a robot-infested future world)…

…but, all is not lost. Really loving the little Vita, primarily at this point for Rayman Origins. Now, a few folks – including @feenwager – have enjoyed this one prior, and I just want to laud artistic and aural accolades upon Origins. I’ve been a big Rayman fan since the old days, and always wondered why Mario copped all the praise when there’s so much creativity and visual delight (and it’s so subtly dark and morbid just below the surface in some areas) in these French gems. (Rayman 2 over Mario64 any day of the week! Très controversée!!!)

Anyway, I can’t say much more than hasn’t already been said. It’s a good challenge, has brilliant production values, character and level design from a scribbler’s perspective is second to none (I still cannot get over the attention to detail in the simple things like foliage crops…take a moment to gaze at the arrangement of ferns on the various planes in the first couple of levels). A very inspired piece of work.

Coming up next month: Resistance: Burning Skies, then the month after, Gravity Rush/Daze. So very keen.

@feenwager Every time I load this page, I see your challenge list pop up briefly and I couldn’t help but notice you crossed off some heavy hitters recently. Did you actually make it through Deadly Premonition? How was Lords of Shadow? etc.

@angryjedi Congratulations, you’ve broken the Challenge. Nice haul, but sheeeesh!

Feenwager Challenge Field Report 2: Bayonetta

On a relaxing Sunday where I finally had nothing to do for a change, I decided to marathon through the rest of Bayonetta and spent 5 hours doing so. Note that, following my previous attempt to get through it, I decided to swallow my pride and play it on easy. I played enough of it on Normal to experience the combat system and enjoy it but to be honest, my desire to finish Bayonetta had everything to do with wanting to see through the sheer absurdity of the whole thing and boy was I not disappointed.

I truly cannot tell you what actually happens in the game plot-wise but boy was it a ride….The whole thing plays like some teenage boy’s crazy dream. A beautiful women with a naughty teacher vibe spends a whole game throwing around sexual innuendo while kicking the heck of out enemies with crazy guns and weapons. Once you stop shaking your head at the whole set-up and just roll with it, it’s enjoyable from an absurdest point of view. The boss fights are just huge and crazy to experience. Most of Bayonetta’s one-liners made me laugh when they first pop up and her different special moves (especially her “climax” and “torture” moves) are just ridiculous. In what other game would you have a finishing move where her hair/body suit become limbs that play volleyball with a Golem for a bit before smashing it to bits? Or where break-dancing with guns shooting from your feet is a “normal” move? That’s right… none! :p

Anywho, the game was a fun romp but nothing I would go back to. I don’t care about my scores for each level so the re-playability is lost on me. It is not a game for everyone – the initial set-up will turn some people off immediately. However, if you fall for the initial scene where a J-Pop version of “Fly to the Moon’ plays while you destroy angel demons in a cemetery (like I did), then this will a game that you enjoy.

Next up from the Challenge list: AC Revelations. Time to see if I’ve gotten tired of the Ezio storyline yet…

There’s a pretty good sale going on at GoG right now.

Be strong, lads.

@angryjedi Yeah, not that it was never not on my list, but it just found itself underlined scrappily with a black ballpoint. Good riddance to time units, this frees up a lot tactical options and – as only the best strategy encourages – gives rise to creativity, rather than rewarding patience. Slightly subjective, but there you have it.

So many good titles on the horizon.

—

Feenwager Challenge Update:

I’ve lost Hitman. Yep, I asked too much of the man…after taking Cambria General, I pushed Ira, Fox and Hitman across to the university. Hitman was already rather wounded, and in game time, these folks have been fighting for nearly six hours. Fatigue had set in, stamina a rare commodity. When the guns didn’t jam, the bullets rarely found their mark. And Hitman was hit, man. I should have pulled out, I should have pulled out and headed back to the airport…

Frank Hennessey, you were a good man. And, if the lore is to be believed, *this* close to retirement. That old chestnut, just one last mission. I’m sorry, Hitman. Here’s to you *raises glass*.

