Silent Hill 3

It's going down hill soon in Silent Hill. Like a vertical drop rollercoaster.

Now I know, some people will disagree with me and some people will agree with me on this, but that's never really been a concern, just something I know and felt like stating. Yes it's a stalling tactic because I'm still thinking up what to write about while typing this out. But Silent Hill 3 is worthwhile playing. Yes I know, I've not reviewed Silent Hill 2 but I need a while to revisit that one before I go all out in the next few reviews and such. This however is a more overlooked game because it's compared to the previous one in the series while the first game seems to be nodded to and referenced and recognised but never really accepted outside of Silent Hill 2's grand (supposed) presence.

Taken as a game by itself, Silent Hill is about one girl's struggle with the pressures of society personified by an evil fucking town with large monsters. She also may or may not be the reincarnation of God... or A God at least. That said, actually... That's all that really needs to be said.

Not the best of days to have a breakout of blood.

One thing you will notice with this game is that it's very empty of people. Which comes as an odd contrast to the introduction which has our protagonist happily chatting to her father in a burger bar (he's on a phone) until she goes to leave and is stopped by a fat man in a dirty Macintosh (the clothes, the other Macs are just as dirty) before bottling the encounter like a coward and hiding in a toilet. After escaping through the window it all goes downhill from there to Silent Hill.

Silent Hill, a lovely town with a gorgeous hotel overlooking a lake that will likely kill you before you can do any real sight-seeing amongst the fog. Or darkness. Or both.

Oddly enough, this guy isn't a direct threat to you.

What you're basically set up with for the first half of the game is getting your protagonist home while traversing through a mall, a train station, a building site for a condemned building (in more than one sense of the word) and then home before actually getting to the titular town itself where more angsty bombs are dropped and curses uttered.

The game makes sure it's as eerie as ever with changes in setting from going back and forth between an empty looking normal place, to looking like hell changed the fire and brimstone for barbed wired and chain link fencing. While you're navigating various locations you'll occasionally find yourself looking at what would be Dante's realisation of Hell if he was more into metal than fire and ironic tortures. All of which are used to give you the idea that something is not quite right.

It all serves a purpose. I'll be damned if I know what thoug.

But it's never explicitly stated, but certainly alluded to, that whether you're really going through these changes and seeing an alternative, possessed, location. Or if you're being forced to see it in a form of hallucination brought about through other means. Do you really see hell and the monsters? Or are you visualising these things. This also brings into bearing the point about the monsters themselves. Each monster is in some way a personification of a fear that typically plagues the demography of the protagonist. A theme that usually carries through the games (until a point at least...). In this particular game, the theme is around fears that teenage girls might have. Relating to cancer (huge fat things, with fat growing on their fat), split-headed dogs (ok some people fear dogs), walking penii (I can't think of a better way to explain them but the sexual allegory is made there) Lots of monsters based around phallic imagery really, or trying to stick things into our heroine in a sort of penetration/rape reference. Seriously though, one boss basically is a huge (think London Underground Tube Train sized) dick with teeth.

Oh and there's some fears around pregnancy in the game too.

Rhyming slang about being Brown Bread probably isn't appropriate here.

But while that's the hidden bonus for those that look deeply into the why and wherefores of a game, it's not the key focus. There's plenty of running around, finding maps and checking which doors are broken and can't be used and which ones lead you ever deeper down the rabbit-hole that is Silent Hill. Filled with references to multiple pop-cultural situations and occasionally poking fun at the world, in particular with theme park mascots. Robbie the Rabbit never looked so... soaked in ichor before.

Actually I do prefer my mascots, dead.

If you think this looks bad, be prepared for it get worse.

