Backlog: The Listmaking
This isn’t really a “to-do” list that is going to happen any time in the near future. Honestly, keeping on top of my three classes is pushing me hard enough, much less getting ready for the JLPT in December. The only gaming I’m really making time for is, well, the “get some use out of the PSP” project, which is something I’ve mentioned before and will return to once I have some more to say on it.
But.
Before this term started, I had a little extra time, so I spent it figuring out what games I owned for which systems and which I’d finished and so on. My reasoning was that, well, whenever I’m looking for something new to play, I waste so much time looking through stuff that I sometimes wind up with no time to play whatever I’ve decided on.
It came out to… mmm. I’m actually kind of embarrassed to go into numbers. Let’s leave it at this: It’s a really good thing I almost never pay anything close to full, new price for a game.
I bought a bunch of DVD and CD bins from Ikea. These are kind of cheesy cardboard affairs, but they seem like they’ll hold up and they let me do one of the more important things: Hide most of the games.
I put just about everything that would fit in to a box into a box. It came out to 18 DVD-size boxes and 12 CD-sized boxes. Lots of stuff didn’t fit into these nice Ikea boxes, unfortunately, so I need to find some kind of a home for those nice big Saturn and Sega CD boxed games.
Side effect: Bookshelves with identical storage boxes on them look better than a sea of spines. At least, they’re a change.
Then I went through the boxes and tried to pick one shelf’s worth of games that are either really highly recommended, or that I’ve always been curious about, or that I think I ought to play because they’re part of the overall language of the community, as it were, or that I just bought, darn it, and want to play them at least a little bit even though I don’t really want to, you know, try to finish them or anything.
I left portable stuff out of this, because by their nature they’re usually played outside the home.
I came out with the following shelf o’ games that serve two purposes:
- Helps me narrow down what to play next, in the unlikely event I have any real time to devote to getting into a game anytime soon.
- Helps remind me, when I’m in a store and something catches my eye, that I have all of these to play and I really ought to, instead of buying new ones.
- Helps me avoid the shame associated with the sheer number of games that are NOT on this list, despite their unplayed statuses, because they’re not right in my face taunting me. I have, as an example, something like 6 Zelda games. I’ve never finished a Zelda game, or even come close to getting very far in one. I don’t need to see six Zelda games every time I look at the shelf.
The list:
- Shenmue II (Dreamcast)
- Skies of Arcadia (Dreamcast)
- Final Fantasy IX (PS1)
- Castle of Shikigami (PS2)
- Disgaea (PS2)
- Final Fantasy X-2 (PS2)
- Final Fantasy XII (PS2)
- Grim Grimoire (PS2)
- We (heart) Katamari Damacy (PS2)
- Kingdom Hearts (PS2)
- Odin Sphere (PS2)
- Okami (PS2)
- Sly Cooper (PS2)
- The Maid and Machine Gun (PS2)
- Xenosaga (PS2)
- Ys: The Ark of Naphishtim (PS2)
- Rayman: Raving Rabbids (Wii)
- Eternal Darkness (GCN)
- Killer 7 (GCN)
- Metroid Prime (GCN)
- Resident Evil (GCN)
- Sonic Gems : Sonic CD (GCN)
- Starfox Adventures (GCN)
- Armed and Dangerous (Xbox)
- Brute Force (Xbox)
- Conker’s : Uncut & Reloaded (Xbox)
- Fable (Xbox)
- Fatal Frame II (Xbox)
- Half-Life 2 (Xbox)
- Lego Star Wars II (Xbox)
- Metal Arms (Xbox)
- Panzer Dragoon Orta (Xbox)
- Prince of Persia : The Sands of Time (Xbox)
- The Chronicles of Riddick (Xbox)
- X-Men Legends (Xbox)
- Dead or Alive 4 (360)
- Dead Rising (360)
- Kameo (360)
- Phantasy Star Universe (360)
- Prey (360)
- Rumble Roses XX (360)
- Itadaki Jan-Gari-An R (PC)
- Psychonauts (PC)
- To Heart 2 (PC)
- Tomb Raider Anniversary (PC)
Yeah, that’s a list that’s going to get gone through REAL fast. All those quick-to-play knock-out-in-a-weekend RPGs, for a start…
Wii get!
This morning’s weight: 196.4, for anyone who cares to watch me count down.
Today was a rather nice day, too nice to stay indoors, so I elected to get out and get some sunshine in.
OK, I lie, there was more to it than that. While trying to decide which game to finish next a few days ago, I found out that one developer (Smilebit) was responsible for two games I quite enjoy - Panzer Dragoon Orta and Jet Set Radio - and that this developer had done a third game for Sega before ceasing to exist. Furthermore, this last game - Gunvalkyrie - was available for the princely sum of $4.99 from your average used video game merchant.
There is a used video game merchant of the EBgames variety 4.1 miles away from here.
I figured, I’ll walk down to this merchant, purchase me a copy of this fine game should they have it, and get a decent walk out of the day.
Note: I am aware that this game has a reputation for having one of the worst controls schemes on record and as a result a difficulty curve that will break me should I ever try to finish it. It’s a shooter. I don’t finish shooters anyway.
I walk to EBgames. Along the way I stop and buy sunscreen and apply it because I’m realizing that after a winter without much sun I am pasty white and would rather not be unemployed AND sunburned.
In EBgames, I find Gunvalkryie, used of course but with a manual. I even have their discount card, so I will save 50 whole cents on the deal. I just get the card because it comes with a subscription to Game Informer, but sometimes I actually make a used purchase.
While I am puttering around in the bargain bin thinking things like “should I buy Sudeki for $4.99? It got a lot of press and all. Also, Maxim gave it five stars, it says right on the cover!”, the UPS delivery comes.
I hear the manager ask his register monkey who’s checking the contents of the order, “Did we get six Wiis?”
The monkey responds “No, they sent us nine.”
Now, the point of this isn’t to say, what a good day it is to be this EBgames and actually get more consoles in your shipment than you expected, it is rather to say that a shipping container full of Wiis had just been delivered to the store I was standing in.
I have tried to be strong about the whole thing in the past. It’s a system from Nintendo, I rationalize. It’s going to have lots of strong first party titles and not much else.
Then they announced a NiGHTS sequel for the thing, and my objections drifted away like… uh, something that drifts pretty easily. I’m not good with simile.
I purchased one. It went directly from its shipping container to a bag on the counter in front of me.
At that point, I realized that I was 4.1 miles from home with a new game console to lug home. On foot.
At least it wasn’t an Xbox. I don’t have a lot of back problems anymore, but I think carrying one of those for four miles would break me.
I made it home. My legs are killing me and I’m maybe just a little sunburned, but I have a feeling of triumph about me.
About
About the author:
I’m a married 30-odd-year-old fanboy, college student, and software QA guy, mostly recovered from an 8-year long Everquest addiction and trying to catch up on the last decade of videogames as a result.
I’m working towards a BA in Japanese and hope to be done by 2011.
This blog contains an awful lot of posts about games as I finish them, occasional rants about keeping in shape, the odd bit of bitching about the antics of the instructors and students I cross paths with, and every once in a while a post or two related to weird things I’ve seen while traveling.
Oh, and the occasional post about videogame girls in glasses because I like making my wife roll her eyes and shake her head at me.
