1288: Final Fantasies

I've been thinking a lot about the Final Fantasy series recently, prompted in part by the impending release of the third Final Fantasy XIII game Lightning Returns, which is actually looking rather spiffy. It's a series that, as I've noted a few times before, I've followed from VII onwards, though I later went back and educated myself on earlier installments in the series.

As such, here's a few thoughts on each mainline entry.

FINAL FANTASY I: Generic as hell, right down to the monsters ripped straight from the D&D Monster Manual and its high fantasy setting. Minimal plot, incomprehensible plot twist right at the end. Worth playing to see the series' origins, but feels very grindy these days.

FINAL FANTASY II: Very interesting, particularly when you compare it to other JRPGs around at the time. Not only was it an early example of a Final Fantasy game focusing on plot, its mechanics were kind of cool. Okay, they had their problems, too, but indirectly Final Fantasy II set the template for the "use it to improve it" skill system seen in, among other things, the Elder Scrolls series.

FINAL FANTASY III: By now, the pattern of odd-numbered Final Fantasy games focusing on mechanics and even-numbered ones focusing on plot was set in place. Final Fantasy III had minimal plot, even in its later 3D remake, but it's a game worth playing to see the genesis of the Job system that made frequent reappearances throughout both the mainline series and its numerous spinoffs.

FINAL FANTASY IV: Heavy on the plot, light on the mechanics. In Final Fantasy IV, you're stuck with whatever party members the plot dictates you have at any one point, with minimal customisation. This isn't necessarily a bad thing, though; it allows you to focus on the plot which, while basic and clichéd these days, was impressive, epic stuff back when it first came out, and noteworthy for having characters with distinct personalities.

FINAL FANTASY V: I must confess to never having finished this one, but it has one of the best implementations of the Job system of the whole series, allowing you to blend abilities from two different Jobs, assuming you've already learned some from the Job you're not actively equipped with. Once again, it's an odd-numbered Final Fantasy so the plot is somewhat disposable, but again, the mechanics are the reason to explore this game.

FINAL FANTASY VI: For many, the best Final Fantasy but again, I must confess to never having beaten this, and somehow never having had the ending spoiled for me. VI gives a good balance between the predefined characters of IV and the customisation of V by having distinctive characters whom you could teach spells to. The plot, meanwhile, was excellent, if arguably overly ambitious for the technology it had available to tell it.

FINAL FANTASY VII: I'll always have a soft spot for this one, what with it being the reason I like JRPGs as much as I do today. I haven't played it for probably a good ten years or so, but I'm open to the idea of revisiting it at some point. Those awful field screen character models bugged me even back then, though; I believe the PC version allows you to mod them.

FINAL FANTASY VIII: Much-maligned, but this is one of my favourites of the series. A touching love story coupled with some world-shattering silliness, with one of the best final encounters of all time — even if the finale itself was somewhat nonsensical.

FINAL FANTASY IX: One of the best battle themes in the series, though the child-like characters looked a little strange after the realistically proportioned people in VIII. IX has a ton of series fanservice, as it was the series' swansong on PS1.

FINAL FANTASY X: The change to PS2 and full 3D was very jarring to me, especially when combined with the move to a fully turn-based system. Said turn-based system was great, though, particularly the way you could manipulate the turn order to your advantage. This mechanic would later be seen in a whole bunch of other JRPGs — Trails in the Sky is one that springs to mind — so it proved to be massively influential. Also noteworthy for having a cool level-up system that made for highly customisable characters… and for having a terrible conversion to PAL consoles, with ugly black borders at the top and bottom of the screen and a frame rate significantly slower than the NTSC (Japan and US) versions.

FINAL FANTASY X-2: Gloriously camp, and delightful as a result. Final Fantasy X-2 may have taken place in the same world as X, but it had a completely different character. X was melancholy throughout; X-2 was rambunctious and joyful. This ultimately wasn't to everyone's taste, but the game certainly didn't suffer as a result. A non-linear structure combined with a fantastic implementation of the Job system made Final Fantasy X-2's small party of three immensely customisable, and there was a ton of stuff to do in the game, much of it optional. Highly recommended.

FINAL FANTASY XI: The first of the two MMOs in the series, Final Fantasy XI is noteworthy for being one of the first games of its type to actually make an effort with narrative progression alongside the otherwise relatively straightforward MMO gameplay. There was a story, there were bosses, there was even a final boss. Subsequent expansions continued the stories into ever more exciting encounters, but you had better be ready to invest a lot of time — the game had one of the slowest rates of levelling of any MMO, and though this was marginally improved over time, it's still painfully slow and dependent on playing in parties.

FINAL FANTASY XII: XII took a bunch of ideas from the MMO XI and transplanted them into a single player game. It was the biggest shift the mainline Final Fantasy series — many fans don't count Final Fantasy XI due to its online nature — had seen for a long time, since it abandoned the old-school turn-based or active time battle systems in favour of a quasi real-time system somewhat akin to that seen in a Western RPG like the later Dragon Age. In fact, Dragon Age pinched a few ideas from Final Fantasy XII itself, such as being able to program the game's AI to respond to specific circumstances.

