The Most Terrible Games of 2010

Every game starts off as a perfect 10. During those virgin moments when I'm loading up a game for the first time--Havok acknowledgement, Bink Video acknowledgement (what the hell is "Bink Video" anyway, and why do some many games seem to depend on it?), and so forth--my heart practically explodes with hope. (I wrote about this peculiar brand of hope in detail in this post.) I'm at maximum optimism, baby. I want the game that I am about to play to be nothing short of spectacular. I want my head to be blown off by how terrific the game is.

Then, as usual, almost always, the game turns out to be complete and utter dog shit.

Scientific fact: Approximately one out of 20 games is interesting and worth playing. Another scientific fact: Maybe one out of every hundred games is legitimately great. In baseball, you get one hit for every 20 at-bats, or one home run for every 100 at-bats, and you're out of a job pretty quickly.

Yet we gamers continue to march into game stores, continue to gladly hand over $60--or in Canada, $70--only to receive the videogame equivalent of an exploding cigar in return. I remember living on 106 Street in Manhattan about 10 years ago. Money was tight back then. I was working at a terrible job, trying to survive, trying not to have to pack up my belongings and go back home.

One day I marched into the nearby EB Games and saw that the Dreamcast version of Soldier of Fortune had just come out. I bought the game. I'd read quite a bit about Soldier of Fortune, and always wanted to play it, and finally it was out on a platform that I owned. I headed home with my new game, loaded it up (hope, hope, hope, hope, etc.) only to be completely fucking soul-crushed by the atrocious load times and shitty gameplay.

I promptly took the game back to the store, hoping to trade this trash in for something better. The gloating cashier--at least he seemed to be gloating--informed me that in its current "opened" state, the game was only worth $20. Even though I'd paid $60 for it only an hour or so ago.

I said: "So, as soon as I take the shrink wrap off the game, it loses two-thirds of its value?"

He said: "Yes, that's right."

I said: "This is bullshit."

I was practically in tears. I grabbed the stupid fucking game off the counter and exited the store, my face hot with shame and embarrassment. As soon as I got home, a terrible electrical storm hit New York. Rain came down in sheets. Lightning pinged off the tops of buildings. I sat by the window, watching the storm do its work, clenching and unclenching my fists, not realizing in this moment that I was experiencing my own super hero-like origin story. It was on this night, as rain and lighting came from the sky, that my life took a turn, that I forever became someone else.

Thanks to that piece-of-trash port of Soldier of Fortune, I became who I am today.

So the next time you think I'm being too hard on a game, that I've handed out a score that seems cruel and unusual, remember this: All I'm trying to do, you dummy, is to make sure you never have your own Soldier of Fortune moment.

Anyway, here are five $60 exploding cigars from 2010.

5. Star Wars: The Force Unleashed II (LucasArts, PS3/360)

This one really hurt. Sure, it looks a little better than the original--a game that I loved dearly, mostly because it let me feel like a Star Wars fan again--but the sequel is short and repetitive, and worse still, just plain fucking dumb. The writing is terrible. The story: Also terrible. The game has huge narrative holes in it that imply that it wasn't even close to being finished. LucasArts has the best intellectual properties, the best facilities, the most talent and money, etc. Star Wars: TFU II is basically a greeting card from George Lucas that says: "Dear Gamers, Eat shit. Love, George." Price: $59.99. What the game is actually worth: -$2.

4. Mafia II (2K Games, PS3/360/PC)

I could not wait to play this game. I thought: "This is a smarter, more mature Grand Theft Auto." Note the Roman numeral in the title. As a general rule, games with Roman numerals tend to always be smarter and more mature than games that feature regular numbers. But what Mafia II turned out to be was a painfully linear, painfully dull experience. Also: Collecting old Playboy magazines was cool. But who leaves their old Playboys sitting around on coffee-shop counters? I don't. So even the whole old-Playboys thing was ruined. Also: driving old-time cars is never fun. Never. Also not fun: a mini-game centered around selling cigarettes out of the back of a truck. Fuck you, Mafia II. Price: $59.99. What the game is actually worth: $4.99.

