Editorial: The School of Patience

Being an adult sucks. I will not really waste anyone’s time beating around that particularly thorny bush. As part of the aging gamer market, I often find myself in the difficult position of ravenously impulsive spending habits waging a war of attrition on the desire to be responsible with my meager wages while making savvy consumer investments. I am certainly not always successful at the latter, yet that is not for lack of trying. Prior to my time at LusipurrCorp, it has come to my attention on several occasions that I am anything but on the cutting edge of gaming. As gaming itself becomes increasingly social, I often have to ask myself whether or not there is anything wrong with the practice of waiting. I imagine I am not the only person with this problem.

Contrary to my misgivings about some recent Nintendo announcements, my 3DS was abandoned simply because I had run my course with the product line, for now. It would be easy to assume I harbor hatred for Nintendo now, which is not the case. I am disappointed with some directions things are heading, but to entertain my hate demands that certain criteria have been met, and I am not sure a corporate entity is actually capable of fulfilling them. What led me to a shift in the handheld system world was that I had exhausted all that I wished to play on it, and it was time to turn my eye elsewhere for awhile.

However, running out and buying a New 3DS remains firmly on the list of options I will not be pursuing now, rather, perhaps, revisiting in a year. As a personal rule, there must exist more than a handful of games that I plan to play (regardless of reviews) in order for me to consider investing in a new platform. This requires not only patience, but some rather brutal self-honesty when it comes to really deciding if I am thinking without the impulsiveness of my younger years when virtually all income was deemed disposable because I refused to heed the warnings of my parents. There were no pressures to budget then because I had no bills and was healthy, thus, invincible.

With Bloodborne emerging as a work of art, leaving in its wake a flow of wonderful reviews, I find myself with twitching legs, eager to take the needed steps in finally procuring a PS4. The release of indie titles such as Axiom Verge only sweetens the notion with proper sugars, and none of that healthy alternative nonsense. My misinformed hopes that Axiom would pop on the Vita along side its powerful new daddy were quickly dashed on the day of release, though not without good reason. At the very least, I feel I can count on the developer to bring his game to the Vita platform with the assurance that it will not suffer on the smaller system.

While I remain unclear as to whether or not patience is actually a virtue, it does have some benefits. Having never touched a Vita prior to making the switch from 3DS, I have a good amount of games that I will be playing on it over the course of the next year at least. I will always have a place in my heart for JRPGs and the Vita library seems pregnant with them versus what I was offered by Nintendo. Persona 4 Golden has become something of a daily habit, my technical second in a series which I largely ignored because, at the time, I did not want to buy a new system. True, it is ripe with the usual high school tropes one has come to expect from many JRPGs, something I typically do not relate to in the slightest, but P4G offers mechanics that I really enjoy, pacing I quickly adapted to, and what is panning out to be a great murder mystery plot.

In some ways, I am glad I waited, and continue to be patient regarding a move into the PS4. Having a new game library to explore while doing so certainly makes a difference, but compared to the days when I was part of the PC gaming crowd, I no longer feel as though I am simply throwing my money at a screen. Back then, Steam was the name of the game and their legendary sales would leave me with a collection of well over a hundred games, perhaps only ten of which I can say I actually played as opposed to turning it on for an hour and moving on to the next thing. The industry has changed from when I was kid, where it seemed like games were released at a slower pace, maybe in lower volumes, though any actual truth to that perception remains to be researched. When compared to the industry today, it often feels as though I am in Las Vegas where billions of flashing lights and buzzing neon signs glow with the promise of pleasure, empty as it sometimes may be.

Balance in all things, I suppose. As an older gent, it is my duty to keep on top of my money and be a contributing factor to society, so the idea of a choice between “do I pay my bills,” and “do I buy a new game,” does not exist for me. The urge is there, but it is fought as one deals with one’s other self in P4G, which makes some weird sense considering the game borrows from Jungian psychology. I would love nothing more to jump on the Bloodborne train and ride it til it flies off the rails, among other titles, but as close as I was this past weekend to giving in to the demands of my inner Shadow, it will just have to wait.

On that note, the explosion of the gaming industry has given us all a backlog buffet to fall upon when current titles may not pass muster. While I clutch my little list of Vita games I will be checking out over the next few months, what are some games that you, Lusiphants, are waiting on? What games have you gone back to finally play months, maybe years after release and what were your experiences? I would love to hear them!