The problem with the game is that the puzzles are either too easy or ridiculously difficult, combat can be a cakewalk or in the higher settings, mandatory to avoid and boss fights can go on for far too long with little hope of victory. Playing in easy mode makes everything almost like paint-by-numbers for the puzzles while playing in hard mode will force you to recollect and understand the order of Shakespearian works, deciphering cryptic poems relating faces to keypads and a very dark and disturbing twist on the "Who Killed Cock (heh) Robin" Nursery Rhyme. A nice touch with some of the puzzles is that they change and aren't really the same on any two playthroughs. Such as key codes which have to be found using specified methods rather than just looking it up online. Mainly because you'll encounter a key plot point or item during the hunt for the answer.

There's very little in the way of subtlety in this game either. If something odd is going to happen, you're always going to be in a position where you HAVE to see it, usually through cut-scenes, but even when playing in the game normally, the camera will be positioned often in a way where you can't avoid the weirdness. Case in point, climbing the long ladder in the crossover from one hospital to another. You will basically have one of the creatures of Silent Hill shoved in your face for you to watch like it is some form of living-art exhibition. Almost like the game designers are slapping you in the face with the obvious and waiting for you to take the time to acknowledge it. A problem with a lot of big money games nowadays that force you to observe everything they've done because it cost them money.

[The blogger was chastised greatly for making a "tap that" reference]

What it does that is creepy, it does very well. The reflection in the mirror being one example, the entire Borely Haunted House and the usual descent into madness that is the crossover from normal world into the demonically possessed world (for the most part) while sometimes it's a more subtle approach than blaring an air-raid siren and other times it's smacking you in the face with cock than a 'bring your own rooster' convention. It does mark however the change in the nature of the Silent Hill games as it is, but I'm side-stepping here.

As far as plot and progression goes, you encounter a nutcase who preaches about God and basically follows you home. Sounds like my Sunday evenings back from the local pub. While they claim they're your nemesis, nothing is really done about it until the mid-point in which it goes from them following you to you hunting down them. Plot wise it's a little stop-start and that's mainly because it can take a LONG time to navigate around the game's "dungeons" and get to the key points that start to unravel the main plotline. Though there's plenty to do at the same time with small sub-plots but these are only encountered along the way as a sort of distraction between the main interests on what is a very long and otherwise dry tour from start to finish.

Big, mean and the first enemy you fight. It's also a normal enemy.

Grabbing a submachine gun never seemed to scream "survival horror" either. Though I rarely use the guns, I prefer the melee and with that end up becoming the monster and just going kill crazy happy on the baddies.

3 Different endings await but gameplay-wise there's little difference between one play and another. You could go for the Alien based ending, which is entirely nonsensical but funny all the same, and does require you playing the game dressed up and powered up like something out of Sailor Moon, but it's still amusing. While the other two canonical endings are just the "You did well" and "You killed a fucktonne of things" (by the metric load) which gives you the good and evil bastard endings. Quite the drop from the multitude of endings in the first few games and even the later ones too by that standard.

Come at me, Sis.

It's linear, it's not too complex and the subtle hidden details are laid bare for all to see. It's a real no-brainer of the series that requires little knowledge before the story and about the entire series if you want to play it but within it there's enough there to make you guess what's around the next corner and what's going to happen in the endgame. Fans will enjoy it, hardcore fans will be left feeling unfulfilled by it and to everyone else it's a horror game with some gross out factors and the paranormal stuff will leave others confused as to what the rules of the games reality really is.

PSX Final Fantasy 7

Whether I get any backlash over this or not all depends upon the irate fan base that seems to worship this game above and beyond all games as, and I quote "It's da bestest game evar!" You can add your own childish voice to that line however you wish. While I'm open to admit that it's a game, it is ground breaking in its own ways and certainly seemed to open up the Japanese RPG genre to a lot of people around the world. It is by no means a game that should be held in such high regard as the "OMG #1 GAME!!11!!" as often touted by many idiots that rightly deserve to be shown some 8 bit classics or just need to get out a little more often and talk with real people.