3. MAG (Zipper Interactive, PS3)

To be honest, I sort of knew this one was going to be terrible in advance. Because I am psychic? No. (Though I've always thought that I might be a little psychic.) This is why: Because you can't hang a game on what amounts to basically a technological boast. Sure, you can DO 256-person multiplayer. Yes, it is POSSIBLE. But you still need A REASON to have 256-person multiplayer. Because, just being able to do it does not qualify as a reason. So, what you're left with is a heartless, soulless experience where, instead of working together in factions, most jagoffs run through the game as if they are auditioning for Rambo 9. We need faces, Sony. We need story. We need more than tech. Price: $59.99. What the game is actually worth: $3.

2. Crackdown 2 (Ruffian Games, 360)

I loved the original Crackdown, and I thought that I loved the sequel, too. Crackdown 2, to be fair, was a fun little diversion for a few nights. Yes, I obsessed over the orbs. My beloved orbs! Yes, I enjoyed driving through zombie hordes at top speed. But like a pork taco purchased from a street vendor, what tasted pretty good at the time moved through my system at an alarming rate of speed. Explanation of my elaborate metaphor: Crackdown 2 is the pork taco. And the whole "moving through my system" thing is a reference to poop. What I am trying to say is that this game barely registered on my gaming psyche. And now the Crackdown "series" ends after two games. Price: $59.99. What the game is actually worth: $7.

1. BioShock 2 (2K Games, PS3/360/PC)

More Big Daddies. More Little Sisters. More BioShock. PLUS: MULTIPLAYER!!!!!! (NO WAY!) BioShock multiplayer, in my opinion, wins the award for Unholiest Abomination of 2010. I feel terrible for the poor people who had to build the multiplayer component. Sure, you can still find a few lost souls playing the game online. Yet, I can't shake the feeling that anyone who is still playing BioShock 2's multiplayer must have had something go horribly wrong in their lives. Maybe their wives left them. Or they lost their jobs. Or they are in a prison because they were wrongly convicted of a crime of passion and the only game that the prison owns is BioShock 2.

They must have experienced some sort of devastating tragedy. Because no one plays BioShock 2 multiplayer of their own volition.

Also: The Big Sister concept sucks. Remember how strange and unnerving the Big Daddies were when you played the original game? The Big Sister, by comparison, always announces her arrival by practically banging pots together. Then she just flies around and causes havoc exactly like enemies do in about a billion other games.

And while the whole game looks like BioShock and plays like BioShock, and smells and tastes like BioShock, it's not BioShock. None of the BioShock soul made it into the sequel. It's an empty, hollow, cold, heartless, obvious bid for more popularity and more money. That's all it is. It goes exactly where you think it's going to go, every step of the way, making it the absolute worst kind of exploding cigar: the kind that explodes on you only after you've already invested five or so hours into the game.

The 10 Best Games of 2010 (5 Thru 1)

OK, you jackals, here are the rest of my You-Like-What-You-Like picks for 2010. Feel free to chime in with your personal picks, recommendations, and/or hate mail below. [Missed the first entry? Too lazy today to scroll down a few pages? Click here to view my 10 through six picks.]

One more point I'd like to make before I continue: These games are not necessarily perfect 10's. In fact, every game in my like-what-I-like list is flawed in some significant way. Perfection isn't a part of the like list. The like list is simply about the games that I wound up investing the most time into in 2010.

Anyway, let the grousing begin!

5. Rage of the Gladiator (WiiWare, Ghostfire Games, Wii)

The only thing I love more than Nintendo's Punch-Out!! series is a good Punch-Out!! clone. Which is exactly what Rage of the Gladiator is. Instead of the spunky Little Mac, the game stars an up-and-coming warrior named Prince Gracius. There are some cutscenes that explain exactly who Prince Gracius is and why he is fighting. But I usually can't skip through them fast enough. All I want to do is return to the arena/ring and dole out more ass-beatings.

The game features 10 opponents of various sizes and shapes. Once you've defeated all 10 enemies, Challenge Mode is unlocked in which you re-fight everyone a second time, only this time each opponent has new powers. There is a final (final) boss who you battle only after getting all the way through Challenge Mode. It's a pain in the ass to get to him--or should I say "it"?--but trust me when I tell you that it's worth the effort.

