It was all going fine until I foolishly plugged in my ethernet cable while the game was paused… THEN OPENED THE GATES OF HELL.

gamechanger

I was immediately KICKED out of my game session with no option to continue, as the game had to conduct an EMERGENCY UPDATE! Ok fine, update, I thought. It finished, but then it had to install; I suppose that’s fair, hurry up. Then.. a 2nd update started downloading? My eye caught the corner of the screen, “2/13″.

THIRTEEN UPDATES?

Sure enough, the updates kept rolling in, ONE BY ONE, each one around 100mb, totaling over a GB surely. I had to download ONE GIGABYTE of data just to un-pause the game.

look honey, it just hit 80%!!!

Not only that, but I can’t stop it or turn off my system. I CAN’T GO ANYWHERE. 40 minutes later it’s finally finished, and the game RESETS back to the title screen. I suppose I should have expected this considering it’s a whole new game now. Finally, I can play! what new world awaits me?

WHAT THE FUCK, WE’RE STILL NOT DONE? Next up I have to agree to a lengthy terms and conditions statement that treats me like a criminal pedophile. Pages and pages about stalking, bullying, and unlawful behavior. There’s SO MUCH talk about inappropriate behavior that it feels like Sony is encouraging it. My first and only interaction in PlayStation HOME involved a young French girl (American middle-aged guy) offering me sex, then I walked off into a building that was a 40mb download in disguise.

Finally I arrived at the game menu. What’s new? With 1GB, I was expecting rainbows and fireworks and maybe some new music. Turns out the update gave me a new way to save the game. Now the save file can be moved to a different folder in the PS3. THANK GOD FOR THAT! I WOULDN’T WANT TO BE USING UP UNNECESSARY SPACE.

On the plus side, now that I’m online I can enjoy the best feature of the game: the user-created levels and community aspect. There’s an incredible 6 million levels here, and some are quite fun. However, Sony just will not stop pissing me off. Playing my first level I earned a “traveler” trophy for being on the internet. Sitting on my arse and plugging an ethernet cable into the PS3 does not make me a traveler. Then I played a cool go-kart level and rated it 5 stars (I feel it’s my duty to give things I like top marks, thanks to all the fuckheads who give things one star), and got another trophy; “opinionated”. YES SONY, I only JUST formed an opinion, thanks for acknowledging that. Then I got another trophy called “friendly” when another person joined my game. Now I’m furious – this shouldn’t be a TROPHY. If the game could hear me it would not be giving me an award for being friendly. Why do I hate this?

The “reward” is that a person joined, that’s it. That’s cool enough without having to make it a statistic. Playing levels, seeing new things – that’s where the reward sensors in my brain are triggered. Trophies and Achievements are taking all the fun and discovery away from videogames by making the actual experience feel like you’re just passing time until the next achievement comes in. It devalues the experience itself; the only reason we picked up the game; the only reason games exist. This trend has to be fucking neutered in order to save the upcoming generation from being completely braindead.

If I wasn’t already pissed off at this point, I probably wouldn’t care that much about a few popup trophies, it’s not a huge deal. Sony, however, are experts at creating a bad experience: they’ve mastered the fucking art. If Sony keeps going in this direction, I hope PS3 is their last console. It might be an impressive piece of hardware (it’s not), but the user experience so far has been terrible. I just want to play games, not take part in a fucking blowjob service. Accessibility is THE most important thing in a gaming system and always will be. Xbox 360 and Wii never gave me such grief for wanting to play a videogame. The biggest update I’ve downloaded for X360 was 20mb, but maybe I’ve been lucky.

Anyway, LittleBigPlanet is a great game and outside this documented mishap, I’m enjoying it a lot! However, I will now make sure to COMPLETELY DISCONNECT my PS3 next time I put an old game in, and since I just got my PS3, there’s going to be a lot of old games I need to catch up on. I shudder to think of the horror that awaits me if I put in a launch game from 2006. Six years of updates. For now, I’ll just enjoy LittleBigPlanet. There are some great levels here and I can’t wait to make some myself! Here’s a cool level I’d like to play…

“you have to buy more items in the shop before you can play this level”

FFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFFUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUUCK

All the other sites beat me to the punch, too. Diablo III‘s servers have been overloaded since day one and no one can play. They’ve used up all the good jokes like how this should’ve been error 1, not 37. They’ve said the one about how we’re online, Blizzard are the ones offline, they’re breaking their own DRM. I understand that there is a queue now. Like you take a ticket and get in line to play Diablo. Are there scalpers too? Are people selling their place in line to play to the highest bidder? Maybe Blizzard should include that in game, just like the auction house. Oh shit, even that joke has been done already.