Final Fantasy 7; even I have to admit to having a huge interest in the game when I first saw it advertised with the 3D models showing combat in based around turn/time based ordering, menu based attack systems and realising that it alone would require strategy rather than most games at the time having the need to hammer a button, repeatedly, to beat boss x, y and z before getting a credits screen.

The plot is enormous for the time. First runs often taking 60+ hours to get through (assuming you have the patience) which pales into some games today having over 120 hours of game play (padded by HUGE expanses of sitting around doing sweet fuck all...). You assume the role of "Cloud" a spiky headed hairdo of a caucasian with an improbably big sword compensating for a lack of trouser filling. You get to follow cloud through futuristic/fantasy setting from being a terrorist (you tell me blowing up stuff and killing innocents doesn't make you one and I'll point to 2 former towers) to leading a renegade terrorist group into overthrowing a company executive that runs most of the planet, escaping said capital city into an open world filled with towns, villages, ports, all with their own issues and difficulties while following one silver haired man with a big sword (more trouser department issues) and stopping him from destroying the planet because he believes himself to be descended from higher beings and being told he was an experiment set off the emo trip of destruction. Sadly they all look like dolls in shop and any attempt to express emotion is met with the same gormless facial expression.

In a nut shell; There's a lot more going on than just this with motor bike races, double crosses, killing off main characters (not a first in any game nor any Final Fantasy game for that matter either...) developing character and plot (except around Cloud who remains as confused and sword stabby as always just with a little more purpose and a better understanding of his history, that nobody really bothered to tell us about and we just wish he'd tone down the hair-gel!) Racing and breeding of large birds, submarines, Command & Conquer strategy moments, huge monsters, big fights, large annoying bosses and level grinding like a bastard.

Can't beat that boss on level 10? Run around like a retard for 20 minutes, fighting every little random (yes it's random encounter time or as I like to phrase it "computer says fuck you" time) encounter until you come back and can kill the boss just by waving your hairstyle at it or staring really hard.

I could go into every little intricacy of plot but the line "Guy joins terrorists and then realises greater threat, has to save the world" does it perfectly, maybe adding "p.s. Flashy effects ahead"

Cloud isn't alone, at any time he will have up to 2 other people directly with him and will be fighting alongside him which will be intermittently determined by the game when someone plot focused is forced into the view and you HAVE to take along the one character you didn't level up and play with because they looked/sounded/were shit or you'd already invested 20 hours in someone else and now forced to play with another character is just a waste of your time and preferences. Each of these chars will join, take over the story, and then take a back seat while you pick the 2 chars you really want with you the whole time based on usually just "I like the look".

You've the big angry black guy stereo type that swears a lot, the big titted love interest with the world's strongest lower back, the dainty intelligent girl that is better with spells than anything else and gets killed for being dull and to remove the pointlessly forced love triangle bullshit, an old guy with a hatred for most things thanks to losing his dreams, a talking cat stuffed toy comic relief character with just as comical special moves, a talking lion/dog/tiger thing that acts mysterious and speaks in an aloof fashion to make it seem he is more interesting than he really is. Completing the ensemble are the bonus characters of a mopey man with even more of a depressing story to his grief than the main characters and a token young girl ninja with more leg on show than KFC at peak hours who is playing the ditzy-but-determined clueless kid.

It's all much of a similarity that you can't find in your usual anime shows and about as complex in narrative as you'd expect.

The story ambles along at the rate at which you play and succeed. Pointless back stories and histories can even involve their own fights which pads the time you're spending and making absolutely zero progress. Getting into a fight in a back-story is one of the most ridiculous wastes of time I've seen, even if to show off one character that will be the last boss. WE KNOW he's meant to be tough, just do a flashy FMV of it instead. Back stories have the characters being forced to run around locations and talk to characters or go to locations until the right ones are done in the right order to progress plot and get the fuck on with the main story.

My gripe aside however...