You can customize your attacks thanks to an RPG-like skill tree. But what really sells the game for me is the playful spirit of the whole operation. It's even more playful than Next Level's Punch-Out!! do-over was last year, which is really saying something, since that game was pretty playful. Fighting ogres and ninjas and lions who have dual snakes growing out of their backs is fun, but when those creatures transform into--well, let's just say most of your opponents transform into something else after you've knocked them down twice--is the exact moment when Rage of the Gladiator becomes far more than a Punch-Out!! clone.

4. Super Mario Galaxy 2 (Nintendo, Nintendo, Wii)

Wondering why you've never played Super Mario 65? The answer is this: Nintendo normally does not do sequels. And it certainly never does sequels on the same console. Here's an exception. The level-design geniuses at Nintendo had obviously worked up a head of steam after finishing the first Super Mario Galaxy. The result: this masterwork, which somehow, some way turns out to be even better than the perfectly awesome first game. Sure, spotlight hog Yoshi is the big selling point for the sequel--he practically takes up the entire box cover for SMG 2. (He's far bigger than Mario is.) But it's the game's crafted platforming that's the real star of the show here.

"Crafted" is the right word. There isn't one element of this game that feels slapped together and hustled out the door. Every jump, every flip switch, every Goomba, every boss fight feels considered, honed, perfected. But this platforming heaven, thanks to the steep difficulty level, occasionally turns into a hell. I say: stick with it. The sense of satisfaction you feel after completing an especially challenging level will stay with you long after you've powered off the Wii.

3. Kirby's Epic Yarn (Nintendo, HAL Laboratory, Wii)

From crafted, we move to craft-y. My mom was a big sewer when I was a kid. She had tins filled with all sorts of odd buttons. The racket of her sewing machine ruined many episodes of The Brady Bunch for me. Which no doubt explains at least some of the primal appeal that Kirby's Epic Yarn has for me.

The game is constructed entirely of different fabrics, yarn, and thread, as if the whole thing was literally woven together. It's that tactile quality--the want-to-touch-it quality--that really drew me into the game, and helped me conquer the semi-rotten first impression the game made on me. Yes, the game makes a terrible first impression, thanks to all the cutesy bullshit I had to endure at the start.

Yin-Yarn, Fluff, and and Metamato--all characters from the game--are overly sweet. But it's the cloying voice work of the narrator that really made me want to throw up on my shoes. Thankfully, he goes away fairly quickly, and I was able to get down to some old-school, two-dimensional platforming goodness.

It's not nearly as challenging, or as satisfying, as Super Mario Galaxy 2. But Kirby's Epic Yarn turns out to be far more charming and addictive. Like the stop-motion Rudolph the Red Nosed Reindeer that airs each year, Kirby's Epic Yarn has the stuff to become an annual holiday staple. There's just something about the game that will always feel like Christmas to me. And for that, HAL Laboratory and Nintendo, I salute you.

2. Dead Rising 2 (Capcom, Capcom Vancouver/Blue Castle Games, 360, PS3)

The first Dead Rising is one of my personal all-time favorites. Yes, it's a well-established fact that I am a complete sucker for zombies. But in addition to awesome zombies, Dead Rising had a terrific sense of place. The Willamette Mall will forever be as real to me as the Shoppingtown Mall, in Syracuse, New York, is.

If you've scanned ahead, then you know that Red Dead Redemption is not on the list. Sorry, RDR, fans. The reason RDR is not on the list is illustrated perfectly by Dead Rising 2. Red Dead Redemption, which also had a terrific sense of place, was too sprawling, too repetitive, and just plain too boring for me. Dead Rising 2 never felt too big, never overwhelmed me with its scope, and never made me do anything that felt like a waste of my time. Everything I did in Dead Rising 2, whether I was saving survivors or finding a store with a steady supply of chainsaws in stock, always felt purposeful, and essential and dramatic.

One more thing: If you're on the fence about committing to the $59.99 full game, download Case Zero first for $5 and see if its for you. Case Zero is the best damn game demo I've ever played, bar none, and it's a great introduction to the rest of the experience.