FINAL FANTASY XIII: The first HD Final Fantasy divided opinion significantly. I really liked it, but others didn't appreciate the streamlined first 20 hours or so, in which you have a bunch of options locked off as you're forced by the game to familiarise yourself with specific party setups with limited — but still some — customisation. The battle system shifted from micromanagement to switching character classes on the fly, and was very fast-paced. When the game opened up very late on, there was a ton of side content to do, and you could go back and do more after you'd beaten the final boss. Whatever you think of the game, though, it's hard to deny the fact it's one of the most beautiful games you'll ever see on any platform.

FINAL FANTASY XIII-2: Many of the criticisms against Final Fantasy XIII were addressed with XIII-2, but the previous game had built up such an inexplicable bank of ill-will that many people never even bothered with it. The time-travelling story was convoluted and hard to follow, but the non-linear game structure provided a lot of interesting things to do. There were also some actual puzzles in the game, which the series hadn't seen for quite some time.

Lightning Returns: FINAL FANTASY XIII: Details are relatively thin on the ground for this upcoming new entry in the series too because everyone's so angry about the fact that Lightning has jiggly boobs, but it sounds like it's going to be more "actiony," but provide you with a number of different means of tackling various situations. An open world section is also promised, along with some Final Fantasy X-2-style dress-up funtimes that I'm looking forward to very much.

FINAL FANTASY XIV: The second massively multiplayer incarnation of the series was reportedly awful, but I never played it.

FINAL FANTASY XIV: A Realm Reborn: The second incarnation of the second massively multiplayer incarnation of the series is simply marvellous, however, and I'm looking forward to playing it when it releases later in August. It takes the good things about Final Fantasy XI — the Final Fantasy-like presentation, the music, the diverse characters, the implementation of a plot into a massively multiplayer game — and throws out the grindy stuff in favour of a wide variety of stuff to do, friendly to both solo and group players, and a number of mechanics inspired by other successful MMOs such as Guild Wars 2.

FINAL FANTASY XV: Details are scant on this one as yet, but early videos look pretty spectacular. Will it be a next-gen system seller? Who knows? I'm certainly looking forward to finding out.

1287: Thunderbolts and Lightning

Japanese gaming never died. It just shifted its focus. And that's a good thing.

I find myself contemplating this topic for a few reasons, including Twitter discussions on various related topics, and a few articles I've seen posted around the Web recently on the subject of Japanese gaming making "a comeback".

Japanese gaming never went anywhere. It may not be the focus of the games industry now — a side-effect of the very American Xbox 360 dominating a healthy proportion of the console generation we're just coming to the end of now — but it's still been ticking along very nicely, and in fact, for my money, it's been doing a much better job of catering to unique audiences than focus-grouped Western titles.

Japanese role-playing games used to be a big deal. Or, more accurately, a new Final Fantasy release used to be a big deal, particularly back in the PS1 era, which carried some of the best installments in Square Enix's long-running series. The JRPG market was always far broader than just Final Fantasy, even in the West, but Final Fantasy was in the unique position of being a Japanese role-playing game — by all accounts, a fairly "niche" genre, even back then — that successfully achieved mainstream penetration thanks to its impressive presentation. There were plenty of other JRPGs that flew under the mainstream radar but which are still fondly remembered by fans, but Final Fantasy was the one that everyone latched onto — with good reason.

These days, however, Final Fantasy enjoys a curious reaction from press and public alike. Ever since Final Fantasy XIII came along, there's been a significant amount of negativity directed at the series — negativity that isn't altogether justified.

Final Fantasy XIII, like every other Final Fantasy before it, mixed up the formula rather than just being a reskinned version of the previous game. It abandoned the micromanagement of previous games' battles in favour of a fast-paced take on the Active Time Battle system that focused more on carefully-timed switches of character roles rather than choosing individual commands. It provided a focused experience, pushing the story constantly forwards, forwards, forwards down a linear path until a point close to the end, where you suddenly had a large open world to explore.

Past Final Fantasy games have actually followed this exact formula to the letter — linear beginning that gets more and more open as you proceed towards the finish line, with the game completely "open" by the time you reached the end. Final Fantasy XIII just didn't hide it quite as well as the previous ones — and intentionally so; game director Motomo Toriyama wanted players to concentrate on the story for the beginning part of the game without distractions.

This is something to be criticised, apparently, yet it honestly baffles me as to why. Final Fantasy XIII's extreme linearity for the first 20-30 hours or so means that the story is constantly moving rather than doing the usual RPG thing of stalling for hours at a time while the player goes off and breeds chocobos or something. You're always moving from place to place, seeing new things, meeting new characters, fighting new enemies and learning new nuances of the game's systems. By the time you come out the end of this "20-hour tutorial," as some people call it, you're fully equipped to take on the challenges of the open world you're dropped into — and you have characters that are beefed up enough to be able to take on some significantly powerful monsters.

