Monday "morning" (my alarm-clock decided to take a breather, briefly, at some point during the night, only to pick up the tick-tock again after about thirty minutes, thus appearing to be in fully working order by the time it
beeped, which it ordinarily does at 7:30 sharp, and which it appeared to do this morning as well. Consequently, blissfully unaware of the devious trap laid for me by my aging mechanical companion, I rose about a half hour later than usual, sensing immediately that something was dreadfully, horribly wrong, and arriving at work much later than I would have preferred, though still early enough to enjoy a café au lait, a brie sandwich, and a selection of
websites before 10 AM) and I've just returned from a meeting regarding
E3 - the
Electronic Entertainment Expo - which happens next week, in Los Angeles. As always,
Funcom will be attending the show, as will I, but unlike last year, we won't have an open booth. Instead, we'll be talking about
Anarchy Online's
Shadowlands expansion pack to members of the press in a closed room. There will also be alcohol. Hopefully.
Since it's Monday, and the start of a new week (brief though it is; this upcoming Friday Norway celebrates its independence in the only way it knows how: by drinking itself into a stupor - and Monday is another holiday), I'll browse through the RagnarTornquist.com inbox and answer some reader mail, something I haven't done in...quite a while. Yes.
This first one isn't really a question, but this reader agreed with me, and that's always a
big plus (for future reference), so it's worthy of inclusion. Besides, she touches on a topic that's quite interesting:
"I check your site every few months or so and I just read your April 16th rant in your journal about the guy who dissed adventure games, and I just wanted to tell you, I know *exactly* what you are talking about! I play a few strategy games here and there, including the Sims - sure it is fun for a while (I liked your sandbox analogy) but after a while I get so incredibly bored of the game that I wonder why I ever bought it in the first place! Adventure games never leave me with such a bad taste in my mouth at their conclusion."That's absolutely true, although some
TLJ players might disagree. A number of players have written me to complain about the ending, which they felt didn't answer enough questions, didn't live up to the rest of the game, or simply
sucked. But, yes, the finite structure of an adventure game, coupled with a progressing story and characters that grow, change, and reach a goal mean that adventure games are, potentially, more satisfying.
Yet there is much to be said for role-playing games - like
Anarchy Online (plug!) - where the character's arc is defined by the player, where the story is more organic and less linear, and where you can (theoretically) play forever without running out of things to do. An RPG done well may have greater potential than an adventure game, but that's like comparing apples and, uh, pizza. Both taste good, but only one of them is good
for you. No, wait, that's not like the difference between adventure games and RPGs at all.
Personally, I'll play any game, no matter the genre, as long as it's good, as long as it plays well, looks and sounds great, and offers me more than a few hours of entertainment;
PC,
Xbox,
PlayStation 2,
GameCube, or
Dreamcast - it really doesn't matter (although I'm starting to lean more towards console games, simply because they usually offer more than PC games, especially in terms of control, instant gratification and ease-of-use, and eye- and ear-candy). If it's an adventure, then great! Nothing's better than that. If it's an
RPG, yay. If it's a first-person shooter, that's fine, too. Racers, fighting-games, platform-games, survival horror...it really doesn't matter. A great game transcends genres. As a designer, any game, on any platform, of any genre, is interesting, because that game may teach me new ways to look at interface, control, content, learning-curve, or any or all of a million other elements.
Phew. I'll get off my soapbox in a second. My point is just this: It's all too easy to limit oneself to only one type of game, and miss out on a wide spectrum of intriguing titles that are available on a variety of platforms. If you're a
PC-gamer, go buy a
GameCube, or an
Xbox, or a
PS2 (just wait a couple of weeks and they're all $199 - if you live in the US, that is; or even better, a
Dreamcast can be picked up for 50 bucks - now
that's value for money!). If you're a devoted adventure gamer you might be surprised to find that there are actually adventure games available for those platforms too, although they're never called adventures. Instead, they're called role-playing games, or action adventures, or something completely different. But
Shenmue is still an adventure, and so is
Final Fantasy X. Broaden your horizons. The same goes for everyone else. Go on. It doesn't hurt. Much.
Stepping off soapbox, right...now! There. I'm off. Promise.
(More reader mail later on - got to get back to work!)