Foreshadowing is used in varying degrees where some new char might show up, then be fought moments later, while the bigger opponents are given more time to be evil then offed in over the top battles. Sometimes a boss comes out of nowhere and it's a case of "yep... lets fight it" including the ones that talk to you about what's going on. Plot points can be entirely over looked at times and knowing where to go next simply becomes the point of just looking at the map and seeing which location you've not been to lately or haven't been to at all.

Combat is the usual affair for the game making up the majority of the game's structure when it's not reading text, missing some Japanese cultural jokes and watching long videos of nothing happening. It's the usual turn based system picking to fight, cast magic, summon attacks, use items, run off or other extra commands based around whichever coloured ball you pick up and put in your characters inventory.

Magic and extra functions are determined by small coloured balls you assign to a weapon or armour item. Green ones being magical spells, blue ones boost green effects from elemental inclusion to attack lots/multiple times, yellow ones give bonus commands like morphing and power attacks, red ones summon powerful creatures capable of high damage until you reach the later stages of the game when your standard attack out classes them (except for ONE summon... that takes far too long to cast), and purple balls that change stats like health and magic/mana or permit things like countering, more passive abilities.

There's a fairly complex mechanic behind this system where you can pair up some balls to get attacks that drain health from the enemy at the same time, or attack when you die which can resurrect the dead character, counter attacking with summons or spells or boosting the power of various attacks and defences. You slowly get drawn into it with the few spells like cure and lightning attacks, the more you use them, the more exp they gain and the more power spells become opened to you. Bonus points for getting maxed out EXP on the coloured balls and getting the master ones that give you everything, which you already HAVE! Another redundant reward.

The game has a plethora of items and weapons to throw at you with various effects, each char has their own weapon types, various armours and bangles are worn by all or specific to gender/race. Combined with the colour ball mechanic allows for pairing balls, multiplied exp growth for the balls and such. (Yes it's called materia, I'm using balls). Where you can put your most powerful balls together to get different effects, ball pairing was never so calculatingly fun (...no). By the end of the game you'll have so many that you'll be longing for an Optimal function and at one point your carefully collected and planned ball set will be taken away and mixed up and you're left feeling the game has fucked with you once again and you'll never get the combination back that you had before. All of your hard, progressive work, undone again.

Doesn't help that the under aged ninja kid steals all your balls in a side-quest that involves a guy you had to cross-dress for earlier in the game and if done right, lusts for Cloud more than BiggyTits and DeadByDisc1Girl.

Though despite this, it's possible to get through the game with the basic spells and attacks with a few items to help out. The only challenges that could present are the creatures that require a specific tactic (i.e. they nullify all attacks, or need potions to unlock their vulnerable sides... like that ever made sense) in order to progress further. With enough grinding of levels and stats, most bosses and enemies will fall after hitting them enough times.

There's some lengthy side quests you have to undertake if you want the more powerful "I AM GOD" abilities and spells that take up more time to cast them just to show off something before the bigger numbers land on the screen indicating strength and damage. But really the battles and the plot are two different games and the jumps from one to another all serve as a distraction from the alternative. When you're fighting you want progression, when you're progressing plot, you'd rather be fighting.

The biggest grievance though is the "finding yourself" segment of the plot, it can take over 45minutes of walking around and trying to activate the objects in the room just to unlock more videos and more text showing something that could have been fixed very quickly in just one scene without the unnecessary egg hunt for the trigger to move the game onwards.

For the hardcore, there's bonus bosses to fight, breeding racing birds and seeking the elite one to get the ultimate unlocks, bonus characters with their own storylines or the self imposed runs of "items only" for the truly depraved and self-depreciating individual. Though the game is already long enough as it is. As such it suffers the "rush it at the end" approach where the final parts of the game are just a long slog through the last dungeon filled with the toughest things so far that still die too quickly for your army-slaughtering, over-powered, warriors, to then kill the last few bosses and get the credit sequence. You just want it over by then but the game is forcing you to play it out a bit longer.