A common criticism of that "20-hour tutorial" is that there's "nothing to do but fight," which is an argument I can sort of see, but which I disagree with. Sure, in game terms you're doing little more than running forward and fighting, but in the process you're seeing things happen around you, meeting new characters, learning about the world — not to mention the fact that you're choosing how your characters develop and crafting weapons to improve their performance… and not to mention the fact that the fighting is fun. Final Fantasy XIII may not populate its world with gimmicks and sidequests, but that doesn't make it bad at all. It simply means it's not to some people's tastes, and that's fine; what the people who find it distasteful don't seem to realise, however, is that "I don't like it" is not the same as "this is bad" — the very same thing that happens with other, more "niche" JRPGs like Hyperdimension Neptunia, Ar Tonelico and Time and Eternity: games with a laser-sharp focus on exactly the sort of person they want to be playing that game. (Me.)

The initial reaction to Final Fantasy XIII unfortunately meant that its sequel Final Fantasy XIII-2 was met with everything from indifference to hostility on its release, when it was actually a remarkably solid game. Its time-travelling story was confusing and convoluted, yes, but much like the weak, forgettable story of Final Fantasy XII didn't affect the fact that the game itself was good, so too was the case with XIII-2, which built on and evolved many of XIII's ideas. It addressed most of the criticisms people had about Final Fantasy XIII while simultaneously remaining recognisably true to its predecessor.

And now we find ourselves coming to the third game based around Final Fantasy XIII's world: Lightning Returns. Once again, this game is being met with outright hostility for a variety of reasons. Particular attention is being paid this time around to the matter of the main character Lightning, whom everyone seems to have suddenly decided is massively offensive. Game director Motomu Toriyama is clearly enamoured with his creation and that's absolutely fine — in many ways, it's delightful to see a creator so passionate about something he's created; at the same time, I don't blame Square Enix for indulging in some gratuitous cross-promotion such as putting Lightning in a special quest in the upcoming MMO Final Fantasy XIV, or putting out some promotional art of her wearing the starting costume for one of Final Fantasy XIV's character types and doing a(n admitedly provocative) pose from that character's set of default "emote" animations.

It's here that Final Fantasy's background as a niche title with mainstream acceptance is working against it. With the JRPG genre regularly losing out to more popular types of game like first-person shooters and open world adventures, it seems that Toriyama is choosing to focus the Lightning Returns experience on a smaller niche that will appreciate it, and in the process is alienating the mainstream. In the case of most modern JRPGs, which have been happily ignoring the mainstream completely for several years now, this is fine; when you have a property as well-known as Final Fantasy, though, it's an issue. Not that Toriyama and co are trying to focus on a more niche audience, mind you — that's something I wholeheartedly encourage — but that people seem pissed off that Square Enix isn't making the games they want them to make.

Well, to that, I simply say good on Square Enix for sticking with what they want to do. Not every game needs to be a focus-grouped mass appeal game designed to shift five million copies. I often find the ones that are to be rather soulless experiences at their core, so I wholeheartedly encourage and embrace any title with the balls to say "don't like this? Fine. Leave." rather than grabbing onto their ankles and screaming for them to "PLEASE DON'T GO". Games are a business, yes, but that doesn't mean that those who create them have to be beholden to the whims of the public; ultimately it should be the creator's decision what to, you know, create.

I'm looking forward to playing Lightning Returns. You may not be, and that's fine. But if you're not, try not to push your opinions on everyone else as gospel, because there are a lot of people in the world, and everyone has their own take on things. No-one's forcing you to play or like Lightning Returns; just respect the fact that there are people out there who will be playing it, and who may well end up liking it as a result… just like any other game out there.

Stepping away from the Internet now.

1286: Take a Note, Nep-Nep

When was the last time you played a video game that required you to either 1) map it yourself or 2) make notes while playing? I'm willing to bet it's quite a long time, unless you've either 1) been playing the Etrian Odyssey series or 2) been playing an old-school Sierra game.

I've been playing a much more recent game and making notes, however. The game isn't demanding that I make notes, but I'm getting a strange sense of satisfaction from figuring the game out for myself rather than immediately reaching for the walkthroughs, as is the common approach these days.

The game in question is Hyperdimension Neptunia Victory, which I'm now 40 hours into and probably about halfway through the plot, I estimate. I could have raced through and finished by now, I'm sure, but there's something about this game in particular — even more than the previous two Neptunia games, which I adored in all their flawed glory — that is making me want to take my time and soak everything up.

It's a different kind of wanting to soak things up to something like Ar Tonelico, though. In the case of Gust's oeuvre, I wanted to continue immersing myself in the world; spend more time with the characters; see every possible conclusion to that lengthy story that I'd been enjoying so much. With Victory, meanwhile, my enjoyment is coming from the game mechanics as much as the setting and characters.

The three Neptunia games have a fun setting and some immensely entertaining characters, you see, but I wouldn't call the world especially "immersive". The only real "exploring" you do is going into dungeons, and these are primarily designed for being 1) a place to fight monsters and 2) a place to harvest items for use in crafting and/or quests. There's a lot of repeated content — some dungeons are just variations on the same map, a la Phantasy Star Online and Dragon Age II — and thus they're best regarded as a backdrop for the more interesting stuff that's going on with the game mechanics.

