Funny Bits in Star Ocean 2 (5)

I laughed when I first read that sentence, because taken out of context (together with my limited knowledge of English) it sounded funny. This is a church of the goddess Tria, because the game was developed by Tri-Ace.

I just remembered I haven't properly introduced Rena to you, as she's the first character to be added to your party; too bad you'll have to wait till I save her from trouble again. Yes, the very first thing Claude did after getting beamed onto this planet was saving Rena from a monster, using his phase gun, which the girl mistook for a 'Sword of Light', and took Claude for the legendary 'Warrior of Light'. Pretty classic, isn't it?

Because of the Dating Simulator features of this JRPG, the relationships the protagonist builds with his companions (friendship with everyone, romance with girls only) affect the ending sequences you'll get: I heard there are more than 80 different ones!

Some more Final Fantasy VIII hate (3)

Let's talk a bit about the overall presentation of the game, shall we?

That was the time when Computer Graphics were undergoing huge improvements, both in quality and popularity; the CG cutscenes in FFVIII were a nice example of that. Compared to the rather raw-looking ones in the seventh episode, all movies in VIII were really beautiful. Too bad that by then I had already overcome my enthusiasm for pre-rendered animations, so those cutscenes didn't impress me as much as most other players, except for one which sported a nice transition from 'in-game' graphics to the CG scene. Still today I don't really like all those CG movies (Disney/Pixar and Dreamworks alike): I guess there's something in the animations which bothers me.

CG aside, the game wasn't that different, technically speaking, from its predecessor: you have your polygonal characters and monsters move over a pre-rendered background (while in towns or other confined places) or on a full-3D map, while battle scenes were full-3D. All these areas got some improvements, mainly because of 'textures' (instead of using many coloured polygons, you use less, but apply images onto them to make them look better). The first result of this move was improved realism (helped by normal character proportions compared to the 'puppets' in FFVII), while the second one was that everything looked shabbier: maybe it was just me, but it looked like there was much less colour.

All these improvements weren't entirely free: I already mentioned in the previous post that the game was slower, and it's partly because of its better 'graphics', although I hated the slower animation more.

A special mention goes to the music department of the game: before I say anything about the artistic quality of the soundtrack, I must make it clear that I hate the choice of instruments in the game! I also didn't like the battle music (it made me feel the game was even slower) and some other tracks, but really, no other Final Fantasy game I've played or watched has ever made the same effect to me. I once read on a videogame Forum that someone had defined the song 'Eyes on Me' (the main theme of the game) something like a crime against humanity. I wouldn't go that far, but for me that song foreshadowed a worrying trend in Japanese videogames; I won't tell which it is though.

Next post will be about playing cards! I'll write it down so I don't forget it.

Funny Bits in Star Ocean 2 (4)

Introducing 'treasure chests'! Yes, I'm in a couple's house stealing their possessions in plain daylight withouth them minding at all. This is actually a very common thing in JRPGs: the hero you're controlling can freely enter most houses in towns and take useful stuff. Also, did you know that in this game every single treasure chest, found either in towns, caves or castles, looks exactly the same? The manufactorer must be famous galaxy-wide, since you travel to another planet halfway through your adventure and can still find the same chests!

As for all JRPG clichés, there's always a reason for them: this way the player can easily spot useful items wherever s/he goes. It doesn't mean that they don't look out of place most of the time though...

Some more Final Fantasy VIII hate (2)

Let's resume the hate!

Ok, I was screwed with the magic system, but it was actually more complex than that: magic spells could be linked ('junctioned') to your characters' statistics, meaning that you could make your characters stronger by basically 'equipping' them with more and/or stronger spells. It's a lot complicated to explain in a few sentences, so just know that this caused the 'draw syndrome' in a lot of Final Fantasy VIII players, i. e. a player would spend hours upon hours battling random enemies just to draw spells from them and get more powerful; additionally, they wouldn't dare to cast 'junctioned' spells unless necessary, because that would mean having to draw more to get as powerful as before. It's not really mandatory in the game, but I'm pretty sure it was the norm back then: after all, when you play an RPG you tend to make your characters stronger as fast as possible.

That may be a bit extreme gameplay strategy, but I know for certain that I only cast Ultima once (a very powerful spell and quite rare) in my first playthrough just to see how it looked, in order to keep 100 of them junctioned. I don't remember right now, but I think that spell couldn't be drawn from enemies (not regular ones anyway), only from rare 'draw points' which would recharge after a long while (while you can draw spells from enemies endlessly).

