Yesterday I received the collectors edition of Xenoblade Chronicles Definitive Edition for the Nintendo Switch. Luckily I managed to order it one day before launch for the regular price.
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One of the perennial criticisms of zero-to-hero tabletop RPGs like Dungeons & Dragons is that they stifle creativity by sharply limiting your initial character building options and reserving all the really outlandish stuff for high-level play. Like, what if I don’t want to be an elf wizard? What if I want to be a vampire werewolf angel from outer space? What about that?
Certainly, there’s something to be said for games that let you go as weird as you want right from the start, and there are any number of games that will absolutely do that for you. Heck, most tabletop games will do that for you; the popularity of D&D and its various imitators notwithstanding, zero-to-hero RPGs are the exception rather than the rule! (If only because getting character advancement mechanics right is a stone bastard even for every experienced designers – but I digress.)
There’s a trick, though: reserving the weird stuff for high levels obliges you to work your way up to it, and while this can sometimes feel like the rules are saying you have to “earn” the right to play the character you want, introducing that weirdness over a span of time – and here I mean real time, not just narrative time – in response to the events of a story with multiple storytellers will send it in directions that never would have occurred to you on your own.
The result isn’t no weirdness: it’s organically grown weirdness. You start out with something basic like “elf wizard”, and by gradual degrees, over the course of many sessions, that character develops into something that takes several paragraphs to explain.
Now, I’m not saying one approach is better than the other – going full gonzo right from square one can be fun, too. I am saying that it’s not a simple matter of weird now versus weird later; when you build up to it gradually, in response – and as a response — to a collaborative story, you don’t just get deferred weird. You get different weird, in a way that simply could not have been accomplished by leaping straight to the end result.
(This is why high-level characters contrived for the sake of examples and illustrations never ring quite true, incidentally; when somebody’s trying to fake organically grown weirdness, you can tell!)
97If you haven’t played DUSK, I’d highly recommend it. It’s a real classic FPS in the same vein as oldies like Quake or Doom and it’s got a real Blood vibe. It also happens to have a very interesting plot twist at the end.
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![‘Star Wars’
[GB] [USA] [MAGAZINE] [1992]
GameBoy (sic), go hibernate, will ya? I hope that the programmers of Star Wars are preparing to create a full-color portable version when Nintendo wakes up and creates the color GameBoy system! In color, with stable graphics support, Star Wars would be exciting and challenging, but as it is, nah. ~Electronic Gaming Monthly, October 1992 (#39)
Source: Electronic Gaming Monthly, October 1992 (#39) || RetroMags; E-Day #gaming#advertising#star wars#game boy#action#handheld#sci-fi#licensed#capcom#platformers#shmups#united states#video games#1992](https://66.media.tumblr.com/7a5c7df4d50d10483205ee27e3cdd2e1/tumblr_omr70g4azc1snhn1io1_1280.jpg)
‘Star Wars’
[GB] [USA] [MAGAZINE] [1992]
GameBoy (sic), go hibernate, will ya? I hope that the programmers of Star Wars are preparing to create a full-color portable version when Nintendo wakes up and creates the color GameBoy system! In color, with stable graphics support, Star Wars would be exciting and challenging, but as it is, nah. ~Electronic Gaming Monthly, October 1992 (#39)
- Source: Electronic Gaming Monthly, October 1992 (#39) || RetroMags; E-Day
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People who know about computers help!!
Is it better to buy an okay computer and then buy some nicer stuff like a good graphics card and memory. Or should I just buy a good computer to start with and not upgrade it at all?
I know enough about what computer components to know what I’d need/want but I’ve never upgraded/built a computer before.
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Video games be like “my liege, as you are all too aware, *insert sth i am obviously not aware of as a new player*” and I be like yes of course carry on like a pretentious fool
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