1. Limbo (Microsoft, Playdead Studios, 360)

No game has gotten under my skin, and stayed there--not ever--the way that Limbo did this year. From the creepy opening screens--which make you feel like you're about to watch a low budget horror movie--to the minimalist art design, this game is the embodiment of the phrase "and now for something completely different."

What makes Limbo so remarkable is how well it adheres to the show-don't-tell adage. It never beats you over the head with exposition, the way that games like Epic Mickey and Red Dead do. It slowly, and confidently, pulls you deeper into this strange world, never over explaining anything, always trusting you--the gamer--to be smart enough, and curious enough, to figure things out on your own.

Best of all, the game generates a sense wonder like no other game I have ever played. Even now, months after I played it, I constantly think about the things I saw in Limbo, and the experiences I had there. No, I can't explain the ending. No, you will not walk away from Limbo feeling satisfied. It never lets you exhale--that final, cathartic exhale--the way that we expected games to let us exhale. That's what makes it so brilliant, and so special, the way that it slyly flouts convention. It's short--you can get through it in a night or two--but not since Portal has a gotten into my subconscious and dwelled there the way that this game has.

Buy it. Play it. Love it.

Anyway, here's to a terrific 2010--one of the best years I can ever remember for gaming. And here's to an even better 2011. As Vic and I often say to each other, "We live in a golden age." Never was it more true than it was this year.

My Thanksgiving Trip/Pilgrimage To Funspot

Over Thanksgiving--American Thanksgiving, Canadian people--I traveled back to the East Coast to ostensibly visit New York, see my friends, and consume pounds of succulent turkey. But my ulterior motive, I confess, was to make a long-anticipated journey to Funspot in New Hampshire, otherwise known as the world's largest arcade.

Fellow writer John Teti grew up in the area and frequented Funspot as a child, never realizing that it would one day become an accidental mecca for gamers. So John and his terrific wife Anna and I flew up to Manchester, New Hampshire together in a plane that was only slightly larger than a mosquito.

If you've seen the documentary The King of Kong, Funspot--located in the town of Laconia--is the arcade where Steve Wiebe goes to prove himself as a true Donkey Kong contender to the eccentric community of doubters who celebrate--and verify--such things as Donkey Kong high scores. Funspot is also the place in the film where the term "kill screen" is first used. (One of Funspot's oddball patrons/score verifiers realizes that Wiebe is about to reach the Donkey Kong kill screen and begins an annoying journey through the arcade announcing to everyone that a kill screen is coming up, if they are interested in witnessing it. Despite the distraction, Wiebe admirably steels his nerves and reaches the kill screen regardless. It's one of Wiebe's many bravo-sir moments in the movie.)

If you haven't seen The King of Kong: A Fistful of Quarters, grab the nearest pillow and deliver several hundred blows to your head/neck area. It's a terrific film for many reasons, but what I especially admire about it is how well it articulates the curious passion that we gamers have for what we do.

Because we don't always understand why we do what we do.

We simply do it.

In The King of Kong, Funspot appears to be a dingy, yellow-tinged warehouse housing a dream line-up of every incredible arcade game you can possibly think of. In reality, Funspot is a dingy, yellow-tinged warehouse housing a dream line-up of every significant arcade game you can possibly think of, only a disturbingly large percentage of those machines are in a state of disrepair. Also: there is a bowling alley on the lower floor, as well as a dearth of bathrooms. Also: there is an indoor miniature golf course. Windmills and fluorescent lights and indoor/outdoor carpet is a depressing combination. Honestly, when I saw the course, I literally had to rush out of the room for fear of losing my sanity. I thought: "This is a good place to hang yourself."

Yet nothing depresses me more than seeing an out of order arcade machine some reason. There's a place in Brooklyn called Barcade that an ex girlfriend once took me to, believing that I would enjoy it. I did not enjoy it. Seeing all of those beautiful, vintage machines covered in sticky cheap beer and sporting OUT OF ORDER signs just made me want to go screaming into the Williamsburg night.

One of the dual screens in Funspot's Punch-Out!! machine was on the fritz the day I was there, capable of only producing a flickering black and white image. That said, I still managed to reach Bald Bull, and put him down a few times. (Because that's who I am.) The Tron machine circa 1982 had a line of code--1's and 0's--literally streaming through the gameplay screen. Also: Rudy, the dummy head in the 1990 pinball game Funhouse, had his eyes rolled back in his plastic skull permanently as if he was channeling Linda Blair in The Exorcist.