One wonders how this even happened, too. Blizzard know how many people pre-ordered their game, they’ve spent the past decade maintaining the most popular MMO in existence; they have the technology. They even bragged about it:

Since we’ve been supporting WOW for so long we have a large infrastructure of people who have become experts at supporting a live game like this, and have been through many, many launches with WOW and its expansions. They’ve built up the best live team. They really know how to take a game live. Our trust is in those folks to do that job.
- Blizzard’s Julian Love

Well I guess that trust has been broken.

The internet has of course taken out its frustration in its usual, mature, level headed way. But what really gets me is why anyone was even excited about the game in the first place. For a start, pretty much everyone involved with Diablo II left Blizzard seven years ago when Blizzard closed the developer. Most of the key personnel had left before then even. The remains of Blizzard North, nee Condor, scattered to the wind forming companies like Flagship Studios and Hyboreal Games, that succumbed to the realities to capitalism before ever releasing a game. Runic Games are all that are left. They’re hard at work delivering Diablo clones, free from the influence of Blizzard and their diabolical overlords Activision and Vivendi. Maybe Activision and Vivendi could’ve been part of the evil the players fight in Diablo! Someone who actually gets the opportunity to play the game should read between the lines for signs that this is the case.

The other reason no one should’ve been excited about Diablo III is that the Diablo series is one of the most overrated in gaming. I even owned Diablo II. “Whoops! Won’t be making that mistake again,” I thought to myself when Diablo III was announced. The Diablo games just see you wearing out the clicker on your mouse trudging through an endless series of glum, randomly generated dungeons where you collect randomly generated armour and loot. I didn’t like the idea of randomly having fun, I’d rather it was guaranteed through careful level design. The skill trees were the most interesting aspect of the game and I hear they’ve been taken out!

So fuck Diablo III and fuck all you clowns upset that you can’t play because Blizzard don’t have their shit together. Consider it a chance to re-evaluate your life and how you spend your precious free time.

You can probably see where I’m going with this already; despite it’s name, this game is not fun. In Fun! Fun Mini Golf TOUCH! (henceforth, FFMGT) your flamboyantly animated Mii flies around the world on his or her lonesome to play what are allegedly a professional mini golf tournaments. I say allegedly because there are no competitors, nor scores to beat. This is probably because all the other players are playing at venues where they allow you to take your stroke from anywhere on the course, not just from the tee and within 1 metre of the hole. Normally, I would make some kind of joke about the rules of FFMGT being the sort of golf game Hitler would devise, but Shin’en are a German developer so that seems insensitive. Anyway, it’s these fascist rules along with bizarre and inexplicable physics that make me question if any of the development team ever thought to check out a mini golf course and play a round before making this game.

This is from the game’s ‘trick shot’ mode. There is no trick to it and I don’t want to talk about it anymore because it made me so upset.

Of course, like all Shin’en games this one looks great, has crisp sound and a clean simple presentation. I really liked the way the game knew when I had enough in game currency to unlock new courses and took me straight to the shop. After buying it would then take you straight to the next round! Great stuff. Shame this is a golf game and there are only two criteria worth judging it on; the design of the courses and the playability of the physics. FFMGT fails on both counts. Every course is pretty much the same length with just a few obstacles or bumps in the way. This, combined with the fascist rules, means you play every hole the same; go for a hole in one. If you miss the hole in one the ball will roll out of bounds and you have to try again. It you just miss, you’ll get to tap it in. The difficulty comes from adapting to the game’s physics. In FFMGT, golf balls… Sorry I’m trying to think of a way to describe it. You know how with tennis balls you can put spin on it and… no that wont work. Uh, you see the thing is with billiards that… uh. Look, I’m not a physics teacher but I will tell you to shelve all your knowledge of trigonometry and angles if you make the mistake of playing this game. It’s fucked but once you’re used to it, it’s a special kind of fucked that you can almost deal with if you have a younger sibling nearby to take your anger out on.