Dying in the game is the end and you'll have to go back to the last save point. If you've not saved in a while and you're surprised by a bonus enemy or secret boss without warning, you're going to be doing a LOT of backtracking to get there for round 2, or just quit the game and look it up online.

Graphically the game switches in and out of super cute deformed characters when in the over world, to pseudo anime style in battles while the FMVs switch up from one to the other with the more detailed and higher polygon graphics turning up towards the end of the game. Compare the first videos with the very basic looking models in FMVs to the last video of Cloud before the final fight and see the huge difference in styles. The lack of consistency makes me wonder just how many changes were made throughout the game. The fights themselves take the opportunity to showcase just how overboard they can go with the engine with 3D shifts and pan shots of the combatants, close-ups and zooms for attacks and power moves like they're going out of fashion in a pre-graduates media project, though you can appreciate that given the time, they likely felt that HAD to over sell it from the sprite based combat they'd had previously.

Music and sounds are rather lacklustre until the more epic pieces kick in, sound effects often sound muted and grainy and lack the impact of better quality audio that was available at the time and thankfully, no voice actors means I can imagine the large angry black man having a high pitched squeaky voice while the cute big titted girl sounds like an 80-a-day chain-smoker. I like having the choice to perceive the annoying how I choose and thankfully not with some overly cute, childish voice that fits an 8 year old kid. Having to imagine her say "I love you" while wheezing and hacking up carcinogenic lumps of her lungs, was far more entertaining them most of this game.

Nostalgia however is the biggest problem. Too many people are putting this game up as a 'wonder of gaming' all the world over and while it does have its charm and appeal, the flaws in the game are becoming more and more apparent as time goes on. No it's not because the graphics have changed, the same story is still there but it's done and done better before and since this game.

Going on a date with the only other guy in the party is still funny though.

There's a lot more going on beneath the surface but you'll need some very in depth guides and FAQs to get to them and in ways that most people will never find nor bother to find. Only once did I manage to get Cloud to go on a date with someone other than Aeris and while it wasn't intentional, certainly was amusing, though I was called out for being a liar at school until years later when it was discovered not only that it could be done but HOW to do it too. It's all about choices, I just happened to make the right ones.

Replay factor... likely most people will play this once or twice, once to just experience the game and generic story and a second time (if they didn't do this already), to get all the things they missed like the super powerful summons and spells, easily missed items by accidentally completing a dungeon too soon and so on. Or the really odd items you can miss by not having character X with the team at time Y armed with item Z for a one-off chance to find something. That "fair" way of missing something you'd never have had otherwise nor would know to look, or even care, without a guide.

Of course having a character that has a special attack called Game Over, is always fun. As it does exactly that. Game Over, no recovery, no escape. What fun THAT is after 3 hours without saving... I seriously would love to be in on that meeting "Let's put in a move that either kills the opponent flawlessly or if they fuck up the timing, kills the players" and gob-smacking every bastard who said "YES" to that proposal.

To give it credit, the game did usher in and make more accessible the Japanese style RPGs to a new generation of console and open up the genre to even more people than the hardcore RPG players, but it could have it done it in a much better and more enjoyable way.

Now it's time for me to gel my hair up and grab a sword, I've a giant chicken to rescue. And yes, Cait-Sith dying was more touching for me than Aeris.

Gripe: Console war arguments

Xbox360 vs PS3, Gamecube vs PS2 vs Xbox vs Dreamcast, N64 vs Playstation vs Saturn, Super Nintendo vs Megadrive/Genesis-megacd-32x (actually just a big mess by sega), Nes vs Master System, Gameboy vs Gamegear, iPhone vs Blackberry, shit vs sugar, and the even more ludicrous XboxOne vs PS4 which at the time of writing this are both unreleased and there is only stats, schematics and plans that have changed on BOTH sides.