For a place that proudly refers to itself as the American Classic Arcade Museum, these masterworks are generally in a sorry state of disrepair. I know these things are old, and only getting older by the day, but I learned from John that maintaining coin-op arcade machines is far less taxing and labor-intensive than maintaining pinball machines. There are simply fewer working parts to deal with. John has personally restored several pinball machines to working order, so he knows what he is talking about. Sorry, ladies; he's taken. So the frozen Rudy in Funhouse is borderline acceptable. Though John did storm away from the machine with a ball still in play, because seeing Rudy in a state of rictus was apparently too much for him to bear. But the flickering Punch-Out!! and Tron machines? Not as acceptable.

Other games faired better. Mappy, a game that stars a police mouse trying to stop a gang of cat criminals and recover their stolen loot was working well. Stolen loot included a boom box-style radio, an ancient PC, and a digitized replica of the Mona Lisa. Just what every cat criminal covets, no doubt. Our two-player round of Pengo, a game starring a red penguin who must use ice blocks to stop snow bees, went on for so long and was so dull that after a few screens I wished it was broken. Pro Tip: Pengo is a terrible game. Timber, a game that allows you to step into the role of a lumberjack--escapism alert!--who is trying to chop down trees while a kooky-faced bear hurls bee hives at you, also worked just fine.

I realize Funspot is no doubt short on staff and even shorter on funds these days. The day that John and I were there--on the Friday after Thanksgiving--all three floors were only moderately populated, with the top floor--where the American Classic Arcade Museum (of Disrepair) is housed--being by far the least popular of the three floors. Only a half-dozen quarter-wielding skulkers skulked in the Museum's shadows at any given moment.

The sad-but-true question I couldn't stop asking myself during my time at Funspot was this: Why aren't there more goddamn people here? Where is everybody, man? This is Funspot! The spot for fun! Yes, the lights were on the day I was there. But how much longer would they continue to burn?

Going to Funspot is akin to spending time with an obese middle-aged alcoholic/diabetic uncle. Everyone loves the uncle--he's funny and entertaining, even when he's discussing his latest gout flair up--but when the phone call comes that the uncle is dead, no one is going to be terribly shocked by the news. As I left Funspot, as I crossed the muddy parking lot and listened to the wind whistling through the nearby birches, I felt sad and worried. I literally was wringing my hands during the car ride home. As gamers, we need our gathering places. To use John's word, we need a mecca, and Funspot is as close to a bona fide mecca as we have. We need Funspot, and places like Funspot; we need places that celebrate where this medium has been so that we have a better, clearer understanding of where we're going.

What can be done? Consider planning your summer vacation to Laconia, new Hampshire next year. Lake Winnipesaukee is beautiful in summer. Or so I've heard.

Better still, let's start something not unlike the adopt-a-highway program. Call it the Adopt-An-Old-Arcade-Machine program. Donate a few hundred dollars a year towards your game of choice--all tax-deductible, mind you--and that few hundred dollars will go towards maintaining that arcade machine. Let's make this happen, people.

I've got dibs on Mappy, Teti.

[Photo credit: John Teti took the photo of the Funspot entrance that appears at the start of this entry.] [For the last time, ladies, HE IS TAKEN.]

The 10 Best Games of 2010

"You like what you like."

That's a phrase that Vic and I often repeat to one other while shooting the show. We say it on camera. We say it off camera. The only other phrase that even comes close to being repeated as often: "Let's stop here for coffee."

"You like what you like," of course, is shorthand for saying, "I am not going to go out of my way to understand StarCraft II, or Civ 5, or Gran Turismo 5. Yes, they are all well-made games. Yes, smart people made them. Yes, I admire those people. They worked very hard. Good for them. And yes, there are people out there in the world who are dying to play Gran Turismo 5. Also: good for them.

"But that does not mean that I am suddenly going to develop a taste for, say, the Gran Tursimo series, a series that I have despised for many years because of its lifeless, bloodless worlds. I am not going to hoist a game onto my shoulders and carry it around the stadium for a victory lap simply because 1. the rest of the world is doing so, and 2. I am supposed to follow suit.

