Disclaimer: The opinions expressed within this column are those of the participants and the moderator, and do not necessarily reflect those of the GIA. There is coarse language and potentially offensive material afoot. My goal is to offend as many people in two days as chris has in his entire tenure. Don't say we didn't warn you.

So many things to mock, so little time.

The response was good to my debut column yesterday, ranging from words of encouragement to open threats and a few intrusions into my personal life and FTP directory. Seeing as such, I hereby announce my retirement as Double Agent. That's right -- cry for me, Argentina, because after today's column I slide back behind the scenes and continue to wreak havoc there instead.

Seeing as how I only had two days in the role, I've decided to use this final one to mock anything and everything in the gaming industry that deserves it. Go ahead and keep score at home. I'll try to be relevant to whatever the hell you all wrote about, but I'm not making any guarantees. Let the pain and suffering begin!

Which is exactly why series such as Dragon Quest get slammed so hard for looking so mediocre. We aren't talking about any old game looking bad, we are talking about the grand-daddy of all console RPG series. This is the RPG equivalent of Mario leaving US shores for years and returning looking like old news because other platformers upped the ante in the meantime.

Your initial comment about people making premature statements is right on target - so why don't we nail someone to the wall as an example?

Look! Over there! A sacrificial lamb!

The number one sign that somebody has no idea what they are talking about is when they mention random features from a game that they read about in a GamePro preview as incontrovertible proof that it rules or sucks. How is "a bandit group" innovative? You want a noble rat fighter? Play some Ogre Battle!

As soon as you start listing features without the ability to tie them together or describe how they affect the gameplay, you are talking directly out of your ass. It's like the back of a game box or the bottom of a bad press release, the kind that said Blasto had "dozens of weapons and levels" when it means exactly 24 when those two numbers are added together, 23 of which completely suck.

Obvious crutch number two is linking to somebody else's impressions. Some people will like FFIX, some people won't -- the fact that you found one of the former to match somebody else finding one of the latter doesn't mean a thing. Besides, those impressions are some of the most incomprehensible crap I've ever read, and that's even taking into consideration that site's E3 game impressions. All 3 of them. I had to go to babelfish, my favorite web translator, and find the hidden setting "Moron to English" in order to even read those.

I'm sure glad to know FFIX doesn't have any "ultra-realistic spaceships," a concept about as "ultra-realistic" as anybody who passed the second grade enjoying reading such horrible writing. Actually, I'm just surprised they didn't find a way to kiss Working Designs' ass in the impressions somehow. I guess the last check didn't clear.

I found Lunar diverting enough, and while I never finished it, it was certainly deserving of a wider audience than the Sega CD original was doomed to. In other words, invoking the unholy name of J*r J*r B**** is a bit strong. He was such a horrible mistake of writing, editing, and common sense that it becomes an insult so venomous that it should only be used in extreme circumstances.

In case you were curious, such circumstances include Toriyama's ugly Jay-Leno-in-a-green-parka DQVII character designs, IGN64's running a spoiler as a headline yesterday, and their linking to an unbelievably naive web petition at one of their "affiliates." I watched a mob of these "affiliates" get led around Nintendo's booth at this past E3, and something like 15 of these sites were jammed into one tour. I was getting impressions on Dinosaur Planet when the tour came by, and the guys in the back couldn't even see the monitor. Membership sure has its perks.

As for the petition, whose URL will be witheld for obvious reasons, it demands that Nintendo show Dolphin at Space World.

...

I can see it now: Hiroshi Yamauchi, famed leader of Nintendo, a man who has threatened everyone from Sony to Namco, a man who fired his whole family when he joined Nintendo to ensure loyalty, changing a major corporate decision because 450 bored college students who lack a grasp of reality were kind enough to type their names out.

Folks, there's a reason we don't link to petitions.

Good thoughts, the whole lot of them. I obviously wasn't speaking of commercial success when making that remark, but a strong license is often more important to sales than a quality game -- wrestling games, for instance. That being said, there's a twist in that seemingly dark truth: most strong licenses only prosper through quality games.

Yours wasn't the only letter to mention Capcom as an exception, and there are two central reasons why that is so. First if all, Capcom can only milk those series for games because the originals were built on such strong play mechanics, Resident Evil's terrible controls aside. The second is that those series have virtually zero competition, and thus zero necessity to innovate. Everyone and their grandmother makes RPGs in Japan, but how many other survival horror franchises and 2D fighting games has Capcom had to deal with? Where else are gamers going to go? One of the reasons Super Smash Brothers was such a huge hit is because Capcom hasn't done a whole lot with the basic ideas of a fighting game. If Enix makes that same mistake with Dragon Quest VII, Square's products will be there to magnify those flaws in a way no one is for the latest Resident Evil.

When I said "most popular genres" and mentioned those two companies, I did exclude such things as rhythm games. Sega almost made my exception list, but their games don't really cover the same ground as anyone else's. Quite possibly their best feature.

As for Threads of Fate (formerly Dewprism), a fun lil' game will just have to be enough for you. By the way, Square's only real black mark on a great summer thus far is giving that game such a stupid new name.

Without spoiling too much, I'll just say that Chrono Cross is about parallel worlds, not different periods of time. It's also about gorgeous music, an innovative battle system, and a good translation -- the word on the street is very strong with this one.

This name strikes me as "weird" more than anything else. Not bad, not good, but simply weird. Part of me thinks I should flame it for being so out there, but it's just too oblique to really bash with any vigor.

As for naming, everyone should have learned a lesson from the Dreamcast. The name and minimalist logo were initially bashed to all, but gradually found wide acceptance. We wouldn't even be talking about this if there was a single other scrap of confirmed Dolphin information to chew on, so I wouldn't get too fixated on the name for the time being.

Captain Lou Albano, all the way. Not even close. Kinda like Dragon Quest/Final Fantasy in that way. Poor ol' Bob Hoskins is a good enough actor, but was caught in a shockingly bad script and thus in a shockingly bad movie. Captain Lou brought Mario home just about as well as ay actor ever could for a game character.

Your P.S. reminds me of when a company making Batman capes was forced to put a warning label on them stating that they didn't "enable the user to fly."

The real kicker, of course, is that Batman can't fly.

I'll ignore the more-than-a-wee-bit scary fact that somebody was looking through my FTP directory before we closed off access and get straight to explaining the contents.

That large scan, my good friend, is one of the benefits of being a GIA Agent. Playboy playmates calling you by first name (well, okay, that was just an extremely cool one) while signing free copies of their magazines.

It's a ton of work to be the strongest fan site out there and stay independent while doing so, but I wouldn't trade it (or a column to such self-pity in) for anything.

Closing Comments:

It's been a thrill doing these two columns, and my primary thanks goes to everyone who wrote in -- the most difficult part of doing DA was having to leave out letters that were well thought out and well written, but simply didn't flow with the column. You guys helped me understand my own views on gaming in just these two shorts days, and for that I am quite appreciative.

Everyone out there is still welcome to e-mail me should you want my ear, but firstly remember that AK the Weekend Wonder steps back in tomorrow, as scheduled. It's clearer now that doing these columns consistently requires a special dedication, so I'd like to give very, very special thanks to Allan Milligan, Drew Cosner, and Andrew Kaufmann. Your success in this task allowed me a unique forum to step into for these two all-too-short days.

So send AK some letters and keep this perpetual motion machine of ours running!

-Ed McGlothlin, seeing the contradiction in his last sentence and hoping no one writes AK about it