Tuesday, November 20, 2012

The Week The Wallet And Spare Time Died


The above (admittedly low-quality since I gave zero fucks about making it pretty) image displays the pick-ups I made today which is a lead-in to stating that the $100 I spent right there is me getting off light compared to some this week.  By spending only a meager one hundred dollars, I am getting the precise amount of entertainment I want and I am lucky that my desires, my wants, came that cheap this week.  You see, if you've been living under a rock or something, you will know that this was the week that a fucking metric ton of things came out, including but not limited to:  The above Playstation All-Stars Battle Royale (which is faring a bit better in reviews than one would assume - The bulk of the negatives being that it's 'not enough of a Smash Bros clone' which is absolutely fucking hilarious and god I hate critics) and Persona 4 Golden (a must-have for any Vita owner), as well as Hitman:  Absolution, Disney's Epic Mickey 2, and a little thing known as the Wii U which you might've heard of, I guess, plus a whole slew* of games for it.

*Slew not guaranteed quality

If that weren't enough, some of you will recall that this is also the week of Black Friday, which also means that it is the week where a bunch of people replace their brains with their wallets and their common sense with concrete-solid self-centeredness.  (Not in a wholly negative way, but I'm sure you know what I mean.  The bulk of the people shopping on Black Friday are pushy brutes who will trample you to save three dollars on something they don't even want.)  That all means that if you can truly get through this week without spending a dime on games or such, then I salute you, for you clearly have a will that is more steeled than my own.  I mean, I'm in a dangerous situation as it is - I bought those two games as is, and man was I tempted to look further for something else.  "Oh, I'm sure they have a copy of Zone of the Enders HD Collection - I really do want that Rising demo..."  "Oh, perhaps they have 999?  Or at least Virtue's Last Reward - don't wanna miss out on that."  "No, no, I cannot buy the Metal Gear Solid HD Collection on PS3 or Vita yet still.  God help me, I want to, but I can't."  These and more all circulated through my head in the scant ten minutes or so that I spent within the walls of GameStop as I purchased my items and left; being extra careful to give the Wii U demo console a wide berth lest I feel compelled to play it for 'just a minute'.

Of course, if you follow my Twitter (I apologize for bringing it up so much), you might have noticed that I became less impressed with it by a fair deal when a double-tap of bad news (coupled with something I already knew) put everything to a halt.  I'm not going to speak on it too long here, as I want to do a different post for that, but suffice to say if I had made a checklist of "Ways Nintendo Can Make the Wii U Completely Unappealing To Me", then that was a lot of boxes checked all at the same time on a list that wasn't realistically very long to begin with.  On top of that, there's all sorts of reports of consoles bricking left and right because the reportedly 5 gig or so firmware update you have to download when you first power up the system was being interrupted by users and/or bad luck.  (Turning the machine off because there's no canceling the firmware update in the former, internet cutting out in the latter)  Even if I were geared up and ready to get my Mario ZombiU Warriors Orochi 3 Hyper on on the Wii U, all that would've been enough to give me pause - enough so that I think I can resist its charms even after a hands-on.  But I dare not gamble when it comes to these things because it is a fire that I'm not risking a burn with, not yet.

Regardless of whether you do somehow manage to avoid the temptations of spending this week, or you succumb to throwing green (or whatever color your money is) at a clerk for items bound by plastic shells, your free time is in a deathmatch with all that is offered this week.  Why is that, you ask, even if I don't spend a dime?  Well, that's because Playstation Plus arrived on the Vita this week in all its glory, throwing six full games, at least one of which you're guaranteed to not own on a Vita, into your lap or your hands or wherever your Vita spends the bulk of its time when you're actually playing it.  Uncharted:  Golden Abyss (which is getting a wonderful-looking Card Game Add-on at the start of December), Gravity Rush, Wipeout 2048, Mutant Blobs Attack!!!, Jet Set Radio (!) and Final Fantasy Tactics:  War of the Lions join the stable of games included in the Instant Game Collection, not replacing a single existing one in the PS3's list, meaning you have access to an entire 18 games right off the bat for your price of entry.  These Plus games are yours after you download the Vita's 2.00 Firmware Update that went live Monday Nig-

Wait.  Wait.  Did I just say Vita's 2.00 Firmware Update?  Why yes.  Yes I did.  Let's talk about the 2.00 update for a moment.

Okay, 2.00 is awesome.  When it was announced, it was just like "Oh, it's the Plus update, woo" and as it got closer and closer, little things were being said, things about folders for music and pictures and videos which is nice, and things about the browser that were very noncommittal and it was just like "Oh well, some other tweak-y stuff, that's always cool.".  And indeed, there -are- a lot of tweaks; the PSP and PSOne Emulators saw a bit of an update in terms of letting you know how to get into the Emulator options (touch the screen for a few moments) as well as adding some more control and viewing options which is always nice.  Near has once again been revamped for whatever that's worth, and most instances of "Please Wait..." for various things (the one I noticed being Trophy Synching) seems to have been phased out completely which is alright.  But the thing to take away from this update?  The singular thing that elevates it from cool to holy shit yesssss?  Open a game.  Any game.  Whatever, open your copy of Xenogears (because you should have a copy of Xenogears) or Persona 4 Golden, whatever you want, and start playing it some, then press the PS button, swipe over and find your Internet Browser bubble, open it and look up your website of choice.

Yeah.

Yeah.

That just happened.  

That just happened and it's awesome that it works now without a LiveTweet workaround.

Anyways, as I was saying, your time is being contested by these free games out there, simply waiting for you to give them a good home and a little attention and for someone like myself, that's going to be a goddamn chore.  I'm not done with Ragnarok Odyssey yet in terms of I haven't finished it, but with Persona 4 Golden in my possession, I am done with Ragnarok Odyssey for now.  Then I have a copy of PASBR for my Vita on my PS3 disk just waiting to be transferred over (at least, I believe that's how it works) which I actually intend to play because it looks neat.  The aforementioned Mutants Blobs Attack!!! has been downloaded and I put a little time into it already - it's a neat little game, I'll give it that much, but tilt sections are the worst.  On top of all that, I have Jet Set Radio downloading right this moment (and, well, for the last three hours and the next....three...hours) which you know damn well I am going to put some time into.  I do not have time for all this.  At all.  But goddamnit, I am going to make time for it all because this is prime-time right here and I haven't been this excited at being in the middle of a field of options in....well, quite a while.

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