I hated this bit.

I’ve seen, elsewhere on the internet, other unpaid gaming journalists giving this game middling to above average scores. Do not believe their lies. This game is dreadful. Even with all bonus credit Shin’en bring to the table I cannot recommend anyone buy it. Free mini golf flash games offer more interesting courses, better physics and multiplayer. This game on the other hand costs $5. Five dollars can get you a hamburger. A hamburger will be more satisfying and stay in your system for longer than this game. Did I mention I completed it in just over an hour? I did. I had to leave the 3DS on longer so I could submit an angry review to the Shop Channel.

It’s as simple as this: THERE IS A MARKET FOR IT HERE. You may remember this article about Samurai Warriors Chronicles selling extremely well in Europe, to the point where it exhausted its entire shipment and ended up selling for twice the retail price on eBay for a short while. It was criminally undershipped, and Tecmo-Koei themselves admitted they underestimated demand for the game. By the way, I did find a copy of the game after all in a local store (happy ending!) and it’s very good. So anyway, now we’ve moved on from that, what’s their solution this time around?

…

Not releasing Dynasty Warriors for 3DS AT ALL! Wow, that’s a great way to avoid shortages! Why are they making the same mistake? First I want to address the “risk” issue.

“Oh gee Grubdog, the game MIGHT BOMB in the west too!”

IT VERY WELL MIGHT! However… the game is DONE, it’s already been made, it IS a bomb already! Translating it into English will not sink the company! The risk factor is slim to none. It’s far more risky NOT localising it based on it’s potential.

It’s not just a normal Dynasty Warriors game. The draw of Samus and Link is much stronger in the west, based on the fact that Metroid and Zelda are struggling franchises in Japan (Tecmo of all people should know this after Other M) and noticeably more popular in the west. The mere attachment of Link and Samus, however small it may be, is the reason people here are talking about this game. Reading the comments on various websites about this story, people care. It’s a small sample size, but I can say without a doubt it would sell more than 10,000 copies in Europe and America. That’s an easy goal, and Link agrees.

Let’s go way back, because Link doesn’t appear in many odd non-Nintendo games. Let’s look at the huge draw Link had in Soul Calibur 2; the GameCube version was the highest selling version on all three home consoles at the time, despite the console itself being a huge flop and having nowhere near the userbase of PS2. It got HUNDREDS OF THOUSANDS of free sales, ONLY because it had Link.

Japan did not share the same enthusiasm for Link, and this is the basis of my case. Soul Calibur 2 sold roughly 1 million copies in the US and 100,000 in Japan (just the GameCube version). That’s a 10 time increase which is not normal for this type of game when you compare both countries. So take that boost, and add Samus. Then add European sales (I can’t find any data for SC2 there). Suddenly the market for the game is a little less risky – in fact it’s bad business to ignore something with so much potential.

So I’ve made my case on why I think this is a bad call, but WHY has this happened? Are they just lazy? Maybe the game is bad; it did get lower reviews than Samurai Warriors Chronicles in Japan, and I heard some bad impressions of the demo. Samurai Warriors Chronicles was an abnormally good game for the series, Dynasty Warriors VS might not have lived up to those expectations. It’s feasible, but being crap never stopped Tecmo-Koei from releasing a game before, and I can’t judge a game I haven’t played.

Here’s what I think happened: they asked Nintendo to publish it. Nintendo, sick of doing all the leg-work for lazy third parties recently (Dead or Alive Dimensions), said “no, sorry, we have our own games right now”, so they gave up and cried all the way home, taking their game with them. It’s a crazy theory but it’s all I’ve got, and I would like to be proven wrong. That’s it, rant over. This is a game I would have bought, so I felt a duty to question this decision, but perhaps they did me a favour by saving my money. We’ll never know.

