Disclaimer: The opinions expressed within this column are those of the participants and the moderator, and do not neccessarily reflect those of the GIA. There is coarse language and potentially offensive material afoot. For God's sake, don't wake that guy up! Don't say we didn't warn you.

Well, one good thing I can say about ad banner revenue totally drying up is this: at least I won't have to see anymore of those stupid public service announcements anymore. At this point, illiterate children seeking mentors can just eat me.

I started off that introduction as though halfway through it, and now I'm not going to segue into the column at all. Suckers.

I suppose if you want to be cynical, every game coming out in some way builds on the precedents set by previous titles. But just to show how subjective our take on "innovation" can be, I was blown away by ICO, whereas I'm wholly uninterested in MGS2 at this point. Blasphemy, I know, but the game doesn't seem so drastically improved beyond the original Solid title to catch my fickle fancy. Whether sticking to the guidelines laid out by a title is as excellent as MGS1 is a good or bad thing, I leave to you to decide. The way MGS games are so obtuse in their didacticism doesn't exactly thrill me much, either, but that's entirely my own opinion.

Moving along, I also wouldn't mind having aPS2 for the titles you mention, in addition to Harvest Moon: Save the Homeland. You know, just because I'm weird like that. I'll probably wait until FFX comes out to make my choice; by then we should know more about the GameCube Mario and Zelda titles, so I'll be able to make a more informed decision.

As for dating sims, I just don't see how those could go over well enough in North America to warrant all of the time and effort that would go into translating them. They don't appeal to everyone, to put it mildly. Frankly, if I'm going to put time and effort into macking some girl, she'd better be flesh-and-blood. You could point out that I like Harvest Moon, but I only play that for the farming, so, uhm, there. Although props for the sneaky way you managed to work your studliness into that letter. I'm pretty sure everyone reading this column will be impressed.

Bringing up Soul Calibur only reminds me of how unfair fate has been to the poor, poor Dreamcast. That game was indeed the first "next-generation" looking title I'd seen. Sure, the gameplay was based on a fighter running on beefed up PSX hardware, but those graphics were and are amazingly gorgeous.

And, obviously, you can imagine how amazed I was the first time I saw Mario 64 running. I'm pretty sure the people at Toys 'R Us knew me by name with all the time I spent playing the demo units before the N64 hit the shelves.

To be perfectly frank, and I know I'm going to get crap for this, I've never really been impressed by the PC scene. Actually, now that I think about it, Brooke will get crap for this since it's Sunday. This weekend gig is great.

Anyhow, PC games seem to fall into the same limited number of genres as console games, if not moreso. You've got your first-person shooters, strategy games, and PC-RPGs. Everything of late seems to be either a souped of take on one of this genres, or a combination thereof, perhaps throwing in online capabilities. And again, to be honest, I am totally disinterested in playing online titles. When I game, it's to get away from the world and the many, many assholes that inhabit it. I don't want to log onto some game where people feel their quasi-anonymity gives them the freedom to be even bigger assholes.

If you think I'm exaggerating about that last bit, ask anyone who's had all of their equipment stolen by a random cock in Phantasy Star Online, or been brutally slain as soon as they walked out of a village injust about every initial online PC-RPG. I realize developers are getting wiser and programming avoidance measures into newer online titles, but that doesn't change the fact that people are inherently jerks. Just because a guy can't kill me and take my equipment doesn't mean I'm not going to have to interact with him, decrypting 733+ $p34|< on the fly, to get a party together or the like.

I guess what I'm trying to say is everyone in the world except me sucks. And since everyone sucks, I'm sure a few of you suckheads will feel compelled to send in a sucky letter pointing out one or two recent PC games that you feel don't fall into the genres I've mentioned, but so be it. You all think you're so smart.

In a lot of ways I agree with what you're saying. This next letter brings up the topic of just what, exactly, is next-generation, so I'll just address your assessment of console transitions.

I'm definitely not going to argue that the PS2, Xbox, and GameCube are all basically more powerful versions of the previous generation of hardware. And yes, the transition between the 16 and 32/64 bit generation was a marked one. However, consider the transition between the 8 and 16 bit machines. Sure, if you wanted to get down to it, the 16 bit boxes were just more powerful 8 bit consoles, but look at the games we got because of that. You could say that Final Fantasy III and Chrono Trigger were just prettier versions of older RPGs, but I think most people would agree that they were substantially better than anything to come before them. And neither of these titles were possible on the previous generation of hardware.

I suspect that we'll get some neat games down the pike for the new machines, for two reasons, really. The first is that now most developers have really gotten a handle on 3D graphics, so they can devote their efforts to more innovative uses thereof. With the PSX and N64, 3D was a new toy, the proper exploitations of which were relatively unknown. Such is not the case now.

Secondly, as I mentioned before, we'll definitely see clever developers finding ways to take advantage of the new hardware to crank out experiences that never would have been possible previously.

I'd definitely agree that it's only a matter of time before we see the ridiculous citing of polygonal capabilities fade out and disappear. However, I think there's one other crucial paradigm that needs to change before we'll see the term "generation" drop off entirely: the five-year life cycle.

Consoles tend to come and go on a five-year cycle, barring a few rogue systems that come in halfway through a "generation," like the Jaguar and Dreamcast. Of course, at one time, you also saw generations in the PC field; the Commodore 128 was certainly the "next generation" in comparison to the Commodore 64. However, as PC hardware manufacture became more decentralized and you started seeing more powerful PCs by the week, the idea of calling a PC the "next generation" has pretty much disappeared.

I think the real question is if that could ever happen; we're already seeing new manufacturers getting in on the game every console generation, but it remains to be seen if the market could ever support more than 2 consoles at a time, or if console-buyers are willing to put up with the free-for-all atmosphere that the PC scene has become.

I feel your pain, arc. Trust me, I do. I heard that you can get a tidy sum for signing your body away to the school for postmortem scientific research, so maybe my money problems will soon be solved!

I'm trying to adequately brace myself, but cut me some slack; I'm only human.

Wow, I don't know if I should be impressed or frightened that somebody beat me to my insane idea. I will say this, though: I'll bet my slogan is way better than theirs.

Anyway, I'm pretty much with you on every point you make. I stand by my argument that console "generations" still exist, but software is absolutely evolutionary in nature. With the exception of occasional games like Mario 64 or Parappa, of course. And yes, I apologize for the abuse of quotation marks in today's column. I'd like to say that it won't happen again, but it probably will because using quotation marks around a questionable word makes me feel like a member of an elite clique that knows better. (Anyone to who knows where that little bit of paraphrasing comes from, impressive.)

Closing comments:

Well, another weekend slips away from us, it would seem. This is your life, and it is ending one column at a time. But hey, let's not get all morose here; let's mail Brooke instead. It's been said that modern life is one constant state of distraction, and what better distraction is there than that?

Oh, you want a topic, huh? Well here you go: barring Final Fantasy X, what upcoming RPG are you most looking forward to? Has the possibility of a Wild West-themed RPG got you all excited over Wild Arms 3? Or perhaps your affinity for futuristic sci-fantasy appears to be addressed by Star Ocean 3. Then again, perhaps your love of all things old-school has you awaiting the Arc collection with baited breath. Let Brooke know what you wanna play, and why. That last part really is the most important part.

-Drew "Prostitute Laundry" Cosner