More so than any of the previous Neptunia games, Victory is a case of a number of individually simplistic systems and mechanics coming together to create something significantly more complicated and deeper than the sum of its parts would appear to create at first glance. Sure, you can play through Victory without exploring these aspects of it, and that's a perfectly valid way to play. But since mk2 in particular, I've found the gameplay of this series so satisfying that I want to indulge myself in all its nuances as much as possible.

Let me explain what I've been doing and taking notes on this evening. In doing so, you'll hopefully see how the different individual systems at play in Victory combine to make something that is a surprisingly deep experience.

Each dungeon in Victory has a bank of monsters you'll encounter. Like mk2 and unlike the first game, you can see the monsters on the map and attack or avoid them as you desire, though a single monster figure on the field actually represents a party of enemies that might include other opponent types.

Each monster drops at least one item, most of which are "trash" items that don't have any use by themselves. But most of these items are used either in crafting recipes — crafting an item once means that it's then available for purchase in all of the game's shops, so it's something you need to do — or for completing quests. Already we have several overlapping systems here — exploring dungeons leads to combat, which leads to the acquisition of items, which can be sold, used in crafting recipes or traded in for quest rewards.

As well as tangible rewards, quests also manipulate the game's "shares" mechanic that has been around since the first game. I haven't studied the effects these shares have in great detail yet, but if it's anything like the first two games, the characters associated with a particular nation will be powered up or down according to how high their shares are. In my experience, it's not a huge increase or decrease, but I'll need to analyse things more comprehensively to figure that out. In mk2 the shares values also determined which ending you got; I don't think that's the case in Victory but I could be wrong.

Now, here's the twist on the usual "monsters drop shit" thing — partway through the game, you gain access to a mechanic called Scouting, whereby you can send several NPCs off to scout dungeons while you do other stuff. Depending on how much you pay them and their level of proficiency, they may come back with items, money or, more importantly, a report that something has changed in the dungeon they were scouting. This could be a change in the amount of credits monsters drop or the experience points they award, or it could be a shift in the harvestable items or the monsters wandering around the dungeon.

The latter two are significant, because they are the only means of acquiring some items that are, again, used for crafting or completing quests. Most dungeons have at least one optional boss monster, and it's usually these that are manipulated through the Scout system. Normally, these optional bosses are referred to as "Dangerous", which simply means they're tougher than the other stuff in the dungeon and have their own cool battle theme. However, a Scout spotting a shift in the monster patterns may turn them to either a "Risky" monster, which drops chips that can be used to burn discs with specific characteristics, abilities and stat improvements on, or a "Tough" monster, which drops medals that can be traded in to acquire the actual discs required to make use of this mechanic.

Whether a "Dangerous" monster becomes "Risky" or "Tough" when a scout finds it — actually finding something at all is determined largely by chance, but is influenced by both how much you pay the scout and their own abilities — is decided by whether a "flag" item in a dungeon is standing or broken. If it's standing and your scout spots a change in monster patterns, you'll come across a "Tough" monster; if it's broken, you'll meet a "Risky" monster. These shifts in monster patterns only last for one in-game "day", though, so if you've sent your scouts off to random places all over the world and they've all found new monsters, you'll need to decide which ones to take on. It becomes necessary to think about where you send your Scouts and why, otherwise it's a bit of a waste of time.

This "flag" system also determines which harvestable items become available when a scout spots a change in the items available in the dungeon.

Confused? I was initially, too, because the game doesn't explain this in great detail, which I was initially a bit annoyed about. However, having sat down and actually taken some notes this evening on each dungeon — what the normal lineup of collectable items and monsters are, and the differences that successfully Scouting it has, both with the flag broken and standing — I now feel like I understand this game mechanic. It isn't explained in great detail because it's not something you need to use to finish the game. You're told regularly by NPCs that you don't need to do quests and you don't need to use Scouts, but if you do, you'll find more cool stuff.

I could, of course, have simply gone to GameFAQs and looked all this shit up myself. But there's something inherently very satisfying about figuring out how it all works myself. It makes me feel like I'm really "beating" the game at what it's doing — learning how to leverage its rules to my own advantage, rather than simply getting someone to tell me how to do it. It's something I can see myself doing a lot more in the future, as I'm appreciating the game a great deal more as a result.

1285: Wake Up Club

I hate mornings.

Actually, that's not quite accurate. I don't mind mornings in and of themselves, and in fact if I get my day started early enough I'm always pleasantly surprised how much free time I have left at the end of it. What I actually hate is the combination of waking up and getting up.

Waking up is the first challenge. Or rather, remaining awake after waking up for the first time is the first challenge — the actual act of waking up isn't, in and of itself, especially difficult.