Now to try to throw my hat into the ring on this one and rather than take an on the fence approach, a middle of the road view, shit or get off the pot view, I’m just going to blow the whole thing apart and say one thing: It’s all bullshit.

Before the internet gave every man, woman, child, berk, idiot and asshole a voice and the supposed sense of self-entitlement to use that voice, most arguments over which console is better was done on school playgrounds. Invariably between those that owned one console, and those that owned another. Few usually could afford to have both so the arguments were based on the simple premise of “This is what I play, it must be good, so therefore I am right” and both sides using that argument with no progression made by either side. The very few kids that had both, tended to stay out and realise they didn’t quite fit into those cliques.

The further back you go, the older the machines being paired up were. However, thanks to the wonderful invention of the internet, coupled with the invention of emails (yes pre-dating it strictly speaking if we’re talking BBS and such but let’s not lose focus of the point), the world wide web because a hotbed of porn, paedophiles chasing kids, police pretending to be kids and people around the world bitching at each other for having a different opinion and HOW DARE THEY before overreacting like ignorant little savages.

I’ll attack the internet’s growth of trolls another day.

Consoles wars have never really progressed from the simple bouts of “Mine is better than yours” until some people with some actual brains started to relive the playground days, online. That was a mistake for a start, they were in the playground days, LEAVE THEM THERE. You go back to a playground nowadays and you’ll be carted off to Mr Big’s personal cell before you can say “Sorry I really was just visiting, I’m not a paedo”, seriously, leave the kids alone now. Digression and tortured metaphor aside, people started to argue on the internet about the old days of consoles and talk turned to playground fights which then spilled into real fights about the old consoles and the new consoles.

And it all got retarded, FAST.

Whether it’s because people couldn’t believe that the arguments and fights they thought they’d won back when they were kids were flaring up again; that people had the sheer audacity to disagree with them when thanks to age they really should know better by now; because of the supposed anonymity the internet provides us with custom names, gamer tags, handles and pseudonyms; people got aggressive and stupid and sadly, in many an argument, downright nasty.

The companies never helped with that back in the 8bit and 16bit eras. Often the marketing slogans of the time would exacerbate the situation with such slogans “Sega does what Nintedon’t” and “With only 6 reasons for something Super and 100 reasons for something Mega, you know what choice to make” the majority being Sega lashing out at Nintendo with rarities like “Not On Sega” being thrown back. Companies going so far as to make up lies on things like “Blast Processing” and of course, kids lapping it up like greedy, mewling babes suckling at the teat of false information, desperate for ammunition in their pointless arguments.

The lack of information being available save for in magazines and adverts that usually were skewed in favour of one product or another was difficult for most people to sift through and find the truly non biased information and just raw facts. Even then, with specifications finally being released and people able to moan and argue that this statistic was higher on this machine than another, few knew what it actually meant and even less understood whether it was worth actually bragging about.

“Blast Processing” anyone?

Roll forwards a while and you’ve gotten the internet as well as more modern consoles kicking around, the large battle by the companies between where the lines blur as to which consoles are actively partaking in battles between popularity contests and hardware matchups. Namely the big companies Sega (before the drop out from home consoles but not software and games), Nintendo (which can always ride the hand-held market and its biggest cash cow, Pokemon), Sony (always a popular choice and seemingly set to take the mature market share) and Microsoft (carrying a lame leg as it’s Microsoft, leaves me wondering if they’d started an offshoot company and called it something like Dennis, would it have fared better...) were shooting it out with N64/Gamecube, PSX/PS2, Xbox, Saturn/Dreamcast. The battleground shifted so much and so often that I do recall one edition of a magazine labelling their paid-for console as being “not the fastest, or most powerful or the only online console, but the best value for money machine on the market”... Once again The best value for money machine on the market, which basically meant: It’s on the way out and cheap as sin but that’s because nobody wants it. Phrased in a way that never appeal to a younger gaming audience.