In short, to me magic spells were little more than equipment. After all, I found that casting spells were only useful earlier on, when you can exploit enemy weaknesses to certain magic to end battles faster, because in the beginning other alternatives just aren't viable:

• attacking with your weapon doesn't really deal much damage, even if you junction spells to your strength attribute; moreover, you can't enable junctions to all your attributes from the start for all your characters, you need additional Guardian Forces which are found later in the game
• using items for healing is feasible, but they cost money, and you get that periodically (not from battles like in the previous FF) or by selling other items, so why not use healing spells, which are free? Attack items aren't an option either (do they exist? I don't remember)
• summoning Guardian Forces, magical beasts which generally attack all enemies at once with magic, may be useful, and that doesn't consume anything, but initially they take a very long time to summon (spells are cast instantly) and you only start with 2 of them (3 shortly after the start), so you probably won't be using them regularly
• getting low on health to unlock your 'Limit Break', a sort of powerful near-death technique, is a nice option to your regular attack, but the initial ones aren't very powerful, having low health is risky, and the animation lasts longer (boring...)

Oh, regarding the last point, did I mention that battle animations are incredibly slow? Sure, even Final Fantasy VII had its share of slow battles, but this one is even worse! Most regular attacks and spells are quite slow, the initial loading for each battle is long, and enemies always have a dying animation, but the worst offenders are surely Guardian Force summoning sequences; FFVII had very long ones as well, to be fair (I feel they were slightly shorter on average though). But overall FFVIII felt way slower: I blame the designers for trying to convey a more scenic and realistic look to the game, which a lot of players appreciated, but not I.

This is getting too long, see you next post!

Some more Final Fantasy VIII hate

Some posts ago I expressed my dislike for the eighth chapter in the Final Fantasy series. It could be said that a lot of people who played and enjoyed the previous one as their first JRPG would have hated this game just because it's not another Final Fantasy VII, it doesn't have story or characters in common with it (all Final Fantasies didn't, but many didn't know), and it introduces a completely different growth system. I'm sure it isn't just that.

I wanted to put in this post some of my other reasons for hating this game. Maybe it will take more than one post to list them all, but here goes...

First of all, when news and screenshots of FFVIII I was really excited, but only for a very brief moment: some graphical effects shown in the pictures looked great to me, but then I looked at the concept art and started disliking it. Characters, settings, the gunblade (basically a gun with an extremely big bayonette), I didn't really like any of them, maybe because they were going for a more realistic and serious look. In hindsight, I wish I didn't followthe development of this game so much, as I probably would have enjoyed playing it more. I barely knew anything about Final Fantasy VII before playing it.

Some time after the initial information was released, I read that the magic system wouldn't use MP: simply said, instead of using a single pool of magic-casting energy for all spells, you could have up to 100 casts of each spell for each character. This meant two things for me: using magic was going to be much like using items, and the MP-based system was gone. These impliy that going to rest wouldn't replenish your magic-casting ability (as it was in all previous episodes), and the simplest way to get more spells would have been to 'draw' it from enemies (there are other ways, but they're either harder or less efficient). I had played other RPGs before that, videogames and pen&paper alike, and frankly the MP system was my favorite for simplicity and flexibility; it's just my personal preference though.

Wow, I guess this is gonna take a lot more posts than I thought! I'll be back for more.

Simulation and impersonation

A good majority of videogames have the player impersonate a virtual character, which is either shown on screen or is just described with a name and/or a role (king of some country, president of a sports club and so on). This is a way to make the player feel 'immersed' in the virtual reality of the game.

Other games instead provide the player with control over certain elements of the virtual world, from a deck of playing cards to a party of heroes off to save the world; the role of the player in the virtual world is never explicitly stated, or there is no consideration of the virtual world itself.

A small number of games (recently there have been more) play on the concept of the 'player', breaking the 'fourth wall': such games may have a consistent virtual world, but then there would be instances in which some kind of (fictitious) awareness of it being a mere videogame, or there being a player on the other side of the screen.

But in the end, the attitude of the player towards the game is what counts the most: all of the above considerations, in fact, could apply to passive entertainment media, while playing a game makes one more proactive in the fruition of the contents the game provides.

Funny Bits in Star Ocean 2 (3)

What does 'bonkers' mean? I got the general meaning, but where does it come from?