16 hours logged
9% of Arulco liberated
2 Mercenaries operational (currently in field)
2 Mercenaries deceased

@mjpilon I’d say finish up Bayonetta first. Especially considering the other two on the shortlist are sandbox’ey experiences and might take a larger chunk of time, even when critical-pathing the main story.

I think I fall into the same boat as you with the Uncharted series…and funnily enough, the thematically honest parts of Uncharted: Golden Abyss on Vita were the things most critics (and that @ajguy character!) scoffed at, but I appreciated. Everyone talked of pace interruption with the touch and tilt-based modules of GA, but it wasn’t a hugely action-packed shooty-shoot and had a nice intimate and concentrated feel.

That said, give me a new Syphon Filter, Bend. You’ve done your part.

Feenwager Challenge Field Report 1: Uncharted 3

It’s a couple of days earlier than the official start but I figure it still counts

Uncharted 3 is a worthwhile experience if you liked the previous ones but to me, it suffers from the same issues that I had with Uncharted 1 and 2 so don’t expect anything different. It’s more of the crazy blockbuster movie-like experience everyone loved before and the cinematic moments are quite amazing. However, when the gameplay elements get in the way of those moments, it is really jarring. Replaying those sequences again because, for example, I died when Drake got caught in the geometry during his stumbling run animation and thus was short on the jump I needed to make during a chase is a frustrating experience. . All the chase/ running away sequences throughout the game suffer from this issue. The whole “WOW” experience gets tainted when the element of surprise is gone.

My biggest pet peeve with the Uncharted series is how the game ramps up the “difficulty” over the course of the day by flooding you with enemies and/or “enhancing” them in some way (polite way of saying absurd bullet sponges). The 1st two games in the series did it and this one is no different. It wasn’t as bad as the blue guys in Uncharted 1 but still frustrated the heck out of me when it occurs….. surely there is a better way, right?

I don’t want this to sound so negative because the game is quite good. I guess I’m just focused on the negatives because they impacted me so much given the high quality of everything else. The voice cast, as usual, is spot-on with the witty banter and one liners. The game looks amazing – the desert stuff, in particular, deserves much praise – and the music is great again. All in all, a great game that I would highly recommend to those of you have it on their lists.

Not sure which game I will tackle next from the list…. should probably finish Bayonetta but I kind of want to start up Saints’ Row 3 or AC: Revelations. Any ideas Squaddies on where my priorities should lie?

Just read down all y’allses lists for the Challenge. This is going to be fun. Also, Pete is nuts.

@Bowlisimo Just listened to the song and thought the exact same thing….. now playing the Muppet version on a loop as we speak

Quick update on my Uncharted 3 playthrough: It took 21 Chapters but, like the previous two games, I officially hit the point where their way of ramping up difficulty/ challenge starts to piss me off ROYALLY. Full field report within the week I expect…

@bowlisimo @beige You both mentioned “Sailing to Philadelphia” in your submissions, which was great. I decided to choose the road less travelled! Happy listening.

—

Feenwager Challenge Update:

A sneaking suspicion Back in Action will last a good long while. The mods the community have churned out thus far are incredible…and make it a savage, savage affair. I lost a good German mercenary this evening…Helmut ‘Grunty’ Grunther went down valiantly as we liberated Cambria General Hospital. I’m using a couple of new mods, Blue Dawn and Fireams Rebalanced, and they essentially make most enemies elite and heavily armoured, with the FR mod doubling the effective operating range of small arms as well as upping misfires and gun jams. Grunty, a fellow who had travelled with me for the fifteen hours I’d spent in BiA thus far, was cornered in a crossfire, with no angle of attack for Hitman and Ira to cover from and Fox helpless to apply first aid.

Ironically, Grunty died right there on the floor of the hospital, with doctors cowering in their offices no more than ten metres away.

He was avenged. It took two hours this eve to clear four rooms, but he was avenged. I will miss that man.

EDIT: Note that also Frank “Hitman” Hennessey was also quite fond of him, so for the next few missions, his morale is going to be utterly buggered. Might keep him at Drassen Airport until his grief is over. This kind of crazy mercenary interplay is an utter shadow of Jagged Alliance 2 – which has incredible intersquad relationships – but I’m chuffed there’s a tiny case of digital glumness going on at the moment.