"Because, in the end, on my death bed, as I am breathing my last breath and no doubt trying to get in one last game of Angry Birds 14 on the iPhone 11.5GSVX, when it's all said and done, all I can do is like what I like."

Here are the 10 games that I liked in 2010.

10. Vanquish (Sega, Platinum Games, 360/PS3)

I know! Trash. The dialogue is horrid. None of it makes a lick of sense. And it celebrates the most filthy habit in the world: SMOKING. DEAR KIDS: DON'T LISTEN TO THIS GAME. DO NOT SMOKE. IT IS NOT SEXY. SMOKING IS THE NUMBER ONE CAUSE OF NONSENSICAL GAMES. Regardless, I loved Vanquish. Shinji Mikami's games speak to me. He is my Sid Meier. Though Fumito Ueda would actually be my Sid Meier, if only he made more games. Sliding like Rickey Henderson between a mech-beast's legs in slow motion while peppering its mech-crotch with futuristic fire power thrilled me enough to make me forgive and forget the rest of the game's horse shit.

9. Lara Croft and the Guardian of Light (Eidos, Crystal Dynamics, XBLA/PSN)

With her ever-shrinking pair of shorts and ridiculously oversized mamms, this anachronism--she was practically left for dead on the side of Game Industry Highway a few short years ago--continued her campaign for relevancy with this superb game. My first impression, sexist as it is, was that the long distance, overhead perspective would diminish my fun, since I would no longer be able to, you know, see as much. Yet after the opening level, after sniffing out treasure the way my mother sniffs out bargains at Wal-mart, and solving puzzles--some of the best puzzles of the year in any game--and leveling up, man alive, did this game ever get its hooks into me.

8. Spider-man: Shattered Dimensions (Activision, Beenox, 360/PS3)

Fact: I could give a rat's ass about super heroes and super hero games. But if I have to spend 15 hours in someone's virtual tights, that someone without a doubt would be Spider-man. His versatility, in the air and on the ground, along with his Borscht Belt "zingers" make Superman, Batman, et al. all look like brooding bores. The art style, the first-person boss fights, and the constant channel surfing between dimensions--Amazing, Noir, 2099, and the symbiote-infected Ultimate--all effectively distracted me from the fact that I was basically hitting light attack and heavy attack buttons over and over again. Well done, Beenox.

7. GoldenEye 007 (Activision, Eurocom, Wii)

Never having been a Bond man, I loaded up the do-over of the 1997 classic with the lowest of expectations. The original game probably should win some sort of award for Worst-Aging Classic Game of All Time. There's a reason why it's hasn't received a Perfect Dark-style XBLA makeover, and that reason is because it's terrible. Yes, it was great in 1997. But trust me, your memories outstrip the actual experience.

The do-over and I, like Bond and Vesper in Casino Royale, did not get off to a good start. We bickered back and forth through the first few stages. It wasn't until I'd finally ditched the Classic Controller in favor of the nunchuck-Wii remote control scheme that this game and I fell madly, passionately in love. No game in history has ever delivered the stealth/fisticuffs/mow-them-all-down trifecta as well as this game does. Though I kept waiting for GoldenEye 007 to betray me at the end, just as Vesper does to Bond, it never did. As soon as the credits rolled, I immediately started playing it again. It's that good.

6. Bayonetta (Sega, Platinum Games, 360/PS3)

I know! More trash! This time, it's not Shinji Mikami but his cohort Hideki Kamiya who is to blame-admire (blamire?) for this stylish nonsense. Bayonetta managed to make even less sense than Vanquish did--no small feat--yet it was more exciting to play. I had no fucking idea what was going on in this game approximately 70-percent of the time. No joke. See if you can make sense of any of it by watching this. What made this game so remarkable was that it starred a witch with long, magic hair that can occasionally be turned into a hair-dragon. Which describes exactly zero other games in videogame history. And for that, Hideki Kamiya, I salute you. Pro Tip: Keep pressing buttons and jaw-dropping, amazing shit will continue to happen. Which, if you think about it, is really what videogames are all about.