Anyhow, there he is, your typical 19 year-old beamed onto an unknown undeveloped planet with no means of communicating with his ship. Luckily for him though the place is eerily similar to Earth: he can breathe normally, there's plants, animals and civilized humans (Expellians to be exact) who even speak his language! The only thing that seems to be different is gravity, but I'll explain it later when fighting monsters gets more interesting.

I said 'monsters', didn't I? What did you expect? This is a JRPG after all, the protagonist has to fight monsters to kill the time, otherwise the game would be really boring.

The sequel syndrome

Like in many other industries, making sequels to successful series is common practice:

• you'll be working on something you know people will like
• you'll be able to reuse material from the previous editions
• you might even get the people who tried the newest episodes to buy into the older one

Additionally, fans of the series will be pleased to find references to other episodes they've seen.

The downside to making sequels is that a bad episode can ruin an entire series: that way, a follow-up of a non-appreciated game can end up selling even less than the previous one, even if it's actually better. 'Franchise fatigue' can be an issue as well, since variety in games is very important and a series of games which play the same will raise the churn-out rate.

Of course, most of what I listed above is more relevant the more often a series gets new episodes: yearly sequels are common nowadays, especially for sport simulations. About that, I don't really like it, but I can't blame producers since they always seem to get a lot of sales, even when the latest game only has slight additions (like an updated footbal roster, I'll never get why people think names are so important).

What seems to be a recent trend instead is making sequels to very old games: I guess there's an opportunity to reach veteran gamers as well as to get newcomers to experience different things (as older genres may be underappreciated today).

Funny Bits in Star Ocean 2 (2)

I didn't really like most of the sprites in Star Ocean 2 (for those who don't know, a sprite is any animated image in a videogame, in this case the characters); some animations the main characters have looked really bad to me. This one in particular makes me cringe every time I start a new game with Claude: thankfully it is only shown once in this 40-hour JRPG.

Here Claude is at the beginning of his adventure, being sucked in and teleported away by a mysterious device, whose existence isn't explained in the game.

EDIT: ok, it seems that for some reason the picture was converted from an animated GIF to a static PNG; let's try hosting it somewhere else... There!

Funny Bits in Star Ocean 2 (1)

I thought about playing an old Playstation game, a JRPG called 'Star Ocean: the Second Story', and posting some screens I thought were funny, as in generally odd-sounding or out of place.

The game was released in 1998 and has been recently remade for the PSP. When I played it back then I had a decent understanding of the English language: the game being from Enix though meant I was in for a whole lot of 'unusual' words (I learned the word 'blimey' thanks to this game!).

The character selection screen (your choice makes you go through the story with a slightly different point of view)

I didn't really understand what 'A typical 19 year old' meant: since the game was set in a futuristic world with intergalactic spaceships, how was I supposed to know how a typical 19 year old would be like? Finally I resolved that was a knock at contemporary culture, and I guess that was it, but being my culture a bit different from the American one (or the Japanese one for that matter), I sort of struggled to understand some parts of the game.

Luckily the game itself was a lot of fun to play, over and over.

See previous post

...

What had made me think (again) about 'gamers' and their public image was the announcement of a reality show about videogames, where the 'cool' aspect of gaming is shown. I'm against the trend of creating a 'gaming subculture', since it's bound to lock a lot of people out of the videogame world: a world which is much more varied than what the most popular 'cool' games make it to be.

For this I mainly blame Microsoft, which has, since the introduction of the Xbox console (or was it since the Xbox 360?), tried to make stronger ties between videogames and... I don't know what it's called today, whatever's the leading trend now on MTV. But Sony and Nintendo (the two other console manufactorers) may have their share of the blame: Sony having a good number of ads for their PSP that focus exclusively on a young male demographic, and Nintendo, despite their claims of trying to reach everyone, has made some marketing choices which tend to alienate long-time gamers and kids (I didn't think ill of Wii Music, but I was baffled by the significant backlash it had generated since its announcement).

Videogames should be for everyone, just like any other entertainment medium.

No, I don't need a pic for this post, it doesn't deserve it.

Of 'Gamers' and image

'Gamer' is usually the term which applies to any person who plays videogames; such a classification is made because playing videogames nowadays is still not a very common form of entertainment, except for kids. The industry is expanding continuously however, so maybe in the near future the word will be forgotten, and playing a videogame will seem just as normal as watching a movie.

Yes, 'normal'. An adult person habitually playing videogames wasn't considered very normal some years ago, and to an extent it still isn't. This situation is bound to pass with time, as long as videogames still get made, but there's a related phenomenon which bothers me more: the 'image' of a gamer. That is, explained in a few words, the stereotyped, typical person who plays games, a 'nerd' if you wish.

