Proof That I Am Lazy, Three Years Later

Yeah, I really am that lazy, apparently. I'm still poor, still playing lots of classic games, and still pretty angry about the hobby in general. As of late I've been playing through the Sega Genesis version of Shadowrun and enjoying it more than I have in years. I'm also sporadically picking up and playing Final Fantasy X (I'm at the part where you have to dodge the lightning... ugh), and enjoying playing Tetris Party on the Wii with my lovely fiancee. I've gotten a different perspective on gaming thanks to having two preteen boys in the house; they pretty much only like to play Minecraft and first-person shooters on the Xbox 360 (we don't allow them to do multiplayer online -- we only let them do it locally). It's fascinating to me that they can play first person shooters with no problem, but they can't get past the first level of Super Mario Bros.

I hope to start updating with some kind of regularity even though I know no one will ever read this blog nor stumble upon it, if for no other reason than to just be writing something again.

That being said, I give my nearly three year absence a score of:

    

Five twirling L-blocks from Tetris that I found in a minute using Google Image search out of five

Being Lazy & Poor Ain't All That Bad...

I'm lazy in the sense that I don't keep up with the latest in movies, music, and video games anymore. I basically just pop into a store, see what they have in stock, and blindly buy things. Well, not always; sometimes I just stick to the "classics" that I've seen, heard, or played before but don't own anymore for some reason. I find that I'm generally much happier with my purchases that way.

I'm poor in the sense that I just don't have $60 to spend on every new game that I want. Actually, I don't have $60 to spend on any new game that I want. I'd love to snap up a copy of NBA 2K11 and put Jordan on a superstar-packed team and have myself a ball, but the reality is that I just can't. Why do that when I can buy last year's game for $10? Or download an emulator, and ROM of Tecmo Super NBA Basketball and play with Michael Jordan on the Bulls-- with hair!

Yeah, that dude with the ball (and the hair) is Michael Jordan.

I'm sure that NBA 2K11 would give me a much deeper NBA experience than a Tecmo game from 17 years ago. But is it worth $60? That's the question I ask myself every time I even consider purchasing a new game. There's nothing I hate more than buying a game at full retail than bringing it home, playing it for a few days (or hours, even) and loathing it. I end up forcing myself to play through it so I can justify the purchase by saying I got my money's worth. I could have used that $60 in much better ways: paying bills, bolstering my savings, or buying my guinea pig more guinea kibble. The possibilities are endless. But no, I'm stuck with a game I don't really like.

Sure, I could trade it back for $25 or so, but even then I'm out $35. What a waste of my money and my time. It's almost depressing to think about. It's sad that buying new releases has become painful. As a result, I end up buying games I know and love (and their remakes) usually a year or so after initial release, and almost always pre-owned. I make very few exceptions to this rule: pretty much any Atlus RPG (especially if it's Shin Megami Tensei or a spin-off), re-releases of older Final Fantasy titles, and compilations of classic games. Usually they are priced lower than a big-name release, and thus it's easy for me to spend some coin on them while they're still fresh.

So that's what this blog will focus on (mainly): my experiences with these older games. Opinions, rants, maybe some full-fledged reviews. And probably lots of angry diatribes. Yeah, I've been known to go on one of those every now and then.