I've mentioned this before, but I tend to have very vivid dreams in the morning after I've woken up for the first time and fallen asleep again. Sometimes I have very vivid dreams immediately before I wake up for the first time, too, and the immediate temptation is to fall back asleep again to "finish" them, because waking up almost inevitably interrupts them at an interesting, exciting or otherwise pleasing point. (Sometimes they're nightmares — err, morningmares? — but even then there's a sort of morbid curiosity to see how things pan out.)

It's so easy to just close my eyes and drift back off to sleep again, particularly if Andie has gone out to work and I've been left by myself. Without anywhere I "have" to be and with a job that I don't need to start until late morning, I can quite feasibly fall back asleep again if I want to.

Doing that isn't really compatible with having a productive day, though, and certainly isn't compatible with the programme of light exercise (walking 3-4 miles a day at a fairly leisurely pace) I've been following for the past couple of weeks. So I've been forcing myself out of bed in the morning, even if I don't really want to. And this morning I really didn't want to, but I managed it anyway.

One tool I've found quite helpful in making myself wake up and get up first time is a freebie download for Vita called Wake Up Club. This is basically little more than an alarm clock app, but it has a few little features built in that engage the brain enough to prevent you from falling asleep again.

There are two main ways it does this. Firstly is the fact that in order to get it to shut up in the first place, you have to actually pick up the Vita, press the "Yes" key when it asks if it's all right to let the Wake Up Club app bring the Vita out of sleep mode without you having to touch the power button. Once the app is open, you then have to tap on a leisurely bouncing image of your PSN avatar to actually get the thing to be quiet.

Except there's another step after that, too, which is where the "club" bit of the app's title comes from. Every morning, Wake Up Club picks a bunch of people who have all set their alarm for the same time and invites them to harass each other if they don't wake up immediately. You do this by tapping on their avatar, which causes their Vita to yell at them until they, too, inform their device that they have indeed woken up and could they please stop shouting at them?

I'm actually yet to have to do this on other "players" who are using the app, since everyone seems to wake up fairly quickly. The only time I get to tap on other people's avatars are if there's no-one else "playing," or if the Vita has had some sort of PSN-related meltdown in the night and has lost connection. Then you get to tap on the avatars of computer-controlled "club" members until they wake up, which takes a good few seconds. By the time you have finished tapping on things, you're well and truly awake, those simple motor actions being enough to get your brain moving beyond that point that will allow you to fall asleep again as soon as your head hits the pillow.

Also there are trophies if you are a trophy whore and like receiving arbitrary rewards for "gamifying" your life. So there's that.

Anyway. Yeah. If you're having trouble waking up, get some form of alarm clock that requires you to do something more than just hit it to shut it up. If you have a Vita, Wake Up Club is as good as anything, particularly as it's free.

1282: Dead Body Gathering

I've been replaying Corpse Party recently due to the fact that I've owned the sequel Book of Shadows for ages and haven't gotten around to it yet. Since Book of Shadows is more of a spinoff that tells other concurrent stories that take place during the first Corpse Party, I figured it would probably be a good idea to refresh my memory on the original.

I'm reminded how much I liked the game first time around, for a number of reasons. It has its frustrating elements, sure — chief among which is the lack of a "fast forward" function for scenes you've seen before and want to skip after reloading from a "Wrong End" — but there's a lot more to like than there is to dislike.

The most impressive thing about Corpse Party is still its sound. Not only does it have some fantastic music, but it also makes use of some utterly brilliant 3D sound effects that are alarmingly realistic when listened to on headphones. There's one sequence partway through where a character is listening to someone's voice on their phone, and the way the sound is positioned actually makes it sound like a phone held up against your ear. Elsewhere, careful positioning of sounds in the stereo field can make it sound like they're coming from over your shoulder, or off in the distance.

Alongside the marvellous 3D sound is some incredible voice acting. I have pretty limited knowledge of Japanese seiyuu, but it's clear that those who signed on to voice Corpse Party's cast really know what they're doing. The delivery of their lines is packed with character and some really genuine-sounding emotion. When a character shouts, they sound angry. When a character is crying, it's heartbreaking. When a character screams, it's enough to send shivers down your spine.

The game, as I've said on a few occasions previously, is also a masterclass in that essential part of horror — "less is more". While Corpse Party has its share of explicitly gory moments, its most horrifying scenes are completely invisible in terms of visuals, instead unfolding entirely through sound effects, text and occasional flashes of colour. The imagination really gets to work in these scenes, filling your mind with some truly, truly unpleasant mental images that are all the worse for the fact you know that you're responsible for picturing them. I often find myself wincing at explicit, gory horror movies, but Corpse Party is the only game that's managed to genuinely get me squirming using nothing but a minimalist approach.

I'm into the game's fourth chapter, so I'm making good progress on my playthrough. I've managed to avoid a lot of the "Wrong Ends" so far, though the growing completionist streak I appear to be developing will probably insist I go back and get them all in order to fill in all those "Ending List" stars at some point. And this time I will actually play the "Extra" scenes that you unlock as you play through, too — for some reason I didn't get around to those last time around.

Anyway. Yeah. Corpse Party. If you're yet to experience this creepy classic on PSP and Vita and are hungry for something scary, get on that right now.