@unmanneddrone I will focus on Uncharted 3 since I am currently about halfway through and then we’ll go from there. ME3 is not a priority for me so the list will be the focus for now

@unmanneddrone I think Bastion’s the most logical first step for me. Like @feenwager, I’m going to knock it out before ME3 drops on Tuesday.

@feenwager Good stuff. We can always bung together a twitpoll or something to aid in the Feenwager reconquista. I’m going to continue with Jagged Alliance, which should last a good while. 13 or so hours in and I’ve only got 9% of Arulco liberated. God help me. Next stop, Cambria University, and from what I’ve seen via a squad on the outskirts, Deidranna’s forces are there in number.

More than a great idea, a very sensible idea, this Feenwager Challenge.

@unmanneddrone I’m gonna try to finish Rochard before Tuesday, then ME3. After that I’m gonna crowd source this piece.

What’re folks going to tackle first on their list?

@angryjedi It seems to have gotten some great buzz, this Corpse Party. It’s on iOS or at least coming to it here, so fingers crossed for a Western release. Either way, more impressions when you’ve sequestered them, if you please!

I’m taking this seriously. I’ll actually be removing anything not on this list from my house. It’s getting donated to my team’s break room.

@feenwager Cool beans. Plus, it’ll be easy to edit the lists and tick off/mark the conquered.

EDIT: @rocgaude Will do. Might add a few more games to the list, then.

@feenwager Right.

@unmanneddrone @mjpilon @cgrajko @redswir1 and anyone else still interested, please re-post your list as a comment on the sticky.

@unmanneddrone I think we agreed we’d keep the lists in the sticky and make edits to our posts as the Challenge progresses. Discussion about the games can be in the main Squawk, appropriately tagged.

Cool?

Should we use the sticky to post lists?

It’s going to be interesting playing a lot of the backlog that isn’t a strictly linear experience or has a definite end-game. Not sure where one draws the line there.

The Feenwager Challenge

(starting March 6th)

This is the best idea we’ve had in a while. I’ll play through the games and decide whether or not to finish them by the third hour or so. If it’s a “no go”, I’ll mark it off of the list for good with no regrets. I’ll be making it a point to leave my “field report” for each game here on the Squawkbox.

XBox 360:
Castlevania: Lord of Shadows
Space Marine
Darksiders
Tony Hawk: Project 8
Far Cry 2
Vanquish

PS3:
Uncharted 3
M&M: Clash of Heroes

Mac:
Frozen Synapse
Civ V
Cave Story+

…and the most daunting, *the PC:
Amnesia
Arcanum
Baldur’s Gate
Baldur’s Gate 2
Commandos 3
Company of Heroes
Dawn of War II
Freespace 2
Ghost Master
Hitman: Blood Money
Neverwinter Nights 2
Planescape: Torment
S.T.A.L.K.E.R.: Call of Pripyat
Vampire the Masquerade: Bloodlines
The Witcher

*I currently have no way of playing these games until I get either Win 7 or a gaming PC. It might be awhile.

Games I will be playing in 2012 despite this list:
Mass Effect 3 (360)
Witcher 2 (360)
SSX (360)
Persona 4 Arena (360)
BioShock Infinite (TBD)
Assassin’s Creed 3 (360)

I feel like the only way I’ll ever play through games like Deadly Premonition, Dark Souls, Godhand, etc. are if I’ve got some kind of book club/support group. Not sure I can commit to the Feen Challenge, but I’d be up for a side mission. (Do we still do those?

@feenwager “Before adding any new inventory into the pile”?! Fuck that.

Okay, after Mass Effect 3 I don’t think I plan on buying anything else for the first half of 2012. Except probably Xenoblade. And Kid Icarus.

…and I just tracked down a Dreamcast copy of Resident Evil 2 today because I never got to play that game. A new numbered RE game is coming out this year man.

This is kinda how I’ve been operating for the past few years though – raise standards on my purchases, and only buy games day one if I absolutely intend to play them to satisfaction right there. It’s… kinda working. In comparison to my oldschool backlog, my current gen console backlog is pretty small I think.