The name Crash Car Racer does a pretty good job telling you what it is: a racing game with cars that crash. However, it’s not really ABOUT crashing, it’s just a normal racing game that happens to have completely broken physics, conducive to crashes. The disconnected car handling, poorly programmed AI, and bizarre tracks all combine to create a game that pretty much crashes itself every lap, no matter what you do.

First I’ll talk about the handling: it’s quite a frustrating game to adapt to. The Wii controller is used as a steering wheel and it’s nice and responsive, but when you try and turn a corner the car shits itself and a dimension to another universe opens up. Turning into the apex of a corner as the physics in this universe would encourage, slows the car down almost to a crawl. To be fast, you basically have to bully your way through the broken physics by missing the braking point and just swinging wide as the car wobbles like it’s on the moon. Unbelievably, the car speeds up when it loses grip.

Here’s a TECHNICAL explanation of how fucked up the car handling in this game is; I could be wrong, but I feel it’s my duty to try and explain this. You can HEAR the engine wanting to change gears when you exit a corner conventionally – the sound is horrifying. It’s at peak revs yet at the same time, the tyres are struggling for traction. That means it’s time to SHIFT UP a gear, the car is READY! Except we can’t, and the game just sits there while the car tards out. Even though we can’t change gears in this game, the game incorporates it into the cars behavior. This leads me to believe that the game actually caps your car at a certain speed through corners, keeping it in low gear for far too long as it fails to recognise the corner finished a long time ago. Therefore, missing the apex of a corner TRICKS the game into thinking you’re not taking a corner at all, allowing you to keep your speed AND accelerate away! If you don’t do this, an invisible force appears to either push down on the car, or cleverly restrict the engine revs. This universe fascinates me!

OK, so now I’ve figured out how to play the game! Is it any fun? … not really. I did try to like it, but even when the handling “clicks”, it’s not very satisfying. In fact it goes against everything it means to drive a car fast in real life. Momentum is also unattainable; the car just slows too much and awkwardly skids even when you’re speeding up. At times I honestly have to question if the speedometer is lying to me as it changes with such odd timing compared to what my car is doing on screen. I’ve never questioned that in a game until now.

Since the driving isn’t fun, there isn’t much more to talk about. Passing cars is entertaining as the AI usually wanders all over the track; it’s impossible to predict where they’ll go next. The smallest bit of contact between two cars usually results in both of them glitching into the side of the track after doing a few uncoordinated flips.

As far as content goes I have no complaints, 8 tracks isn’t a huge amount but it’ll do for fifteen bucks, and the track design is unique. There’s standard races, a championship, a bizarre “weekend” mode which is just one track repeated over and over in the same championship, and crash mode. The crash mode isn’t really about crashing either, you just do a normal race and bump people for points. The AI seems to have no idea this mode exists as they drive normally and don’t even try to bump each other, making it incredibly easy to win. In fact, losing would be a bigger challenge as the opponents get no points at all. There is, however, a high score you can challenge. Fun.

Overall the game is crap.

The release of Nintendo DS in 2004 was accompanied by the biggest boom the gaming industry has ever seen, spurring the medium not only to new heights, but new audiences. It became the fastest selling gaming device ever, smashing records left and right on the back of games like Nintendogs and Brain Training that reached out to new audiences with the new touch screen interface. In an attempt to understand this phenomenon, gaming journalism somehow wandered up shit-creek, and the term “casual gamer” was born to EXPLAIN these funny looking people who enjoyed simple, lesser game concepts like Nintendogs and Wii Fit. Inferior beings who trained their brains and bodies in a pathetic attempt to match the superior intellect of existing gamers (thus the term HARDCORE gained momentum, to differentiate these people).

These new games ushered in a new wave of gamers, but it didn’t stop there. Somehow in all this, Super Mario and Mario Kart had become “casual“. New Super Mario Bros. was the best selling Mario game since the original that was packed-in with the NES in the 80s, while Mario Kart DS outsold all previous iterations. This meant the new expanded audience had also embraced the existing game conventions of the last 20 years. Wow, established gaming still matters! Nintendo has done it – the industry is bigger and healthier than it’s ever been. What an awesome headline! Except that wasn’t the headline.