[Five thru one of my like-what-I-like selections are on deck. I'll post them in a day or so. -Jones]

A Fistful of Writing

Had a couple of reviews appear in The Onion's A.V. Club recently. First up: God of War: Ghost of Sparta.

"Ghost Of Sparta’s plot is more of the series’ highbrow trash. Typical of all God Of War games, the mythological milieu gives this installment a faux erudite patina. Though you're merely banging away at two buttons, the series’ genius is that you forever feel like you’re doing something of grave importance, something that would make a ninth-grade English teacher proud."

Read the rest of my words--the A.V. Club limits me to a miserly 400, so there aren't too many more to read--here. One commenter took issue with my use of the phrase "faux erudite patina." My feelings on this matter:

1. It makes me happy that people are not only reading my reviews, but also reading them closely enough to take issue with my phrasings.

2. I think "faux erudite patina" accurately describes my experience with the series--the GOW games have always come off as smarter than they actually are--but I can see the commenter's point. This phrase would probably merit at least an eight out of 10 on the Douche Scale, with one being least-douchiest and 10 being maximum-douchiest.

Still, I'm standing by my phrase. It's probably the most interesting string of words I've written all year. Just look at the way those vowels and consonants crash into one another! Whee! Say it aloud a few times. Faux. Erudite. Patina. See? It's already starting to grow on you.

My second more recent review for The A.V. Club was for the Kinect. A sample:

"In its worst moments, Kinect doesn’t feel like a better way to play—it’s more like a barrier between you and the game. Instead of drawing gamers deeper into the experience and making things more immersive, actions like navigating gameplay menus or pausing a game—simple actions that gamers take for granted—suddenly feel complex and needlessly obtuse. At these moments, veteran gamers will pine for the poetic certainty of an old-fashioned button press."

Read the rest of it here. In typical A.V. Club fashion, one commenter dings me a second time for my previous use of "faux erudite patina" in my Ghost of Sparta review. Bravo, sir. Brah. Vo.

One comment did get my ire up. A guy--well, I'm assuming it was a guy--left a comment saying that he wishes two things would happen. One: That the A.V. Club learn how to review games critically. And two: That the A.V. Club stop reviewing games altogether.

The not-so-subtle subtext here: That I have absolutely no idea what I am doing. That I do not know my ass from a hole in the ground.

To you, sir, I say this: I do in fact know my ass from a hole in the ground.

Of course, these sentiments are commonplace on message boards and comment threads. I've read them before. I'll read them again. People are always informing me that I am terrible at my job.

That simply is not true.

For some reason, gamers--more so than movie lovers, or TV fans, or book readers--perpetually feel that they are born not only with the toolset required to write and speak critically about games, but that they are also born with the inherent god-given right to review games.

No matter how well one writes, or how well one articulates something about a game, there will forever be be an army of salivating, semi-delusional jackals out there waiting to let you know they could have done your job exactly one million times better than you have done it.

To those jackals, I say: I hear you. And I love you.

I once felt the way you do.

And trust me: You. Are. Wrong.

Irrefutable proof that you are wrong: If you could do my job one million times better than I'm doing it, you would be doing it instead of informing me that I am terrible at it.

Now please enjoy this complimentary box of faux erudite patina.

The Great Milo Hoax Of 2009

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Hay Kidz! It's the Busy Season!

It's that time of year. Time when I see the Fed Ex delivery man more than I see my imaginary girlfriend. Time when I am literally buried beneath a gamevalanche--that's an avalanche of games, people--and the rescue team won't be deployed until December at the earliest. Time when my wrists are sore, my thumbs ache, and my right eye twitches involuntarily--it's doing it now, even as I type this--because I have stared at my television for a thoroughly unhealthy number of hours in a row.

That time.

Fact: It is not uncommon for me to require an eye exam each January because of all the high-definition damage I do to my retinas in October and November.

Some numbers: I have spent at least 40 of the last 48 hours gaming. Here's a fly-by of what I've seen: Fable 3, Vanquish, the new God Of War on the PSP, Rock Band 3, Need For Speed: Hot Pursuit, Divergent Shift and X-Scape on the DS, Sonic The Hedgehog 4: Episode 1, Costume Quest, Def Jam Rap Star, random iPhone games like Naughty Bear and Angry Birds Halloween, and, inexplicably, just because I had a strange hankering for it, a few rounds of Star Fox 64 on the Virtual Console. While you've been eating, sleeping, or playing with your kids or pets, while you've been talking to your Uncle Bill on the phone--hi, Uncle Bill--or re-reading a Nicholas Sparks novel, for better or worse, for richer or poorer, in sickness and in health, I have been gaming.