...

Final Fantasy

I thought I'd make another post about JRPGs in order to close the topic. Final Fantasy is the other most recognized series of Japanese RPGs other than Dragon Quest; it is also the most famous one worldwide, and that's probably because of the success of the seventh episode, my very first JRPG, Final Fantasy VII.

At the time the game stood out for various reasons: the graphics were out of the ordinary, Computer-Graphics animated scenes weren't very common, as was the game's setting (your typical RPG would be set in a medieval-looking fantasy world, this one had a much more modern look).

Mechanics-wise, the game isn't that much different from Dragon Quest (see previous post), as you can find about the same adventuring theme (although the plot makes it feel different), random encounters with monsters and other enemies, battles in which you take turns to select your actions (except there are special timers for actions), character improvement by fighting and buying new equipment. I wasn't new to table-RPGs, so I could recognize some game elements such as character levels, statistics and equipment. However I couldn't grasp most of everything (including the English text), so my playthrough would be considered very chaotic by an expert of the genre. I still had a lot of fun playing it, for uncountable hours.

The first time I saw something about Final Fantasy VII was at a comic convention, where I saw someone playing the game: I just remember the battle screen, which looked incredibly good to me (full 3D perspective, even though there only was Aeris/Aerith fighting a Shinra dog). I had to wait to see one of my friends play it at home to make me curious enough to buy it.

After this, through "emulation" or remakes, I played some other episodes in the series, basically all of them through VIII. It's worth noting that there are twelve out so far: this means I skipped the most recent ones. I could blame Final Fantasy VIII, which was so much a turn-off for me I quit (but I played it to the end), or IX, in which battles looked so slow I gave up; but in the end I think all of them never gave me reason to get back into the series.

But I really want to give a more extensive explanation about my dislike for the eight episode, since there's so much I don't like in it, and since it's one of the most controversial ones in terms of criticisms and fan base. I'll save all this for a later post though, for I'd have a lot to say.

Dragon Quest

I'm very fond of the 'JRPG' videogame genre: for those who don't know what it is, it's the class of Role-Playing Games that are developed in Japan. This distinction has been made because, compared to classic, 'western' RPGs like Dungeons & Dragons (now often called 'WRPGs'), these games have a generally different 'feel', due to their design being based on different priorities. I'm not going deeper into this, at least not now.

I read that the first electronic RPG to be published in Japan was some Dungeons & Dragons based game; Dragon Quest is surely the most recognized though, and now it is a well-established series.

What kind of game is Dragon Quest? To put it as simple as possible: the main series of games (there are other games based on it which may cover other genres) usually has you controlling an adventurer in a fantasy world with medieval setting, magic and monsters. In some of the episodes your objective is clear from the start: you're some kind of hero who sets on a quest to slay some demon and bring peace to the world. You may get help from other game characters, who may accompany you in your journey and aid you in battle.

Your travels involve going from town to town, castle, 'dungeon' (i.e. a place with monsters and treasure), in search of items that will help you in your quest, gaining experience from fighting against beasts, monsters and demons. You can engage battles randomly, or have pre-set encounters with stronger enemies: fighting takes place in a different screen than that which displays your exploration, you take turns to plan your battle actions (and possibly those of your companions) and watch the two sides exchanging blows and spell-castings. Winning a fight may net you experience points (which make you stronger), Gold (the game's currency) and useful items. You may use Gold to buy stronger equipment and healing items, which make the battles easier.

The farther you go in your travels, the stronger your enemies become, so it's important to get experience and better equipment to survive and get to the last battle strong enough to win. These games have a lot of strategy to them, and they last quite long compared to action games (they also need a longer development time to balance things just right). This is more or less what all Dragon Quest games are about; of course, each game has its own story and peculiarities which make every episode enjoyable and fun to play.

Yes, they're fun to play indeed! Provided you do like some strategy in videogames, and don't mind the fact that the game mechanics feel somewhat 'archaic' (the series has about 22 years upon its back), you'll find they give a great sense of adventure and rewarding 'growth'.

Too bad that Dragon Quest isn't nearly as popular outside Japan as it is there. Fortunately, thanks to improved distribution and various remakes of the older episodes, they're getting some visibility even in Europe. The next game coming out for the series in the USA and Europe is Dragon Quest V, one of the episodes which were never released in a language other than Japanese. I've never played the first 3, maybe I should try importing the USA versions.

