What I think my S. & S. would look like, even with a game or two I haven't played yet
- 6 Japanese games, 4 that are not. I'm not quite experienced yet, but I'm sure that a list like this can have some relation with the videogame canon. As for PC gaming specially, not only the main sources of those.
- 3 (or 4) that are easier to "get" than the rest.
- 2 (or 3) that anyone could play, but the rest are for a bit more experienced gamers.
- 1 Japanese title that DARES quite a lot. Is a game that plays with the idea of crossing the line a measure for including a videogame of this kind in a list like this? At least I don't think it should be ignored.
- 5 games where you shoot.
- 4 games that I haven't played, sorry. Those are the last four, but the only one that makes me doubtful about removing it or not is Fallout, specially having Kichikuou Rance as an example of (some times extreme) emergent narrative. It's just that one explores it for the characters and, if I'm not mistaken, the other, FO, is for the world and your place in it. I think that every game of this list has some capacity of making you uncomfortable, so I'd put one that doesn't do that instead of Fallout. Maybe a racing game or a walking sim, not sure. Cosmology of Kyoto???
WHAT I HAVEN'T PLAYED
1) Tokimeki Memorial is a game that, as for what I've heard about it, makes you want to take people seriously in a context where everything is previously determined by different choices and statistics. To go with the flow even knowing that.
2) MGS2 and Majora's Mask (played it, it's only a comparison) come from an era where making sequels started to become a more serious business. But something's really different about those two. More like a statement to make and not other thing. Majora's Mask's day & night cycle is a VERY well thought out system compared to the one in Ocarina's. MGS2's, AFAIK, justifies the technology advancements to recreate VR spaces of the previous MGS. So I think it's a technology statement related to the possibilities in gaming.
3) I haven't played a lot of Portal, but I think it's quite the ideal game to be introduced to 3D spaces: - You're just in rooms, and not open spaces; - You've a voice by your side that helps you, makes you laugh and... other stuff; - Controls and actions are easy to understand, and even if it possess the verb of "shooting", it's a variation of that concept; - The ending can make you want to feel for more... and there is more!
WHAT I HAVE PLAYED
1) If I put Sexy Hiking and SM64 instead of the original Super Mario Bros. as a game that encapsulates the strengths of both of them, it's because I think that sometimes the inherited genes have more to say than the original ideas/concepts in a broader context. SM64 feels like the dream of the exploration of spaces started in SMB, while Sexy Hiking feels more like an exploration of the frictional avatar inside a "limp" software.
2) Majora's Mask makes a distinction between NPCs and people. The people and the flow of time in Termina are functional depending on whether you are stepping on it or not. A game that defines those kind of technical limits in videogames in an authentic way.
3) Kichikuou Rance, at least for now, is my suggestion of a "daring game". But not only that: being also a large scale strategy game, not only because of the technical aspects, but also because of all of the plot aspects involved in it, it fills the quota I've decided for this list. It's its own sense of tension compared to the other games, and that without talking about the sexual and moral aspects of it. I put it above any Dragon Quest, Final Fantasy, etc. because of the kind of cultural place it occupies as a Japanese narrative game and a Role Playing game.
4) Tetris is a game that causes fulfillment when seeing it even if you're not playing it. I can say the same about Snake (starting as Blockade in 1976), and both of them are basically the same: a mass that will become so massive you won't be able to control it anymore and it'll collapse. But I think that Snake makes you wish to have a broader control over it. Making good runs 'til you eat your tail makes it the best Game Over of all time (?). There has never been a better opponent in an arcade than yourself (?) and your own mistakes.
5) A game about playing videogames, but doesn't feels like a mere compilation of minigames, or a party game.
It's more like the relation you have with the video... microgames that are being shown to you.
At the moment I'm not sure what to say exactly about WarioWare, I just feel like it has a bit of a lot of stuff.
- 3 (or 4) that are easier to "get" than the rest.
- 2 (or 3) that anyone could play, but the rest are for a bit more experienced gamers.
- 1 Japanese title that DARES quite a lot. Is a game that plays with the idea of crossing the line a measure for including a videogame of this kind in a list like this? At least I don't think it should be ignored.
- 5 games where you shoot.
- 4 games that I haven't played, sorry. Those are the last four, but the only one that makes me doubtful about removing it or not is Fallout, specially having Kichikuou Rance as an example of (some times extreme) emergent narrative. It's just that one explores it for the characters and, if I'm not mistaken, the other, FO, is for the world and your place in it. I think that every game of this list has some capacity of making you uncomfortable, so I'd put one that doesn't do that instead of Fallout. Maybe a racing game or a walking sim, not sure. Cosmology of Kyoto???
WHAT I HAVEN'T PLAYED
1) Tokimeki Memorial is a game that, as for what I've heard about it, makes you want to take people seriously in a context where everything is previously determined by different choices and statistics. To go with the flow even knowing that.
2) MGS2 and Majora's Mask (played it, it's only a comparison) come from an era where making sequels started to become a more serious business. But something's really different about those two. More like a statement to make and not other thing. Majora's Mask's day & night cycle is a VERY well thought out system compared to the one in Ocarina's. MGS2's, AFAIK, justifies the technology advancements to recreate VR spaces of the previous MGS. So I think it's a technology statement related to the possibilities in gaming.
3) I haven't played a lot of Portal, but I think it's quite the ideal game to be introduced to 3D spaces: - You're just in rooms, and not open spaces; - You've a voice by your side that helps you, makes you laugh and... other stuff; - Controls and actions are easy to understand, and even if it possess the verb of "shooting", it's a variation of that concept; - The ending can make you want to feel for more... and there is more!
WHAT I HAVE PLAYED
1) If I put Sexy Hiking and SM64 instead of the original Super Mario Bros. as a game that encapsulates the strengths of both of them, it's because I think that sometimes the inherited genes have more to say than the original ideas/concepts in a broader context. SM64 feels like the dream of the exploration of spaces started in SMB, while Sexy Hiking feels more like an exploration of the frictional avatar inside a "limp" software.
2) Majora's Mask makes a distinction between NPCs and people. The people and the flow of time in Termina are functional depending on whether you are stepping on it or not. A game that defines those kind of technical limits in videogames in an authentic way.
3) Kichikuou Rance, at least for now, is my suggestion of a "daring game". But not only that: being also a large scale strategy game, not only because of the technical aspects, but also because of all of the plot aspects involved in it, it fills the quota I've decided for this list. It's its own sense of tension compared to the other games, and that without talking about the sexual and moral aspects of it. I put it above any Dragon Quest, Final Fantasy, etc. because of the kind of cultural place it occupies as a Japanese narrative game and a Role Playing game.
4) Tetris is a game that causes fulfillment when seeing it even if you're not playing it. I can say the same about Snake (starting as Blockade in 1976), and both of them are basically the same: a mass that will become so massive you won't be able to control it anymore and it'll collapse. But I think that Snake makes you wish to have a broader control over it. Making good runs 'til you eat your tail makes it the best Game Over of all time (?). There has never been a better opponent in an arcade than yourself (?) and your own mistakes.
5) A game about playing videogames, but doesn't feels like a mere compilation of minigames, or a party game.
It's more like the relation you have with the video... microgames that are being shown to you.
At the moment I'm not sure what to say exactly about WarioWare, I just feel like it has a bit of a lot of stuff.
