We are often plagued with a sense of shallow myopia, by being exposed only to the familiar reality we condemn ourselves to, by seeing only what we focus on, and not the greater majesty of the art that surrounds us.

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This realization goes a long way in giving us a sense of perspective on ideology

As I continue to march through My Friendly Neighborhood (MFN), my mind has been racing with contemplation and ideas involving both the game, the industry, the metaphysical, self-identity, and the swiftness with which we all seemed to just blow by the ‘Spoopy season. The one saving grace of (at least) that last notion is that any holiday can last as long as you want if you never take down the decorations. Of course, that is only partially true, as everytime of year brings its own trials, tribulations, and general vibe to the table, so some realm of the abstract and the topical will be lost, but cognitive dissonance and delusional fanfare go a long way in peppering the everyday with abject lunacy and warped perception…for better or worse.

As far as MFN is concerned, which is an indie survival horror game which I’ve described as ‘Resident Evil set on Sesame Street’, I decided to resist my temptation to close the book on the title, and not yield to the easier apathy of bouncing off the title like I had the knee-jerk reaction to. A few reasons for this of course, some of which I’ve detailed in the past (more on that in the immediate). While I maintain that game design is an important metric in the relativity of judging a video game, as any formula applied within the realm of the virtual will make both its limitation and abundance loud and clear from moment one, there was another part of me that borrowed from my own sense of chowing down on a big bowl of regretti spaghetti upon starting Hollow Knight: Silksong, as I did not commit to the first title for long at all, which made me nearly not give a shit about the second. A near disastrous tragedy I successfully avoided, mind you, willed to life via a reliance on Cartesian skepticism, and the radical boundaries of supposed self-evidential reality being questioned at every turn, which often times leads me to the real bread and butter of the metaphysical.

My implication inherent within my own supposition herein is not predicted on the notionality that MFN is secretly the next would be Hollow Knight series lying hidden, waiting in the lurch to strike, but it is certainly true that one being too dismissive tends to regulate themselves out of a lot of great opportunities due to rejecting so much with such little confident evidence to back up baseless assumptions. Even so, I would posit that like much of life’s giveness in terms of exposing one to the raw, the real, the visceral where interest is concerned, one can often find the highest levels of engagement, relevant experience, and sense of informative venturing, within the moments of their greatest adversities, and exposures to the alien, peculiarly coarse, and otherwise abrasively paralyzing affairs.

I mean to say that much of the greatest wisdom I’ve stockpiled was not due to being seated in the lap of luxury, or sequestered away deep in safe spaces, nor have I lived high on the hog or found any worth in drowning in privilege, but found the most urgent sense of realization and ponderous endeavors in my moments of greatest struggle. Obviously, contending with a video game with a compromised sense of imperfect idealism is a far cry from a survival situation, cheating death, or triumphing over the brutality of nature, but within the pretense of pushing one’s self to ever greater heights of boldness and daring, even in the most modest moments of one’s everyday, is essential on building a stronger sense of rationality, and hardening one’s inherent sense of self, on the road to actualization.

In a more direct address of my musings I am currently putting forth, though this idea in current discussion is deserving of a much more in depth write-up in covering the depths of my feelings on the matter, when I was weighing up the options for which games to play next, one of the titles I could have went with was the remake to Snake Eater, not only a game that arguably represents the pinnacle of the Metal Gear Solid series, but also belonging to one of my favorite old school franchises full-stop. I yielded at my sense of temptation, however, as I already had a strong inclination that I was likely to greatly enjoy the game, and that to perhaps be inspired to gather a greater number of novel ideas or generate more compelling insights, I should expose myself to a fresher experience, and perhaps one that was much harder to grapple with, to boot.

While the gear shifting did bring me to Returnal’s doorstep, and it was indeed a game I had not played before, and even a roguelike to boot, so not easy to contend with in the slightest, I did end up letting myself bounce off of that game, as even though the title was likely to be a challenge, I need more than just a difficult system of conquest to tackle, in order to make greater discoveries within the universe of the conceptual, the metaphysical essence behind a game arguably just as important as its more tangible assets, when considering how keenly my own sense of compulsion and creativity will lead me to a nirvana of radical imagination.

As mentioned at the beginning of this article, MFN has made me ponderous on multiple levels, and not necessarily one that prevents me from rambling on about the chaotic sense of wonderment that pushes me to jump around in my own internal focuses. If you did want a greater sense of what MFN is more explicitly like, I do invite you to check out what turned into a more straight forward preview of sorts, and one that became the catalyst for this article, and is now continuing as a sustained line of thought that will see me to the credit roll.

As I’ve detailed before, one of the reasons I made my own personal exit stage left from working within the industry almost a decade ago, involved not enjoying the standard of fixation that many others seemed drawn to, like moths to a flame. Treating articles on video games like some kind of cheap, basic expositional not unlike the greasy, cheap contents involved with the insights of a bag of potato chips, leaving one terribly uninspired, and embarrassed quite frankly, at association with the industries shallow proclivities, which end up being regularly cringe worthy to the last breath. This is to be expected of course, as this is where the money is to be made, from the whales to be milked, as when companies are constantly aiming for the lowest hanging fruit, which tends to be thirsty as fuck gooners with no worldly experience, brains in their head, or developed tastes to speak of, surrounded in a room full of action figures in the house they grew up in, you’re going to get some inbred opinions and a general sense of demented homogenization when it comes to their favorite hobby, and the creatively bankrupt content with which they inspire through mindless consumption.

So yes, within the spirit of pushing back against that grain, and from one curious creative to another, I felt the desire to give My Friendly Neighborhood another shot, and continue to feel a breath of fresh air, even if it was not an entirely steady breeze with which to softly soothe myself with…

Here’s to the rejuvenating effects of changing it up and trying something different, from time to time.

-Pashford