Super Mario and Mario Kart became GROUPED with Nintendogs as casual games. Their definition changed, as they explored new heights of popularity. There’s no way Nintendo could have pulled this off, nuh-uh. We didn’t see it coming, therefore it didn’t happen. It’s not happening, because these aren’t real games! Mario Kart is a casual game, get back to me when Fire Emblem sells 20 million copies.

The term “successful” had morphed into “casual” without anyone batting an eyelid. Little Jimmy who played 3 hours of Mario Kart a day was a casual gamer. Little Rosy who walked her Nintendog every day wasn’t hardcore enough to matter. You can be sure if Fire Emblem did sell 20 million copies, it would be labeled a casual game too. Just like how Super Smash Bros. is a “party” game, and not the most successful fighting game ever.

NOW… the definition has changed again! Casual isn’t even casual anymore! Mario Kart is off the hook, it’s been set free! We’ve gone full circle and a game can be any definition you want it to be! In this article on cnet.com, the guy uses the word mainstream and casual every second line. It’s a complete clusterfuck that makes no point whatsoever and completely falls on its arse and leaves everyone sweaty and confused. Here’s a quote:

“This is the big problem for Sony, Microsoft and Nintendo. Casual isn’t casual anymore. Casual is now mainstream. It’s the mainstream they have lusted after for more than 10 years. It’s the mainstream Nintendo won with the Wii’s fun-before-fidelity approach.”

Casual isn’t casual but casual IS mainstream, despite not being anything therefore mainstream has no definition in this context, subsequently falling somewhere inbetween being casual and not being casual; lending its existence to any possible circumstance that isn’t one of the two.

WHAT THE FUCK ARE WE TALKING ABOUT?

The journalist who wrote this called it “scintilating wordery” on Twitter. I couldn’t agree more. Yes, I put that in quotes because he spelled scintillating wrong, and wordery isn’t a word. This guy writes for cnet and appears on television representing gamers. The point of the article is that fun isn’t fun, yet it’s fun when it’s casual. This insight isn’t even strong enough to light a fart, let alone a candle of meaningful discussion.

So now we’ve explored the origin of the word casual in gaming industry terms… what does the ACTUAL WORD mean?

“happening by chance; without definite or serious intention; careless or offhand; seeming or tending to be indifferent to what is happening; apathetic; unconcerned” dictionary.com

“suited for everyday use” thesaurus.com

CASUAL is… HARDCORE

Nintendogs is hardcore. Sine Mora is casual. If a game is casual, then it is hardcore. If it’s hardcore, it is casual. WHAT WORLD IS THIS?

Casual. Mainstream. HARDCORE. This shit is doing my head in; they are stupid terms that don’t mean anything. I tried to figure out this trend and got nowhere, because it isn’t anything. It succeeds in doing one thing: alienating people. We have to get past these ridiculous terms before videogames can firmly plant themselves in our culture as things that don’t need to be explained. Mainstream isn’t a friendly word: it creates the thought that “normal” games aren’t mainstream, that “mainstream” is what a struggling game from the ghetto should strive to achieve.

No.

A game should just be a game. If a game is available to buy, it’s mainstream. It’s CIRCULATING. If you play it, you’re gaming, simple. If you’re NOT playing a game, that doesn’t make you a non-gamer either. I think non-parachuters would agree with me on that pointless definition. When you imply a game should be something else, you admit that being a game isn’t good enough on it’s own, devaluing the entire term. We’re past this, there are enough smart people on the internet now that we can write proper headlines and talk about more exciting things. I know this because I talk to them every day on Twitter. I have hope that in 5 years time, all these stupid articles about “mainstream audiences” and “casual strategies” sound like gibberish from another planet, and we’re actually talking about games without making excuses for it.

Beware the narrow hallways that make fighting ghosts nearly impossible, the deathly fear of potential game-breaking bugs, the bewildering persistence of that nurse I can’t remember the name of, the REVENGENCE of Ayako as I storm her room for sheet music, the wheelchair lady who somehow pushes herself, and the terrifying black death thing that scares the living shit out of me!

What is that final monstrosity? Just what is in the breaker room? Will Ruka ever be able to open a door without taking her time, even when chased by demons from Hell? Find out next time in this Durpthrough!