I now pronounce you Man and Game. You may kiss the Game.

My couch has retained a lawyer in the name of taking out a restraining order against me. Sample of the courtroom proceedings in Jones Vs. Couch: "Mr. Jones, my client claims that you routinely farted into him, with the number of farts often exceeding 20 farts per day. Do you deny this, Mr. Jones? And remember, you are under oath."

Me: [I shoot a how-could-you-betray-me look across the courtroom at Couch.]

That photo up above? That's a shot of the coffee table in my living room. Whenever I run out of square footage on the table, my only option is to go vertical. So what rises up before me is a kind of relief map of the holiday gaming season. It literally becomes a mountain range of discs and game boxes, instruction booklets and peripherals. Like strata in a geological dig, good games tend to stay near the top of the mountains (Vanquish, Dead Rising 2, Kirby's Epic Yarn) while the bad games (Medal Of Honor, The Force Unleashed 2) sink to the bottom, never to be seen again until I get the chance to clean up this godforsaken mess at the end of the year.

It's no wonder that my girlfriend is "imaginary." (Which is only slightly less terrible than "inflatable.")

Vic and I have an acronym that we use during this season. It's A.B.G.: Always Be Gaming. No matter where we are, no matter what we're doing, this time of year it's essential that we constantly game. A.B.G. means making sure that your portables--DS, PSP, iPhone, iPad--are charged and ready to go if you're going to be away from your consoles for a few hours. A.B.G. means starting a download via PSN before getting into the shower, so the download will be completed by the time you've finished washing. It means waking up in the morning and turning on the 360 before you've had your coffee, while it's still dark outside--these days the sun doesn't come up in Vancouver until 7:30 or so--just to squeeze in a few more levels, another boss, another power-up, or more experience points.

Always Be Gaming.

Always.

I can't believe this is my fucking life. Man!

See what happens when you stay in school, don't do drugs (well, except for that one time) (and that one other time), and eat your vegetables, kids? You get to have an insane job.

Cue the "Don't Stop Believing" song.

You know the one.

Confessions of GameStop Employee

A few short days before Crispy Gamer suddenly stroked out, pooped itself, and went to website heaven--R.I.P., old girl--I met a man who had recently done a stint behind the counter at a New York City-area GameStop. As he told me his tales of woe, I began to write them down, hoping to turn the stories into a much larger piece for CG.

Once CG gave up its ghost, I figured there was no reason for this story--which felt important to me--to die along with it. The result: a massive seven thousand-word piece that my friend, writer and editor Susan Arendt, agreed to publish in The Escapist Magazine.

Susan helped trim the story down to a more manageable size, then came up with the idea to split the story into four smaller sections and run it over the course of four weeks. She also urged me to change the pseudonym of the protagonist from "Peppy Hare" to "Ben" (another good call, SA).

Whether Peppy/Ben is dealing with irate moms, learning the fine art of "gutting duty," schooling kids in Super Smash Bros., or putting a stop to budding criminals, his stories consistently offer cool, oddball insights into videogame culture.

A sample:

"Gamers on message boards constantly say - and yes, they typically write the following in caps - 'HOW CAN THEY SELL AN OPEN COPY OF A GAME AS NEW WTFFFFFFF GAMESTOP SUX BALLZ?' The answer from GameStop's corporate perspective is this: Gutting keeps shrink to a minimum. Definition of shrink: Customer theft. Irrefutable fact: If you put an empty box on the shelf, there is no incentive whatsoever for a thief to steal it."

Now that the fourth and final section has been published in TEM, you can read the whole damn thing, in its entirety, right here.

Also: Peppy/Ben, I promised to split my paycheck for the story 50-50 with you. So please come to the window to collect your much-deserved winnings.

And if anyone else out there has a story that you'd like me to tell, you know where you can find me.

One last: follow Susan on Twitter. She's the best.