Retro Gaming

Retrogaming may be generally seen as the nostalgic attachment that long-time gamers have towards older videogames. I think it's much more than that.

First of all, while 'veterans' are the main target of the retro-fever (in any field), there's always a good number of other people who can catch it: after all, while technology advancements have made old videogames look obsolete, well-made, enjoyable games are still enjoyable now. So newcomers to the electronic entertainment world can appreciate old games as well, especially when they can buy them at a fraction of the price gamers had bought them back then, if not for free.

Moreover, even if the history of videogames is relatively short, there are some genres which have been abandoned, and you can hardly find any new games of that genre anymore (assume you've found one by chance and liked it); then you find out that those kind of games were all the rage 10 to 20 years ago, and may be lucky enough to find means to play them.

Lastly, I think Retrogaming has a little more charm than that of nostalgia; because of technical progress, the focus has changed greatly in game development, and not necessarily for the best. Sure, back then developers struggled to make enough figures move on the screen at the same time, or fit all the game on a tape/cartridge/floppy disk, and we don't have to go back to that anymore; but as it often happens, progress also makes other issues become more important, in this case a realistic, consistent, believable virtual world in which to play, ensuring a long-lasting entertainment period for a fair price, an accessible, non-clunky interface and so on. People tended to pass on such things in the past because they didn't even know they could get better; that, and also because good videogames were very refined within their own limitations (because having strong limitations in a creativity medium can have its advantages).

Because of this charm, a recent trend in games has pushed towards 'retro' style features: things like blocky graphics and low-fi sounds are certainly mostly for nostalgic players, but also simpler game levels, shorter but carefully designed worlds and resurrected genres make for a good offer to everyone who wants entertainment.

Of Genres and Types - Part 2

Continues from previous post

Two aspects come to my mind in regards to the classification of interactive simulation games in general, videogames in particular, from the point of view of a player: the first being the game's outline, the second being the required skills.

The outline of a videogame (I can't find the right words, it's something like the game's concept, but not considering the mechanics) is what is generally understood at first glance by an uneducated/inexperienced player: 'in this game you have to shoot down aliens to save the human base', 'you have to match items of the same color as fast as possible, to make the most points'. See it as the shortest summary of a game that doesn't use genre definitions or references to other games. An outline doesn't usually specify how the game is played, but is often the primary draw for a casual buyer.

Regarding required skills, what I wanted to say is just that interactive games have a certain balance of 'action' and 'strategy'. An 'action game' is one where you have to think little, but fast: this translates to good reflexes and the ability to quickly acknowledge your situation in the simulated world. A 'strategy game' has you thinking about your next moves most of the time, giving you a reasonable (if not unlimited) period of time to plan your actions.

Pure 'action' and 'strategy' games are rare, as most videogames have a healthy mixture of both: this is both because extremisms can make a game not fun to play (becoming a chore to play because of repetitive mindless shooting or too complex resource management), and because accessibility usually suffers from it. Incidentally, Action Games and Strategy Games are also two macro-genres for videogames (although typically they're not used as a dichotomy).

That's all for now. Maybe I'll get back to this topic later on.

Of Genres and Types

Nowadays videogame experts, as well as a good number of occasional players, know about the main "genres" of games that you can find: it's a very simple classification method which helps a person decide which games s/he might like to play.

The list of videogame genres expanded time by time, thanks to new games which became very popular thanks to their innovative gameplay ideas (often helped by newly acquired technologies). This list, complete with genres and sub-genres, hasn't been growing much lately, simply because:

• a lot of games have been created, and it's getting harder and harder to come up with a genre-defining videogame (i.e. comes up with entirely original rules and becomes popular enough)
• lately technology advancements haven't been significant enough to help in creating new playing mechanics (we're talking about things like realtime 3D rendering, physics processing and so on)

Abstracting from genres even further, we can have a variety of ways to make more general classifications. I want to explain some in this post and possibly the ones to come. Since I'm not an expert of multi-player videogames, I'll start with solitary games.

The reasons for making an interactive videogame rather than another kind of game may be numerous. One is to use the elaborating power of a computer to simulate an opponent (or many) in a known game (from board games to sports); another one is to help the player by simulating the experience of a game or another entertaining action on a screen, experience for which the player would get help from a computer (mixing and placing cards for Solitaire, playing quiz), or which the player wouldn't be able to have (driving an F1 car or a plane, shooting soldiers down without having to kill people... I didn't specify which kind of experience; it's just an example anyway, I'm not saying people would like to experience killing other people).