Most of my list is relatively short too, especially on console, but there are still some troublesome titles in there. Demon’s Souls and Dark Souls ain’t BOTH happening this year. One of them maybe, probably Demon’s since I’m further through it and the servers will probably go down this year. GTA IV is the other big console problem. I think that I seriously only made it a third of the way through that game.

There are two Bethesda games on my PC list, and ArmA II is a hell of a lot of game. It’s a combat sim with JRPG amounts of singleplayer content. I’d actually almost call that game squad material. I have no idea what’s waiting for me in STALKER.

Thanks for reminding me @shingro. The Void is also on my PC list… I swear there’s more on that list than even I realize.

Ah, I think I’ll bow out of this then. I love old games, classics and steam sales. Besides, if some Squaddie comes in waving an old overlooked gem of a game I want the freedom to buy it. (besides GoG sales and Steam games of the day are good stuff.) If something Like that D&D sale comes along again I’m going to jump on it feet first and I know I will.

Heck, if anything I’d be more willing to go the other way, to swear off new big releases until I get cracking on some of those old classics I bought like The Void, Freedom Force and finally finishing Planescape:T.

Of course I know I wouldn’t do that either ’cause I’m going to get Borderlands 2 and Bioshock Infinite day 1 on Steam.

Best of luck to you though!

@shingro Here’s the gist:

List all of the games that you currently have access to that you have a realistic intention to play. You don’t have to list every Gameboy game sitting in a drawer somewhere, or that copy of Pandemonium you impulsively spent $5 on the PSN.

The goal is to play through all of these games, however long it takes, before adding any new inventory to the pile. You are allowed special dispensation to play big, tentpole games such as Mass Effect or Assassin’s Creed, but as a group we’ll keep each other honest before picking something up because we’ll get to it “eventually”.

Bowley suggested an interactive element of the group choosing the next game in the list, and I’m happy to go along with it, but that part can be optional.

It’s not a race, or anything…more like a support group. It’s also very close to the Squad’s original mission, only the bargain bins are coming from INSIDE THE HOUSE!

@mjpilon I think putting the lists in a separate area for reference is a good call. If I knew how to do that, I would.

@feenwager This should be a fun challenge especially with so many of us planning to follow through.. It might easier to put the lists elsewhere for “official” purposes but personally I think we need to insure most of the discussion and interaction occurs here on the Box… just seems right to me.

@Bowlisimo Okay…. I pledge to play Amnesia this coming October. I may need you to keep me honest however.

@angryjedi @scribl I can definitely understand the sentiment regarding AC. So far, the only one I “kept” up with so to speak was Brotherhood. I played AC2 almost a year after it came out and Revelations is still sitting here. The series still pulls me in, so I’m not tired of it although the reports on Revelations make me wonder if that will change. However, the prospects of AC3 keep me excited over the long term.

Like @Bowlisimo said though, I would never marathon through them…. that would be insane

@cgrajko kilgrimage. Love it.

Ok, if we’ve got a few people doing the challenge, should we consider moving it somewhere specific and cementing the details?

There’s at least 3 of you now who have listed Amnesia. October, all of you, do it for Halloween. I can throw in my free Steam copy for someone else if you do it…

As promised, I’m back to talk about religion in Final Fantasy X. (I apologize in advance for what will inevitably be a wall of text.) In order to do so, however, I am going to spoil the shit out of major plot details, so anyone who hasn’t played it and is waiting for the HD port should consider this their warning to stop reading. Anyone who wants to see my list of shame can look below the big line that I put in separating FFX talk and other talk.

I feel as if religion is the scaffolding for the rest of the game to be built with; the Yevon faith provides the vocabulary and the tone for the rest of the game. The story itself is ostensibly the story of a pilgrimage (and in some cases, a kilgrimage, [I'm so sorry]) to Zanarkand as a way to atone for the sins of a society. The summoners in the Yevon faith are tasked with various spiritual and metaphysical duties, and the party in FFX is tasked with delivering Yuna safely to a point at which she can summon an aeon and defeat Sin, which has been wreaking havoc on Spira. Again, this isn’t news to those of you who have played it, but I wanted to recap in case it’s been a while or in case you don’t give a shit and just want to read my post.