1280: More Truckin'

I had an all-too-brief chat with my good friend Mr Alex Connolly earlier today, during which I briefly extolled the virtues of Euro Truck Simulator 2, which I played for a good few hours today. This post is primarily intended for Alex — and anyone else who is similarly curious about Euro Truck Simulator 2 — since we only had a brief moment to talk earlier.

Here's what Euro Truck Simulator 2 is all about, then.

You start the game by creating your driver profile by giving yourself a name, naming your haulage company-to-be, choosing a logo for yourself and selecting a truck you like the look of. You then choose a home base somewhere in Europe, and then it's off to work you go.

Your first job is what is later referred to in the game as a "quick job" — you're provided with a truck already loaded up with cargo, and all you have to do is deliver it to the destination. If you elect to follow the tutorial, you're walked through various elements of the interface, though you're not told where a few important keys (headlights, windscreen wipers, indicators) are, so you'll need to check the options menu for that. (I recommend assigning all of those controls to a controller, if you're using one.)

Delivering cargo is a simple matter of following your GPS, which sits in the corner of the screen like a space sim's multi-function display. (Indeed, here it is multifunction, too, allowing you to switch between views of your route, diagnostic information and other helpful bits and pieces.) While driving, you'll have to be reasonably careful. Hitting things can damage your truck and potentially cargo, too — the latter will cost you some of your fee at the end of the run. Similarly, breaking the rules of the road will cause you to be fined, though much like reality, you can get away with speeding so long as no-one catches you doing it.

The roads are convincingly rendered, meaning you'll have to merge carefully onto motorways, slow down for country roads, and stop-start-stop-start at the traffic lights found in city centres. If you're driving in the UK, you'll have to drive on the left; head out onto the continent, meanwhile, and you'll be on the right. Both left- and right-hand drive trucks are available.

Once you reach your destination, there'll be a glowing parking space that you must reverse into. This is harder than it sounds, as trucks and trailers behave strangely when in reverse. You can, of course, press the "auto-park" button, but if you do so you're effectively declaring that you're a big wuss.

Once you've successfully parked and detached your cargo, you'll be rewarded with money and experience points, with a bonus if you parked yourself. Levelling up rewards you with skill points, which you can plug into one of several different skills — one allows you to transport hazardous (and consequently higher-value) cargo of various types; another allows you to take on more long-distance jobs; another still provides you with larger rewards for heavy, oversized or otherwise valuable cargo. You can effectively tailor your driver's profile according to the types of job you like to do.

After a couple of successful runs, you'll be invited to head along to a truck dealership that sells the type of truck you indicated was your "preferred" type at the outset of the game. A new truck will inevitably be much too expensive for you to afford with the few thousand Euros you've acquired from a couple of jobs, so you'll receive an email shortly afterwards from the bank inviting you to take out a loan. Here you have a choice; keep doing quick jobs for reasonable pay until you can afford to buy a truck outright, or take out a loan, buy your own truck immediately, and ensure you make enough money each in-game day to pay off that particular instalment.

Once you have your own truck — which can be customised in numerous ways, more of which open up as you level up — you have a lot more freedom. You can freely drive around Europe at your leisure, and the in-game map keeps track of how much of the road network you've explored. Arriving at new towns "discovers" them and unlocks them as a starting point for future jobs; coming across "?" markers on the map reveals new truck dealerships, recruitment agencies for hiring additional drivers for your fleet and other facilities; stopping at petrol stations or hotels allows you to restore your fuel and fatigue levels respectively.

Having your own truck allows you to take jobs from the "Freight Market" rather than the "Quick Job" menu. Here, you have to actually drive to the place where the job offer is — they expire after a while, so if you don't get there quickly enough, you're not doing the job — and then manually attach the trailer to your truck.

From here, it's a case of proceeding to do more jobs and build up your available funds, then gradually build up your fleet of trucks and drivers so it's not just you hauling shit around Europe, but your very own army of bearded chain-smokers too. Each of your hired drivers can be levelled up the same way as your own character, so you can get different drivers to specialise in different things.

All in all, it's a really neat game. I didn't think it would have much to offer beyond the initial appeal of "WOW I'M DRIVING A LORRY" but there's actually a surprisingly competent game in there, too. And even if you struggle to handle one of these many-wheeled beasts, you can have some fun by causing chaos on the open world. Which is nice.

Anyway, there's my enthusing on the subject of Euro Truck Simulator 2. It's surprisingly worth your time, particularly if you like open-world driving games where you just pootle around rather than killing everybody. Plus there's something inherently satisfying about driving such a gigantic vehicle and not killing everyone around you, or ending up on your side. (Though it is possible to end up on your side.)

So there you have it. Euro Truck Simulator 2. Enjoy.

1279: Hauling Ass (and Wood, Propane and Other Exciting Things)

I picked up Euro Truck Simulator 2 in the Steam Sale the other day on a bit of a whim. This is one of those simulator games that, like Farming Simulator, was roundly mocked upon its original release, but promptly turned out to be a rather good game.

