The end of Summer makes me remember the good old days of gaming. Mainly I think of long hot summer afternoons playing NCSoft MMORPG’s on a malfunctioning old Dell laptop that gave off heat like a red hot Hell portal. I remember the original Guild Wars, and spending many many air conditioned hours indoors playing simulations of the great outdoors. This summer there was a little Beta action to be had with Guild Wars 2.
Even so, nothing remains the same. Change brings tedium with it. Much so in gaming. As board rooms full of deciders put more and more unfun-ness into games and more monitizing-ness for themselves goes into the game stream.
This summer was terrible for gaming wasn’t it? There was nothing good around to play on PS3 anyways. Nothing really stood out enough to review or be interested in to pick up. To save energy mine has been unplugged for two or three months. The key words in that sentence are “has been”.
Sony has made it abundantly clear that they aren’t willing to take that stinging blow of failure again, and aren’t planning another console. Mark my words, they will be shutting down the neglected PSN network in the not too distant future. They have been focusing on their handheld platforms, and phones. I don’t want to weigh down my purse with another brick. I have enough small devices. I want something that does everything. Since I don’t use landline phones, then I am out, finally, when it comes to Sony.
In the 1960′s I had an etch a sketch, and at that moment I knew it was only a matter of time before tablet computers would be invented. I imagined it would be a color TV, an art palette, and a video phone. To me the iPads represent more than just a cool device. They are the fulfillment of many predictions. My own, Gene Roddenberry’s and of course Steve Jobs. Not only that, but with them and other visionary baby boomers now passing away, there is the question of legacies too. Copy cats Samsung have wasted no time in portraying iPhone users as greying old folks. These days I feel like an observer, peeking out from between the stones of a cemetery, not quite dead yet, but somewhere in between. Relating the tech news of the world not just for the living, but for the dead also. Whispering “What’s Next? What’s Next?” , what will come inevitably after the demise of Apple and Facebook. I feel like I’m a fall corpse bride of dead geniuses, a zombie geek woman.
I need a good survival horror game!