The reason I point to FFX as an interesting example is because it deals with both the metaphysical aspects of the religion as well as the relevant cultural issues that are mentioned in the article Tolkoto linked. While religion does inform the culture of Spira, it is also something that is directly provable in some ways. Summoners are able to perform Sendings as well as summon Aeons. (If anyone is interested in following a tangent, Aeon has Platonic and Judeo-Christian connotations of eternal ideas and eternal life. I’m sure there’s a Wikipedia page or something.) The Faith manifests itself as a tangible thing, and it doesn’t cast believers as simpletons or naive, although Yuna arguably is.

The power of belief plays a large role in how the narrative of the game plays out. The “twist” that everyone sees coming is that Yuna will be forced to sacrifice herself to save the planet from Sin. I probably don’t need to spell out the allegory here, but I think the game is interesting for more reasons than this incredibly obvious and blunt metaphor.

Yuna’s faith is discussed in depth, and this is one of the few games I can think of where we’re given a window in to the world of a deeply religious person whose faith informs the vast majority of their decisions. Not only does it focus on her own faith but also the type of social pressure that is exerted upon someone of her status. Yevon, and the accumulation of knowledge of Yevon furthers the party’s quest, is central to the narrative of the game. The numerous temples that the party visits during the pilgrimage and the other priests (including Seymour, of course) all shape our perception of both Yuna’s quest as well as Yuna’s notion of the pilgrimage. While she starts out hopeful, it becomes increasingly difficult to keep her spirits up, as she accumulated enough knowledge of the inner working of the faith, the way she previously viewed her role in Spira’s society eventually begins to conflict with how she feels her role will play out. Not only that, Yuna discovers that she has her own personality outside of her social role. She is not a faceless head of a religious organization, which is a rarity in these types of games. (In fact, the eternal Gaian and Messian conflict of the SMT series, is nowhere to be found. There are zealots in FFX, but they are not zealots for black and white reasons.)

Indeed, I think one of the central conceits of the game is that the social pressures Yuna faces and her religious calling often differ in both scope and tone. The transition from faithful servant to an architect of deicide unfolds as Yuna realizes not that her faith is fake, but that her faith allows others to treat her like a servant and a means to an end. (We can extend this metaphor even further if we look at the way the summoners, particularly Seymour, use their Aeons.) Yuna’s faith is always placed in this dual bind between metaphysics and social pressures, which is something I imagine other people of faith deal with, and it’s one of the reasons I think this game provides a bit more nuanced perspective on some things than is immediately obvious.

I may have some more thoughts on this topic, actually, but those are my most basic thoughts for now.

__________________________________________________________________________________________

I’m definitely in to participate in The Feenwager Challenge. My list of games that I have sitting around unfinished is truly shameful. I’m currently on the home stretch of Nier, but the rest of these haven’t been played much. I’m not bothering to list stuff like Gears of War, Lego Harry Potter, or Halo Reach, because I only play those co-op with my girlfriend. Also, I’m all ears if someone has suggestions as to what I should play next. For what it’s worth, it’s easier to play console stuff than PC stuff.

PS3
Nier
Final Fantasy XIII
LA Noire
Ratchet and Clank Future: A Crack in Time
Resonance of Fate

PSN
Wipeout HD
Costume Quest
Little Big Planet

Xbox 360
Alan Wake
Deadly Premonition
Lost Odyssey
Portal 2

XBLA
Perfect Dark (I have beaten it, but not on the hardest difficulty)
Puzzle Quest 2
Scott Pilgrim

PC (There’s way too much here as it is, so I’m not listing all of the Indie Bundle stuff)
Amnesia
Aquaria
Beneath a Steel Sky
Cryostasis
The Dig
All 3 Deus Ex games.
Fallout: New Vegas
Limbo
The Longest Journey
Loom
Machinarium
The Penumbra series
Recettear
Vampire the Masquerade: Bloodlines

The PC list is heavily truncated, as there are a ton of smaller or Indie games I could list.

Now, if you want to see something really bad, I could list all of the books I’ve bought but haven’t read. One of my goals this year is to read all of them. (It’s not shameful because there are hundreds of unread books, but mostly because I have seriously amazing shit like The Master and Margarita and Blood Meridian sitting around unfinished.

