Ice Cream Jonsey wrote:

foolio wrote:

There are turning points in your life. Veterans remember the moment they killed another man in combat; weepy sentimentalists remember their first love; athletes remember that One Play at the height of their career; children remember the last time they saw their father alive, assuming he died in some classically tragic fashion.

I vividly remember the moment I realized that I'm no longer a gamer.

As with most everything with me, there was a steady buildup to this point. Lack of interest in several new hot titles, disinterest in gaming news, reviews, and previews, interest in new non-gaming hobbies, reading OMM's 'death of adventure games' combined with playing the newer, more awful Monkey Island games, playing and then going cold-turkey on the deliciously-addictive MUD, the growing realization that gaming was my lifestyle...

So let's get down to the actual moment. I'm playing Ico and am frustrated. I'm in the big tower thing, and Ico's totally alone in some sort of puzzle. Ten minutes into figuring out what I'm supposed to do while attempting+failing to jump up that ledge and I internally scream (highlight to reveal spoilers!)
THIS GAME SUCKS
And this is the precise moment that I realize: I've been playing a ton of games that I don't even like. And I've been reading magazines or their online-equivalent to keep up with gaming trends, and reading messageboards and even USENET archives to figure out what the 'scene' was like before I even arrived! I read BluesNews and followed half of the links! I downloaded all the mods for Quake just so I wouldn't miss a good one--in fact, for a period of time I played every positively-rated computer game that came out. I know, because I read the previews months before the games came out, read the reviews in the most recent CGW/Next Generation, browsed the local store at least once a week, and spent all my free time gaming. I'd read articles about game design, and dreamed about designing games (multiple). I'd measure my life by how much free time I had to invest in gaming. I mean, who else CARES what genre a game is classified, besides obsessive gamers?

I used to care about the fact that CGW forces all their reviewers play the game the whole way through. I really cared!

So at this point of Ico-frustration, I began to realize that I am no longer this way. I don't have to play every good game available--there just isn't enough time. It's not my paid (as in for-money) job to play/review/build/test video games in some fashion, as opposed to every single inhabitant of www.quartertothree.com, so why am I even trying to keep up?

In short, it was just like the theme of Fight Club, only 4000% DORKIER.

I hear you on that -- all of that -- I just wish it wasn't Ico that made you feel that way. In my personal opinion, Ico was one of the few games as of late that I didn't react to that way.


ICJ