Skyward Sword is a weird game. It’s lazy and closed off; it won’t play itself. If you want to get anywhere, you have to pick up the controller and ENGAGE. It’s the concept that started video games, and it’s the only reason they ever existed. If you want anything in this game to respond, you have to poke it. Skyward Sword is a naive attempt to put the focus on the actions of the player, and it completely tears apart the passive nature of recent blockbuster games like Skyrim and Mass Effect. Zelda is an AWAKENING. Skyward Sword will have you feel like you’re actually CLIMBING things, and actually wielding a sword. It all comes together thanks to the MotionPlus controller, and it WORKS!

Firstly, the sword. It will do whatever you want [Editor's note: Not quite, but far more than most other games dare to, let alone succeed at]. Moving the controller around moves the sword around. Simple, but this is the FIRST TIME it’s ever happened in a game like this. It doesn’t just affect the gameplay, it IS the gameplay. You can swing at any angle you like, you can twist the sword how you like, and the enemies and puzzles that await you in this magical world will all require this new-found finesse. If you waggle mindlessly like a retard and complain that it’s not working, then you’re too dumb to be writing reviews; get off my internet. This game doesn’t have a WIN button.

Link takes on two game journalists, and easily disposes of their pathetic waggling efforts

Zelda has always been about solving puzzles, using items, and taking advantage of the varied gameplay of the world to advance. Skyward Sword takes it up a level with just how interactive it is. This is a continuation of the design in Phantom Hourglass and Spirit Tracks, where the initial “hardcore gamer” backlash began for the Zelda series. Stylus-exclusive controls annoyed some gamers because it made their precious hands tired, but it opened up a lot of new gameplay possibilities. Skyward Sword does the same thing with the accuracy of MotionPlus, allowing interactions that weren’t possible before, in ANY game.

When you walk into a dungeon, it’s intimidating. There are structures that don’t make sense and pathways that look confusing as hell. It’s like someone has thrown shit all over the place and you’ve got to piece things back together. It becomes a lot less intimidating when you wrap your head around how much you can DO with these new game mechanics. Skyward Sword takes advantage of the most advanced control mechanics available, and the puzzles are even more brilliantly designed as a consequence. Nintendo knows the dungeons are intimidating, as Link looks slightly hesitant every time he steps into a new place. He presses on however, why? Why is the game designed like this? Because Link is the HERO OF TIME. Yes, you’re PLAYING AS A HERO, REMEMBER? Intimidation is what’s for lunch, and the only sauce you’ll get on that crybaby sandwich is what’s dripping from your ass.

This isn't The Legend of Ugly Bitch, Zelda is a girl WORTH saving

When you play a dual-analog console FPS, you’re moving your thumbs to simulate running and shooting. In Skyward Sword, you’re swinging to swing, tilting to tilt and thrusting to stab. The important part here that actually makes it fun, it’s not just the MOTION that makes things happen, but the accuracy. This is not a Kinect game where you can win without even doing anything; you have a huge level of control over what you’re doing. EVERY action is fun: sprinting, flying, doing a nunchuck roll off a cliff, even switching items becomes natural with this control scheme. You aren’t following a menu; just flicking in the direction you’ve placed the item. It feels like you’re taking something out of your pocket.

Look at this, it’s beautiful. I had to capture this cool pointless moment because it’s what the game is about; exploring your abilities. I rarely find swimming in games much fun, but I love doing it in Skyward Sword, and leaping out of the water is unbelievably satisfying. This has the best swimming in a game I’ve ever played. It’s Super Mario-levels of responsive control, and it’s almost immersion-breaking that Link can swim so good.

This game is for KIDS: curious people who have not had their worlds shaped and defined by other people. People who will poke things without fear of getting in TROUBLE. There are some interesting characters in this game, funny and charming, but they won’t give you any complex conversations or backstories. Your best friends on this journey will be your dexterity, your memory, and most importantly, your curiosity. Unfortunately, these things don’t come bundled with the game. Most people are born with them, but for some it’s an arduous task to bring them out, and the effort simply won’t be worth it. Look forward to my review of Final Fantasy XIII-2 if you’re one of these people.