Ah the infamous and pretty annual pile of Shame listing… okay then, here we go:

360:
Saints Row the Third
Assassin’s Creed Revelations
Bioshock 2 (one more try before I ditch it)

PS3:
Heavy Rain
Ico
Shadow of the Colossus
Uncharted 3 (currently going)

Wii:
Okami
Donkey Kong Country returns
Mario Galaxy 2

PC – Too many to list due to Steam sales but of note:
Amnesia
Cave Story
Original Deus: Ex
Rock of Ages
Terreria

Most of the upcoming games that interest me will come through GameAccess this year (Canada’s GameFly), so that will help limit the expansion of my physical pile. Also, the one game out of a time will force me to get through a game before I can add to the pile – hence why I need to get through Bayonetta at some point :p

@impynickers It’s about damn time someone else got around to Scratches, you buncha ninny scaredy cats. : P

@redswir1 Please do play Cryostasis, I’d love to hear at least one other squaddie’s view on that game. It gets downright abstract at times, but it’s worth it in the end. Also, ice, and holding your outstretched hands up to flickering light bulbs for warmth.

I don’t have much hope for any of you people staying on track for very long, by the way, this year’s releases could kill a grown man.

I dared count my steam games one afternoon. Lets say its somewhere over 140 games.
Good thing for me the majority of those have been put to rest, or have been played to my satisfaction.
Its mostly a list of classics that I keep for a rainy day of nostalgia, and very few have cost over 5 dollars.
There are games in there that are simply quick hits well worth the time and money spent, but no more.

2012 as an itinerary probably won’t be as conveniently binary as I would wish. I know that I cannot force myself into a particular mode of gaming. For me that is a recipe for a one night stand.
I do however enjoy the concept of this challenge. It might get me to appreciate more of what I have, and less of what is new and shiny.

The games I have sitting around that I intend on putting to rest are as follows:

PC:
Magicka
Freedom Force
Trine
Dead Space 2
Scratches:Director’s Cut
Singularity
Gabriel Knight 3
Cave Story

360:
Saints Row the Third
Rayman Origins
Dead Island

PS3:
Pixeljunk Shooter 2

Wii Emulator (you heard me):
Last Story
Xenoblade Chronicles

As far as releases I know I will buy Mass Effect 3 is definitely there. SSX may also be happening.
Other than that I will afford myself the luxury of multiplayer gaming.

The next major releases I am looking forward to may be Max Payne 3 and maybe Silent Hill: Downpour if it fixes the franchise. So I will vow not to succumb to these may releases (I think) until I have crossed off pretty much everything from my list. I think this is a good challenge. Nice idea.

@feenwager I’m with you. This year is all about cutting back and making do with what one has for the most part. I seriously don’t know how I’d cope if I operated under the @redswir1 mandate…it’d end up being a burden and choice paralysis would be an encumbrance like nothing else.

Outside of curiosities, I’ve got all I need for a good long while. This is it as it stands:

PC:

• Wargame: European Escalation – This covers my online strategy needs, which can be offset by the trusty old Supreme Commander 2 with friends.
• Real Warfare 2: The Northern Crusades – Having something this tough is great, and covers a semblance of RPG-ness with unit veterancy.
• OilRush – Really enjoy this one. Galcon Labs on the sea with node-specific unit creation. It serves the purpose as an evening’s warm-up.
• Jagged Alliance: Back in Action – For all its faults, I can’t get enough. The new mod scene for BiA is only bringing new and exciting things to the table, so there be legs here.

Vita

• WipEout 2048 – Being a racing game, there’s really no end bar the speed of light. Plus, you can always work on being better at WipEout. Plus, having a nice little rivalry with @ajguy on the lap time friends leaderboards is terrific.
• Unit 13 – The demo is great, so having a score-centric military shooter with heaps of content and challenges allows me to get my shoot on, but also do it in co-op. Especially having reached that time in my life where I simply cannot play any sort of competitive multiplayer shooter on account of time commitment and, frankly, the community, beating score is the order of the day.
• Motorstorm RC – Who can say no to an RC version of Ivan ‘Ironman’ Stewart’s Super Off Road? Not me. Cheap as chips, and one game where I won’t mind paying the tiny prices for DLC like new cars and tracks. A new pack of four vehicles came out yesterday for the game in Euro-land with the price of under a buck. Nickel and dime me all you want with Motorstorm RC. Asynchronous racing is where it’s at.