Another reason to make a videogame is to create an entirely new interactive experience which wouldn't be possible in reality: these range from games like Tetris (similar to Pentomino, but the game simulates endlessly falling pieces to place in order and clear before too many of them fill the board) to science-fiction-inspired games (commanding a spaceship, exploring alien-inhabited planets), to completely irrational games which may or may not even have a clear goal the player has to pursue.

Continuing on Part 2...

Death in videogames

I started playing videogames when I was little, first on the Commodore VIC-20, then on the Nintendo Entertainment System, PC and Videogame Arcades (actually bar Coin-op machines at first).

But initially I preferred watching others play, rather than playing myself: my reason for this preference was, I think, fear of defeat. There were (and still are) a lot of videogames which have the character you control die or get destroyed somehow when you fail; whether it was just the simple vanishing animation of Pac-Man or the more realistic falling-to-your-death animation in Prince of Persia, it always made me feel uneasy. Excessively "violent" death sequences actually impressed me more (I clearly remember the moment I saw Scorpion's and Sonya's Fatality sequences in Mortal Kombat for the first time), but the concept of punishment upon failure may be the root of this fear more than just graphical representation of death.

I eventually grew over it, but I still like watching others play videogames, especially those I've already played. I have to thank the evolution of the Internet if I can now watch so many videos of really good players who show off their best tricks to win the hardest videogames.

Maybe as a consequence of my fear of defeat, I'm not really that good at most videogames: my best gaming feat might as well be finishing The Legend of Zelda: the Minish Cap with 3 Hearts and one Bottle (and those who've played it can tell it's not really much of a challenge).

Briefly about Multi-player videogames

I'm no expert of multi-player games, much less of online ones. I've only played against another player at some classics like Street Fighter and Puzzle Bobble, and my experience with collaborative games stops at some short sessions with Secret of Mana and Blaze & Blade. Oh, I forgot about Wii Sports: I love golf games, but rarely do I compete against other players.

Nonetheless, I wanted to make at least one post about this type of videogames. There!

...

Just kidding! I figured I'd at least write some notes.

Playing online has always felt very different to me from playing in the same room; I guess things have changed a lot since voice streaming over the Interenet during play became common. But it's also true that we aren't quite on the same level yet. I might feel that way also because when I think of online games, all that comes to mind is guns (you know, like all those games where you play with a first person view) and overly complicated chat software (Massively Multiplayer Online Role-Playing Games; yeah, I said it was complicated). I also know there are lots more, basically almost every videogame nowadays has some feature which exploits the Internet somehow; I suppose I'm already too old to care.

Closing note: you can't pause the game when playing online, but you won't need to split the screen for the other players to play (in games where it would be needed).

Solitary games

Some of you might have noticed that I used an unusual word to refer to single-player videogames: it was my attempt at putting more emphasys on the player being alone when playing such games.

Of course one could play most single-player games with friends around, possibly because they are entertaining to just watch (I love watching...), or even switching with the player from time to time, competing or collaborating in some way.

However, there has been a long period during which the greater part of the videogame market was taken by solitary games, particularly those played on consoles - although on PC there were really few multi-player games outside of the online-enabled ones, but that's another issue altogether. Things are balancing out a bit now, but a lot of effort is still put on the development of solitary entertainment.

It's a bit funny when you consider that the first widespread electronic videogame was a game for two players.

Introductory Post

Hello everyone, and welcome to this Blog!

This is just an introductory entry, with which I'll try to explain as briefly and as fully as possible what the Blog will be about.

First of all, excuse me for my English, which isn't my first language. If you are wondering why I'm not writing this in my language, it's simply because I need exercise.

Secondly, this Blog is mainly about electronic videogames. Despite the pretentious-sounding (and probably grammatically awkward) title, I'm not actually trying to offer my insight on the industry of interactive entertainment, but rather examine said industry with a look as balanced as possible: I'll try neither to comment on games with a "hardcore-gamer" critical attitude, nor to write as a person who has barely touched any (as a matter of fact, I'm neither).

Further comments on what kind of Blog this is will be added to future posts: I want to keep this one short.

DISCLAIMER:
Any claims of originality on the contents of this Blog are pure fantasy
I have no idea about how a modern Blog should be made, I did this on a whim, so don't expect much unless I manage to reach 10 posts