Post 27: Party Games

You may have noticed that I changed days in my subjects to posts.  I figured it was stupid to track the days when there are days that I don't write anything.  Plus, posts provides a better experience for you, the reader.  If you don't like to think of things in days, that is.



Whoever this guy is, he has a shitty hand.

 Remember in the days of yore, when your parents would have a party and sit around drinking scotch or whatever and playing cards with their friends?  The drinks may have changed today, but not much about party games has.  There are a ton of card and board games out there that are excellent to play with a bunch of friends, but the best party games nowadays are all on your video game console.  I'm not saying that you need to go out and burn all of your old games, I just want to introduce you to the mounds of fun that are readily available for your gaming system, at least all of the ones that I give at least two shits about.  One shit games just don't make my list.

One hell of a party.  Yeehaw.

Let's start off with one of the greatest, in my opinion, party games of all time.  Yes, Mario Party could be classified as a retro game, but I'm including it here because there are so fucking many of them.  Even though there are as many of these as there are The Land Before Time movies, they can still be decent games.  Each one has the same premise, you go around a giant game board trying to get stars.  The player with the most stars at the end of the game wins.  To gather the winning components, you must collect coins and win mini-games.  The coins are used to purchase items and stars while the winners of the mini-games can win items, coins, or stars.  Of course, the mini-games are also the worst part of the games.  For the most part, they're ridiculous half-assed version of go-karting, drawing, and even bumper cars.  Some are okay, but by the end of a few games you'll have tired of them.



So many characters it's like a buffet.

Sticking with the Nintendo groove for the moment, let's shift genre gears and take a look at Super Smash Bros. Brawl.  I played a metric shit ton of SSBM in high school and this newer version in college, which leaves me with two things to say about the series:  It's freaking amazing with a bunch of people, and it's shitty because it's always dominated by the best players.  I was pretty good at the game, though I've lost my touch for now as I haven't played in over a year, and always ended up in the final two fighters.  Of course this wasn't bad for me per se, but it becomes annoying as time goes on that the same people always use the same move with the same character and win over and over again.

Drums = Paris Hilton

Moving on, I feel like I need to address the musical game revolution.  I'll clump them all into one massive pile, because that's where most of them belong.  Specifically Rock Band sticks out as a great party game.  Who doesn't want to be in a band?  The only problem that I can foresee here is that there's a lot of expensive junk being beat on by a bunch of different people until each one is a worn down shell of it's former self.  By the end of a night of gaming your drums probably look like Paris Hilton after a regular Friday night, both banged by way too many people in a row.  Another game that can be pulled out of this mess is Karaoke Revolution.  It's just a mediocre karaoke machine on your console that's wasting dollars in your wallet and space in your DVD binder.

Another type of party game that needs to be addressed is family/board games.  One that I have a particular issue with is the Scene It series.  If you don't know, Scene It is a board game where you have to asnwer questions based off of various or specific TV shows and/or movies.  Oh, and a onus is that it's got a DVD to play along with it.  So wait, it's now a video game too?  What the fuck is the difference?  It's the same damn thing.  Why not freaking play it with the board and DVD where it's roughly $20 less expensive?!  Ugh, makes me sick.  In any case, why would you play ANY board game on your console, just use the fucking board!

A final type of game that I need to address is Kinect party games.  These are pretty fun and get you moving quite a bit, but it takes a lot of shuffling and complaining before you get some type of order going as the max amount of players at a time is really two.  Of course if you have like 30 people playing Fruit Ninja Kinect, you'd probably be better going bowling.

So the main problem with the newer generation of party games is that they are limited by the number of controllers, total players, or just by space, and really, have the games changed much from sitting around table playing cards?  it's pretty much that you're still playing your board game, but it's on TV rather than sitting on a table.  I have to ask, what's the fucking point?  Smash Bros. I understand, it's a game that cannot be manipulated or recreated using a board or cards or karaoke machine or real musical instruments, but for all of the others why put the game on a console?  If you're going to play Scene It or Monopoly on 360, put that fucking controller down and pick up that cardboard; it'll save you some cash and make you look less like an idiot.

Day One: Fruit Ninja and Fallout: New Vegas

Until today I was suspicious that the Kinect wouldn't live up to the expectations that motion gaming could be the path to the next generation of consoles, but my state of mind has been altered...by fruit.  When I viewed the initial previews for Fruit Ninja Kinect on my dashboard, all it did was make me crave vitamin C, but as I stand here playing it I've been refreshed.  It's as if the combined power of all of the spattered fruit juices was being beamed directly into my body.  If that's a little too strange, suffice to say that the game is excellent.  Even though my dog conveniently pops on-screen just as a bomb enters the background and his swishing tail forces an explosion, I have to say that this is definitely a step in the right direction.

I'm reminded of my excitement over the original Kinect games, such as Fighters Uncaged, as well as my disappointment that your character was some kind of terrible karate one-liner reject.  Gone is the lag from your first move to your next and the awkward positioning.  Fruit Ninja is responsive, exciting, and fun.  I can already see some of the future games that will now inhabit this former niche device:

Halo Kinect
Final Fantasy 14 Kinect
Left 4 Dead Kinect

Okay, so maybe those are wishful thoughts, but a man can dream can't he?  In any case, my point is that the Kinect was almost lifeless before a game like Fruit Ninja came along and exploded onto the scene in a giant mess of fruit pulp.  Now, while it's in this awakened state, I feel like I can anticipate titles from it that will blow my mind.  Who would have thought that super fruits are not only super for humans, but also for motion gaming devices?  Maybe someone should inform Sony.


Today's post is going to start a long and hopefully eventful journey through Fallout: New Vegas seen through the eyes of the Courier.  But first, a few items that I've always found humorous, and yes frustrating, while playing through the wasteland.  Why is it that bullet casings and ammo weigh nothing, yet most of the regenerative items weigh at least a pound, besides stimpaks of course?  For instance, how exactly does a 16 or 20 ounce glass bottle of Sunset Sarsaparilla weigh a pound?  I guess I'm taking for granted that it's a relatively "normal" size of soda container.  Maybe it's just that our hero carries around one or two liters of soda for kicks.  That would make sense as to why when I have 53 bottles of the stuff my character's breaking his back even trying to carry his bobby pins.

My last thought for the day has to do with the radio, not only in New Vegas but also in Fallout 3.  Do the citizens of the wasteland not realize that the same songs and news stories are being repeated?  Hell, if I lived in the Capital Wasteland, Three Dog would've been dead within a month.  Don't even get me started on Mr. New Vegas, his songs only upped the ante on suckage.  If I hear something along the lines of "my spurs go jingle jangle jingle" one more time, I'm going to blow a fucking gasket.  Yes, I do realize that you can turn the radio off or switch between stations, but how else am I going to hear of my exploits?  I want to know what the people think of me murdering the King in cold blood because I used my favor to get caps rather than have him stop messing with the NCR.  Who doesn't want self-gratification like that?