So, yeah. I’m with you on the backlog attack. To quote the affable Don Chipp of the Australian Democrats, “We’ll keep the bastards honest”.

—

In regards to religion in games, I agree that the most interesting and relatively finger pointing-free experience would be found in the Japanese gaming sphere. Religion, especially the Japanese appropriation and interpretation of Western Judeo-Christian dogma, appears to come from a spiritualist perspective, rather than an ideology that serves also as a civil construct and establishment.

Does the divergence occur in the West mostly due to the games industry (safely assuming) being primarily of the leftist political persuasion, whereas – at least in my understanding of modern day America – revivalist evangelism and religiosity is very much a part of conservative right-wing affair? And for the most part, the Western European religious experience is in somewhat of a decline and, as Eddie Izzard put it, “a bit of a hobby”, especially in the colonial Antipodes.

The Japanese cultural experience, traditionally, has had that delightful and rather quaint spiritual malleability. Shinto animism (which I think bleeds through a highly iconographic-centric society into why they have mascots for everything; the spiritual inhabitation of objects also seems to affect a child’s appreciation/respect of surroundings – but that’s another tale) found coalescence alongside Shibunritsu Buddhism. Of course, one could argue that the import of Christianity upset the apple cart, but the cultural packaging was different. Buddhism arrived to mark the birth of Japan’s cultural golden age; heralding the appropriation of kanji, of interesting social and political doctrine, of artistic and architectural breakthroughs etc. The arrival of Christianity could be considered just as important, as the Portuguese brought the arquebus and the breech-loading cannon, new naval and smithing techniques and so on. Buddhism, however, was not one part of the early imperialist arsenal and thus, given the Confucian social construct, religious oppression was not part of the landscape to any great extent (unless you were Christian and faced someone like Kato Kiyomasa).

If we look at games in general, I find religion in Western games – particularly RPGs – is used as anything other than source of spiritual guidance. It’s portrayed as a specific arm of power or traits, used to define and augment a player as having a particular set of skills or definitions. In King Arthur: The Role-Playing Wargame, your choices and actions (in probably one of the more fascinating aspects of that game) shift your religious persuasion around towards one of four socio-religious points. For the sake of gameplay, this offers your forces and kingdom certain attributes or negatively affects diplomatic standing etc., but religion is purely a convention of mechanic, rather than narrative. I think this speaks to how we in the West view religion. It has historically always been an extreme point of contention on account of its social countenance, rather than its spiritual depth, co-opted into a political force time and time again. The US Republican campaign trail at the moment is fascinatingly similar on some levels to the Iberian Reconquista or the Teutonic push into Prussia.

Contrast that to the Japanese “religious” experience, where you have Shinto marriages, Buddhist funerals, various superstition-centric time-tempered holidays, the Chinese zodiac being more than simply trivial and other such calendar and life events. Despite this variance of spiritualism, I would be hard-pressed to call the Japanese people “religious”, though most people would tick “Buddhist” on the census. They’re an introspective (perhaps overly so) lot, so religion or belief is just another filtration process for pondering or processing perspective, feeling and emotion. Couple this with an incredible respect for tradition, helped in no small way to – like many old cultures – a fairly inflexible social structure, and you’ve got a group of people who see the spiritual experience as an unshakeable cultural construct, but remarkably one of the few aspects of Japanese life that starts from within, rather than without.

This sensitivity to others’ preconceptions and beliefs allows for a non-vitriolic attitude to the notion of belief. You’ve a country where the societal glue requires as little friction as possible (due to a number of things, though I’d put it down to population density, natural phenomena like quakes/floods and limited land for food production), so it stands to reason differences in Buddhism schools and variation in Shinto ties are seen with fond interest, rather than hostility – much like a regional dialect or food product.

