Quintet of Suckage

Every once in a while games introduce us to a character so vile you cannot forget them – years later they still stick like hot bubble gum. But they say that being able to verbalize your pain is the first step to recovery, so I have trekked for through the dank, overgrown jungle of my mind in the hope of healing the hurt. Here they are, my Top 5 Worst Videogame Characters.

Navi, Legend of Zelda: Ocarina of Time (N64)
1.She tops every list. I know, I know “Hey, Listen!” But the way I see it, she's been recognized so often for her abuse I'm just going to close the book. Navi who?

Announcer, Crazy Taxi (PS2)
2. So first on the firing line is the announcer from Crazy Taxi. With the throaty voice of a reptile on crack, his riffing assails the player with some of the worst X-treme dialogue ever written, from the title screen up until you shut the damned system off in rage. Finish a round? “Awwwwwright! It's time to check out how yuu deed t'day now let's take uh look! Uh Clayusss Dee lycense!” And in the world of Crazy Taxi, you don't make money, you make “Cuh-razy munney!” Oh, and did I mention the game's entire soundtrack is from The Offspring and Bad Religion? Yah-yah-yah-yah-yah!

Oddjob, Goldeneye 007 (N64)
3.Ah the good old days, when you could dual-wield PP7's and sneak around Soviet missile silos. I always liked it when my character's health would drop for no reason, making me swerve wildly trying to get a bead on my opponent. Never did quite figure out why that happened – oh yeah, now I remember, it was that little crouching bastard Oddjob who would hide behind the grates of a ventilation shaft. You can't see him in there, but he can see you. Like a Cold-War Killer-Rabbit, with a cute little butler suit and a top hat, he hopped from his burrow to claim your life.

Cool Spot, Cool Spot (SNES)
4.Third was a close tie between two equally shitty marketing turds: 7up's Cool Spot, and Izzy of the 1996 Atlanta Olympic games. Cool Spot wins out however, because he's a red dot... with sunglasses... and sneakers and gloves. How such a game was ever made I will never understand, but nevertheless you – the lucky player – get to step into the awesome shoes of Cool Spot, the radical 1990s mascot for 7up. You'll make a platforming pilgrimage across such perilous locations as: the beach and under-ground, collecting – you guessed it – red dots!

Mesprit, Pokemon Pearl/Diamond (NDS)
5.Ever since the Gameboy originals, Pokemon has been on a downward spiral, cranking out blob after blob of generic, lightly colored smiley faces. Just when you didn't think it could get any worse, meet Mesprit. She fits all of the requirements of a new Pokemon: pastel colored, check; made of basic shapes, check; big eyes, check; stupid name, check. This may look like an ordinary pokepoop, but don't be fooled, this balloon-animal is “Known as the being of Emotion. It taught humans the nobility of sorrow, pain, and joy.” Jesus!

(Rumor has it the upcoming Pokemon Uranium will feature a light-blue square pokemon called “Boxlor”. And yes, he'll still have that same 64kbps modem growl.)

Dishonorable mention:
Beat, The World Ends With You (NDS)
If you've played it, you know.

Chris takes issue!

You'll have to excuse the blog's poor state. HTML is Greek to me and I don't think anyone actually reads this, both of which keep me from feeling embarrassed.

In the last post I noted how in-your-face games are the bulk of a year's release schedule. I've thought some more about it since then and I have taken issue with the way games are designed, or at least how they make you feel. Whether or not it is intentional is a whole 'nother discussion.

My issue with games right now is that they require you to become more neurotic, more obsessive and skittish. Think of mindset when you're playing Frequency, or Guitar Hero, or Team Fortress 2. Part of this is personal - we each have our own unique physiological reactions to certain stimulation - but you cannot deny that a slaughter-fest FPS like TF2 fucks with your mind. Instantaneous death feels bad.

It is the mark of a good game when playing it makes you more contemplative rather than less. I don't own an Xbox 360, but Braid certainly seems to have had that effect. You might say 'well, not all games have to aspire to high-art, there is a place for the relentless, fast-paced experience'. That is absolutely true, but if you think about it even the worst of cases, like say Counter-Strike, could be made more contemplative. Instead of assaulting you with round after round and cramped maps developers could make use of the space and create natural empty zones. Maybe it's just me, but I don't think you should literally have to switch your console off in order to get some rest from a game. You can see now why I own a PS3 *cough* Home! *cough*. But isn't that a brilliant idea? Instead of navigating games via menus, you could simply be placed in a world within the game world that isn't part of the game itself. You still retain the same control mechanism, but you are in a representation of the menu. Games like Psychonauts, Katamari Damacy, and Super Mario Galaxy suspend your disbelief for just a little bit longer with their seamless environments. This gets me into another issue that I think is the greatest detriment to the flow of a game, and subsequently to any hope it may have had of being cinematic: loading screens. But alas, that is for another time.

Adios amoebas!

Thoughts on Assassin's Creed