“Hey, my console is the best value for money” Has NEVER won a single argument in a playground.

These days, it’s mainly the Xbox 360 and PS3 at the time of writing with a healthy, half laughing, but half respectable nod, to the Wii and WiiU. Handhelds are competing now with Smart Phones and tablets as technology blurs the lines further between the definitions. But we still have the same old bullshit on a much more accessible scale. Forums, Social Media, Chat sites are still rife with the same topics, the same fanboy-ism that there always has been.

Oh and saying “I’m not a fanboy” at the start of argument, will excuse nothing at all in the paper thin attempt to mask the underlying bias.

Some people have 2-3 of the main consoles and can claim that they know better because they have them all, it’s still just an opinion and like any opinion, can be slighted, slanted, biased or ill-informed. More importantly, it can be ignored too. The level of anger and abuse stirred up from such arguments is horrifying in several ways. The nature and just the sheer thought that someone can summon up these suggestions, does not make for a good outlook on society. (Though maybe these people SHOULD remain indoors). The abusive, hateful, misogynistic, racist kind of comments that just disgust your core on so many levels that deserve no place in this day and age, being thrown around in discussion (I use the word lightly there, saying “this is shit” is not really a discussion, it’s a statement of a lack of vocabulary and an urgent need of a dictionary and thesaurus)

It often begs the question, why do some people get so angry about such things? Because they’re loyal to the product? Hardly. The companies involved aren’t going to give a damn unless their bottom dollar is going to be affected severely. Until then, customers will be gobbling down that thick turd sandwich. Because they bought an item and aren’t satisfied with their purchase? More likely. That wonderful adage “The grass is always greener...” probably rings more true with people having only the capacity of one console rather than several. Though this is more the sorrow of the Opportunity Cost being emotional rather than monetary.

Perhaps it’s the insecurity of people that are offended by the nature of these arguments because the console they have isn’t the one they wanted, or they aren’t happy with the purchase because all their friends bought something else and now they’re playing alone, that they get so angry about the comments attacking “their” console not because they like the console, but because it reminds them of what they DON’T have. Reminds them of the mistake they supposedly made perhaps?

Which brings me to the current arguments and future arguments... Such wonderful arguments of “XboxOne is shit” or “PS4 is bollocks”, these are the most shameful. Whether it’s a one line argument or in some, ridiculously trumped up cases, actually bringing in statistical information related to the specifications of 2 unreleased machines, or going on the companies histories as their basis of the argument. Let’s see an example “Xbox4 is shit because microsony released a console some years back that didn’t quite do as well as I wanted it to and didn’t play the games I wanted to but all my mates bought it and I did too because I’m too much of a sheep to go against the flow and my parents never loved me enough wah wah wahh...” Sound too damn familiar? I know it is.

None of it matters. Not a single thing.

I could try and put it in some context for people. There are children dying on streets in foreign countries, living homeless in every country including yours dear Reader. In particular, 3.1million children died of starvation and malnutrition across the planet in 2011, this works out to be just over 8493 children per day, which is over 353 an hour, which breaks down to around 6 children per minute.  People starving across the planet, not just in 3^rd world countries and the most annoying, anger-inducing thing is that someone bad talked an inanimate object?

Before anyone tries, I’m not suggesting that playing the wrong console kills kids.

There’s no point arguing over which console is better; it’s just the trumped up hurt egos of idiots attempting to assert their mistakes over others for a greater attempt at accepting their own short comings. Pick a console, or consoles, play the games you want to play and remember it’s a product from an entertainment industry. If you’re not entertained, take it back and get another one.

And for those arguing on hypothetical products that are either not released or just in the paperwork. Get a life and discuss something meaningful in video gaming, like how big Lara Crofts next bra size might be, it’s just as worthwhile a conversation.

Future attacks coming soon on Backwards Compatibility whiners and letting kids play underage games.