As it stands, Japanese spiritualism in games appears – though I am no expert, especially these days – as a challenge of character and source of inspiration. We may kill Gods, but those Gods are merely proxies for adversity and a growth or attainment of sensibility – as Pete said. The true Japanese spiritual experience can be seen where the notion of a pantheon is not a binary equation, where an entitled perspective of good/bad doesn’t stick. In Judeo-Christendom, demons are irrevocably evil. In Japanese spiritualism, they take a far more neutral form – sometimes even good.

In essence, as much as I can’t stomach JRPGs these days for a number of reasons, their depiction of religion is always the more palatable. I’m not a New Atheist – I find them as bad as religious fundamentalists on account of lacking any hint of humour – but I can understand the stance and enjoy the rhetoric. However, from a cultural perspective, there’s so much room for experimentation and analysis of religion and spirituality in games from across the geographic board.

@feenwager Please dog.

Actually, my current gen backlog is pretty small. The bulk of it is older PC and handheld games. The $60 price point has really helped me reign in my purchasing habits this gen.

Oh, and skip Conviction.

My Current Gen List:

Xbox 360:
Need For Speed Hot Pursuit
Dark Souls
Shadow Complex
Stacking
Gears 3: RAAM’s Shadow
Banjo-Kazooie: Nuts n’ Bolts
Halo Anniversary

PS3:
3D Dot Game Heroes
Demon’s Souls
Top Spin 4
Sly Collection
Rayman Origins (nearly done)
GTA IV

PC (current gen):
Skrim
Fallout New Vegas
Bioshock 2
ArmA II
Metro 2033
STALKER Chermobyl
STALKER Pripyat
Gemini Rue
Magicka
Penumbra Black Plague
Penumbra Requiem
Amnesia
Civilization V
Sonic Generations
Super Meat Boy
Bionic Commando Rearmed
Command & Conquer 3
Cryostasis
Deathspank
Mount & Blade
Trine

Interactive? Oh, hell yeah.

This practically begs for its own special place…somewhere.

@feenwager Whew, that’s a tall order. Good list though, lots of thrills, some frills, a couple of chills. You won’t be bored, that’s for sure.

Can we do this interactively? Like each squaddie gets to make one call on how your list plays out? I say October is Amnesia time if you find yourself looking at this list.

>:)

Ok, here goes. This is the list of what I have on hand that I would legitimately like to play. In the interest of making this something that is attainable, I’m not even going to list all of the “stuff” cluttering up my collection, i.e. stuff from previous generations or things bought on Steam sales that I knew I never had any intention of playing. I’m also not listing any iOS games, because that way lies madness. I buy those as a professional curiosity, I know I’m not serious about portable gaming.

How about this, I’m not going to pretend that I’m going to pass up on games like Mass Effect 3 when they come out, but…I’m going to make every effort not to ADD to this pile by accumulating additional inventory until it’s completely gone. In between tentpole games, I’m going to go right back to this list and see what I can do about making it go away.

I’m counting on you folks to keep my honest, so before obtaining anything new, I’ll run it by the Squad to see if it’s “legal”. Who’s with me?

The list:

Xbox 360:

Arkham City
Dead Island
Castlevania: lords of shadow
Majin and the forsaken kingdom
Deadly Premonition
Singularity
Skyrim
Sonic generations
Crysis 2
Shadows of the damned
Homefront
Rage
Gears 3: raam’s shadow
Beyond good and evil hd
Outland
Sam and max save the world
The baconing
Splinter cell conviction
Mafia 2
The saboteur

PS3:

Jak 2
Jak 3
Ico
Shadow of the colossus
Sly 3
Ghost of sparta
Shank
Rochard
Pixel junk sidescroller
Back to the future episodes 2-5
Dead nation
Trine
3d dot game heroes

PC:

Alice: Madness Returns
Amnesia: Dark Descent
Starcraft 2
To The Moon
Binding Of Isaac
Divinty 2: Dragon Knight Saga
Duke Nukem Fovever
Gemini Rue
Neverwinter Nights 2: Platinum
Tales of Monkey Island 2-5
Witcher 2