There are a few things that stop the game being perfect, firstly I want to mention the battery warning. Whenever it goes down to one quarter you’ll get a message. In my experience there’s still about 10-12 hours of battery left at this point, but the reminders are constant, and annoying enough that I swap and recharge my batteries immediately JUST to get away from this message. Secondly, Skyward Sword still features the classic Zelda problem of TOO MANY RUPEES. Treasure is worthless in this game, there’s no excitement in finding a treasure chest anymore, it’ll just contain a collectable you already have 20 of, or some rupees that won’t even fit in your wallet. My last complaint contradicts some of my earlier praise; the game isn’t that difficult. It’s “difficult” in the sense that unmotivated / uncoordinated individuals won’t get very far, but the progression of the game is made painfully easy by how many hints you get. Skyward Sword is more linear than any other Zelda game, always making sure you know where to go. It feels like a half-hearted attempt to cater to crap journalists. Don’t bother next time, Nintendo. They already decided this game was crap before playing it.

Skyward Sword gets the most important things right, and the journey itself is remarkable. It’s engaging from start to finish and some of the most fun I’ve ever had playing a game. It’s so accurate and responsive that it doesn’t really need enemy Z-targeting anymore; fitting for the series that introduced it to videogames. We’re past that now, there’s one thing consistent with the Zelda franchise: it’s always moving forward, and this level of interaction is unprecedented. It makes you think “I can’t do that,” then gives you a way to do it. Want to be a hero? Want a videogame that rewards you for being alive? Play The Legend of Zelda: Skyward Sword. It’s the best.

However.

Let’s instead talk about the one bad thing. WHY ISN’T IT IN HIGH DEFINITION? Why does a Nintendo-developed game have to be on a NINTENDO SYSTEM?

480p? What is this, the stoneage?

I’m a journalist on the internet, so I will now exaggerate a bit more in case people think my point is weak. WHY THE FUCK DOES THIS BRAINDEAD JOURNALIST TAKE THE OPPORTUNITY TO TALK ABOUT A WONDERFUL GAME THEN SHIT ALL OVER IT’S FOUNDERS? I can’t decide whether the technical limitations of this guys brain make me want to projectile vomit or take a 12-gauge to my monitor, and it makes me angry enough to write a whiny article and hold GameInformer accountable, because the game deserves much better. Xenoblade deserves more than a jagged-edged fuzzy rant. It deserves more than a gasping fish flopping up and down on a keyboard forming words. Notice the hyphen in jagged-edged, dickhead. It’s not a band.

Here’s what REALLY got me, the huge contradiction that INSPIRED me to give a shit and flop around in true journalistic fashion,

“I honestly believe that Xenoblade Chronicles could have been this generation’s Final Fantasy VII”

FINAL FANTASY VII – THIS

WHAT THE FUCK IS THAT? It’s a technical juggernaut, that’s what. Step the fuck aside N64, you’ve got nothing. This was the defining game of the generation because of its graphics.

<deep breath>

Even GREAT GAMES have become reasons to troll Nintendo now. Can you POSSIBLY IMAGINE why they’d be hesitant to release something like this to the western media? The SAME MEDIA who criticised Nintendo for holding back games like this?

I for one am sick and tired of it. I’m tired of paid game journalists shitting on their responsibility to objectively review content. I’m tired of seeing Mario games relegated to “casual” quick-snip comments, Im tired of The Legend of Zelda being swept aside in a shitstorm as an example of an UGLY MUDDY BROWN game. I’m tired of Xenoblade Chronicles, the game everyone asked for, being thrown under a bus and used as an example of WHAT’S WRONG. It was wrong when we WEREN’T GETTING IT.

Xenoblade on Wii looks better than most 360 games I own – resolution means jack shit. How did videogames ever make it through three decades if they were all ugly and underpowered? I can still be amazed by my N64; good design will always be evident no matter what the limitations are. Limitations are FOREVER EXPANDING – how can you ever appreciate anything with this mindset? Xenoblade on Wii U would look ugly in ten years in this journalist’s eyes. It’s a destructive way of thinking and this guy should be muted, not quoted.

But hey; hits, drama. CONFLICT! Not the best way to generate traffic, but certainly the easiest. Thanks for the free rant.