Column

[therhombus]

Over the past two weeks, I think I've started something like seven columns and finished exactly zero of them. Today, I was reading Bill Simmons' piece about Hunter S. Thompson and he said that Thompson made you think about what you COULD do rather than what you couldn't do. That got me thinking a little bit

Comments

[killakangaroo]

Very good column. I remember NHL 95 I think, despite being about 8 at the time. I likely only played as Montreal the entire time. I never owned a football title for my SNES, though, so that would be a different experience altogether. Do cheap wraparounds still work far too often in NHL? I always abused that far more than I should have.

The whole concept of "Having everything" is all over the industry though, not even just sports titles. Metroid Prime 2, for instance, isn't a HUGE leap forward from the original title. While I think it had great bosses, great gameplay and great graphics, so did the original, and on top of some thematic issues that I felt the first handled better, there was just a different sense of wonder going through Metroid in 3D...the first time. It wasn't there the second time, and it was just a really great game, not a really great experience.

Wrestling titles are getting to be the worst, though, and have the same basic issues. No Mercy is still the most highly regarded title of its kind, and yet there have been HOW many since with larger story modes, more characters...the power of nostalgia, or the idiocy of modern game design? You be the judge, I guess. It's your column.

Now, I shall wait for my newly inexpensive iPod Mini to get here and play some Pikmin 2...a sequel that definitely doesn't make me long for the inferior original.

McNutt

[therhombus]

NHL '95 changed my life. It's a very sad commentary on your life when you're so impacted by a hockey game. Yet, it's completely true. But the cheap wraparounds don't really work - today, the one-timer is the way to go, followed up by slapshots from the point that somehow beat the goalie. Happens more than you might think.

I'm reminded of a column Alex Williams wrote bashing the PSP for making it like the PS2 when it should have been more like the PS1. Why? Because people would have bought the PS1-esque PSP anyway, even if the graphics system was a decade old. It still would have been better than the GBA was offering and it would have had the novelty of a Sony handheld for the first time. Now, Sony's fucked because what are they going to put out next time, a portable PS3? He was dead-on, and I think you can apply a lot of gaming concepts to that. I'm not saying they should have taken stuff out of Metroid Prime, but maybe they could have done something more to make Metroid Prime 2 a new experience, just like the first one was.

Wrestling games definitely are the worst. I don't even buy them anymore. I'd rather play a game like WWF Royal Rumble for Genesis, which came out in an era where I was as big a wrestling fan as I've ever been, had all the characters I loved as a kid, and gameplay that's pretty cheesy today, but can still be enjoyed from time to time. You don't have to spend hours learning moves in Royal Rumble, and you can pick it up years later without wondering what the hell the buttons do. But that's just me.

Enjoy your iPod Mini. My 20 GB iPod has changed my life - not as much as NHL '95, but then again, what has?