I haven't spent a huge amount of time with it so far and I don't know how much time I will spend with it in the long term, but early impressions are that it is basically a game that I've thought should exist for a long time — that is to say, it's Elite, but on the roads instead of in space.

Okay, that's perhaps not quite accurate; you're not really "trading" stuff, you're simply taking jobs and hauling shit (sometimes literally) from one place to another, and there's certainly no "combat" besides any accidents you deliberately cause yourself, but the idea of fusing a management/business game with a vehicle simulator is a sound one, and it has always surprised me somewhat that we've only ever seen it happen in space, really.

Euro Truck Simulator 2 is an odd experience. It's a driving game, but without all the jostling for position and chaos that normally accompanies driving games that focus on racing. It's an open-world game, but without anything to really "do" besides seek out truck dealerships, try and visit every road in the game and sightsee. I haven't got far enough into the game to look at the business sim side of things yet, but I assume that will add an element of light strategy to the mix, particularly once you start hiring other drivers, too.

It's a peculiarly relaxing experience to play. Once your truck is out on the open road, you don't really have to do a lot besides ensure you don't hit anything, and try not to get caught by speed cameras. But it's pleasingly chilled out to just trundle along at 50mph down some convincingly-realised (if geographically-inaccurate) roads that go to real, actual places with recognisable landmarks. It also implements another feature that I've always thought should be in open-world driving games — the ability to stream Internet radio stations as the soundtrack to your drive. I was listening to some pleasingly mellow German jazz while I drove from Southampton to Dover earlier.

I say it's a relaxing experience to play. Well, that's only mostly true: it's relaxing until you reach your destination and have to reverse the fucking thing into a parking space. Parking a truck is horrendously difficult and I have new-found respect for anyone who is able to do it successfully, particularly in a yard that doesn't have very much space available. I don't really understand how to make it go the correct way when I'm reversing it yet, but I'm sure it's something that comes with practice.

Anyway, I guess what I'm saying in a roundabout way is that if you've seen Euro Truck Simulator 2 in the Steam sale and are mildly curious about it, do yourself a favour and download it. You might just find yourself enjoying the experience. It's just a shame there isn't multiplayer; hauling stuff around Europe with a friend would be a lot of fun, I feel.

1277: Failing to Resist the Urge to Call This Post 'Rim Job'

I'M SORRY. (I'm not sorry.)

I went to see Pacific Rim this evening with my similarly-named friends Tim and Tom. This, along with Akira the other night, means that I've officially been to the cinema more times in the past week than I have in the last year.

As for Pacific Rim, it was enjoyable, if cheesy. Good, dumb fun on the surface, but a movie clearly designed with an appreciation — possibly even reverence — for Japanese giant robot anime. Throughout the whole thing, I couldn't help thinking that the movie might have been better just as a straight-up anime. In fact, partway through the movie, I found myself making mental comparisons with the visual novel Deus Machina Demonbane, with which Pacific Rim actually shares a significant number of similarities.

Lest you're unfamiliar with Deus Machina Demonbane but have seen Pacific Rim, the former is a visual novel about giant robots battling monsters loosely inspired by the work of HP Lovecraft; the latter is a movie about giant robots battling monsters with too many mouths. Already quite similar, albeit the Lovecraftian twist on Demonbane is a pleasant break from the norm.

Then we have the whole "you need two people to pilot a giant robot" thing, which is present in both Demonbane and Pacific Rim; in the former, the pilot is paired up with a "tome" (in the case of the protagonist, an absolutely adorable personification of the Necronimicon), while in the latter, two people have to "drift" together and share their consciousness, or memories, or something.

Then there's the fact that the main "hero" robot gets the crap kicked out of it repeatedly, yet somehow always gets repaired to immaculate condition every time, which is present in both works.

And the fact that the giant robots fighting do just as much damage — if not more so — to the places they're trying to protect than the monsters they're fighting, which is, again, present in both works.

Demonbane does have a bit of a twist in that the antagonists are given personalities and stories of their own, rather than just being "GRRR ARRGH MONSTERS". There's an overall "bad guy" in Demonbane, who is responsible for the Lovecraftian beasts invading our dimension, and there are some truly loathsome "lieutenants" who give the protagonist and the other characters in the story a lot of grief, to say the least.

Also, there is more fucking in Demonbane, while there is none in Pacific Rim, what with it being a 12A and all while Demonbane is an adults-only title. For the most part, the sexual scenes in Demonbane are more horrific than titillating, though; it's one of those "I can't fap to this!" games, unless you have some seriously weird tastes. Likewise, you cannot fap to Pacific Rim, but for different reasons.

Anyway, I guess what I'm saying is that if you enjoyed Pacific Rim and you're open to the idea of playing sexually explicit visual novels, then you should give Deus Machina Demonbane a look. It's one of the more memorable, well-written visual novels I've played in my time, and it's satisfyingly hefty in length, too, particularly if you go for all the endings.

I am hot and sweaty. I am going to drink something cold and go to bed. Good night.

1276: Be Patient

Those who are "against" video games are always quick to mock how supposedly "brainless" and "useless" they are — the other day, for example, a writer for The Times displayed a staggering amount of ignorance on the issue, which resulted in this article.

But video games can teach us all manner of new skills and abilities. Besides the old favourite hand-eye co-ordination — everyone says it because it's true — games also help train our reflexes, develop the problem-solving parts of our brain, express our creativity, socialise with others and all manner of other things.

One of the things they've helped me with most over the years is the matter of patience. I have a significant amount of patience for irritating situations, which is something I was regularly complimented on back when I was a teacher. (Having patience to endure irritating situations is very much a benefit when you're dealing with a class of 30 misbehaving little scrotes.)

Actually, it's not just irritating situations I have patience for; it's the patience to keep beavering away at something until I'm successful (also file under: stubbornness); the patience to try and achieve something even if I don't know that I can do it; the patience to learn things that initially seem difficult.

A combination of video games and learning musical instruments growing up taught me this particular virtue. And it pays off.

My patience means that I have a lot more time for, say, games that take a while to get going; games that might not be the most accomplished technically, but which have their heart in the right place. My patience means that I am able to keep trying a particularly difficult part of a game until I'm successful at it; my patience means that I'm willing to explore beyond the superficial in games that have hidden depths.

This sense of patience has persisted over the years, too; replaying old first-person shooters such as Blake Stone: Aliens of Gold recently has revealed that they're a lot more difficult than I remember, and people with less in the way of patience would undoubtedly give up very quickly. But I've been persisting, and it's been an enjoyable experience to return to these games that I grew up with — while they may look dated, they're still extremely fun, so long as you can deal with the fact that these are games that make much more of an effort to actually kill the player than a lot of modern titles.

I'm weirdly proud of my sense of patience, because it means I can find a lot more things enjoyable than some other people. The games in which I've made use of my patience to look past flaws and problems have become some of my favourite games of all time, no exaggeration, and it's largely due to the fact that I know relatively few people have seen the things I have.

That may sound smug and superior and for that I apologise (a bit, anyway) — but I wouldn't have things any other way.

1273: You Have Earned a Trophy

I can feel my attitudes towards achievements and trophies mellowing somewhat. While I still think people who play games just to get the trophies/achievements are big pillocks — and people who refuse to buy a PS3 game if it doesn't have a Platinum trophy are even bigger pillocks — I have started to think about them a bit differently, particularly with regard to PSN's implementation of them.

The way I've started thinking of them now is as another means of showing my appreciation for a quality (or at least enjoyable) piece of entertainment to the people who make it. Trophy data is public and synced online, so it's not unreasonable to assume that developers and publishers are looking at the proportion of people who achieve particular milestones in their games. Thinking of it in that way, I'm happy to put in a bit of extra effort to attain a Platinum trophy in a game I especially enjoyed, as it shows that I liked the game enough to want to see everything it had to offer. That enjoyment is then recorded permanently — or as permanent as my PSN profile is, anyway — for all to see.

I've achieved Platinum trophies — or 100% completion, where a game doesn't have a Platinum — in relatively few games to date. One was Thatgamecompany's Flower, which remains one of the most beautiful, moving interactive experiences I've ever had — and yes, I think it's better than Journey. The second was Hyperdimension Neptunia mk2, which ended up being way better than I thought it would be; the third was Ar Tonelico Qoga, which was the climax to a series of games that now ranks among my favourites of all time. At my present rate, the fourth will be Time and Eternity, which I want to give some recognition and love to purely because it's been so thoroughly (and slightly unfairly, in my opinion) panned by a lot of critics, and completely ignored by others. In the case of all these trophies, attaining the Platinum represented a good balance between being able to enjoy the game normally, and going out of my way to make a bit of effort; I wouldn't have bothered if achieving it required too much in the way of unenjoyable grindy bollocks. (On Xbox, incidentally, the only games I've achieved 100% of the, uh, achievements on are Oblivion and Pac-Man Championship Edition DX. In the case of Oblivion, chasing the achievements actually spoiled the experience significantly for me because it directed what should have been a freeform experience far too much, and Pac-Man Championship Edition DX had insultingly easy achievements that really didn't reflect whether or not you were actually good at the game.)

I think much more fondly of PSN trophies than I do of Xbox or Steam achievements for some reason. I think it's because the "value" of PSN trophies is more immediately obvious. Sure, Xbox achievements have Gamerscore values, but Gamerscore is fairly meaningless, particularly as it's applied inconsistently between games and, well, doesn't do anything. Trophies, meanwhile, have instantly recognisable values; bronze ones are "fodder" for the most part; silver ones require a little more effort; gold ones are generally either challenging or time-consuming; and platinum ones show true dedication to a game. To say you have "Platinumed" a game is a much simpler, more elegant way of saying that you've done everything on that game's arbitrary checklist than "I got all the achievements".

Also, the PSN "You have earned a trophy" noise is infinitely better than the Xbox's "plink", and anyone who says otherwise is wrong. The Xbox noise is the same sound as when someone comes online, for heaven's sake; the PSN one sounds like you've picked up a powerup in a retro game. See? BETTER.